Featured The Key to the KJV-Only Conundrum

Jack...Jack, is that you??

 

It has been alleged from multiple sources that Alberto was a fake. Here is one who worked with him:http://www.thebibleistheotherside.org/lettersp5.htm. He didn't even know Latin!

I have some sympathy for Jack Chick's ministry (translated one of his tracts back in the day), and therefore his protestations about Alberto. (https://www.chick.com/articles/houstonletter.asp) I would like to believe him, but Jack has twice before been fooled by fakes: allegedly fake ex-sorcerer Johnny Todd and allegedly fake ex-witch Elaine whose story was told by Rebecca Brown.

Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice (or three times), shame on me.

 

Good point. The "guard" would have had to know the original languages and Latin too in order to tell what was going on.

I would say it wasn't a miracle at all by the common and normal definition of the word, not just "not much of a miracle."

 

Let me clarify what a miracle is. Here is a definition from the classic Smith's Bible Dictionary: "A miracle may be defined to be a plain and manifest exercise by a man, or by God at the call of a man, of those powers which belong only to the Creator and Lord of nature; and this for the declared object of attesting that a divine mission is given to that man."

Note that the usual word for miracle in the NT is semeion (σημεῖον), occurring 69 times in the Bible and often translated "miracle" in the KJV, but also translated often as "sign," the core meaning. The Analytical Lexicon of New Testament Greek (Robinson and House) has this definition: "a sign, an outward (visible) indication of secret power or truth; a miracle regarded from that point of view." (p. 315).

Note from these definitions that a miracle (a sign) must be "plain and manifest" (Smith), or "an outward (visible) indication" (Robinson and House).

Another word often translated as "miracle" is dunamis (δύναμις), with the core meaning of "power." Again, it is a word demanding outward recognition." A dunamis miracle is not one that can remain hidden. Again, the word teras (τέρας), or "wonders" (always in the plural and always linked with "signs") occurs 126 times and always means "miracle." Here is a definition: "a prodigy, an extraordinary occurrence (appearance, act), a startling portent" (Robinson and House). Once again, it will be clearly seen and understood.

So once again I repeat, there were no miracles in the translation of the KJV. None were claimed by the translators and none have been claimed by historians and none have been claimed by KJVO partisans. There were none, therefore the KJV cannot be perfect because man does not produce perfection without a miracle. I stand for the original texts, not for any translation, though I consider the KJV the best ever.

I know from experience how hard it is to translate. Even after the second draft was done, I have found many typos, omissions and other errors in our translation, even though I would have loved to have a miracle from God! Only hard work can produce excellence in a translation. But I once had a thread here on the BB asking KJVO people how I could produce a perfect translation in Japanese. No one bit.

 

Har, har.

No, it would actually be only the koine Greek words with the syntax mixed up. But what Onley maybe didn't realize is that word order is not that important in Greek, so in most cases the meaning would not change. The prefixes and suffixes provide most of the meaning, and those would be intact in Onley's scheme.

 

That's an excellent analysis of John 1:1 which, yes, would be covered by my "most."

 

An Understandable History of the Bible, by Samuel Gipp, a graduate of Ruckman's Bible school who also has an honorary degree from there, is an interesting read if only to find his mistakes. (Just try to match the footnotes to the sources, if you have the books he used. Many don't match!)

Anyhoo, Gipp does use the word "miracle" in connection with the preservation of Scripture, unlike the great majority of KJVO writers. He says, "Is a miracle [his emphasis] too hard for the God of miracles? Was the creation too hard for God? Was the flood too hard for God? Was the parting of the Red Sea too hard for God? Was the 40 years of manna too hard for God? Was the virgin birth too hard for God? Was the collection of the 66 books of the Bible written over a period of 1,700 years too hard for God? Was overcoming the human nature of the sinful writers too hard for God? Is preserving the words of those writers too hard for God?" (pp. 19-20).

That's it, though. Gipp does not tell when and how the miracle happened, even though the true miracles that he listed were all easily discernible as events in space-time: creation, the flood, the parting of the Red Sea, the manna, the virgin birth, the inspiration of Scriptures. Unfortunately, he then mixes in with these obvious miracles the collection of the canon, which was providential and not miraculous, as any student of Bibliology knows.

Nowhere else in his book does Gipp call preservation a miracle, or even tell how the process occurred. Apparently we are simply to believe that what he said is true, with not a historical hint of a miracle: the KJV is perfect and inerrant, and can correct the Greek and Hebrew.

 

Chick Publications put out a little (88 pp., starting on p. 7) tome by Barry Burton (no info on the author) entitled, Let's Weigh the Evidence. I found nothing whatever in the book about preservation, either providential or miraculous. It is a pretty basic book with the usual attack on Westcott and Hort and the usual comparisons between the KJV and other versions.