Featured In search of J. J. Ray

While searching for biographical information on J. J. Ray, author of God Wrote Only One Bible in 1955 (1976 edition at link), I ran across a June 14, 2004 thread by Paul of Eugene (Oregon) called Can any body tell me about JJ Ray?. Paul was looking for information on Ray for Maurice Robinson of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. That's been nearly 14 years, and Paul and Maurice may have found what they were looking for by now. But, as for me, I couldn't find much of anything readily available, so went through Ancestry.com and Newspapers.com to see what I could come up with. One person in the thread asked Paul, "If you do find out anything about him, would you please share it here on the BB?"

In consideration that someone on the BB might still be interested. I am posting a bit of what I found.

WorldCat library catalog lists only the one book by Ray. His initial foray in the subject appears to be an 8-page pamphlet called The Eye Opener: an Unbiased, Non-sectarian Examination of the Revised Standard Version Bible, which was copyrighted in 1953. It even elicited a response in A Malicious Attack on the Revised Standard Version of the Bible: A Review of the Booklet "The New Blasphemous Bible" by Dr. Gerald B. Winrod and "The Eye Opener" by J. J. Ray, by someone named Carl J. E. Nelson of Colorado Springs, CO that same year. In 1978 Ray published "The New Eye Opener," a tract apparently about the TEV Bible. That was the extent of his writings that I found. The current Eye Open Publishers of Eugene keep for sale "The New Eye Opener" and an updated version of God Wrote Only One Bible.

Though using the material of a 7th-Day Adventist, it is very unlikely that Ray was. He was a preacher and moved in evangelical circles, but I never found what his membership was. His mother's obituary says she was a Methodist. In 1920 he was the manager of a dry goods store in New Plymouth, Idaho, but by 1930 he is listed in the census as a Secretary of Home Missions. In 1934, living in Junction City, Oregon, he is listed as a missionary in the Eugene City Directory. In 1936 he became the new missionary for the American Sunday School Union in the Lane Field (Lane County and vicinity). He apparently was already with the ASSU before then, and he remained with them as long as I found any such references, into the early 1960s. He preached and did Sunday School work in many differently denominations -- Baptist, Bible Churches, Christian & Missionary Alliance -- but there was nothing that ever identified him with any particular denomination.

According to God Wrote Only One Bible, Ray's world-wide ministry was his publishing business. "The Eye Opener Publishers is a world-wide ministry operating on a no-profit basis. It is international and absolutely non-sectarian, serving the entire body of Christ." (unnumbered page 2)

Eye Opener Publishers is what appears to be called in Oregon an "Assumed Business Name." (Apparently this is the same as what we call in Texas "Doing Business As" or DBA.) J. J. and Ruth E. Ray are mentioned as the owners of this Assumed Business Name in the Register-Guard (Eugene, Oregon), February 4, 1959 (Wednesday, p. 7B). There is someone doing business as Eye Opener Publishers at present in Eugene, Oregon.

No pseudonym -- Jasper James Ray was born 10 July 1894 in Montana to T. H. Ray and Sadie Glassley. He died 1 Sept 1985 in Lane County, Oregon. Paul misread that he was survived by his wife (her name is given in the death index). Ruth Etta Ray died 4 April 1973.

With what I had access to, I could not determine if J. J. Ray has any living descendants. Both of his children were living at the time the BB thread was started in 2004 -- one in Lane County and the other possibly in Dallas, Texas -- but both have since deceased.

Probably too much information for most folks, and not enough for those with the greatest amount of interest.

 

Looks like the 1978 New Eye Opener wasn't so new after all. Probably a readaptation of the 1969 one -- which probably included some references to some new Bible that had been recently published around that time.

There is also one of these -- no preview -- for 1921. Interesting to know that he had some background in the printing/publishing industry.

Thanks.

 

From the Mind of God to the Mind of Man: A Layman's Guide to How We Got Our Bible (edited by James B. Williams) called J. J. Ray "a Baptist minister". Unfortunately, he gives no source.


[I learned a new term from the above book, Williams calls the opposite extreme from KJVO "King James Discreditors".]

 

"The Revision of 1881 [et al.]...are in no true sense a revision of the King James of 1611. If they were, they would follow the same Greek text, the Textus Receptus. All that they should have done, was to replace the obsolete words, correct a few errors in translation, and clarify some hard-to-be understood expressions...The crying need of today is still for an honest, trustworthy revision of the King James Bible. However, it remains the very best English translation now extant."

J. J. Ray gets cited a lot in KJVO and anti-KJVO writing. Both sides might be surprised he wrote the above sentences. God Wrote Only One Bible, pp. 30-31

 

I don't understand for certain what you are asking, but I generally agree. On the other hand, there were some incidents that called on Christians, churches, or associations to verify their stand on "which Bible," such as the 1817 Tennessee Association upset by John Wesley's 1755 New Testament. See HERE.

You're welcome.

 

I think with KJV, like so many other things, issues are addressed when the come up. For example, you'll not likely find much about churches or denominations addressing abortion or homosexual marriage before these became major issues in our society. In the same way, since almost everyone -- despite the fact some other version might have been theoretically available -- was using a King James Bible (regardless of what they thought about it), so there was little reason for the topic to come up. The incident in 1817 in the Tennessee Association was predicated, apparently, by a Methodist preacher hawking John Wesley's New Testament. There seems to be general agreement (and I have no reason to doubt it) that the impetus for J. J. Ray's book (and Edward F. Hills, as well) was because some people were pushing the Revised Standard Version which had recently arrived on the scene.

 

Regarding the works of J. J. Ray, "The New Eye Opener" is online HERE. I'm not sure which "year model" it is (maybe 1978, it mentions the TEV).