"Modern versions" in a Nutshell

[Nazaroo]

The Issues









(1) No important Christian doctrine is affected.

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(2) The edited text is as good as the traditional text.

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(3) The critical text is sufficient for all religious and doctrinal matters.

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(4) The critical text is closer to the original autographs.



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[mandym]

At one time the KJV was a modern translation.

 

[NaasPreacher (C4K)]

Is this what happened in 1611?

 

[Nazaroo]

At one time the KJV was a modern translation.

Not really.
It was a continuation of the Geneva and Bishop's Bible, based on yet earlier versions. It was in rather archaic language even in the time of King James.

Its advantage then and now was that it was a very literal and informed translation, done by believers who knew their own language and history well.

 

[Amy.G]

I liked your presentation. :thumbs:

It was indeed "in a nutshell".

 

[Alcott]

Not really. ....
Its advantage then and now was that it was a very literal and informed translation, done by believers who knew their own language and history well.

Yeah, so well they christened infants and had the state's king as "head of the church."

 

[Nazaroo]

Yeah, so well they christened infants and had the state's king as "head of the church."

But King James did not interfere in the translation of the new version, only insisted they do it right. His guidelines were scholarly and reasonable.

The skilled experts at Cambridge and Oxford were from a generation who still believed in the authority and power of the word of God, rightly and honorably expressed in the English language.

They did such a good job that it is recognized worldwide as the "Authorized Version" and is respected even by Roman Catholics and dissenters.

 

[Alcott]

The skilled experts at Cambridge and Oxford were from a generation who still believed in the authority and power of the word of God, rightly and honorably expressed in the English language.

If "still believed in the authority and power of the word of God" describes them and their approach, I will please to unlike them and their racks and hotseats and strappados and annual required teachings that opposition to the king [the one who "authorized" this version] means imprisonment or death in this world and damnation in the next.

They did such a good job that it is recognized worldwide as the "Authorized Version" and is respected even by Roman Catholics and dissenters.

Am I supposed to say "Hail Mary", or what?

 

[Nazaroo]

If "still believed in the authority and power of the word of God" describes them and their approach, I will please to unlike them and their racks and hotseats and strappados and annual required teachings that opposition to the king [the one who "authorized" this version] means imprisonment or death in this world and damnation in the next.

Don't confuse the lords and judges of England and Scotland with the scholars at Cambridge and Oxford. The scholars may not have been standing on moral ground that much higher, but they didn't advocate burning dissenters at the stake, or torturing 'witches' like the insane Spaniards of the Inquisition.

Am I supposed to say "Hail Mary", or what?

Well, Elizabeth said that, so if you meet her, I suppose its protocol.

But if you imagining her in the room, I'd talk it over with a family member.

 

[Nazaroo]

Is this what happened in 1611?

..probably on more than one occasion.

But there is a qualitative difference between those in 1611 who wished to get the most accurate text, and the Unitarians of the 19th century who wished to overthrow traditional Christianity.

 

[Rippon]

..probably on more than one occasion.

But there is a qualitative difference between those in 1611 who wished to get the most accurate text, and the Unitarians of the 19th century who wished to overthrow traditional Christianity.

You are again repeating the lie that W&H and the whole company of the English Revised Version translators were composed of Unitarians.

 

[Dr. Walter]

His guidelines were scholarly and reasonable.

.

I am generally in agreement with you but not entirely at this point. He was wrong for demanding that the terms 'baptizo" and "ekklessia" should not be translated but instead the ecclesiastical terms "baptism" (a transliteration) and "church" should be used to represent those Greek terms.

I have his 15 rules and most are good but not these as they interferred with proper translation of these Greek terms.

 

[Dr. Walter]

You again repeating the lie that W&H and the whole company of the English Revised Version translators were composed of Unitarians.

Well, the "whole" company may not have been Unitarians but the fact that the "whole" company allowed Unitarians into the translation committee certainly speaks volumes about the orthodoxy of the "whole" company of translators.

 

[Dr. Walter]

You again repeating the lie that W&H and the whole company of the English Revised Version translators were composed of Unitarians.

JOSEPH HENRY THAYER

Thayer was on the American Standard Version translation team (chairman of the New Testament committee) and was the author of the famous Thayer’s Greek Lexicon.

He was a Harvard professor of New Testament criticism. He was the assistant to Ezra Abbot at Harvard, and succeeded him as Bussey professor of New Testament criticism and interpretation at the Harvard Divinity School when Abbot died in 1884.

He was a Unitarian who denied the deity of Christ and the infallibility of Scripture. Prior to his tenure at Harvard, Thayer was a professor at Andover Seminary, but resigned in 1882 in protest to Andover’s requirement of “a rigid assent to the letter of the Creed” (Ernest Gordon, The Leaven of the Sadducees, 1926, p. 145). Thayer could not assent to the infallibility of Scripture and the deity of Jesus Christ.



EZRA ABBOT

Abbot was on the American Standard Version translation (ASV) committee (1901). He was a Harvard theology professor and was an influential textual critic.

The testimony of Matthew Riddle, who was a translator on the ASV committee: “Dr. Abbot was the foremost textual critic in America, and his opinions usually prevailed when questions of text were debated” (Matthew Riddle, The Story of the Revised New Testament, 1908, p. 30). Matthew Riddle‘s testimony is very important, as he was one of the most influential members of the ASV committee and one of the few members who survived to see the translation printed.

The testimony of the ASV committee upon the death of Abbot on March 21, 1884. The following excerpt from a memorial resolution issued by the committee gives additional evidence of the Unitarian’s influence on the Revision on both sides of the ocean: “Always one of the first in his place at the table, and one of the last to quit it, he [Ezra Abbot] brought with him thither the results of careful preparation. His suggestions were seldom the promptings of the moment. Hence they always commanded consideration; often secured instant adoption. ... But it was in questions affecting the Greek text that Dr. Abbot’s exceptional gifts and attainments were pre-eminently helpful. Several of his essays on debated passages, appended to the printed reports of our proceedings which were forwarded from time to time to the brethren in England, are among the most thorough discussions of the sort which are extant, won immediate respect for American scholarship in this department, and HAD NO SMALL INFLUENCE IN DETERMINING THAT FORM OF THE SACRED TEXT WHICH WILL ULTIMATELY, WE BELIEVE, FIND ACCEPTANCE WITH ALL CHRISTIAN SCHOLARS” (Historical Account of the Work of the American Committee of Revision, 1885, p. 68).

Abbot was a Christ-denying Unitarian.

He authored the footnotes in the ASV that say that Christ should not be worshipped and that question his deity. For example, at John 9:38, the wicked footnote states, “The Greek word denotes an act of reverence, whether paid to a creature (as here) or to the Creator.” I cite this from an edition of the 1901 ASV that I have in my library.

He argued that the last clause of Romans 9:5 was a doxology to God and does not refer to Christ.

In Acts 20:28 Abbot led the committee to remove “God” and replace it with “the Lord,” thus corrupting this powerful witness to the deity of Jesus Christ. Unitarians and theological modernists alleged that Jesus is “the Lord” but not actually God.

Abbot wrote a long article arguing for the omission of “God” in 1 Timothy 3:16.



http://www.wayoflife.org/database/unitarianism.html

 

[Dr. Walter]

You again repeating the lie that W&H and the whole company of the English Revised Version translators were composed of Unitarians.

GEORGE VANCE SMITH

Smith was on the British translation committee that produced the English Revised Version.

He was a Unitarian minister of St. Saviour’s Gate Chapel, York, who denied the deity and atonement of Jesus Christ, the personality of the Holy Spirit, and the divine inspiration of Scripture. This was made plain in his book The Bible and Popular Theology, which appeared in 1871. This was reissued in 1901 in an enlarged fifth edition entitled The Bible and Its Theology: A Review, Comparison, and Re-statement. Consider some of the blasphemies that came from the pen of this man:

“... what is really meant by the term in question [the Holy Spirit], is no other than God himself ... but this fact will not justify us in saying that it is ‘God the Holy Spirit,’ as though it were a distinct personality...” (Smith, The Bible and Its Theology, p. 215).

“[Salvation] was in no way purchased of him [God] or of his justice. It was not because his ‘wrath’ was appeased, or satisfied by the sufferings of an innocent substitute, but because of his own essential fatherly goodness and ‘great love.’ ‘It is the gift of God,’ not a thing bought from him with a price, except in so far as this might be FIGURATIVELY said in reference to that death of the Messiah...” (Smith, The Bible and Its Theology, p. 246).

“... it is equally clear that it was not as their substitute that he died for men; not to redeem them from eternal misery; not ... because the clouds of God’s wrath had gathered thick over the human race, and required a victim, and could find that victim only in the innocent Jesus! ... The popular theory, in reality, is largely the product of dark and ignorant ages...” (Smith, The Bible and Its Theology, pp. 248, 253).

“It is, that the Bible manifestly offers itself to us, the people of these later times, largely as a Book of History. It never professes or claims to be more: never, in truth, makes any profession or claim at all on that point; but stands before us there, simply as a collection of writings preserving for us the remaining literature, the traditions, and the history of the Hebrews. ... It nowhere, in truth, claims inspiration, or says anything definite about it. The biblical inspiration, whatever it is or was, would seem, like the genius of Shakespeare, to be unconsciously possessed. The phrase, ‘Thus saith the Lord,’ and its equivalents, are simply to be referred to the style of the prophet; or to be understood only as indicating his belief that what he was about to say was conformable to the Divine Will. ... It is scarcely allowable, in short, to think of inspiration as being or acting in THE DEAD WORDS OF ANY BOOK” (Smith, The Bible and Its Theology, pp. 269, 276, 277).

“Then again, are we not, all of us who seek to be so, spiritual Sons of God?” (Smith, The Bible and Its Theology, p. 298).

“Jesus of Nazareth is nowhere presented to us as God, but simply as the Christ... ‘There is one God, the Father,’ and ‘one Lord, Jesus Christ;’ but these are not in any sense one being or one nature” (Smith, The Bible and Its Theology, p. 299).

When an attempt was made to have Smith removed from the ERV translation committee, Westcott, Hort, Stanley, and Thirlwall stood by him and threatened that they would resign if Smith were removed. The sordid story is given by A.G. Hobbs in the foreword to the Centennial Edition of Burgon’s Revision Revised: “[Smith’s participation in the communion service] led to a public protest signed by ‘some thousands of the Clergy.’ The Upper House passed a Resolution that ‘no person who denies the Godhead of our Lord Jesus Christ ought to be invited to join either company to which was committed the Revision of the Authorized Version of Holy Scripture: and that it is further the judgment of this House that any person now on either Company should cease to act therewith.’ This Resolution was also passed by the Lower House. And still they could not get this non-believer off the Committee. Here is a real shocker: Dean Stanley, Westcott, Hort, and Bishop Thirlwall all refused to serve if Smith were dismissed. Let us remember that the Bible teaches that those who uphold and bid a false teacher God speed are equally guilty. ‘For he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds’ (2 John 9-11). No wonder that the Deity of Christ is played down in so many passages!” (A.G. Hobbs, Foreword, The Revision Revised Centennial Edition).

Smith testified that the textual changes in the English Revised Version and the Westcott-Hort Greek New Testament reflected his own theology. Some of the passages listed by Smith as being theologically superior in the modern texts and versions as opposed to the King James Bible were Rom. 9:5; 1 Tim. 3:16; Tit. 2:13; and 1 Jn. 5:7, and that is because these passages in the critical text weakened the doctrine of Christ’s deity, which Smith rejected. This English Reviser admitted what modern version proponents today such as James White often try to deny, that the modern Greek texts and versions weaken the doctrine of the deity of Jesus Christ! No man is blinder than he who WILL NOT see. Following are two examples from Smith’s pen:

“The only instance in the N.T. in which the religious worship or adoration of Christ was apparently implied, has been altered by the Revision: ‘At the name of Jesus every knee shall bow,’ [Philippians 2:10] is now to be read ‘in the name.’ Moreover, no alteration of text or of translation will be found anywhere to make up for this loss; as indeed IT IS WELL UNDERSTOOD THAT THE N.T. CONTAINS NEITHER PRECEPT NOR EXAMPLE WHICH REALLY SANCTIONS THE RELIGIOUS WORSHIP OF JESUS CHRIST” (Smith, Texts and Margins of the Revised New Testament Affecting Theological Doctrine Briefly Reviewed, p. 47). This statement, of course, is a lie; but we reprint it to demonstrate the damnable heresies of this modern textual critic.

“The old reading [“God” in 1 Tim. 3:16] is pronounced untenable by the Revisers, as it has long been known to be by all careful students of the New Testament. ... It is in truth another example of the facility with which ancient copiers could introduce the word God into their manuscripts,—a reading which was the natural result of THE GROWING TENDENCY IN EARLY CHRISTIAN TIMES ... TO LOOK UPON THE HUMBLE TEACHER AS THE INCARNATE WORD, AND THEREFORE AS ‘GOD MANIFESTED IN THE FLESH’” (G. Vance Smith, Texts and Margins, p. 39).

http://www.wayoflife.org/database/unitarianism.html

 

[Nazaroo]

...Thanks Dr. Walter.

And for more on the Unitarians behind the nervous 19th century movement to alter the Bible text, see here also:

The Unitarians
& Modern Critical Greek NTs


Here's a few excerpts:

(C) NT Textual Criticism
& Unitarianism

Introduction
15 Key Unitarian Textual Critics:
The Unitarian "Fathers" of the 'modern versions'

First Wave: (1730-1810) The Invasion of German Skepticism
    J.J. Wettstein (c.1730-52) - The 1st 'critical' Greek NT
    J.J. Griesbach (1745-1812) - 2nd 'critical' Greek NT
    E. Harwood (1766-1776) - author radical Greek NT & transl.
    A. Geddes (c.1769-1779) - author radical Greek NT & transl.
    T. Belsham (c. 1808) - 1st 'Unitarian' English NT

Second Wave: (1800-1880) The Peak of the Unitarian Movement
    K. Lachmann (1831-1850) - 1st to drop TR: Radical Greek NT
    S.P. Tregelles (c.1860-78) - used only old MSS: Greek NT
    Tischendorf (c.1856-69) - eight 'radical' Greek NT editions
    G.R. Noyes (c.1869-1872) - AUA translator of Tisch. 7th Ed.
    S. Davidson (c.1848-1880) - translator of Tisch. 8th Ed.

Third Wave: (1880-1920) The Fight over the English Bible
    F.J.A. Hort (c.1882) - Creator of the W/H Greek NT
    Ezra Abbot (c.1882) - Amer. NT Committee: Revised Vers.
    G.V. Smith (c.1871-82) Brit. NT Committee: Revised Vers.
    J.H. Thayer (c. 1880-1920) - Amer. NT Committee: ASV
    C. Gregory (c.1880-1917) - text critic, transl. of Tisch. 8th Ed.

 

[Nazaroo]

I am generally in agreement with you but not entirely at this point. He was wrong for demanding that the terms 'baptizo" and "ekklessia" should not be translated but instead the ecclesiastical terms "baptism" (a transliteration) and "church" should be used to represent those Greek terms.

I have his 15 rules and most are good but not these as they interferred with proper translation of these Greek terms.

Actually, I think I agree that the "baptism" issue was a clever political solution, but perhaps not an accurate one.

"ekklesia" again, this set the tone for quite a while on this dispute between congregationalists and the official church of England.

There are a handful more less than adequate translational compromises, as we have noted before, such as the word "ordained".

Still I think it is safe to say that these blemishes can be counted on a pair of hands, while the sheer number of outrages to the text done by modern versions numbers in the thousands!

Its like comparing a knee-scrape to the rape and murder of a whole town.

 

[Rippon]

Tell me what Unitarian or unorthodox doctrines are in the 1881 ERV and the 1901 ASV.

 

[Nazaroo]

Tell me what Unitarian or unorthodox doctrines are in the 1881 ERV and the 1901 ASV.

How about the childish and nonsensical Egyptian reading, (μονογενος θεος [!?!]) further botched in translation at John 1:18?

No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him. John 1:18 (KJV)

"No one has ever seen God; the only Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has made him known. " (RSV, - absurd = RV)

"No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared [him]. " (1901 ASV - repaired = KJV)

Most 20th century versions read similarly to the New American Standard--"the only begotten God" [Gk. "theos," rather than TR's "huios" ("Son")]--although it is notable that the English Revised Version of 1881-5 and the American Standard Version of 1901 retain "Son" and only preserve the opposing reading in the margin ("Many very ancient authorities read God only begotten"). Furthermore, a sizable number of post-Textus Receptus editors of the Greek NT--Griesbach, Lachmann, Alford, Wordsworth, von Soden, Bover, and even Tischendorf in his influential 8th edition based on Codex Sinaiticus--also read "huios" rather than "theos." Since, as Dean Burgon points out, both Sinaiticus and Vaticanus give "theos", this consensus among such editors in reading "huios" suggests that they considered the position of Traditional Texts supporters like Burgon on this passage--who condemned the "theos" reading as "undeserving of serious attention" (Last Twelve Verses of S. Mark, p. 81)--something to be taken seriously. It is interesting, then, that modern scholarship has apparently made up its mind that "huios" is to be soundly rejected in favour of "theos." Edwin Palmer, executive secretary of the NIV translation committee, wrote:

"John 1:18, as inspired by the Holy Spirit, is one of those few clear and decisive texts that declare that Jesus is God. But, without fault of its own, the KJV, following inferior manuscripts, altered what the Holy Spirit said through John . . . . [T]he verse should read: 'No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only [Son], who is at the Father's side, has made him known' (NIV)."
(--Quoted from Richard Kevin Barnard, God's Word in Our Language: The Story of the New International Version, Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1989, p. 30. Ellipsis and brackets in source (Barnard). I note in passing the insertion of "Son" in brackets, which is not in the NIV at this point but is either Palmer's or Barnard's "fudging" of the version's text in an apparent move to make it more palatable and "orthodox.")

• (Curiously, earlier editions of the NIV New Testament show a different wording: "No man has ever seen God, but God the only [Son], who is at the Father's side..." [qtd. from the Eight Translation New Testament (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale, 1974)--brackets in source; see illustration below]. Note that this does not agree with the way Palmer quotes the verse either!)

• (It also bears mentioning that the TNIV, a revision of the NIV that appeared in 2001, changes the NIV reading to "No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known" [emphasis added; "Son" is in also in half-brackets in the printed TNIV, whose translators/revisors apparently mean this to be understood as a word "not in the original texts but required by the context" (see "A Word to the Reader" in TNIV)]). Dare I suggest that the divergences between Palmer, the NIV text [or rather texts], and the TNIV text in this verse seem to indicate that someone on the NIV/TNIV committees is justifiably uneasy about reading "the only begotten God" here, as their critical text would require?)

As is to be expected, James White also comes to the defence of the modern reading in this verse (The King James Only Controversy, Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1995, pp. 258-60). Significantly, he introduces "the textual evidence as given by the UBS 4th edition text," yet only gives the portion favourable to the "theos" reading! And, with all due respect to him, his presentation of even this is a bit misleading (i.e., in saying that "We also note that the Syrian, Georgian, and Coptic translations support this rendering"--when in fact three of the five Syrian recensions and one of the two Georgian ones cited in UBS-4 actually support "huios"/"Son"!). Here is just some of the substantial evidence for the KJV's reading from UBS-4, which is omitted by White:

• Uncials: A (5th century), E, F, G, H, Delta, Theta, Psi (these seven codices from the 8th & 9th centuries);
• Miniscules: family 1, family 13, 28, 157, 180, 205, and numerous others;
• Lectionaries: majority;
• Ancient versions: several Old Latin mss. (including "a," 4th century), the Vulgate, the Curetonian version of the Old Syriac (3rd-4th century), the Harclean and Palestinian Syriac, the Armenian and Ethiopic versions, the earlier of two Georgian versions (9th century), and the Old Church Slavonic version;
• Church fathers: Hippolytus (d. 235), Letter of Hymenaeus (about 268), Alexander, Eustathius, Chrysostom, Theodore, Tertullian, Jerome, and countless others.

Now while White grudgingly admits in passing that the evidence for "huios" is "very great indeed," he alleges that "It is difficult to see how the reading theos could arise from huios. The terms are simply too far removed from one another in form to account for scribal error based on morphology. However, it is easily understood how theos could give way to huios. . . ." (One assumes that, by his reference to "morphology," White implies that theos could not have arisen as a scribal misreading or mishearing of huios--a fair enough assumption.)
But, despite Dr. White's inability to see any other alternatives, this is not the only way that an original reading of huios could have been changed into theos.


In defense of the KJV reading

© 1996, 2002, 2003 by T.L. Hubeart Jr.

 

[Nazaroo]

continued...

Since White goes on to speculate that a scribe recollecting "only-begotten Son" at Jn. 3:16 and 18 could have changed theos into huios, I will offer my own hypotheses as to how the TR's reading may have just as easily been the original, but was altered to theos:
1. Since the word "God" (in the form "theon") appears as the first word in the Greek of the present verse, it is near enough that an early scribe could have retained it in his mind and recopied it here rather than "huios," with the change to "theos" either his own compounding of error or done by a subsequent hand to correct the grammar;
2. Since White is fond of alleging that KJV textual differences reflect scribal "expansions of piety," one could equally well argue that an early scribe may have changed "huios" to "theos"--"from a desire to protect and reverence divine truths," as White says in another context (p. 43). Through misguided zeal, this scribe may have felt that "Son" did not adequately express the full deity of Christ and made the word change to "God" to safeguard the Son's Godhood;
3. This could have been a deliberate corruption of the text by a heretical group, made to teach a plurality of gods in the Godhead rather than the orthodox doctrine of one God in three Persons. As Wilbur Pickering says in a separate context, "It is clear that during the second century, and possibly already in the first, [heretics] produced many copies of N.T. writings incorporating their alterations" (Identity of the NT Text, Rev. ed., Nashville: Nelson, 1980, pp. 113-4).
And there is one further consideration I would like to mention briefly, which has nothing to do with manuscript evidence, but relies on considerations of style. It seems to me more credible that the Apostle John would have written "only begotten Son" than "only begotten God" because he would have wanted it understood clearly at the outset of his writing that Jesus was the Son of God. We have this implied in the first few verses of this gospel, made clearer at verse 14 , but otherwise not clarified until verse 34 of this chapter! This is rather strange in view of the fact that in two of the apostle's other contributions to scripture, the First and Second Epistles of John, we have Jesus clearly expressed as the "Son" within the first three verses (cf. 1 John 1:3, 2 John 1:3). Of course John may have wanted to enhance interest in the opening of this gospel by delaying the statement of Jesus as "Son" and instead introducing Him first, unnamed, as the "Word," as the Agent of Creation, as the Light of the World. But why, here at the crescendo of his introduction, the Apostle would neglect to mention that this was also the "SON" of God, but would instead oddly refer to Him as "the only begotten GOD"--and risk confusing the initial readers of the gospel who needed to be evangelized--is something that is utterly beyond me.
In sum, there is no compelling reason to believe Palmer's implication that his Greek text is "inspired by the Holy Spirit" at this point, or that the KJV "altered what the Holy Spirit said through John." Given the impressive attestation for the KJV's reading, the hesitancy of many early modern editors to change it (perhaps they knew the implications of the change better than today's scholars?), and the lack of adequate internal justification for the modern versions' reading, one may accept the reading "the only begotten Son" in this passage with full confidence.'

In defense of the KJV reading

© 1996, 2002, 2003 by T.L. Hubeart Jr.