My position explained

Entire post deleted due to its irrelevance to the discussion and multiple unneccessary attacks.

[ March 04, 2003, 05:52 PM: Message edited by: Preach the Word ]

 

There are NO mistakes, errors or lies in the AV!

Except for the ones I've pointed out, which, again, were overlooked by the KJVO crowd.

 

These accusations actually come closer to describing the Catholic church of Erasmus and the Anglican church of the KJV translators than they do any of the MV contributors.

Besides being wrong about MV's, this assertion is also wrong about the KJV. The subject of this Psalm is not God's Word it is the oppressed godly man. There are threads here that discuss at length the technical aspects of Hebrew that disallow your interpretation. It isn't the MV's that are messed up or even the KJV- it is the interpretation of KJVO's who are desperate to find even an oblique proof for their predetermined beliefs.

This is apt to happen any time someone puts their desired presupposition out first then goes looking for biblical proof. The Catholics and other false religions do this persistently.

Having interacted with you in civility and at expense of my time to answer questions, I don't think I am out of line to ask you to prove any of what you accuse here.

I agree and favor more consideration for the majority. However, even the critical texts don't simply accept things because they are older.

The very same argument could be used against the tradition aspects of KJVOnlyism.

Who said so?

No. Mistakes are not always lies and mistakes in precise wording do not necessarily make a Bible less than perfect in its message.

He didn't... but then again He didn't inspire the copyists nor the KJV translators. They don't qualify as scripture writers.

There are no mistakes in doctrine or teaching. However, if the standard is what the evidence says the originals said then the KJV does have mistakes in various words.

Or, since God providentially preserved His Word through a multitude of varying documents rather than one perfect one, Satan might try to create division and ignorance amongst believers by tempting some to hold a false view about a particular translation.... Yes, I think this is the more likely view since he tried it before with the Latin Vulgate.

This trick was so effective that by the time alternate translations began to be produced with the advent of the Reformation and printing press, the masses were completely ignorant of the scriptures and even afraid of them. They simply trusted the church's teachings. They had been taught that only one version was endorsed by God and that all others were perversions from Satan. Imagine his glee as progressively the people ceased to understand the language of the Bible. Of course, it took special spiritual wisdom to understand the scriptures and men of great vanity and deceit stepped forward to fill those roles.

This so closely parallels what is going on in KJVO circles it's scary. Yes, Satan has someone tricked and he is relying on the fact that man's pride and insecurities have not changed in the last 600 or 700 years. Wherever KJVOnlyism persists, errors will progressively creep in just as they did with the Roman church. I have personally witnessed the beginnings of this as supposed Bible believers apply modern understanding to 400 year old syntax and diction.

 

So where was this "complete absolute perfect Bible with no errors" before 1611? Was there a period of time the English people did not have the "complete absolute perfect Bible with no errors"? If not, where was it before 1611? And if there was a "complete absolute perfect Bible with no errors" for the English people before 1611, why was it changed?

 

My Exposition of Psalms Chapter 12

There has been a lot of discussion about the meaning of a verse in this psalm. Here is my interpretation of Psalm 12:7 in context.

Psalms 12
1 Help, LORD; for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the children of men.
2 They speak vanity every one with his neighbour: with flattering lips and with a double heart do they speak.
3 The LORD shall cut off all flattering lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things:
4 Who have said, With our tongue will we prevail; our lips are our own: who is lord over us?
5 For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the LORD; I will set him in safety from him that puffeth at him.
6 The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.
7 Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.
8 The wicked walk on every side, when the vilest men are exalted.

The main point of this Psalm is that the “godly man” ceaseth, but the “words of the Lord” do not. This psalm discusses the use of language repeatedly. Verse 2 says godly men fall into apostasy and “speak vanity” and use “flattering lips” and “speak” with a double heart. This is expanded upon in Isaiah where it says they draw nigh to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. In verse 3 the Lord promises to cut off the flattering lips of apostate godly men who speak proud things. In verse 4 it says that apostate godly men are their own authority. With their own “tongue” they will prevail, and with their “lips” they can speak what they want, there is not an authority greater than their own “tongue”. In verse 5 God is setting up why He is going to promise something later in the psalm. God says, for the sake of the “poor” and “needy” He will rise to the occasion, and protect them from these apostate godly men who are proud and speak with a “double heart”, whose own “lips” are their final authority. Now did you catch that. God is talking about protecting the poor and needy babes from the godly men whose tongue is their final authority. Verse 6 continues the setup of His point by saying what is said all over this Bible, that God’s words are the only things that are pure, and by obvious contrast, godly men are not pure. God then says something very prophetic, He mentions seven fold purification. I know that on the surface it seems only to be a reference to the purity of the words of God. However, there are some that interpret this in reference to the reformation English Bibles. In verse 7, God says, that He shall preserve them (His words from the preceding verse) from this generation for ever. In my mind He clearly is promising to preserve his pure words for all generations because the godly man ceaseth, and He will do this to help the poor and needy. So in a sense, God is promising to preserve Himself a people (a remnant if you will), but only through the preservation of His holy words. The Lord’s word is a light to your path, how else shall a young man cleanse his way? God is saying that godly men fall away and pervert the living words of the living God, and only through the preservation of His words can the poor and needy find safety. God closes with verse 8 with the wickedness that will be rampant when the godly man ceaseth. This will be a time when the vilest men are exalted, and this wickedness is only rebuffed by God’s holy preserved words, the sword of the Lord. I believe this psalm is for the day we currently live in more than any other, and it’s distortion in the MVs is very telling about the “godly men” who were their translators.

 

What good is it to the godly man that the words of the Lord do not?? I think you have missed the point of the Psalm in you effort to support a position.

The point of the Psalm is that the godly man appears to be ceasing but the promises of God assure him of continuation. Vv. 6-7 say that the word of the Lord is sure and therefore he will preserve the godly on the earth. The words of the Lord are appealed to for assurance that the godly man will not cease.

On to the point of this thread, while there are, IMO, a host of problems with Pastor Bob's position, it is a position that is far closer to orthodoxy than the KJOnly position. I think he has genuinely tried to reckon with the vast and insurmountable difficulties of the KJOnly position and has done so carefully.

However, when he says This is the text that has been used by virtually all orthodox, Bible-believing churches from the second century to the present, I must think that this statement cannot be proven in any way. The only manuscripts we have from the second century disagree with the TR and therefore give the only solid evidence of a text that was used in the second century. We can say that the TR parent texts were ruined through use in the second century, or through war, or through whatever, but the bottom line is that is only a conjecture. There is no proof for that. So I think we must be careful to not assert as fact that which cannot be proven. There is no solid evidence that the TR was used in the second century.

I would also question the terminology "Preserved Text." All the texts we have are preserved. That is why we have them. We could call the Eclectic position the "preserved text" position because it certainly does not use texts that were not preserved. The fact that a particular text is here is evidence of a "preserved text." To me, this designation is useless for this discussion.

I would question, Pastor Bob, if you believe that the NKJV is also acceptable since it is translated from the TR? To me, that is the acid text of your position. If you are truly TR preferred or TR Only, then you cannot object to the NKJV since it uses the same text, no matter the vehement objections to the contrary. A true TR Only/preferred adherent will allow the use of the NKJV. A KJOnly will not.

 

Dear Pastor Larry,

RE: NKJV
Personally, I use any MV where it is faithful to the underlying text (TR).
In fact it has been shown by myself and others that in some cases an MV will translate the underlying text more accurately than the KJV.

OK before any one asks here is an example.

KJV Hebrews 2:9 But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man.

RSV Hebrews 2:9 But we see Jesus, who for a little while was made lower than the angels, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for every one.

If we took the radical KJVO stand then we could say that IN HEBREWS 2:9 THE KJV ROBS JESUS CHRIST OF HIS DEITY! THE RSV IS THE WORD OF GOD.

"little while" is in all Greek mss.

HankD

 

Pastor Larry,

You said: [There is no solid evidence that the TR was used in the second century.]

I beg to differ. Please consider the following testimonies of scholars:

THE TESTIMONY OF BISHOP ELLICOTT DISPELS THIS MYTH

As for the Received Text being based on “seven late manuscripts,” consider
further the testimony of Bishop Ellicott, the chairman of the committee
that produced the English Revised Version of 1881 (the committee also
included Westcott and Hort), the predecessor of all modern versions:

“THE MANUSCRIPTS WHICH ERASMUS USED DIFFER, FOR THE MOST PART, ONLY IN
SMALL AND INSIGNIFICANT DETAILS, FROM THE GREAT BULK OF THE CURSIVE MSS.
The general character of their text is the same. By this observation the
pedigree of the Received Text is carried up beyond the individual
manuscripts used by Erasmus ... That pedigree stretches back to remote
antiquity. THE FIRST ANCESTOR OF THE RECEIVED TEXT WAS AT LEAST
CONTEMPORARY WITH THE OLDEST OF OUR EXTANT MSS, IF NOT OLDER THAN ANY ONE
OF THEM” (Ellicott, The Revisers and the Greek Text of the N.T. by two
members of the N.T. Company, pp. 11-12).

Dr. Ellicott was familiar with all of the textual scholarship of his day,
and he had no hesitation whatsoever to say that the Received Text is based
upon textual authority which is at least as old as that upon which the
Westcott-Hort text rested. Dr. Ellicott was saying that the textual
authority underlying the Received Text is at least as old as the famed
Sinaiticus and Vaticanus manuscripts.

THE TESTIMONY OF THE TRINITARIAN BIBLE SOCIETY DISPELS THIS MYTH

The Trinitarian Bible Society (TBS) of London, England, puts the matter
into a perspective that many modern version defenders seem to try their
best to ignore. The TBS was formed from a conflict within the British and
Foreign Bible Society (BFBS) over the doctrine of the Trinity and the deity
of Jesus Christ’. The BFBS, which was organized in 1804, refused to take a
stand against Unitarianism, and those men who were concerned for doctrinal
purity left in 1831 to form the Trinitarian Bible Society (TBS). In the
early years of the TBS, the matter of different Bible texts and versions
was not a serious issue in the sense it was to become at the end of the
nineteenth century. Though there were textual critics in the first half of
the 1800s, they did not exercise wide influence in ordinary Christian
circles. The battles faced by Trinitarian in its earlier years were in
other directions. With the publication of the English Revised Version (ERV)
and the Westcott-Hort Greek text of 1881, the TBS began to take a more
active position on texts and versions. A number of articles were published
in the TBS Quarterly Record at the turn of the century critiquing the ERV
and supporting the Received Text. Some of these drew heavily upon John
Burgon’s Revision Revised, as well as the research of F.C. Cook and F.H.A.
Scrivener. From that time to this, Trinitarian has stood solidly behind the
Received Text and the King James Bible. Of particular note in the defense
of the Authorized Bible within the TBS is Terence Harvey Brown, TBS
Secretary from 1958 to 1990. Brown authored many of the scholarly,
Bible-believing publications produced by TBS during these years,
publications that influenced great numbers of people around the world. This
is described in the official history of the TBS as follows: “From 1958
onwards the TBS waged war on all these fronts with considerable vigour.
Successive modern English translations were reviewed by the secretary in
the Quarterly Record, and their defects analysed” (Andrew J. Brown, The
Word of God Among All Nations: A Brief History of the Trinitarian Bible
Society 1831-1981, p. 118).

The following testimony by the Trinitarian Bible Society explodes the myth
that the Received Greek Text is a “late text” whereas the eclectic Greek
text is a “old text.”

“It must be emphasised that THE ARGUMENT IS NOT BETWEEN AN ANCIENT TEXT AND
A RECENT ONE, BUT BETWEEN TWO ANCIENT FORMS OF THE TEXT, one of which was
rejected and the other adopted and preserved by the Church as a whole and
remaining in common use for more than fifteen centuries. The assumptions of
modern textual criticism are based upon the discordant testimony of a few
specimens of the rejected text recently disinterred from the oblivion to
which they had been deliberately and wisely consigned in the 4th century”
(The Divine Original, TBS article No. 13, nd, p. 7).

 

Pastor Larry,

You said: [What good is it to the godly man that the words of the Lord do not?? I think you have missed the point of the Psalm in you effort to support a position.

The point of the Psalm is that the godly man appears to be ceasing but the promises of God assure him of continuation. Vv. 6-7 say that the word of the Lord is sure and therefore he will preserve the godly on the earth. The words of the Lord are appealed to for assurance that the godly man will not cease.]

I have carefully considered your position. I respectfully disagree.

 

FFF,

My point is about actual evidence. To say that the parent text of the TR is as least as old as the extant Alexandrian text means nothing. I can say it all I want. But I cannot prove its existence. It is a conjecture, no matter how solid and no matter how logical and firm. It is a conjecture that it existed. You cannot prove that something existed then because something exists now. I can say "I have a hundred dollars in my pocket today." That proves nothing with respect to whether I had that hundred today.

There are many good reasons to believe that the byzantine/majority text type did in fact not exist that far back. And those reasons are at least as solid as those for it.

In the bottom line, the only actual textual evidence that we have mitigates against the TR. It may be wrong, but it is actual. You can put your proverbial "hands" on it. You cannot do that with the TR.

 

The antiquity of the Traditional Text...

W, the Freer manuscript of the Gospels, Matthew's Gospel and the last two-thirds of Luke's Gospel are in the Traditional Text, although the rest of the four Gospels is an Alexandrian text or a Western text or a Caesarean text. W is a fourth or fifth century manuscript written in Egypt.

Secondly, A (Alexandrinus) was written in the fifth century probably in Egypt. This manuscript contains the four Gospels mostly in the Traditional Text, and is another witness to the antiquity of the Traditional Text.

HankD

 

Here is a URL with extracts (many) from Burgon's

The Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels Vindicated and Established.

http://www.deanburgonsociety.org/dbs2771.htm

HankD

 

Hank, I can buy alot of these arguments and, while I am not an enemy of the CT's, I do not believe that their methods are the best for reconstructing the original text. The assumptions they make about shorter and harder readings have become hang ups for me.

On the other hand, the TR does not seem to be the best possible representative of the BT. It simply doesn't make sense that TR readings like I John 5:7-8 and the last 6 verses of Revelation would be lost for over 1000 years then miraculously rediscovered by an unconverted Catholic. In your opinion, how much distance do you think there is between our views?

 

Distance between our views...

Miniscule pardon the pun?

Truley it is small.
Second, There are several editions that go under "TR" or "Received Text" or "Traditional Text", that is why I almost always qualify or give a short defintion of "TR" (Scrivener 1894/5 a distillation of the several sources which underlies the KJV).

Thirdly, The Johannine Comma (1 John 5:7) has only 6 late extant Greek witnesses but a significant array of old Itala, and Latin TR type documents back to the 3rd century.

Many reject the Comma, I do not.
Whether it is cannonical or not is very important.
I realize I am on the "least likely to succeed" side but it is my choice based upon both faith and evidence (imo).

I respect the views of other brethren (of the Comma and the text type) and will not demean them for their choice. I hope we can all do the same.

HankD

 

Regarding the Byzantine Priority hypothesis, here is an interesting article written by a pro-Critical Text-ish fella. Notice his conclusions at the end.

http://www.skypoint.com/~waltzmn/ByzPrior.html

Another interesting item from the entire debate regarding greek texts: Isn't it odd that each side see's their text as superior and the "other" text as corrupted?

CT: - Alexandrian/Western/Caesarian are best
- Byzantine is late/secondary and characterized by scribal glosses and harmonizations

MT: - Byzantine manuscripts provides the best text
- Alexandrian/Western/Caesarian are uncontrolled local copies characterized by omissions (Aleph in particular), wild expansions (p46 in romans, Codex D everywhere), etc.


I currently hold to a Byz Priority position, but
am still evaluating the evidence and different views.


-kman

[ March 04, 2003, 02:55 PM: Message edited by: kman ]

 

I find it interesting to note that in the last 100 years plus the majority of professing believers have abandoned the time-honored texts of the Bible, the Bomberg Masoretic Text, and the Textus Receptus, and that in favor of the manifestly inferior Westcott-Hort type text and the modern Hebrew edition of Kittel, also inferior. When I think of the Baptists of past centuries, and chiefly those who I think have best represented the original New Testament Christianity of the apostolic times, the British Particular Baptists of the 17th century and the 18th century, and their offspring the Gadsbyite Baptists of the 19th, and their American counterparts the old Regulars of the 17th & 18th centuries. Then I think those Baptists in those times did not question the texts of the Bible they had received of God in the providence of God, and those were the Bomberg Masoretic Text and the Textus Receptus. They did not question them with a "yea, hath God said" type of infidelity, but were most probably thankful for them. It is only in more recent times that professing Baptists have rejected those preserved and handed-down texts in favour of said inferior text types, which have most often been edited by manifestly ungodly men. I do not argue that the editor of the old Masoretic Text was godly because I do not know. As for Erasmus and Estienne and Beza I cannot tell if they were godly men, yet I have not heard anyone say they were liberal in the way modern textual critics and editors have been. I believe those men had much higher views of God and His word than their modern day counterparts.

The modern day successors of those aforementioned Baptists I mentioned still stand for the preserved and handed-down texts just as their forefathers in the Baptist faith. I chiefly refer to the Gospel Standard Baptists in Britain, who are successors of the Gadsbyite Baptists, who were the successors of the Gillite Particular Baptists, who were of the original Particular Baptists. And I think their modern day American counterparts stand with them. What I in essence claim is that the few true churches that exist on earth today have not abandoned the God-given texts. And when I say few I mean few by comparison, because false churches, synagogues of the Adversary (Satan) abound, but true churches of the Lord Jesus are hard to come by these days.
Interesting.

Harald

 

What I in essence claim is that the few true churches that exist on earth today have not abandoned the God-given texts.

Are you implying that if a church does not "stand for" the TR and Bomberg Hebrew text, then it is not one of "the few true churches"?

If so, then what I in essence say is: Codswallop.

 

Uh, what is the Strong's number for this word?

HankD