The Disappearance of the Dean Burgon Society

[John of Japan]

What's your position on the KJV? How would you differ with D.A. Waite and other KJV only advocates?

I'm a Lifeline Bible Only advocate! That is the Japanese NT translation from the TR that I was the lead translator for. (We were in Japan for 33 years.) This is the only modern Japanese NT from the TR, not from critical Greek texts. My team is now working on the Lifeline OT. My point is that KJVO advocates are rarely knowledgeable or supportive of missionary Bible translations. Such translations are the heart of my position on the KJV. To advocates of the KJV in the US I say, "Put your money where your mouth is, and support missionary translations." Few do.

So, my position on the KJV is that it is the best English translation in history, and I teach and preach from it, but I do not believe in a perfect translation. Rather, I think most of the KJVO movement is off target. They are not obeying the Great Commission, which never says to defend the Bible. In fact, there are no passages in the whole Bible telling us to defend God's Word. Instead, we are to preach it, spread it, use it, and translate it. (Bible translation is implicit in the Great Commission.)

Refugees from the DBS started something called the William Carey Bible Society, thinking to support missionary translations, but it went belly up. Their website was taken over by a Japanese yakuza gang, and for a while it had instructions for nefarious purposes on it. It is now totally inactive.

Having said all of that, I do support or acknowledge the following institutions for their emphasis on missionary Bible translation:

WorldView Ministries (I'll be at a meeting in June.)
Bearing Precious Seed (They printed our Japanese NT.)
Baptist Bible Translator's Institute
Global Bible Translators. Interestingly enough, this organization is KJVO, but their main translation consultant, Steve Combs (a very able man, though I've never met him) wrote a Greek grammar: The Translator's Greek Grammar of the Textus Receptus. In it he gives translation problems from the TR, but then translates them in modern English. This is the forced direction missionary translation must take.

 

[Truth Seeker]

I'm a Lifeline Bible Only advocate! That is the Japanese NT translation from the TR that I was the lead translator for. (We were in Japan for 33 years.) This is the only modern Japanese NT from the TR, not from critical Greek texts. My team is now working on the Lifeline OT. My point is that KJVO advocates are rarely knowledgeable or supportive of missionary Bible translations. Such translations are the heart of my position on the KJV. To advocates of the KJV in the US I say, "Put your money where your mouth is, and support missionary translations." Few do.

So, my position on the KJV is that it is the best English translation in history, and I teach and preach from it, but I do not believe in a perfect translation. Rather, I think most of the KJVO movement is off target. They are not obeying the Great Commission, which never says to defend the Bible. In fact, there are no passages in the whole Bible telling us to defend God's Word. Instead, we are to preach it, spread it, use it, and translate it. (Bible translation is implicit in the Great Commission.)

Refugees from the DBS started something called the William Carey Bible Society, thinking to support missionary translations, but it went belly up. Their website was taken over by a Japanese yakuza gang, and for a while it had instructions for nefarious purposes on it. It is now totally inactive.

Having said all of that, I do support or acknowledge the following institutions for their emphasis on missionary Bible translation:

WorldView Ministries (I'll be at a meeting in June.)
Bearing Precious Seed (They printed our Japanese NT.)
Baptist Bible Translator's Institute
Global Bible Translators. Interestingly enough, this organization is KJVO, but their main translation consultant, Steve Combs (a very able man, though I've never met him) wrote a Greek grammar: The Translator's Greek Grammar of the Textus Receptus. In it he gives translation problems from the TR, but then translates them in modern English. This is the forced direction missionary translation must take.

If I understand you correctly you would be KJV prefer just like John R Rice. Do you know of any IFB churches or schools in the U.S. who would also have this more moderate position on the KJV. I would dare say if John R Rice was alive today he would probably be using the NKJV based on the same Greet text.

 

[John of Japan]

If I understand you correctly you would be KJV prefer just like John R Rice. Do you know of any IFB churches or schools in the U.S. who would also have this more moderate position on the KJV. I would dare say if John R Rice was alive today he would probably be using the NKJV based on the same Greet text.

Yes, that would describe my position.

Non-KJVO: my college and seminary (baptistcollege.org), Maranatha Baptist U. and Seminary, Detroit Baptist Theological Seminary, Central Baptist Theological Seminary (in Minnesota). I understand that Pensacola Christian College is TR only; don't know if they consider themselves KJVO. BJU is actually critical text preferred, and nowadays it is mostly IFB, though I don't know percentages. (Back in the 1990s it was 95% Baptist.)

With the deaths of Peter Ruckman and D. A. Waite, there are no national leaders of the movement that I know of. Large schools like Crown College and West Coast Baptist College are KJVO to the best of my knowledge, but don't make a big deal about it. They are more about the Great Commission.

 

[Logos1560]

Global Bible Translators. Interestingly enough, this organization is KJVO, but their main translation consultant, Steve Combs (a very able man, though I've never met him) wrote a Greek grammar: The Translator's Greek Grammar of the Textus Receptus. In it he gives translation problems from the TR, but then translates them in modern English. This is the forced direction missionary translation must take.

I meet Steve Combs at the National Conference for the King James Bible Research Council. I talked with him a little. I gave him a copy of one of my books.

Steve Combs' first two books A Practical Theology of Bible Translating in 2019 and The Translator’s Greek Grammar of the Textus Receptus in 2021
were mostly balanced and reasonable.

In Steve Combs' last two books So Shall My Word Be: Using Biblical Principles to Judge the Modern Bible Versions Movement in 2024 and Magnified Above His Name in 2025, inconsistent KJV-only reasoning is more on display.

 

[John of Japan]

I meet Steve Combs at the National Conference for the King James Bible Research Council. I talked with him a little. I gave him a copy of one of my books.

Steve Combs' first two books A Practical Theology of Bible Translating in 2019 and The Translator’s Greek Grammar of the Textus Receptus in 2021
were mostly balanced and reasonable.

I have both of these and have perused them. He did a fair job. I respect him for actually becoming a translation consultant and visiting many fields to help. Judging by his Greek grammar, he knows Greek pretty well.

When a KJVO person meets missionary Bible translation, they are forced to change. I was once asked, "Is there a KJV in Japanese?" Puzzled, I answered, "No, the KJV is English, and the Japanese read Japanese."

In Steve Combs' last two books So Shall My Word Be: Using Biblical Principles to Judge the Modern Bible Versions Movement in 2024 and Magnified Above His Name in 2025, inconsistent KJV-only reasoning is more on display.

Don't have those, and probably won't get them. But thanks for you diligence in this area.