Uni-corny unicorn

The KJV translators had no reason to not believe unicorns existed. And I'm not referring to anyting except the horse-like creature with one spiraled horn in its forehead. While its existence cannot be 100% ruled out, it's about as likely to have existed as the centaur or Pan, the half-man, half-goat demigod of the Romans.

When King James took the British throne, his royal coat-of-arms from Scotland had a unicorn upon it, while the British royal COA had a lion standing upon its back feet in a belligerent pose. KJ made a new COA with both the lion and the unicorn depicted upon it.

Here's a URL for the current British COA:

http://www.fleurdelis.com/royal.htm

While we cannot fault the AV translators for rendering the Hebrew re'em as 'unicorn', the KJVOs certainly cannot fault later Bible versions for saying 'wild ox'. Any Jew proficient in Hebrew will tell you that re'em has no specific definition, that it could be almost any large, powerful wild animal with a horn or horns. To me, it isn't much of an issue to use to show the KJVOs that the KJV isn't perfect. There are many far-better arguments based upon solid, undeniable evidence to prove the KJVOs wrong.

However, for the KJVO who insists 'unicorn' is correct and 'wild ox' is wrong, I can show you a wild ox...But can YOU show ME a unicorn? There's no mistaking that the AV men had the unicorn depicted on the royal COA in mind when they wrote'unicorn'. They did NOT mean 'rhino' or any other animal not native to England or Israel.

 

First, I don't think they ever got on the ark; they were extinct before God created man. Otherwise, their remains wouldn't have been fossilized. I don't care what the likes of Kent Hovind say, fossilization is a S-L-O-W process. Remember, the "skeletons" of prehistoric creatures you see in museums are made of ROCK, which had very gradually replaced the bone as it lay buried and undisturbed. This process simply cannot naturally occur rapidly. I believe GOD is sending us a message by allowing us to discover just how fossilization occurs.

I believe a more representative species of dino for your little illustration would be any of several species of protoceratops, which had one stubby horn on its nose, had a beak, ate vegetation, grew to twice the size of the modern rhino, & had a brain the size of an orange.

Second, the AV men weren't familiar with dinosaurs. Over 2K years ago, the Chinese found some "dragon bones", but that's as far as it went. In 1676, a British clergyman, Reverend Plot, found a huge femur which he believed had belonged to a giant such as Goliath. The first complete dinosaur skeleton was assembled in 1824 by William Buckland, a British clergyman whose hobby was fossil collecting. The name "dinosaur" was coined in 1842 by Sir Richard Owen.

However, the AV men WERE familiar with the mythical horse-like unicorn depicted on KJ's Scottish coat-of-arms, and soon incorporated into the British royal COA.

Third, when MOSES speaks of the re'em, it had to be an animal familiar to Israel. Even though the earliest references to re'em are in Job's book, first written long before Moses' time, it's doubtful if Israel in general was familiar with it. To make sense of his illustration, Moses had to mention a familiar creature.

You've missed the bus again. My initial post was a brief explanation of why the AV men wrote 'unicorn', along with a reminder that later translators knew the unicorn is a mythical critter. Therefore, while 'unicorn' isn't wrong in older Bibles, it would be remiss to continue to use that word in later Bibles when the existence of such a creature is questionable to put it mildly.

You make yourself look slightly foolish in defending such readings made with 17th century knowledge that are shown to be incorrect in light of today's knowledge. I know the AV men didn't deliberately write 'unicorn' incorrectly, but time has shown it to be incorrect.

 

Slambo:You mean Solomon was wrong when he penned " and there is no new thing under the sun???????"

Newp! The fossils were already there.

 

Trouble is, Slambo, you have your worlds mixed up. The fossils were there before God arranged the world into its present configuration and created man. Obviously, the animals died same as today in the prehistoric world as well as the present one.

Animals cannot sin; thus Romans 5:12 is as true today as it was when written.

 

Slambo:So your saying that death was present BEFORE Adam sinned???

Yes, in the world before God made the present arrangement.


Where in scripture is that found??!!

It's not. God is now concerned with THIS world order since He wiped out the older one. He chose not to give us any Scriptures about the old order that existed before this one.

Try a little study, Slambo. Do you realize that less than 1/20 of all the various species of both plants & animals that have ever existed are alive today? God didn't allow fossils to form and geological evidence to exist to CONFUSE us. He didn't allow us to discover the maximum speed of light & how to roughly measure the distances to many stars just to throw us off. There is a vast amount of evidence showing there has been life on earth for AGES before God ever created man or arranged the land and seas into their present order.

Remember, Moses wrote that at least one pair, male and female, of EVERY CREATURE went aboard the ark. It should be a no-brainer that meant every THEN-LIVING creature.I hardly believe that Noah woulda missed such a creature as megalosaurus, which was 1/4 the size of the ark, had they been extant.

Slambo, I KNOW you're not as silly as some of your posts are. God's Scriptures are concerned only with THIS world; He leaves it up to us to discover many things in His good time. Remember, He chose to include the bat among non-kosher BIRDS, leaving it up to later generations to find that bats aren't birds. Does that make God WRONG? Of course not. He communicated His message that bats are non-kosher. The bat would be no more non-kosher if He'd included it in His list of small mammals such as mice.

AND GOD DIDN'T INCLUDE THE UNICORN IN ANY OF HIS LISTS OF KOSHER & NON KOSHER!