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Church History Greek New Testament the Bible

Which is the best English Bible?

KJV

The King James Bible (KJB) was translated from the traditional Hebrew and Greek texts (Masoretic Hebrew Text, The Second Great Rabbinic Bible and the Greek Textus Receptus  (TR) or Received Text) and God’s Words in these original sources most Christians would agree are verbally inspired or God breathed. 2 Timothy 3:16 “All scripture is given by inspiration of God,…”.

But here’s what interesting. Modern translations (after 1880) are largely based on the Nestle-Aland Greek text, which is an edited version of the Westcott-Hort Greek text, which is largely the Codex Vaticanus with some corrections from Codex Sinaiticus, not Textus Receptus (TR) the Greek Text on which the KJB is based. The Nestle-Aland Greek text differs from the TR by about 9,970 Greek word differences, additions or subtractions equalling 7% of the total 140,521 words in TR. 

The Editors of the Nestle-Aland text were

“Kurt Aland (who is an unbeliever), Matthew Black (an unbeliever), Carlo M. Martini (a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church), Bruce Metzger (who is from Princeton, a man who demonstrated his apostasy as editor of the Reader’s Digest Bible), and Alan Wigren (from Chicago, an apostate also).” 

— D.A. Waite. Defending the King James Bible, (3rd edition, The Bible For Today Press, 2006, page 38.

This Greek text underlies most modern English translations. And there has been 26 new editions of their Greek text in 81 years? Shows that the Editors themselves don’t place much confidences in their own work. 

The Masoretic text was compiled from the ancient manuscripts of the Old Testament by the Masoretes Hebrew scholars dedicated to guarding and standardizing the traditional Hebrew text as “handed down” (the basic meaning of Masoretic) from the earlier Hebrew scribes, who had in turn meticulously copied the ancient Hebrew manuscripts, scrupulously guarding against error. As far as the Hebrew text developed by Rudolf Kittel is concerned, it is worth noting that Kittel was a German rationalistic higher critic, rejecting Biblical inerrancy and firmly devoted to evolutionism.

The men most responsible for alterations in the New Testament text were B.F. Westcott and F.J.A. Hort, whose Greek New Testament was largely updated by Eberhard Nestle and Kurt Aland. All of these men were evolutionists. Furthermore, Westcott and Hort both denied Biblical inerrancy and promoted spiritism and racism. Nestle and Aland, like Kittel, were German theological skeptics.

Westcott and Hort were also the most influential members of the English revision committee which produced the English Revised Version of the Bible. The corresponding American revision committee which developed the American Standard Version of 1901 was headed by another liberal evolutionist, Philip Schaff. Most new versions since that time have adopted the same presuppositions as those of the 19th century revisers.

Furthermore, the Westcott-Hort text was mainly based on two early Greek manuscripts, the Sinaiticus and Vaticanus texts, which were rediscovered and rescued from long (and well-deserved) obscurity in the 19th century. Since these are both said to be older than the 5000 manuscripts that support the Textus Receptus, they were called “better.” This was in spite of the fact that they frequently disagreed with each other as well as with the Textus Receptus and also contained many obvious and flagrant mistakes.

The fact that these two manuscripts may have been older does not prove they are better. More likely it indicates that they were set aside because of their numerous errors. Thus they would naturally last longer than the good manuscripts which were being used regularly.

So one of the serious problems with most modern English translations is that they rely heavily on Hebrew and Greek manuscripts of the Bible developed by liberals, rationalists, and evolutionists, none of whom believed in the verbal inspiration of the Bible. Is this how God would preserve His word? Would He not more likely have used devout scholars who believed in the absolute inerrancy and authority of the Bible?

—excerpted from “Should Creationists Abandon The King James Version?” by Henry Morris, Ph.D.

Chuck Missler has recently promoted the ISV as the best translation. But he mis-translates the Bible himself, promotes the false Gap theory of Genesis 1:2 (which is so obviously inconsistent with Exodus 20:11) and seems to spread confusion, not clarity. Watch this!

The Kings James Bible is the best most accurate translation in English of the original inspired Words of God so that we can say of the text of the KJB that they ARE the Words of God. But beware of deceivers…

For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many. (Matthew 24:5)

—Jesus Christ

Recommended Reading

By John Gideon Hartnett

Dr John G. Hartnett is an Australian physicist and cosmologist, and a Christian with a biblical creationist worldview. He received a B.Sc. (Hons) and Ph.D. (with distinction) in Physics from The University of Western Australia, W.A., Australia. He was an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Outstanding Researcher Award (DORA) fellow at the University of Adelaide, with rank of Associate Professor. Now he is retired. He has published more than 200 papers in scientific journals, book chapters and conference proceedings.