If I didn't believe there was a perfect Word of God that I can trust with every word being perfect and true, I would not be a believer today. For if I cannot trust one word, what makes me trust the words that Jesus had died for my sins, was buried, and was risen three days later? In other words, the Bible is a package deal. You either believe all of it. Every word. Or you don't believe it. I see the Word of God as perfect. I cannot add or take away from the Word of God. You can't change it. I have to submit to what it says and not to what I would like it for it to say with another new Modern Version or some fancy new Greek interpretation I discovered (When I know that nobody speaks Biblcial Greek anymore).
For a guy not interested in arguing this point, you sure are arguing it
The reason I can trust the bits about Jesus dying for my sins is the MSS testimony, the version,s the translations. There is no doubt on that point. It's not a question "if I can't trust one word, then I can't trust any of it" is just silly. It's essentially the genetic fallacy. Jason, there are some things you say that are wrong. That doesn't immediately mean all of what you say is suspect - you also say some very good things as well. The point is that I be honest and assess what you say on its own merits.
The same with the text of Scripture. A good 95% of the biblical text is beyond question. Most of the rest are spellings, harmonisations, insertions for clarification. Literally the two most significant doubtful passages are the Comma Johaneum and Long Mark. Neither destroys whether or not I can know that the Scripture's attest to the death and resurrection of Jesus, whether or not God has revealed himself through the profits, whether I am saved by faith, how to follow God, etc. You're creating an absolutist ultimatum that, unfortunately, has no basis in reality.
And, again, GOd's word being perfect or inerrant has nothing to do with what later scribes did with the text in one of hundreds of thousands of copies later.
I mean, what do you think people did for hundreds when there was no Modern Version and they just had the KJV? Again, if you lived during that time, you would not being having this debate. It would be silly.
I don't understand what you mean. The whole reason the KJV exists is because people had EXACTLY this debate - people realised they could do better than relying on the Latin versions for the basis of English bibles, and so instead they went back to the Greek to compile the Textus Receptus. That doesn't mean people wereen't saved, and were doing 'nothing', before they had TR based translations. It's the same dealio now.
We also have to remember that Jesus said.... Beware of the scribes. Who are the scribes? People who had tranSCRIBED the written Word of God. They are the scholars today who create new Bible versions and who change the Word of God very subtly. Yes, I am grateful that the Modern Versions can help me to understand the "Early Modern English." So they have some use to them. But I also have to be crazy wildly careful not to place my entire faith or authority in them because they add the devil's name in many passages where it is not supposed to be there.
So who were the people who compiled the TR, then? Who were the people who translated on the basis of the TR (though by no means stuck exclusively to the TR). What were they, if not scribes?
They change words like "Godhead" (Trinity) to "divine nature." They eliminate 1 Johnn 5:7 which is the clearest teaching on the Trinity. They eliminate "Walk after the Spirit" in Romans 8:1 which is the key focus point of Paul's argument in Romans 7 leading up to Romans 8. They change "Son of God" to "son of the gods" in Daniel. Sorry, I believe in the Son of God and I believe He was the One being spoken about in Daniel with his three friends.
Um, the change from Godhead to divine nature says precisely nothing about the Trinity. The word refers to the true divine nature of God, but is not a specific reference to his triune nature, which is a meaning 'godhead' came to have only AFTER the time of the KJV.
Read Matthew Henry's commentary on the chapter (17th century Christian who used the KJV), and it's clear he sees Godhead as an idea that does not necessarily include a trinune understanding. In fact, he explicitly says (and I quote):
"They could not come by natural light to the knowledge of the three persons in the Godhead (though some fancy they have found footsteps of this in Plato’s writings), but they did come to the knowledge of the Godhead, at least so much knowledge as was sufficient to have kept them from idolatry."
If he understood Godhead to include the concept of the Trinity, then he has not only contradicted the plain reading of the Scripture in his own dialect, but has actually just contradicted himself in the space of a sentence.
I've already gone over Romans 8:1 with you previously. It makes no sense for someone to take out 'walked in the Spirit', or to "meddle with the Scriptures", when the exact same expression comes up 3 verses later in reference to the same people in all the MSS- Christians.
1 John 5:7 I've also discussed with you before. It does not destroy the Trinity (although it is the most explicit statement in Scripture), it does not appear in the earliest MSS, it does not appear in the Syriac version, it does not appear in the Old Latin VSS, it does not appear in the earliest of church fathers, including ones who spoke on this precise passage and would have reason to quote the passage if they knew it, it does not even in appear in the majority of manuscripts, and most agree it comes from the Latin Vulgate (which is the first place it appears).
AS for Daniel, the only return answer that needs presenting is: are you really expecting Nebuchadnezzar to refer to and recognise the one true God in that moment, despite all that he does immediately after? If you want, we can discuss the Aramaic.
New Age Bible Versions is just a resource reference. Ignore her comments if you don't like them. But you can't ignore the plain side by side comparisons of the KJV vs. the Modern Translations. Well, unless of course you don't want to see it, then it really doesn't matter if you read the book or not. If people's minds are closed, we know too often how a person here will never see something. So I challenge you. Either get the book at the library or... just Google KJV vs. Modern Translations and do a bunch of comparing of the verses yourself. Ask yourself. Are things changed for the better or for the worse? If it is for the worse, then how is that a good thing?
Her entire comparison is underpinned by her belief that the modern versions deliberately set out to turn Christianity into a New Age religion. Her comparisons, in many cases, are explicit formed around that (there are occasions where she attacks modern translations saying simply "the Christ' because she believes "the Christ" is used as a New Age concept.
I already have the book, sitting right here on my desk. I have read it before, and I am more than willing to walk through with you and have a reasonable discussion of the comparisons, item by item, if you want. Give me page citations, if you like.
Finally, again, I will say this - the concepts of better or worse in this case can only make sense if you have already decided what it is that the apostles and prophets originally wrote. Or do you implicitly mean to say that it is ok, or even possible, that one can improve on the words they originally wrote down (i.e that what the prophets wrote was 'worse' than what came after?)? If not, then it is self-contradictory to say something is subjectively 'better' because it more explicitly discusses, say, the Trinity, if that more explicit statement was not actually written by the biblical writers.
