The Error of KJV-Onlyism

Some say that the KJV is too hard to understand. Compare it to the ESV.

On the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level (a non-bias comparison) the KJV received a 4.32 when the ESV received an 8.22.

The sentence complexity for the KJV is 29, when the ESV is 61.

Vocabulary complexity for the KJV is 2 and the ESV is 10, with the higher number being easier to read.

The short sentences in the KJV has 10,342 and the ESV with 3,441.

Again the KJV has 5,728 simple sentences with the ESV having 2,301.

The ESV had 13,478 big words, while the KJV only had 7,020.

Finally, the KJV had the average of 8.78 average words per sentence when the ESV had 18.82.

These results show that the KJV is an easier read than the modern ESV.

You are building my case. Only believers who have the Holy Spirit can confess that Jesus is Lord. An unbeliever cannot confess Jesus is Lord because they are not even saved for him to be their Lord.

Oooh... let's make yet another fallacious comparison.

I wonder if the average person, new to the Bible, has ever heard of the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level assessment. I would suspect not, and I would further suspect that they wouldn't care.

In other words, the above is irrelevant. If a person perceives the KJV to be difficult, then it is difficult (for them). Period. Technical assessments mean nothing. The same goes for any translation.

By the way, I wouldn't recommend the ESV to most people unless they were avid graduate-level readers. It's not a beginner's translation.

There are no other kinds.

Your argument is moot. Let it go.

The serpent asked Eve, "did God really say?" and She answered, "yes, he did say that" and the serpent said, "Well, God lied..." That is the truth, in so many words.
Now, go on, someone accuse me of being a liar and changing scripture.

You're continuing to prove my initial point. Thank you.

Please elaborate.

The modern versions say, "That if you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord...you will be saved." How can someone who is not saved confess Jesus as Lord? Only those with the Spirit can confess Jesus is Lord. Confessing Jesus is Lord is not about salvation.

You seem to not really understand the context of these words. Here is a brief explanation from one of my favorite sites:

The word itself
We find some help in understanding the word confess from its Greek origin, homologeo. The roots homo, means same, and logeo, to speak, thus, to say the same thing, or agree. Confess means to share a common view, or to concede or admit that something is true. There is nothing about the word itself that demands a public or oral declaration to others. Twice in Romans, the confession is made to God (14:11; 15:9; compare its use in 1 John 1:9).

The context
Paul is primarily writing to the Jews in Rome (10:1-3), though this truth applies to all people (10:4, 11-13). His Jewish countrymen were not eternally saved, because they had rejected Christ's righteousness while trying to establish their own (10:3). The Jews needed to believe in Jesus Christ as their Messiah; in other words, they needed to confess Him, to admit that only Jesus could give them righteousness. Confess, therefore, has the same significance as believe (compare how confess is used in 1 John 2:23; 4:2-3; 2 John 7). The confession, as with faith, is directed toward God, not men. Faith is the prominent issue in the context (10:4, 6, 11, 14, 17). Paul's interchange of confess and believe in verses 9-11 point to a similar meaning, as do believing and calling on the Lord in verses 11-13.

The quote from Dueteronomy
In verses 6-8, Paul quotes Deuteronomy 30:12-14 to remind the Jews of what they had already heard and even perhaps had memorized. They did not need to search extensively for God's righteousness. It was and is readily available—as near as their mouths and hearts. All the Jews need to do is agree with or admit the truth of God's Old Testament testimony of righteousness in the Messiah, to believe in Jesus Christ. The mouth and heart are intrinsically connected (Matt. 12:34; Luke 6:45) as reflected both in the Deuteronomy quote and Paul's use of it.

To "confess the Lord Jesus" simply means to admit that Jesus is who God said He is, the Messiah and Savior. The designation "Lord" in verse 9 and in the quote from Joel 2:32 in verse 13 translate the divine name YHWH, which has the primary significance of deity.

Looks like people are misreading again and being stupidly cherry-picky.

Confessing The Lord Jesus with your mouth AND believing in your heart that God raised Jesus from the dead...go together in one verse, it is not a part verse. In all scriptures, both KJV and other versions.

Its the confessing AND the believing in your heart thats important.

As for faith of or faith in...I think people are reading in a bit of calvinistic belief into their preferred versions of the Bible, or they are doing the dispy thing and using KJV to justify a cherry picking of pet doctrines. Its not there if you actually read it in order.

Jesus did say to many great is YOUR faith when he healed them. He wasnt boasting about his own faith. And in Hebrews 11 the cloud of witnesses are mentioned how their faith worked i.e what they did. And again, James was saying about faith without works is dead. And this is all in KJV too.

And the KJV says, "If if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus... thou shalt be saved." You're criticizing "the modern versions" when the KJV says exactly the same thing. I honestly don't understand what you think the problem is here.

Agreed. What's the issue?

Um, what? It is evidence of salvation.

if a translation has ellipses and misses out scripture that is not a good version, but I dont think they all do that.

Can you say which one does that or are you just quoting something and cutting out scripture yourself. Or reinterpreting it?

Well your paraphrase is not faulty, but something else which should have been brought out is the correspondence between "Yea, hath God said...?" (Satan) and the same attitude of the Higher and Lower (or textual) critics. They do not really believe in the divine inspiration and preservation of the Word of God, and that God says what He means, and means what He says. And that has led to a whole raft of corrupt modern versions, which have changed the truth of God into a lie. Adding and subtracting from Scripture is forbidden, but the modern translators did not get that message.

In regards to your claim that Erasmus said a similar thing to the serpent in questioning God's words:

Well, as you said to me here in another thread,


Please keep in mind that I was able to provide evidence when you made this quote, and yet now you are not providing any for me when I am asking for it.

Again, the two lies in the Garden by the Serpent should give you a clue as to what is wrong with most of Christianity today.
Most Christians do not believe in a perfect Bible and they believe that it is okay to question the text like Textual Critics do in certain places of the Bible to hopefully one day figure out perfectly what God said. This is like the words of the serpent when he said, "Yea, hath God said...?" (Genesis 3:1). The other lie by the Serpent that he was pushing was that, "ye shall not die" (Genesis 3:4). Meaning, it was the lie that one could break God's command and not die. Adam and Eve did not die physically the day they disobeyed God, but they died spiritually. Obviously living like the devil on some level, and being unfruitful sounds appealing to many in this Laodicean age. Just read the last chapter of the Bible (Revelation 22). While we are initially saved by a belief alone by believing the gospel message in 1 Corinthians 15:1-4, that is not the only requirement as a part of our faith (See: 2 Thessalonians 2:13-14, Galatians 6:8-9, Romans 8:13, 1 Timothy 5:8, 1 Timothy 6:3-4, James 4:6). In Revelation 22:14-15, it doesn't sound like a "Perpetual Belief Alone Salvationism" to me. But if that helps you to sleep at night believing the easy and wide gate path put forth by the teachings of men, go ahead and believe whatever you wish. This is not really the argument involving the KJB position. Neither do I argue for the secondary aspect of salvation in my 101 Reasons for the KJB, either. It's not necessary. There is enough evidence already to refute the false belief of Modern Textual Criticism and to trust in a perfect Word of God.

In any event, I see your post here as an attempt to drive a wedge between me and my fellow KJB Bible believers. We may disagree on certain things (like sin and salvation), but we both believe that the King James Bible is the Word of God, and it is our final authority for all matters of faith and practice. Note: There is another KJB Only believer who believes Eternal Security is false (Safeguardyoursoul.com). Anyway, most today do not have a final word of authority. That's the problem. The Bible says we are all to speak the same thing, that is simply not possible in the world of Textual Criticism.


Side Note:

I also do not technically believe in works salvationism as if that was the only form of salvation I believe in (Which is implied by what you said).

I believe in two aspects of salvation.

Aspect #1. We are initially saved by a belief alone in Jesus as our Savior and the gospel message in that Christ died for our sins, He was buried, and risen the third day for our salvation (Ephesians 2:8-9) (Titus 3:5). Also, if a believer unintentionally sins again on rare occasion, they do not go out and do a good work to absolve themselves of that sin before God, but they boldly come before the throne of grace and seek forgiveness with the Lord Jesus (See: 1 John 1:9, and 1 John 2:1). We also continue to believe the gospel message in 1 Corinthians 15:1-4. So we are initially and foundationally saved by God's grace.

Aspect #2. God has chosen us to salvation through the Sanctification of the Spirit and a belief of the truth (2 Thessalonians 2:13).
Sanctification is to live a holy life. 2 Corinthians 7:1 says, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. But many believers today do not believe this verse. They do not think the word "fear" means "fear" as we would understand that word because they don't like what this verse plainly says. It has no advantage for them in their current belief that they can sin and still be saved on some level. But without holiness, no man shall see the Lord (Hebrews 12:14). Holy living will require one to be fruitful. Remember, in the parable of the Talents, the unprofitable servant was cast into outer darkness (Matthew 25:30).

Most folks fail to see what happened in Acts 15 in regards to the false belief of Circumcision Salvationism. They do not understand that is what Paul was fighting against in many of his letters.

Anyway, if you want to continue this discussion involving my view of sin and salvation, it would best to do so in another thread.

May God bless you and your family (even I disagree with your beliefs strongly).

Sincerely,

Bible Highlighter.

I wonder where they got the 17th Century Elizabethans to test for the assessment.

While false beliefs can come from even a pure translation that is inspired like the King James Bible (Because a person needs the Holy Spirit to guide them and they need to employ honesty when reading things contextually), it is a sure fire bet that some false doctrine will be picked up by a person believing in a Modern Bible because they are are riddled with many false doctrines. Not believing in a perfect preserved Word of God is a false doctrine that denies the promise of Psalms 12:6-7.

Correct, but that's not what the new versions state.

When one confesses the Lord Jesus, one is agreeing with the testimony concerning the Lord Jesus. Compared to confessing that Jesus is Lord, one is confessing that Jesus is Lord of their life. Big difference.