The Error of KJV-Onlyism

The title of this thread is "The Error of KJV-Onlyism".

I have thought about this issue extensively and haven't been able to come up with a satisfactory answer -- until now.

KJV-Onlyism is idolatry! Rather than understanding that the KJV is just one of many English translations, the KJV-only people have elevated it to an irrational level.

Throughout the Bible, in both the Old and New Testaments, God's people are warned over and over against Idolatry. Instead of turning to God Himself, people (including God's own people) turned to physical objects made of inanimate materials, to “speak” to them for guidance, wisdom, and other matters. Idols can be made of almost any material: wood, metal, leather, paper, etc.

Rather than communicating with their true Father – the living God – for guidance and answers, people seek inanimate objects instead. They believed that those objects, rather than God, would give them answers.

Jesus specifically warned about this in John 14:6, saying “I am the way, the truth, and the life. Nobody comes to the Father except through me.” Not through an inanimate book which cannot “speak”!

Does an idol “speak” normally? Of course not! Because it is not actually a person, it speaks ABNORMALLY, and only certain people can understand what their idol is actually “saying”. (Others, of course, cannot.)

This is the same kind of distorted thinking that KJV-only people have. They think that only their translation can accurately communicate God's words. They come up with all kinds of rationalizations and twisted facts to justify their rigid opinion, but there is no actual basis for their claims.

They have turned the King James Bible, a single translation, into an idol. It is a translation through which God communicates to people, but it is not God. It is idolatry!

To me, that is tragic!

What do you really know about the source documents? Today there are two printed Greek texts -- (1) the Westcott/Hort Nestle-Aland text (or Critical Text) and (2) the Received Text. So let me show you that the NIV deliberately and gratuitously corrupted this verse.

CRITICAL TEXT
καὶ ὁ Κορνήλιος ἔφη Ἀπὸ τετάρτης ἡμέρας μέχρι ταύτης τῆς ὥρας ἤμην τὴν ἐνάτην προσευχόμενος ἐν τῷ οἴκῳ μου, καὶ ἰδοὺ ἀνὴρ ἔστη ἐνώπιόν μου ἐν ἐσθῆτι λαμπρᾷ
RECEIVED TEXT
καὶ ὁ Κορνήλιος ἔφη Ἀπὸ τετάρτης ἡμέρας μέχρι ταύτης τῆς ὥρας ἤμην νηστεύων, καὶ τὴν ἐννάτην ὥραν προσευχόμενος ἐν τῷ οἴκῳ μου καὶ ἰδού, ἀνὴρ ἔστη ἐνώπιόν μου ἐν ἐσθῆτι λαμπρᾷ

While there is no exact match to the entire verse (difference has been bolded), Ἀπὸ τετάρτης ἡμέρας (ago four days) is in both verse. Idiomatically that is "four days ago". Every English translation, other than the corrupt NIV and Weymouth, has "four days ago". But those two have "three days ago". On what grounds? None whatsoever. The NIV has simply played fast and loose with the Bible. And this is only a very small tip of the iceberg. The NIV has made hundreds of such changes.

I would like to get this book at some point. I have a long list of books to read on the KJV believing topic. However, I am still busy with my write-up for the 101 Reasons for the KJB. A Christian friend at work challenged me. He asked me, “If I could only choose one reason on my list, what would it be?” I really did not have an answer from my list, but it was one outside my list. I believe the #1 Reason is changed doctrine (When doing a comparison between the KJV vs. Modern Bibles). I had 23 major doctrines that were changed on my list. I decided to remove the doctrines as individual points and make it just one point and mention the changed doctrines as sub article in my write-up. This is challenging because I have to come up with more reasons (22 of them). I came up with 16 new reasons for the KJB. I am considering 2 new reasons. But I need to come up with 4 additional new ones. It is very challenging because I have so many good reasons already. But I have been praying about it, and I know God will help me to finish it. I want this write-up to be the ultimate free write-up for people to trust in the KJB.

Unfortunately, the only thing you don't have is any kind of promise from the Lord that He would preserve His word in the King James Bible and only the King James Bible. Too bad.

You seem to have missed the point after all these posts. The Word of God is preserved in the traditional Hebrew and Greek texts (which represent the majority of manuscripts). And the KJB is based squarely on these texts. So what does that mean to any thoughtful and unbiased person?

Show me an OT prophecy that says it was Jesus Christ who is going to be the Messiah. In other words, we don’t have to have His name in OT Messianic prophecies to know He is the Messiah. So this is why your rationality here is silly and unbiblical.

the NIV deliberately and gratuitously corrupted this verse

On what grounds? None proof whatsoever? LOL!!!

Quite obviously a) you want to attack the best-selling Bible (without evidence) and b) you know nothing about the source documents or the art/science of Bible translation.

It means that you don't know what you're talking about.

Why do you believe myths?

Translators were told to follow the Bishops' Bible as much as possible, and to be guided by the previous translations of Tyndale and Coverdale when they agreed better with the original texts and manuscripts, supported by translations of available Biblical manuscripts. The New Testament was translated using the Textus Receptus (Received Text) series of Greek texts. For the Old Testament, the Masoretic Hebrew text was used, and for the Apocrypha, the Greek Septuagint text was used primarily.

Since the translators were instructed to use the Bishops' Bible (1568) as a guide, which was a revision of the Great Bible (1539), which was a revision of the Matthew's Bible (1537), which was a revision of Coverdale's first Bible that included all of Tyndale's translation work (1535), the King James version includes much of the wording of the Tyndale and Coverdale translations.

Hoho, you should have to because, this is what you are good in.

Here are the rules the King James "translators" were to follow...

1. The ordinary Bible read in the Church, commonly called the Bishops’ Bible, to be followed, and as little altered as the truth of the original will permit.
2. The names of the prophets, and the holy writers, with the other names in the text, to be retained, as near as may be, accordingly as they are vulgarly used.
3. The old ecclesiastical words to be kept, viz.: as the word “Church” not to be translated “Congregation” etc.
4. When a word hath diverse significations, that to be kept which hath been most commonly used by the most of the Ancient Fathers, being agreeable to the propriety of the place, and the Analogy of Faith.
5. The division of the chapters to be altered either not at all, or as little as may be, if necessity so require.
6. No marginal notes at all to be affixed, but only for the explanation of the Hebrew or Greek words, which cannot without some circumlocution so briefly and fitly be expressed in the text.
7. Such quotations of places to be marginally set down as shall serve for fit reference of one Scripture to another.
8. Every particular man of each company to take the same chapter or chapters, and having translated or amended them severally by himself where he think good, all to meet together, confer what they have done, and agree for their parts what shall stand.
9. As one company hath dispatched any one book in this manner, they shall send it to the rest to be considered of seriously and judiciously, for His Majesty is very careful for this point.
10. If any company, upon the review of the book so sent, shall doubt or differ upon any place, to send them word thereof, note the place and withal send their reasons, to which if they consent not, the difference to be compounded at the general meeting, which is to be of the chief persons of each company, at the end of the work.
11. When any place of especial obscurity is doubted of, letters to be directed by authority to send to any learned man in the land for his judgement of such a place.
12. Letters to be sent from every Bishop to the rest of his clergy, admonishing them of this translation in hand, and to move and charge as many as being skilful in the tongues have taken pains in that kind, to send his particular observations to the company, either at Westminster, Cambridge or Oxford.
13. The directors in each company to be the Deans of Westminster and Chester for that place, and the King’s Professors in the Hebrew and Greek in each University.
14. These translations to be used where they agree better with the text than the Bishops’ Bible, viz.: Tyndale’s, Matthew’s, Coverdale’s, Whitchurch’s [Great Bible], Geneva.

Quite obviously you can't even write a reasonable English sentence. And you use the King James Bible???

Rule #1 must have been slightly modified or changed because the KJV translators said that out of many good ones they made one principle good one. Meaning, they looked at other Textus Receptus English Bibles.

Actually those are not trivia but blunders and there are more examples.

I have no idea what that means.

I wrote "Do you really think that this kind of trivia deserves an answer?" and you answered with "Hoho, you should have to because, this is what you are good in."

The point that I am making is that many people who use the King James translation, which is basically written in early 17th Century "Englyshe", do not even have a good command of the English that we use today. The King James translation is not easy to understand! Yet some people claim that they understand "God's inerrant word" when they can't even express themselves decently in modern English.

As a result, they read whatever they want to read into it. Very often that is false doctrine. I cannot understand why anyone would want to use a translation that is not clearly understandable.

Again, it is definitely an error to claim that any single translation is the written Word of God.

1) It is impossible to translate any of the languages of the Bible into English (regardless of which type of English). There are too many differences between the languages -- the meaning of individual words, verb tenses, word order, idioms, meaning in context. Even if such a translation was possible, how would the differences among the source documents be resolved?

2) Every translation should be clearly understood by the target audience. "The word of God is living and active..." and should produce in the reader the same understanding that the original readers had. That is extremely difficult, as words are always interpreted through a cultural "lens". None of us are living in the Biblical era (which extended over thousands of years); our modern culture is entirely different from the cultures of Biblical times. and none of us live in the culture of early 17th Century England either.
The best translation to use is the one that is most clearly understood in the reader's mind, as understood through her/his cultural "lens". There is a very good reason that the NIV is the best-selling Bible today: it is the clearest written, most understandable Bible to our 21st Century minds. Nobody can give a convincing argument that a translation created more than 400 years ago meets that criterion.

God's word is meant to be clearly understood!!! => EVERY SINGLE PERSON SHOULD READ A BIBLE THAT COMMUNICATES GOD'S MESSAGE TO HER/HIS SELF AS CLEARLY AS POSSIBLE <= To me, that means a Bible that is translated into the English that I have heard, read, and spoken my entire life. And that should be the case for YOU also.

It isn't unbiblical or irrational; it is just that neither Christians nor Jews understand the messiahship. The Jews are hoping for their final messiah for 2000 years and smear them with the wrong fluid; while Christians think there is only one Messiah or Christ ever. Moses, David etc etc. and even Saul were messiah. And Saul was a very wicked one.

Alright man, but can you deal with the facts, It should be pointed out that "filled with compassion is entirely different from being 'indignant' and previously it says 'Four' to 'three' are not only spelling changes. What happened to the accuracy of the NIV? Thanks

NIV 1973, 1978, 1984 - “FILLED WITH COMPASSION, Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man.”
NIV 2011 - “Jesus WAS INDIGNANT. He reached out his hand and touched the man.”

NIV - 1973, 1978 and 1984 editions - “Cornelius answered: “FOUR days ago I was in my house praying at this hour, at three in the afternoon. Suddenly a man in shining clothes stood before me”
NIV 2011 edition - “Cornelius answered: “THREE days ago I was in my house praying at this hour, at three in the afternoon. Suddenly a man in shining clothes stood before me”

You're not getting what I said. The Bible itself teaches a connection between the Living Word (Jesus) and the Communicated Word (like Scripture). I have discovered about 40 such verses. So if you accept such a truth in the Bible, we cannot claim that the Scriptures must refer to the KJV by name (if it is the pure Word for today) because the Scriptures do not prophetically speak of Jesus Christ specifically by name. What you speak of does not in any way relate to my point.

The Symbiotic Relationship Between
The Living Word, & the Communicated Word:

1. Christ is good (John 10:11, John 10:14), and the word is good (1 Kings 2:42).
   
   
2. Christ is the truth (John 14:6), and the word is the truth (John 17:17).
   
   
3. Christ is called Faithful and True (Revelation 19:11), and the word is called faithful and true (Revelation 22:6).
   
   
4. Christ is pure (1 John 3:3), and the word is pure (Proverbs 30:5).
   
   
5. Christ is incorruptible (Acts of the Apostles 2:27), and the word is incorruptible (1 Peter 1:23).
   
   
6. Christ abides forever (John 12:34), and the word abides forever (1 Peter 1:23).
   
   
7. Christ’s name: “Jesus” is above all names (Which would include God’s name) (Philippians 2:9-10), and the word is above God’s name (Psalms 138:2).
   
   
8. Christ has flaming eyes of fire (Revelation 19:12), and the Word is like a fire (Jeremiah 23:29).
   
   
9. Christ can burn things like a fire (Matthew 3:12), and the word can burn things like a fire (Luke 24:32).
   
   
10. Christ can be eaten (John 6:57), and the word can be eaten (Jeremiah 15:16).
    
    
11. Christ is like the discovery of treasure (Matthew 13:44-46, cf. 2 Corinthians 4:7-10), and the word is like the discovery of treasure (Psalms 119:162).
    
    
12. Christ is the light (John 8:12), and the word is light (Psalms 119:105).
    
    
13. Christ is life (John 14:6, 1 John 5:12), and the word is life (John 6:63).
    
    
14. Christ is the living bread (John 6:51), and the word is the living bread (Matthew 4:4).
    
    
15. Christ is eternal life (Romans 6:23, 1 Timothy 6:16, 1 John 5:20) and the word is eternal life (John 6:68) (cf. Matthew 24:35, John 6:63).
    
    
16. Christ quickens (makes alive) (John 5:21), and the word quickens (makes alive) (Psalms 119:50).
    
    
17. It is by Christ which makes the gospel possible (1 Corinthians 15:1-4), and it is by the word which makes the gospel possible (1 Peter 1:25).
    
    
18. Christ is near to men (Acts of the Apostles 17:27) (Revelation 3:20) (Psalms 145:18), and the word is near to men (Romans 10:8).
    
    
19. Christ discerns the heart (Matthew 9:4, Luke 9:47), and the word discerns the heart (Hebrews 4:12).
    
    
20. Christ can get men through a storm (Mark 4:35-41), and the word can get men through a storm (Matthew 7:24-25).
    
    
21. Christ sanctifies (John 17:19), and the word sanctifies (John 17:17).
    
    
22. A person can stumble over Christ (Romans 9:33, 1 Peter 2:5-8), and a person can stumble over the word (1 Peter 2:8).
    
    
23. Christ will judge men (John 5:22), and the word will judge men (John 12:48).
    
    
24. Christ’s bones were never broken (John 19:36 cf. Psalms 34:20), and the word is never broken (John 10:35).
    
    
25. Believers are told to seek after Christ (Matthew 28:5, Mark 16:6), and believers are told to seek after the word (Isaiah 34:16).
    
    
26. Christ is our hope (1 Thessalonians 1:3, Colossians 1:27, 1 Timothy 1:1), and the word is our hope (Psalms 130:5).
    
    
27. Believers are to have the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16), and believers are to meditate (use their mind) upon the word (Psalms 119:148, 2 Timothy 2:15 KJV).
    
    
28. Christ is to be heard and obeyed (Matthew 7:24), and the word is to be heard and obeyed (James 1:22).
    
    
29. The love of God is within Christ (Romans 8:39), and keeping the word places the love of God within us (1 John 2:5) (Also see John 14:23).
    
    
30. Christ is the way to the living waters, which is the Holy Spirit (John 7:37-39), and the washing of the water of the word (Ephesians 5:25-27) (which is obedience to God) is the way to having the Spirit (Acts of the Apostles 5:32).
    
    
31. Christ is like the foundation that is a part of a house (1 Corinthians 3:9, 1 Corinthians 3:11), and He is like a rock (1 Corinthians 10:4), and the obeying the word is like a house built upon the rock (Matthew 7:24).
    
    
32. Believers are to follow after the steps of Christ (1 Peter 2:21), and believers are to order their steps in the word (Psalms 119:133).
    
    
33. Christ breathed the Spirit upon his faithful chosen (John 20:22), and the word is “inspired by God” (i.e. God breathed) for the benefit of his faithful chosen (2 Timothy 3:16-17).
    
    
34. Christ is the way to having the fruits of righteousness (Philippians 1:11), and the word is the way to being instructed in righteousness so to be perfect unto all good works (fruits) (2 Timothy 3:16-17).
    
    
35. Christ can abide in us (John 15:4-7) (Ephesians 3:17) (Philippians 4:13), and the word can abide in us (John 15:7, Psalms 119:11).
    
    
36. Christ dwells in our hearts (Ephesians 3:17), and the word dwells in our hearts (Colossians 3:16).
    
    
37. Believers can be hidden in Christ (Colossians 3:3), and the word can be hidden in believers (Psalms 119:11).
    
    
38. Christ is always with us (Matthew 28:20), and the word is always with us (Psalms 119:98).
    
    
39. Christ can make our joy full (John 15:11), and the word can make our joy full (1 John 1:4).
    
    
40. Believers’ hearts rejoice with Christ (John 16:22), and believers’ hearts rejoice with the word (Jeremiah 15:16).

..41. Christ is called a seed (Galatians 3:16), and the word is called a seed (1 Peter 1:23, Luke 8:11) (Note: See my post below here for further details).


The communicated word of God that we have today is the Bible.

“So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.” (Isaiah 55:11).

Jesus (the Living Word) was sent by the commandment (mouth) of the Father. Jesus said and did everything the Father told Him to do (John 12:49) (John 14:31).

What is interesting is that the Living Word accomplished that which the Father commanded Him to do and to prosper (accomplish) that thing He sent to do (i.e. Jesus suffered on the cross, and said, “It is finished” and died for man’s sins). Jesus was risen three days later, and ascended to the Father. God’s Word (the living Word) did not return void by whom the Father sent.

The communicated Word can also be sent out and not return void, as well. For many have believed and have stayed faithful to what God’s Word says.

In the creation: The Word made flesh (John 1:1, John 1:14) (i.e. Christ) created everything. In the beginning God spoke words to bring forth the creation in six days (Genesis 1:1-31).

So in the beginning was the Living Word, and the communicated Word.

In the end of this sinful world: Christ will return (Revelation 19:11-21) and a sharp sword will proceed from His mouth. This sword could be the “sword of the Spirit,” (Which is the Word of God) or it could be symbolic of such (Ephesians 6:17).

So in the end there will be the Living Word, and the communicated Word.

For at Christ’s return: His name is called The “Word of God.” (Revelation 19:13) (Living Word).

On His thigh, and vesture is a name written (words) “KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.” (Communicated Word).

Jesus was beaten to a pulp and crucified on a tree.

The Word we have today (the Bible) is a result of pulp made from a tree.

Jesus was the Word made flesh (covered in skin).

The Word we have today (the Bible) is popular to be available covered in skin (leather).

Words on the page hang on this tree (paper) (the Bible),
just like the Living Word hung on a tree (the cross).

Jesus says,
“Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.” (John 5:39).

This is completely false. There is only one Messiah*. and He is the one who was "cut off" (crucified), but not for Himself: And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined. (Dan 9:26).

Every time we see the English word "Christ" (Gk Christos) in the New Testament it means "Messiah" (the Anointed One) in Hebrew ( מָשִׁ֖יחַ mā-šî-aḥ) .
*Strong's Concordance
mashiach: anointed
Original Word: מָשִׁיחַ
Part of Speech: Noun Masculine
Transliteration: mashiach
Phonetic Spelling: (maw-shee'-akh)
Definition: anointed