The KJV: revised or edited?

BOTH
there has yet to be produced a "perfect' Kjv version, or a Sole Kjv version agreed upon as the the "real and only" one!

 

Editing is what may be done to a manuscript or book before it is printed or published.

Changes made to a book or Bible that has already been printed are properly, accurately, or correctly called revisions. The new revision of an earlier edition may also be edited, but its changes to an earlier edition can accurately be referred to as "revisions."

The 1828 Webster's Dictionary defined revision as "the act of reviewing; review; re-examination for correction; as the revision of a book."

Roget's Thesaurus listed "revision" and "correction" as synonyms.

Rodale’s Synonym Finder gave “revised or new edition” as a synonym for “revision“ (p. 1036).

If the text of the 1611 edition of the KJV needed to be corrected, changed, or improved, it can accurately and properly be said to have been revised.

The word "revision" can be accurately used concerning later editions of the KJV.

In his “Editor’s Introduction” to The New Cambridge Paragraph Bible, David Norton observed that the 1769 KJV text and that of later editions “is not the translators’ text but has many readings changed according to the judgements of editors who had made it into a revised version: not a heavily revised version, but still a revised version” (p. viii). David Lawton asserted that “the copies of the King James Bible that we now possess are very different from the original production” (Faith, p. 78). Glenn Conjurske pointed out: “The King James Version itself has been subjected to a number of minor revisions since 1611” (Olde Paths, April, 1993, p. 85). William Paul claimed that the 1769 “Oxford Standard Edition” became “popularly known as “Blayney’s Revision of the King James Version (Oxford, 1769)” (English Language Bible, p. 32).


Geddes MacGregor observed: “It is a common supposition that the text of the King James Version has never varied. This is, however, far from the case” (Bible in the Making, p. 181). William Chamberlin maintained: ‘The KJV text usually differs in minor points, from edition to edition, printer to printer” (Catalogue of English Bible Translations, p. 10). There were at least two different editions of the KJV printed in 1611. The Cambridge History of the Bible noted that “by a chain of accidents the sheets of the two [1611] editions were frequently mixed, so that during the early years of the new version’s life no one copy was certain to agree with all others in all places” (p. 458). In an article in Hendrickson’s reprint of the 1611 KJV, Alfred Pollard noted that “It must be remembered that no copy of the version of 1611 had been ‘sealed’ as a standard, as was done in the case of the Prayer-book” (p. 53). In 1613, a new edition of the KJV was printed with over 400 variations from the original printing.

William Loftie wrote: “It is no exaggeration to assert that our modern Bible [A. V.] is altered throughout from its original, for the better in some places, for the worse in some” (Century of Bibles, p. 4). David Norton pointed out: “Changes--sometimes deliberate, sometimes accidental, some for the better, some not--were made in subsequent printings by the King’s Printer” (Textual History of the KJV, p. 3).

 

Which begs the question, if the 1611 was the perfect translation, why revise it at all?

 

To make it even more perfect! Didn't you know that perfect can be improved upon?

 

Well, since some of the ardent KJVO seem to make the KJV same as the originals themselves

 

There are revision such as NKJV and ASV and then there are editing such as MKJV and KJVER.

 

It can be known that the work of the KJV translators had errors based on a comparison of their work to the preserved Scriptures in the original languages.

It can be known that the makers of the KJV failed to make sure that the printers corrected quickly any errors that they were supposedly responsible for introducing into the 1611. Some of the KJV translators had positions of authority and powers of censorship over printing so that they could have made sure any errors introduced by the printers were quickly corrected in the very next edition or especially in any edition printed two or three years after 1611.

At least some of the work of the KJV translators themselves has been found in an annotated edition of the 1602 edition of the Bishops' Bible with the changes made by the KJV translators written in it, a manuscript [Lambeth Palace MS 98] from the first stage of the KJV translators' work, and the notes of KJV translator John Bois.

If the KJV translators failed to write in a correction of an error found in the 1602 edition of the Bishops' Bible, that would not be the fault of the 1611 printers.

David Norton observed: “The KJB of 1611 reproduces peculiarities of the Bishops’ Bible, some of which are found only in the 1602 printings” (Textual History of the KJB, p. 35). Norton asserted: “That the KJB was printed from an annotated Bishops’ Bible--possibly from Bod1602--is almost certain from the presence of the peculiarities and errors that come directly from the printed 1602 text” (KJB: a Short History, p. 106). Norton wrote: “Several times a Bishops’ Bible mistake creeps apparently unnoticed into the KJB text” (p. 130).

The fact that the KJV translators did not make sure that some errors found in the 1602 edition of the Bishops' Bible and kept in the 1611 edition of the KJV were corrected even in a long period of time as much as over ten years could suggest that they had not noticed nor corrected those same errors in the copies of the 1602 edition of the Bishops' Bible that they used as their starting point.

1 Kings 11:5 [Ammonites--1560 Geneva, 1568 Bishops; Amorites--1602 Bishops]
Amorites {1611, 1613, 1614, 1616, 1617, 1631, 1634, 1640, 1644 London}

Ammonites (1769 Oxford, SRB) [1629, 1769 Cambridge, DKJB]

2 Kings 24:19 [Jehoiakim--1560 Geneva; Joachin--1602 Bishops]
Jehoiachin [1817 Cambridge] {1611, 1613, 1614, 1616, 1631, 1634, 1640, 1644, 1650 London} (1816 Albany) (1816 Collins) (1818 Holbrook) (1823, 1827 Smith) (1832 PSE) (1835 Towar) (1843 AFBS) (1854 Harding)

Jehoiakim (1769 Oxford, SRB) [1629, 1769 Cambridge, DKJB]

2 Kings 11:10 [house of the Lord--1560 Geneva; the temple--1602 Bishops]
the Temple {1611, 1613, 1614, 1616, 1617, 1631, 1634 London} (1843 AFBS)
the temple (1675 Oxford) [1629, 1637, 1648, 1677, 1817, 2005, 2011 Cambridge] {1640, 1644, 1650, 1672 London} (1638 Edinburgh) (1816 Albany) (1816 Collins) (1818 Holbrook) (1823, 1827 Smith) (1828 MH) (1832 PSE) (1854 Harding) (2006 PENG)

the temple of the LORD (1769 Oxford, SRB) [1638, 1769 Cambridge, DKJB]

1 Kings 4:10 [Hesed--1560 Geneva, 1568 Bishops; Heseb--1602 Bishops]
Heseb {1611, 1613, 1614, 1616, 1617, 1631, 1634, 1640, 1644, 1650 London}

Hesed (1769 Oxford, SRB) [1629, 1769 Cambridge, DKJB]

1 Kings 8:61 [Lord our God--1560 Geneva, 1568 Bishops; Lord your God--1602 Bishops] [see 1 Kings 8:59]
LORD you God {1631 London}
LORD your God {1611, 1613, 1614, 1616, 1617, 1634, 1640, 1644, 1650 London} (1843 AFBS)

LORD our God (1769 Oxford, SRB) [1629, 1769 Cambridge, DKJB]

 

While we may not now have the complete text that the makers of the KJV prepared for the printer, you skip over the fact that the king's printer in London still had it during the first ten or twenty years of his printing of the KJV. There are historical mentions of that text prepared by the KJV translators still existing as late as the 1650's, and perhaps it was not lost until the London fire of 1660. Therefore, if the printer's typesetters had introduced errors in the 1611 edition, the king's printer could have used the translators' own work to find and correct them. The king's printer did correct some errors, perhaps using the text prepared by the KJV translators, that were more likely the fault of the typesetters in those first ten to twenty years.

The errors that the king's printer did not correct [such as some of the errors found in the 1602 edition of the Bishops' Bible and kept in the 1611] could have been the responsibility of the KJV translators and not the fault of the printer or typesetters since they did not get corrected by the printer or proof-readers comparing the printed 1611 edition to the text prepared by the KJV translators.

That may be your mere speculation or assumption since you have not proven that the 1611 edition did not accurately reflect the work of the KJV translators [if a few actual errors introduced by the printers are excluded or corrected].

With some actual printing errors corrected in early 1600's KJV editions, that KJV text may accurately reflect the work of the KJV translators, and it still included some errors that had not yet been corrected and that could have been the responsibility of the KJV translators themselves.

Scrivener maintained that the 1616 small folio edition in Roman type “appears to be the first edition of the Authorized Version which was submitted to any considerable revision” (Authorized Version, p. 17). Mark Simmons asserted: “In 1616 there appears to be the first extensive revision of the KJV” (Williams, From the Mind of God, p. 158). Donald Brake wrote: “The 1616 edition was the first serious attempt to edit the complete Bible, revising the text in a number of places” (Visual History of the KJB, p. 207). David Norton claimed that the 1616 folio “has some new work, supplying twenty readings that have become standard” (Textual History, p. 78).

 

So I assume that you really do not know where the word of God is at, and whether or not you have a copy of it? If you have a copy of the word of God that the Lord promised to preserve for all generations, can you direct me to where I can get a copy of it?

 

You assume or speculate incorrectly.

 

Psalm 119:89 LAMED. For ever, O LORD, thy word is settled in heaven.

Psalm 68:11 The Lord gave the word: great was the company of those that published it.

Once the word left heaven via inspiration the ball was in man's court (so to speak).

It is not God's fault that through scribal blunders we blemished it thereafter in the copying.

HankD

 

God gave us His word in the originals, and he preserved that to us in the various greek/Hebrew texts made by scholars!

 

Read the last sentence in my post Yeshua.

HankD

 

We agree!

Its just foolish how some sem to think that even without having perfect copies of the originals, we cannot have the word of God intended by Him for us to have today!

 

True, for the most part we can virtually reconstruct it.

HankD

 

that is why I would be much more concerned over the method translators used to translate, instead of which text they chose, as still beleiev decent versions can be made off TR/CT/MT, and the various hebrew texts in use now!

 

Sure!

The ancient Scriptural manuscripts, or any valid translation of them.