"The King James Bible is Perfect Without a Single Error!"

[Sigh!] [Bemused look!]

May I suggest the many 'KJVO' threads in the BB archives, for some info on this, perhaps

But I do like your 'handle'.

And welcome to the Baptist Board. :thumbs:

Ed

 

Here is an interesting 'other' thread:


http://www.baptistboard.com/showthread.php?t=42360&page=12

 

I also used only the KJV, but only for the first 20 years (1952-1972) that I was a Christian. But I have used the KJV (not exclusively) for the last 36 years (1972-2008) in which I've also been a Christian. Strangely, 98% of the history of the KJVO movement has come to me as NEWS not as HISTORY.

I will be back.

 

How about King James I, himself? &

Seriously, as to the particular "Tom, Dick or Susie" that came up with this idea, I have no idea of who it might be. It certainly did not come from the KJV translators, themselves, by any stretch of the imagination.

My own first encounter with this effective, even if not technically held, view (which I would rate on a par with some who regularly post on this board) was in a book written by the late Dr. Edward F. Hills, but I do not think he was the first to espouse such a view, by any means.

Ed

& Or did I confuse King James I with someone else?? :laugh: :laugh:

 

Welcome to the Baptist Board! :wavey:

Burgon was what I would call Majority Preferred rather than KJV-only or even TR only. He believed there were translation errors in the KJV, and did not even believe the TR to be perfect.

The first I know of who took a KJV position on this issue was Seventh Day Adventist Benjamin C. Wilkinson, whose book Our Authorized Version Vindicated (1930) was included in Which Bible by David Otis Fuller in 1970. However, I would include both of these men as TR-only rather than KJV-only, and I don't believe either believed in an inerrant KJV, at least at the time of the landmark Which Bible? though it's been a long time since I read the book.

Jasper J. Ray's little book God Only Wrote One Bible was originally printed back in 1955, and he may have been the first to write defending the KJV as inerrant. Again, I havn't read his book in a long time, and don't actually have it, so I can't say that for sure. But he was surely strong on the KJV. However, his book and his own lack of influence did not have enough power to kick off a movement.

If it was not Ray, then the first to portray the KJV as an inerrant translation was definitely Peter Ruckman. IMO, his book The Christian's Book of Manuscript Evidence (1970), along with Which Bible? kicked off the KJV-only movement. Just paging through Ruckman's book I find on p. 7 the phrase, "the A. V. 1611 as the final authority 'in all matters of faith and practice.'" So with that book Ruckman was already taking a position that the KJV was inerrant. :type:

Edited in: I just found in Wilkinson's 1930 book as produced in Fuller's 1970 book the following statement: "The original Scriptures were written by direct inspiration of God. This can hardly be said of any translation" (p. 316 of Which Bible?).

 

Hi, Ed. Hope you're doing well. :wavey:

Actually, Hills did not believe that the KJV was inerrant. I would call him TR-preferred.

 

It does not seem to have been J. J. Ray. At least in the 1983 edition of his book, J. J. Ray admitted: "There are a few mis-translations in the King James English" (p. 102).

Peter Ruckman would seem to be a good candidate to consider for the first one or one of the first to propose this view in writing.

 

Edward F. Hills did use or advocate several of the ideas or arguments that are used to defend a KJV-only view. Although he came close to claiming it, Hills did not actually claim that the KJV was inerrant.

Hills wrote: "Admittedly the King James Version is not ideally perfect. No translation ever can be. But it is the product of such God-guided scholarship that it is practically perfect. Its errors are very few and very minor" (Believing Bible Study, Third Edition, p. 83).

Concerning the KJV, Hills wrote: "Admittedly this venerable version is not absolutely perfect, but it is trustworthy" (KJV Defended, p. 230).

 

What more can I add?

 

Believing Bible Study by Dr. Hills, is the first book where I encountered this.

And as I said, this was the effective, although not technically held view, of Dr. Edward F. Hills, which would seem to be consistent with the quote from his book.

Ed

 

Good post. As you say, many KJVO writers depend on the ideas of Hills, including Ruckman--though I much prefer Hills' gentle approach.

For Christianbookshelf: for your timeline, Hills published Believing Bible Study in 1967. I loaned out his other book quoted above and never got it back. It was first published in 1956.

 

I once was at a church on furlough that had Ruckman's books on a table for sale. In a car with the pastor, other missionaries and a deacon headed to a store, the deacon asked me, "Bro. John, what do you think of Peter Ruckman?" Nothing like putting the missionary on the spot! I gave my standard answer, "He is what the KJV calls a railer, and we are told by the KJV to have nothing to do with a railer. If someone is going to defend the KJV, Hills is much better." They took us on for support, and the next time we were there we didn't see Ruckman's books! :thumbs:

Hills taught one thing that has really stuck with me and influenced me. That is that the priests of the OT were the ones entrusted with actually preserving the Word of God, and we believe in the priesthood of the believer, so all saints of this age are to preserve the Word of God. Hills didn't take it much further, but instead went in the direction of considering divine preservation.

In my view, we as priests have a sacred responsibility to preserve the Word of God by: having our own Bible, studying it, memorizing it, translating it, printing it, distributing it. If we'd all concentrate on doing that and leave divine preservation up to the Divine Preserver, there would be a lot less fighting among Fundamentalists and a lot more Bible loving and translating and distributing. :type:

 

Who is this Ruckman person? What does he believe? Is he a Heretic?

 

Well, my momma once told me if I couldn't say something nice about somone, to say nothing at all.

Dr. Peter J. Ruckman is a graduate of the Univ. of AL, and a grad of Bob Jones University, with a Master's and Ph.D., and is the founder and the President of Pensacola Bible Institute of Pensacola, FL.

There, I said some things that are 'nice'.

That said, I would offer that Dr. Peter J. Ruckman is the only individual I have ever known that could make Col. R. B. Thieme, Jr. and David Cloud, put together on their worst days, look like Dale Carnegie.

Ed

 

God; Psalm 12:6,7