Looking for a good book on KJV Only

Those holding to MT or CT seem to much less into flaming as the TR only/KJVO camp!

 

I've done a lot of compare/contrast with other translations over the years and well...I prefer the KJV for many reasons including I think it's probably the best. However, since I speak, read and write a few languages (Spanish, German, French, Italian and Portuguese) I understand the issues with translation. I choose the KJV as being a beautiful, poetic translation that I prefer to read, memorize and quote from, but the others such as NASB, ESV, RSV add layers of meaning and texture to scripture for me.
This is my OPINION...OK?

 

It is not a book on KJV Only per se, but this is a good resource: https://www.amazon.com/Authorized-M.../ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=

 

Sounds very reasonable to me!

 

I have read some books over the years, and what has impressed me the most, is that the authors must be aware of things that they do not include. "Facts" are not "facts" when other "facts" are left out.

My faith gets shaken by the mess of Christendom, and that there are "sides".

I don't know of a book that focuses on copyright issues and the results of copyrighting that just seem to ripple out endlessly.

Sorry that I am no help. Reading books on the topic didn't help me much. I decided what version I wanted to use because of issues not included in the books. I watched what happened when certain translations were used.

 

Certainly many details would need to be worked out, and writers found who could present their points and counterpoints without condemning the other writers to hell, so to speak -- but I really think this would be a great idea for a book that a lot of people would want to read.

 

Glenn Conjurske wrote: "It is my settled judgment that the King James Version is superior to every English version which preceded it, and to every English version which has followed it" (Bible Version Controversy, pp. 7-8).

That out-of-context statement along with his criticism of all modern English Bible translations might lead some to consider Glenn Conjurske to be KJV-only. However, it is clear from the rest of his book that his statement is his view overall. He does not actually claim that the KJV is superior in every rendering in every verse nor does he claim that the KJV is perfect.

Glenn Conjurske also wrote: "There are errors in the King James Version, errors in text and errors in translation. The insertion of 1 John 5:7 is certainly an error in text. So is 'book of life' in Revelation 22:19. 'Easter' in Acts 12:4 is certainly an error in translation, as is 'one fold' in John 10:16, and 'Jesus' for 'Joshua' in Acts 7:45 and Hebrews 4:8, to name no more. Besides positive errors, there are renderings which are ambiguous, unclear, or misleading. And such folks as Elias, Esaias, and Osee ought by all means to be turned into Elijah, Isaiah, and Hosea" (p. 26).

In spite of his great love for the KJV and his bias for the KJV, Glenn Conjurske is also one of the strongest critics of a KJV-only view.

 

Conjurske is not careful in his language here. For example, if "Easter" is an error in translation, then it is an error in translation in every English Bible that had it, from Tyndale to KJV. No, Easter is an English word that meant the Passover. One might call it an oversight or an editorial blunder, if one is so disposed, but it is not a mistranslation. Same with Jesus. The Greek word is ιησου or ιησους. That is the word/name Jesus in the New Testament. I've heard anti-KJVO preachers, when just talking about the name, state that Jesus and Joshua are the same name. There is no reason for them to change their tune when talking about translation. If they think there should be a different editorial decision, let them think it, but it is not a mistranslation. On "fold" I'd say he did not check the range of meaning of the word -- one of which is "a flock of sheep."

 

The pre-1611 English Bibles used "Easter" to mean the Jewish Passover, but it has not been proven that it is how it was used in the KJV. There is historical evidence from the 1600's that suggest that a prelate or prelates inserted "Easter" into the KJV with a different meaning or at least with a different intention--to provide support for the Church of England's observation of Easter Sunday.

Whiston indicated that a great prelate, the chief supervisor of the KJV, inserted “Easter” back into the text of the KJV at this verse as one of the 14 changes he was said to have made (Life, p. 49). In his 1648 sermon entitled “Truth and Love,” Thomas Hill also noted that Acts 12:4 “was another place that was altered (as you have heard) to keep up that holy time of Easter, as they would think it” (Six Sermons, p. 25). In his 1727 book, John Currie maintained that at “Acts 12:4 in which place we have Easter, whereas it is the Passover according to the Original, this might be to favor their holy time of Easter, or an Easter communion” (Jus Populi Divinum, p. 38). Was the goal of inserting the rendering “Easter” back into the text at this verse in order to present faithfully the meaning of the Greek word in English or was it intended to give the readers a different meaning? In his volume on Acts in his An Interpretation of the English Bible, B. H. Carroll observed: “Pious Episcopalians and Romanists use this verse of the A. V. to confirm their custom of celebrating Easter” (p. 184). James Woolsey asserted: “To support, from the Scripture, the idea of Easter-Sunday and Easter-day, they suppress the original word which the Holy Ghost moved the inspired penman to use, and employed the Saxon word Easter” (Doctrine, p. 93). Concerning “Easter” at Acts 12:4, James Edmunds and T. S. Bell commented: “The excuse is, that by this utter disregard of what the Holy Spirit really said, the solemn feasts of the Church are sustained” (Discussion, p. 33).

Perhaps Glenn Conjurske was aware of that evidence concerning the intended meaning of "Easter" in the KJV.

 

This sounds like some modern extreme KJVOs who are always looking for evil intent rather than dealing with the words/translation.

Perhaps he was. Perhaps he was not.

 

Glenn Conjurske was very well informed about the pre-1611 English Bibles, about Luther's German Bible, and about the history of the making of the KJV. In our correspondence with each other, I may have shared with him the historical evidence from the 1600's which I quoted and which presented the intended meaning in the KJV.

Glenn Conjurske was clearly not perfect and did not claim to be perfect, but he was much more careful in his language and what he asserted than any KJV-only author that I have read and I have read most of them.

 

This topic generates much heat, very little light though!

 

His viewpoint should be the view that those holding to KJVO actually hold!

 

All of us make mistakes, and he would have not claimed otherwise, neither do I. It is a simple matter that I disagree with the things he characterized as mistranslations, nothing personal. In fact, I am the one who recommended the book collecting his writing to the original poster.

Re pre-1611 Bibles, it is perhaps interesting to note that in John 10:16, some had "flock" and some had "fold" (which does not only mean the pen, but can also mean the flock; I do not know which of these all the translators may have thought it meant). It is my understanding that the three primary Bibles which were in use in the early 1600s, and that King James hoped to replace with one Bible, were the Great Bible, the Geneva Bible, and the Bishops Bible. All these (at least in the editions I have checked) were "fold" Bibles at John 10:16. (Actually "shepefolde" in Geneva.)

 

easter was a clear mistake!

 

Is that a sound basis for making that decision when it could possibly involve use of the post hoc fallacy? This informal post hoc fallacy claims that what is first in time is necessarily the cause of what follows. This fallacy of false cause depends on some imagined causal connection that does not exist or has not been proven to exist.

Perhaps what you observed happen was not the result of the use of a certain translation. Can you prove that what you watched happen was actually the result of the use of a certain translation or could you merely be assuming that it was?

Many superstitions were based on this post hoc fallacy. It is always possible to find some small resemblance or seeming connection between any two things, but this does not prove one caused the other. Henry Virkler observed: “Correlation does not prove causation” (Christian’s Guide, p. 144). The same consequences may have come about in some other way.

Many things happen after other events (even regularly) without being caused by them. For example, the sun rises after the rooster crows but not because the rooster crows. The Douay-Rheims was translated and published before the KJV so does that mean that this Roman Catholic Bible was the cause of what followed--the KJV?

 

Glenn Conjurske would acknowledge and affirm that words may have a range of meanings. How a word is used in context could limit that range of a word's meaning, sometimes possibly to one meaning.

At John 10:16 in the KJV, two different Greek words are translated "fold" which removes the clear distinction between them. Were there any important, essential, or necessary reasons why one English word was used to translate these two different Greek words?

A. T. Robertson pointed out the distinction here by Jesus between aule (fold) and poimne (flock) (Word Pictures, V, p. 181). Concerning John 10:16, J. B. Lightfoot observed: "The point of our Lord's teaching depends mainly on the distinction between the many folds and the one flock" (The Revision, p. 73). A. T. Robertson observed that the Latin Vulgate's use of one Latin word for these two Greek words "confused this distinction" and "helped Roman Catholic assumptions" (Word Pictures, V, p. 181).

William Tyndale kept this difference of meaning between the two Greek words by translating the second Greek word (poimne) as "flock," as it is also translated in Jay Green's Interlinear Greek-English New Testament and Berry's Interlinear Greek-English New Testament. The 1535 Coverdale’s Bible and 1537 Matthew’s Bible also have “flock” in agreement with Tyndale. It was Coverdale's 1538 English NT translation of the Latin Vulgate that introduced "fold" into the English Bible in place of Tyndale's "flock," and it was likely the influence of the Latin Vulgate that caused Coverdale to use "fold" instead of "flock" in the 1539 Great Bible.

The KJV translators themselves translated poimne as "flock" at Matthew 26:31, Luke 2:8, and 1 Corinthians 9:7. The KJV translators also translated another form of this word poimnion as “flock” at Luke 12:32, Acts 20:28, 29, and 1 Peter 5:2, 3.

Luther’s 1534 German Bible distinguished between the two Greek words, using Stalle for aule and Herd or Herde for poimne. The 1657 English translation of the authorized Dutch Bible also has “one flock” in agreement with Tyndale’s and Luther‘s.

 

Perhaps we could say Coverdale "reintroduced" it. It has already been introduced by Wycliffe, if not before that. For whatever reason, the Great Bible, the Geneva Bible, and the Bishops Bible also chose to use it.

You may continue as far down this road as you like, but since we multiply comments farther and farther away from the OP, I am dropping out.

 

Jonathan E. Stonis's 2005 book entitled A Juror's Verdict on the King James Only Debate is one book that attempts to portray both sides. [ASJORA Publications, Bear, DE]

Jonathan Stonis wrote: "In the arguments and rebuttal section, the author becomes both sides as each group presents their case" (p. ix).