Reasons for the Second Edition of The Bible Book: The KJV Reborn for Those Who Love the Word of God.

 

People are curious about producing a second edition of The Bible Book: The KJV Reborn for Those Who Love the Word of God.

1. There were so many lapses in the first edition, such as not dealing with Christ in the Psalms. There is no better way to find mistakes than to put them in print. Then the errors wink, blink, and call from the page to the agonized author - "Sloppy! Editor, edit thyself." 

2. Another reason is building the case for the KJV. Apologetics is a name for that role in theology comes from this verse - 

15 κυριον δε τον θεον αγιασατε εν ταις καρδιαις υμων ετοιμοι δε αει προς απολογιαν (apology, give an answer) παντι τω αιτουντι υμας λογον περι της εν υμιν ελπιδος μετα πραυτητος και φοβου

KJV But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear: 1 Peter 3:15.

The NIVians and ESVians are loaded with all kinds of excuses to avoid the KJV, because the denominations have been given monetary incentives for promoting the new Bibles and then for replacing the new Bibles with even newer and worser Bibles. Lutherans should know - the NIV and ESV are Calvinist productions, not at all friendly toward the Means of Grace but hotter than Georgia asphalt for "making disciples."

NIVians and ESVians are packed with contemptuous and snide remarks, "So you are KJV only?" (a strange label) GJ - "No, I am KJV Best, I know your sliced, diced and denatured "scientific" Bibles all too well. They are so bad they have to be revised every few years and made worse than before. I use those Bibles for comparisons on Biblegateway.com - the lair of the NIV factory itself."

"Our Bible was translated by leading denominational figures in scholarship." GJ - No, your Bible text was created and altered by rationalists who cannot agree with each other and constantly make changes from year to year. Your translating was done under the watchful eye of Eugene Nida and his pals, whose 'dynamic equivalence' makes every modern version a farce. The publishers give incentives for your church leaders to promote a modern version and to tie it into the educational books and worship books."

So you like word for word translating in the KJV?

GJ - "Word for word is only used in interlinear Bibles for those who flunked Hebrew and Greek or went to Ft. Wayne and ELCA schools. The KJV is precise translation, the work of a group of unpaid scholars who actually believed the Word of God."

You do know that the KJV is directly related to Luther's German Bible, right? Yes, the KJV is related through Tyndale, who was murdered for translating the Bible. Tyndale's work became the basis for the KJV. WELS excommunicated pastors who favored the KJV over the sect's precious NIV, because church leaders are not allowed to kill the faithful anymore. 

Jump Starting the Second Edition of The Bible Book: The KJV Reborn for Those Who Love the Word of God.

 

Preface – Appreciating the King James Version

                The most read English Bible is the King James Version, with 55% of the readers, compared to a fraction of that for the latest New International Version and many others in the modern category – the English Standard Version and the New Revised Standard Version.[1] The percentages dwindle after the first three modern attempts, and there are so many more versions. The KJV has much to commend it, not only for its use of the Majority Text but also for its deliberately grand and eloquent style. If some complain that the KJV reads too much like Shakespeare, others respond that the modern versions sound too much like television cartoons. Even worse, all the modern “scientific” texts are at war against the Majority Text and against each other, because they remove and corrupt so many passages, diluting and changing the actual message of God’s Word. Nevertheless, the Lutheran synods (ELCA, LCMS, WELS, ELS, CLC, ELDONA) and all other mainline denominations reject the KJV for their colleges and seminaries, printed readings, and official proclamations. Beyond that opposition, agreement is absent.

            Details about the development of the KJV and the crimes of the modern text and translation experts will follow. First, let us cite the reasons why the KJV is favored above the rest and destined to outlast the newest, ever-changing, increasingly vapid Bibles. (See the quotations about the KJV in the post below. There will be a lot more quotations.)

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[1] Christianity Today, March, 2014, quoted a survey giving 55% to the KJV, only 19% to the NIV, single digits for the New RSV, etc. Single digits still add up to a lot of Bibles.

Quotations about the KJV - From the Upcoming Second Edition of The Bible Book, The KJV Reborn for Those Who Love the Word of God

"Aiming at truth, they achieved what later generations recognized as beauty and elegance." Alister McGrath, In the Beginning, p. 254.

From HolyBible.org

Winston Churchill

"The scholars who produced this masterpiece are mostly unknown and unremembered. But they forged an enduring link, literary and religious, between the English-speaking people of the world." The King James Bible Translators; Olga S. Opfell; Jefferson and London: McFarland, 1982.

"One of the supreme achievements of the English Renaissance came at its close, in the King James Bible...It is rightly regarded as the most influential book in the history of English civilization...the King James Version combined homely, dignified phrases into a style of great richness and loveliness. It has been a model of writing for generations of English-speaking people."

Compton’s Encyclopedia, Online Edition. Downloaded from America Online, May 26, 1995.

"The greatest English Bible is the Authorized, or King James, Version. Based on Tyndale's translation and original texts, it was produced in 1611 by six groups of churchmen at the command of King James I. The King James Bible became the traditional Bible of English-speaking Protestants. Its dignified and beautiful style strongly influenced the development of literature in the English language. The influence can be seen in the works of John Bunyan, John Milton, Herman Melville, and many other writers."

Volume 3; Crowell-Collier Educational Corporation; 1967, 1972 ed. p.p. 137, 138 Rev. Holt H. Graham; Rev. Joseph M. Petulla; Mr. Cecil Roth.

 

Charlton Heston

"...the King James translation has been described as 'the monument of English prose' as well as 'the only great work of art ever created by a committee'. Both statements are true. Fifty four scholars worked seven years to produce the work from its extant texts in Aramaic, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and English. Such an undertaking can be expected to produce great scholarship, but hardly writing as spare and sublime as the King James....

“The authors of several boring translations that have followed over the last fifty years mumble that the KJV is "difficult" filled with long words. Have a look at the difficult long words that begin the Old Testament, and end the Gospels: 'In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; darkness was upon the face of the deep.' and 'Now, of the other things which Jesus did, if they should be written every one, I suppose the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.' Shakespeare aside, there's no comparable writing in the language, as has been observed by wiser men than I.

Over the past several centuries it's been the single book in most households, an enormous force in shaping the development of the English language. Carried around the world by missionaries, it provided the base by which English is about to become the lingua franca of the world in the next century. Exploring it during this shoot [Ten Commandments] was one of the most rewarding creative experiences of my life."

 

In the Arena: An Autobiography, pp. 554-555.

George Bernard Shaw

"The translation was extraordinarily well done because to the translators what they were translating was not merely a curious collection of ancient books written by different authors in different stages of culture, but the Word of God divinely revealed through His chosen and expressly inspired scribes. In this conviction they carried out their work with boundless reverence and care and achieved a beautifully artistic result...they made a translation so magnificent that to this day the common human Britisher or citizen of the United States of North America accepts and worships it as a single book by a single author, the book being the Book of Books and the author being God."

The Men Behind the King James Version, by G. S. Paine; Baker Book House; Grand Rapids, Mich.; 1959, 1977ed., pp. 182-183.