Re: KJV vs NIV: 12 round knock out?
Thank you, everyone.
Yes, Rogue is correct. I am referring to the 17th century version. The other versions underwent several spelling and grammatical corrects, the only one of any doctural significance was when a passage in Psalms was changed from "good" to "God" and that error was corrected within the lifetime of many of the KJV's authors. Once corrected the rest of the passage made a lot more sense.
The grammatic and spelling errors are actually of very little significance, barring the one just mentioned. Why? Because most of the people who actually recorded the Bible's passages and preserved them were NOT scholars or scribes. They were common believers who had almost no training in how to write, and because of this their writing tend to be dismissed as inferior. Much of the Textus Receptus was actually formed from these peoples writings. Brave on there part too. Greek at one point was actually proclaimed by the Catholic church to be the language of the Devil. (This was largely responsible for the Dark Ages.) Guess what many of the New Testament writings available at that time were written in? The fact that they have spelling/grammer errors does not diminish the idea that the writings are divinely inspired. All it does is prove that a common man believed in them enough to risk death over writing on a scrap of whatever they wrote it on. Even tanned fur was used.
I wouldn't have any problem with an update to the Bible's Middle English. Yes, it is cumbersome and some words in it could use a serious update. However, not everyone who writes the Bible does so with a true heart in mind. I know that may shock more than a few people here and really get me put under heavy fire, but know this: the Bible, the Word of God, has been Satan's primary target for about 7000 years now. Give or take a millinia or two. Men are offended by the idea that God may send a soul who falls short of His standard to an everlasting lake of fire. They presume God is joking or their must be some kind of mistake in the translation. Read the NIV. Nearly every mention of damnation or Hell has been removed. Lucifer is NOT mentioned by that name in the Book of Isaiah, no doubt leading some of you to wonder what the heck I was talking about in earlier passages. Instead, he is referred to as the morning star, and is cast down to earth, not hell.
The absence of Hell or damnation informs me that the authors of several of the modern versions are not interested in preserving the Word of God. It tells me that they want a Bible that agrees with what they want to believe. In fact, it was the threat of damnation which motivated God to take a finate form and die for us in the first place. Without the threat of divine punishment, the whole "he died for your sins" thing actually becomes rather pointless and stupid. I speak from the perspective of someone who once thought Christians in general were self-deluded and stupid.
In point of fact, nearly all moderrn spinoffs of the KJV don't use the Textus Receptus as their guide. They use the Westcott-Hort version, which in turn borrow nearly all of their ideas from just two sources: Vaticanus B and Sinaiticus (I may have mispelled these). These two were regarded as false in their own time, taking 900 years for a man to get desparate enough to prove God wrong to dig them up and use them again. Vaticanus is accurate when it comes to Old Testament, but cannot be trusted with the New. Indeed, the last passage i the Book of Mark is missing. There's even a large blank space where the passage should be, implying that the author knew about it and ignored it anyways. As for Sinaiticus, it was rescued from a trash can and was found with markings proving that it had been "corrected" several times, as one author modified the other's work.
As for the Apocrypha, note that in the New Testament, neither Christ nor any disciple following in his wake ever quotes them as scripture. This is because while they were well-known in his time to all who studied the Word of God, whether or not they were divinely inspired was a matter of question. The Scriptures may astonish at times, but it is consistant with itself if nothing else. The Apocrypha, being of questionable inspiration, was later removed from the KJV as England offically broke its ties with Catholicism altogether.
If it could be done with a pure heart, and an intent of keeping the Word of God true to itself, than I would take a different tune. I don't see any evidence of this happening however, and as a result I'll choose to read a clumsy dead language for my scripture rather than trust writings from men unwilling to take a honest look at there own hearts.
So, what did I miss or fail to address?