"The Words of the Lord are pure words: as silver tried in a furnance of earth, purified seven times.
Thou shalt keep them, O Lord, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever."
Psalms 12:6,7
The Lord shall keep what? His pure Words. The Authorized King James Version!
I have only watched the first part of this three part series. As of this part, I highly recommend this! It's extremely informative. Do you know what my next two nights will be full of? ;)
With respect, I have to disagree that the King James is the only legitimate English version of the Bible. It was the first English translation and was very good for its time. And, yes, there are bad modern translations - i.e., those that do not go back to the original Greek and Hebrew. However, a modern translation (such as the English Standard Version or the New American Standard Version) whose translators were fluent in and studied what the text says in Greek and Hebrew are just as good as King James. In fact, for many they are better than King James because KJV was written in the 16th century - i.e., in the time of Shakespeare. It was written in regular English of that day, but language changes over time, and so KJV is simply not comprehensible for many people - even Spirit-filled believers. I don't think there's anything wrong if a person wants to read KJV but I do believe it's a form of idolatry to put on a pedestal above all other good (i.e., faithful to the original text) translations.
ReplyDeleteWith respect, I have to disagree with you. There are things wrong the ESV and NASV as well as the NIV, The Message, etc.
ReplyDelete"The use of thee, thou, thine was already antiquated when the King James Bible was translated. The King James translators did not adopt thee, thou, thine because those forms were common to their day, but because they wanted to faithfully translate the original Scripture text into English. These expressions had already dropped out of common English by 1611 when the King James Bible was published. We can see this by reading the translator’s Preface and other writings by the translators. The distinction between the singular and plural in English began in the late 13th century and continued commonly until the 1500s. (source:http://www.wayoflife.org/database/kjvtoodifficult.html <--There's more to be read at that link.) " And if we're going to use that arguement then we need to be consistent and get rid of songs such as, "How Great Thou Art" or at least update them. No one speaks like that! Yet we can totallly understand it. We wouldn't dare think of changing our hymns but when it comes to the Word of the Lord we have no problem with it. Also, the archaic words in the KJV are defined by their context or by comparing to other Scripture where that word is used (except for maybe a dozen or so). According to the Flesch-Kincaid research the KJV is easier to read than modern translations. Here's an interesting comparsion between the NASV and the KJV http://www.av1611.org/kjv/kjveasy.html
I have more KJV posts planned for the future. Stay tuned. I would love to share with you what I'm learning and of course have your opinion (even if we disagree.) Thanks for commenting.