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The problem:
If only we had the original letters that the prophets and apostles wrote it would avoid much confusion. Every Bible version contains bias from its translators; the degree depends on the methods used in translating. The freer the translation, the greater the possibility of bias and the less reliable the version is for study purposes.
There is now a general concept that newer translations are more reliable because they are translated from "older" Biblical manuscripts than the KJV. This argument has been used in discrediting the second half of the verse in Romans 8:1 where it says "Now there is no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit."
Let's look at these "older" manuscripts of NT writings in more detail.
For the past hundred years there has been a rivalry between two Greek texts: the Received Text and the Critical Text.
A Bible version is considered only as good as the text from which it is translated. Therefore we must determine which Greek text is superior: the Received Text or the Critical Text.
The critical Text has only come into wide circulation in the last hundred years, as evidenced by the large number of Bible versions translated from it. It is largely influenced by the Alexandrian line of manuscripts. Out of over 5000 Greek manuscripts in existence, only a small handful -less than ten — contain this text-type. However prominent among these few are two manuscripts which many scholars value more highly than most other manuscripts. They are called Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, and they date a little over 200 years from the original writings.
Sinaiticus was discovered in 1844 by Constantine Tischendorf while visiting a monastery at the base of Mt. Sinai. He found 43 leaves of it in a basket waiting to be burned. Several years later he acquired the remainder of the leaves from the monastery, and by 1862 he had published the complete manuscript.
Vaticanus' history is not as dramatic as Sinaiticus. . Pope Nicholas V brought it to the Vatican in 1448. For hundreds of years, the Roman Catholic Church guarded it so closely that no Protestant scholar of ability was allowed to study it for any length of time. In 1866 however, the Vatican finally allowed Constantine Tischendorf, under supervision, to copy the manuscript. In 1867 he published it.
Both these manuscripts are older than the Received Text from which the KJV was translated. Does this mean we now have a more authentic base for our modern Biblical translations?
These older manuscripts contain significantly different readings than those of the Received Test. The Alexandrian Test had been out of circulation for 1500 years. If it is the true version why would God allow His church to be deprived of the truth for so long? In addition the benefits of the Alexandrian Text to the church have been dubious indeed.
This text type has trouble meeting scholarly standards for accuracy of transcription. Minor differences within text types are normal; however, the number of variants within the Alexandrian Text is enormous. Not including minor errors such as spelling, Sinaiticus and Vaticanus disagree with each other over 3000 time in the space of the four Gospels alone. This means that one or the other must be wrong 3000 times. That averages to a disagreement on almost every verse of the Gospels! It is, in fact, easier to find two consecutive verses in which these two manuscripts differ the one from the other , than two consecutive verses, in which they agree.
Undoubtedly these manuscripts suffer from scribal carelessness. Vaticanus exhibits numerous places where the scribe has written the same word or phrase twice in succession, a clear indication that the writing was not checked. The scribe of Sinaiticus occasionally skipped lines in copying and made so many obvious errors that during the time Sinaiticus was used, ten different readers noted corrections. However, instead of questioning the reliability of these manuscripts, scholars have accepted many of their peculiar readings. Sinaiticus and Vaticanus are the basis for most of the two hundred omissions from the modern New Testament versions.
For several years the Alexandrian Text was blindly accepted. But recent scholarship has confirmed that what has been restored should not be considered the original text, simply the text that had the highest authority in Alexandria, Egypt in the third century.
Alexandria, Egypt, an area to which none of the original manuscripts were addressed, has little claim upon our confidence as possessing a pure text. A look into the history of Alexandria, especially during the time these manuscripts are believed to have been produced, is quite revealing. Alexandria was the center of commerce and Hellenistic culture and was renowned or its schools of philosophy. Christian thinkers regarded Greek philosophy as a tool for understanding and applying Scripture.
Several scholars believe that Vaticanus and Sinaiticus were produced when Constantine ordered 50 Bibles to be prepared in AD 331. Vaticanus and Sinaiticus were both written on parchments of vellum by talented calligraphers, a very expensive specification included in Constantine's order. Constantine called upon Eusebius of Caesarea to be in charge of the preparation of the Bibles. Eusebius is well known as a student of Platonism and Stoicism, which Christian philosophers tried to harmonize into their concepts of scripture. If Eusebius used any of the critical skills of his mentors, he was likely to dissect the Scriptures, thinking he was correcting them. This may explain some of the omissions characteristic of the Alexandrian Text and likewise of most modern versions.
It is also historically told us that the manuscripts ordered by Constantine were written in extreme haste. Repeatedly, Constantine urged Eusebius to press the project with all speed. Careful proof reading and correcting would be time consuming.
It is interesting to realize that several of the omissions and peculiar readings of the Vaticanus and Sinaiticus were once found only in Roman Catholic Bible, the Latin Vulgate.
Now let's examine where the Received Text comes from — the text upon which the KJV is based. Unlike the small number of manuscripts that support the Alexandrian Text, the Received Text is derived from the Byzantine text-type which is represented in 80 to 90 percent of all Greek manuscripts. That amounts to approximately 4000 witnesses! These representations of this text come from many different places — Greece, Constantinople, Asia Minor, Palestine, Syria, Alexandria, Africa, Italy, England, Ireland. This is quite a contrast to the limited locality and time range of the Alexandrian Text.
Although none of the Greek manuscripts of the Byzantine text-type date before AD 400, most scholars agree that in order for this text-type to be so widespread and predominant among the Greek manuscripts, it had to have a much earlier existence. Indeed, distinctive Byzantive readings are found in all of the oldest versions, in the papyri, and in the Scriptural quotations of the early church fathers. It was the authoritative Scriptures of the Syrian church, the Waldensian church of northern Italy, and the Greek Orthodox Church.
When, during the mighty reformation period, Erasmus prepared his Greek New Testament, there were hundreds of manuscripts for him to examine, and his wide travels certainly permitted him to do so. But after much study, he chose to use but a few representative manuscripts. These were all of the Byzantine text-type. As the Reformation swelled, version after version was translated from the Received Text in many of the European languages.
In 1611, 47 scholars produced the King James Version. Although these men did not agree doctrinally, they all had reverent regard for the divine inspiration of Scripture. In addition, the translating was engineered so that no one man would have undue influence upon any portion of Scripture. Every part of the work was reviewed critically at least fourteen times. The Old Testament was based on the Masoretic text type and the New Testament based on the Byzantine text type, the work was accomplished just in time for it to be carried by to America where it became the authorized Scriptures for millions of English-speaking people in the New World.
The New Testament Scriptures of the early church, the wilderness church, the Reformation church, and the Scriptures of our founding fathers were all in essence the Received Text.
The contrast between the Received Text (the Greek text based on a wide range of Byzantine text- type manuscripts) and the Critical Text (the Greek text based on a few remote Alexandria text type manuscripts) is overwhelming, yet the Critical Text has held an honored position in the scholarly word in recent years. As can be noticed by the posts submitted by Nathan. Yet, as we have seen in my previous post, these manuscripts have many problems and had been rejected for 1,500 years.
The preface to the Revised Standard Version will tell you that since "we now possess many more ancient manuscripts" (primarily Vaticanus and Sinaitics) we "are far better equipped to seek to recover the original wording of the Greek text." These scholars will also try to tell us that the Greek text of the King James Version "was marred by mistakes." You may wonder how scholars came to such conclusions about the highly respected authorized Received Text. To understand, we must go back about 100 years.
The last half of the nineteenth century brought many changes to the world. Grievous errors such as spiritualism, evolution and Marxism were on the rise. Just as these false movements sought to dethrone God as the creator of the universe, critical scholars were trying to discredit the Bible as the inspired Word of God. Disregarding the providential care of the biblical text, men began to analyze it as they would any ancient piece of literature. Foremost among such men were Brooke Foss Westcott and Fenton John Anthony Hort.
Westcott and Hort were both Cambridge professors well know in the field of textual criticism. These men shared several points of interest, including a fascination with the theory of evolution. But the one conviction that most closely united the two men was a prejudiced animosity for the Received Text. Dr. Hort was only twenty-three years old and had not yet evenstudied textual criticism when he described the Received Text as "villainous" and "vile." In spite of the unorthodoxy of these men, their scholarship has exerted a molding influence upon the distinctive readings of the modern versions.
In 1890 a major revision of the KJV was being considered. By this time, spelling and grammar had changed and many of the Old English words used in the KJV were considered obscure in meaning. Some critics believed that increased scholarship and the recent availability of Vaticanus and Sinaiticus necessitated a revision. Although there was much fear and distrust of revision in the public mind, it was sanctioned under the condition that no changes be made in the KJV except as were absolutely necessary. Fifty-four men, including Westcott and Hort, were asked to be on the Revision Committee, and they began what should have been a short work.
A grueling ten years later, the committee introduced to an astonished public what amounted to a totally new translation based upon a Greek text different than the Received Test. The Revised Version of 1881 made 36,000 changes in the English of the KJV, and nearly 6,000 in the Greek text. Shortly before the Bible was released to the public, Westcott and Hort published their own critical text of the New Testament. This Greek New Testament was drawn from Vaticanus and Sinaiticus, and in essence was the Greek text that had been used by the Revision Committee for translating the Greek into English. It then became evident that Westcott andHort had exercised disproportionate influence over the Revision Committee.
Most people were unaware that Westcott and Hort had, under pledge of secrecy, circulated among the Revision Committee copies of their own edition of the Greek New Testament. Eloquiently expounding upon the methods they had used to compile their text, they overwhelmed the other members of the committe. Their methods gave preferential status to Vaticanus and Sinaiticus, and have since shaped the thinking of all who approach textual criticism.
One of the most misleading of their rules declares that the oldest manuscripts contain the preferred reading. Vaticanus and Sinaiticus are about 100 years older than any of the existing Greek manuscripts supporting the Received Text. However, age does not guarantee purity. In fact, some of the earliest manuscripts were very corrupt. History records that during the century following the completion of the New Testament, manuscripts suffered the greatest abuse. It was during this time that a number of heretics are known to have made corrupted copies of the Scriptures. Even whiile Paul was alive, someone was passing around false manuscripts (see 2 Thessalonians 2.2) The age of Vaticanus and Sinaiticus is no criterion for considering their readings to be pure. In fact, it can be the basis of questioning their reliability. These manuscripts could have only survived because they were little used. The dry climate of Egypt and the sturdiness of vellum are not sufficient to explain their survival. Reliable manuscripts of the Scriptures ultimately disintegrated from continual use while these manuscripts were preserved by disuse. One must question why they were not used when copies of the Scriptures were so precious and few.
Like the theory of evolution, Westcott and Hort's theory contained a missing link. They had to explain why the majority of manuscripts up port the Byzantine readings of the Received text and not the Alexandrian readings of the Critical Text. Realizing that it was absurd to insist that a variety of scribes, separated by time and space and working independently, would all "alter" their manuscripts so as to produce the uniform readings of the Byzantine text type, Westcott and Hort devised a theory. They theorized that in the fourth century an official ecclesiastical command had been give to adopt a standardized form of the Greek text. They reasoned that the Greek text, thus propagated, contained many errors. This theory became known as the Syrian Recension.
Although scholars accepted the theory for a short time, its error was soon exposed and refuted. There is absolutely no historical evidence of such an official revision of the Greek text. Even if such a theory were true, it assumed that men who were only 200 years from the originals were so ignorant they couldn't recognize the correct manuscripts to use as authority. Strangely enough, today, nearly 1900 years from the originals, scholars feel better able to judge than they could. Sir Frederick Kenyon, a pioneer in the field of papyrology and for many years director of the British Museum, summed it up when he wrote, "Is not the whole theory artificial and illusory, the vain imaging of an ingenious mind, like so many of the products of modern criticism, which spins endless webs out of its own interior, to be swept away tomorrow by the ruthless broom of common sense?"
When the theory of the Syrian Recension crumbled, Westcott and Hort's scholarly treatise was left without a foundation. Yet scholars still refused to recognize the providential hand of God in the spreading of the Received Text. With no suitable explanation of why the Byzantine text-type is found abundantly in Greek manuscripts from all over the world, most scholars still cling to the framework of textual criticism set up by Westcott and Hort. Thus, the most popular editions of the Greek text today — Nestle-Aland and UBS — vary little from the Westcott-Hort text.
We need not despair, we can have assurance that the same text the church used through the ages still most accurately reflects the original writings of the New Testament. And that text is today known as the Received Text.
Having faith that God has preserved His Word int he church throughout the ages leads to the acceptance of the Received Text as the most reliable Greek New Testament.
But most of us can't read Greek so a translation is necessary.
Looking over the English Bible versions available, you will find that the only versions using the Received Text as the basis for the New Testament are those of the King James tradition. Foremost in this tradition is the KJV itself.
This does not mean, however, that we read only the KJV. One weakness is its readability. It still uses 1769 English. For those who have problems with the old English, the NKJV is to be recommended.
The New Testament of most modern versions is based on an Egyptian text rejected by Christendom 1500 years ago. While we can acknowledge the good points of modern versions and appreciate their usefulness for reference and commentary, there is no more reliable English study Bible that the KJV. It still remains the most trusted Bible for the majority of English- speaking Christians.
As we stand in these last days of earth's history, our faith in the Word of God must be strong. We must confidently turn to the Scriptures for guidance and be able to present its saving truths to others clearly. While other versions often make the most relevant truths ambiguous, the King James Version resoundingly affirms them. No other version speaks so convincingly of last day issues.
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The above information was largely taken from an "Amazing Facts" Pamphlet. Amazing Facts website is at:
The new translations of the Bible have "corrected" the older versions and we find many of our beliefs a little harder to defend. What has happened? They say they have found more reliable, and older manuscripts.
The Faithful Witness, From Amazing Facts
The case of those "older" Biblical manuscripts.
AMAZING FACTS