Why We Use the KJV Bible

foreign [Music] I had a couple of co-workers one time okay secular workplace one of my co-workers was a Nazarene Pastor who was working a part-time job and he used another Bible another one of my co-workers was a Free Will Baptist who used another Bible and I just showed them Catholic garbage can 55 000 missing words and they got mad and they said who gave these people authority to take all those words out of the Bible why would I want something that was found in a garbage can and both of those guys said we're using the King James from now on [Music] welcome to another edition of Maverick University I'm your host David Hallberg joining me today and joining me again is Brother Don asawardi uh having been on Maverick University already in the past we're glad to have you back again brother awesome good to be back but also already is a faculty member here at Providence Baptist College and has a wide variety of experience in the ministry having been an assistant pastor a pastor of a church as a missionary in Russia and now acting as the dean of ministry here at Providence Baptist College and so we're going to be talking about something that I think is very um it raises a lot of eyebrows it uh it peaked a little controversy it Peaks a lot of interest a little controversial um as independent fundamental Baptists we have always seemed to make an issue of the King James Bible and those that are not independent fundamental Baptists and even those that maybe even some that are independent fundamental Baptists may make an issue of not using the King James Bible and I wanted to talk about just a we're going to cover this in several episodes but in this particular Edition I don't want to get into the weeds I don't want to get into too deep of you know facts or a study is there an easy way for someone to just get a brief skim of this topic and Come Away with some kind of conclusion even after just skimming and just scanning the details basically the question is why do we use the King James Bible and do we need an entire College course uh on the topic to even determine which Bible we should use well we do have a class here at the college for our students which I think is an important class it's called manuscript evidence and it really does go into great detail about the Bible and how we got it and and really goes into great depth and I think that's important especially for young men who are going to be handling the word of God as ministers but I think that study is maybe a little heavy for the average Christian and I don't think that you need to know that much about it in order to understand that the King James Bible is the one that we should be using so the depth of knowledge for a bible college student going into Ministry this deep but you don't need that much knowledge to at least make a decision about what Bible you're going to use and which Bible you hold to be the word of God right I think we could make it a lot more simpler and that's that's why I'm here today okay perfect so one of the questions I want to ask is what is the history of behind the movement to alternate versions of the Bible well there's some really colorful characters and some really colorful stories that go along with the the new Bible movement basically you've got these two manuscripts now we know that the Bible was printed on a printing press for the first time in the late 1400s when the printing press was invented before that every copy had to be written out by hand and because it's written by hand the Latin word manuscript means writing by hand so these were handwritten copies and it's not like having a printing press where you get it right and then you just crank off a thousand copies every single letter every single word has to be carefully copied and there is uh in in most manuscripts you know that are non-biblical certainly you'll find all kinds of errors and mistakes and it's just difficult I mean if you were to sit down and write out a copy of something that somebody else had done doing it by hand it has a tendency to to have mistakes in it sure so there are all these different manuscripts manuscript evidence is the study of all the tens of thousands of manuscripts that we have that were written out before the printing press was invented well the two that have caused the most controversy and have led to the movement to change the King James Bible and put it into different words it goes back to these two manuscripts that are called codex vaticanus and codex sinaiticus now the first of those codex vaticanus now the Vatican is where the pope lives in Rome it is the headquarters of the Roman Catholic church so basically this manuscript it is a beautiful very very old manuscript of the Bible that is kept in Rome in basically in the Pope's personal Library okay all right well that ought to make you wonder right off the bat why are we putting so much faith and trust in a manuscript that comes directly from the Catholic pope the other manuscript codex sinaiticus now the Sony sinaiticus tells us that they found this manuscript in the desert of the Sinai Peninsula in a Catholic Monastery and the interesting story behind that is there was a German archaeologist Theologian his name was tischendorf and he kind of thought of himself as kind of a Christian Indiana Jones back in the 1800s and he traveled all around the holy land and he did archeology and he did study and he was very interested in Old manuscripts well he visited this Monastery because he knew they had lots and lots of old manuscripts there he noticed they had a garbage can that was stuffed with old Scrolls and he said these scrolls look really really old and the monk said oh yeah they're garbage we just use them we tear off sheets of the the parchment and we use them to help light the fire in the furnace he's like what are you crazy this must be this must be 1500 years old I mean I can tell by looking at it this is the oldest manuscripts I've ever seen and they told them these are no good they're garbage I mean we know manuscripts we work with them all the time and these are garbage we throw them in the garbage can we just use them to like the fires well long story short tischendorf smuggled some copies of these manuscripts out of the Mind basically stole them brought them to the British museum in London and uh and began to study them and found out that this manuscript was very very different than any other manuscript that we normally see it had verses that were missing that you know he figured well you know well here and here was the here was the fallacy that he came up with since this manuscript is hundreds of years older than anything we've ever seen before it must be closer to the source and it must be more reliable and any verse that's missing in here must have been added later in any any verses that are added here you know they must have been taken out later so it was heralded to the world as now we have a new source for scriptural translation um now where do those where do those Scrolls come from the Roman emperor Constantine he was the one who supposedly converted to Christianity brought Christianity into tolerance and acceptance in the Roman Empire he needed many many copies of the Bible because there weren't that many I mean Christianity had been underground so he ordered from some of his top Scholars 50 expensive ornate copies of the Bible and they were ordered from a scriptorium in Alexandria Egypt Alexandria in Egypt was a source of a lot of false Doctrine especially if you study the early church history in the first centuries a lot of the really weird heresies came out of Egypt and Alexandria well if you study the uh these especially these two codex beta codex sinaiticus apparently these are two of the surviving copies that were ordered by Constantine himself so these go back to like the third Century of the fourth Century so indeed these are very they are very very old and much older than anything we have so why would we suspect that there's anything wrong with them well the first place that came from Alexandria they apparently are based on a translation that was based on a scholar named origen he is sometimes presented as one of our Christian fathers of the faith but the guy was a heretic I mean he didn't believe in the resurrection he didn't believe in hell he believed that Jesus Christ was a created being basically he was a third Century uh Jehovah's Witness I mean it was not by that name but I mean the guy was just he was really messed up in his Doctrine okay and he he translated the Bible copied the Bible and just took out the verses that he didn't like and added in things that he did like and when you study the writings of origin and you compare them to these two codexes it's like well now we see the source of this it's a very corrupt source so getting your Bible from Alexandria Egypt is just as bad as getting your Bible from Watchtower press exactly okay and the copying process is such that if you have a copy and you put it on your shelf and it's known to be a corrupted copy and it's just there for decoration it never gets used by real Bible Believers and it can sit there Century after Century nobody ever touches it nobody ever uses it it's just there for decoration and it lasts now at the same time up in Antioch which is where the church was started where they were first called Christians history tells us that Antioch also was a source for Bible copying and they made thousands of copies of the Bible it went all over the Roman Empire and the churches used these and copied these so you have one source of the Bible that comes from a corrupt Roman Emperor a Roman Empire corrupted heretical Source in Egypt that's unused that's that nobody ever uses because they know it's junk and then you have another source of documents of scripture that that is kept by the churches and the Christians themselves and these get used all the time well I have a Bible here that I've had for just a few years and it's already I mean The Binding is broken and it's it's wearing out so a Bible that is good that gets used all the time doesn't last very long have you ever seen a book that's a hundred years old you know how fragile it is and so these copies that were good were constantly used they would wear out that actually would burn them and then they would make copies from the good copies and then they'd burn the old ones the King James Bible which was translated at the order of the king of England in in the 1611 is when it was published that was published based on a family of manuscripts that had been collected and collated by a man named Erasmus and he said all of the tens of thousands of manuscripts we have available can be compared and it's very obvious what the actual text is somebody may have left out a letter here or added a word here but if you compare ten thousand manuscripts and 999 of them say one thing and the other one obviously has a word missing you you know what the text is that principle gives us a text that came to be known as the textist receptus or the received text which was received by the Christians in the churches that's where the King James Bible received its its foundation that's what was translated into English and it was used from 1611 all the way up to the late 1800s well then new manuscripts are found and people just get all hyped up man we got this new manuscript we should have a Bible That's revised to reflect the best manuscripts the best manuscripts being the oldest ones which when you think it through you realize they are absolutely not the best manuscripts the guys who knew most about them and actually were in charge of them threw them in a garbage can okay so they're not the best manuscripts but every time you read a scholar who says now the best manuscripts translate it this way so it should have said this do we want a Bible That's based on the text that the Christians in all the churches had used and copied and accepted for thousands of years or do we want a Bible that came out of a garbage can and a monastery and the Pope's uh Library every single new version whether it's the rise version The New International Version the the English I mean even the new King James you compare the verses and you'll see that it matches up with the readings in the garbage can manuscripts so for me the history shows me I've got the right Bible and every other English Bible comes from the garbage can manuscripts so on a simple level that's enough for me to know I've got the right Bible in the King James so given the history and you know the King James Bible's here with its history the modern versions are here with their history obviously um it's history matters and its background in the source of the text matters and obviously if your source is bad then you're going to have bad content so obviously we haven't even talked about the content of these versions yet in comparison with each other what why are some problems with some Modern versions especially in the content that's another really interesting study that you don't have to go to a take a college course to to find out that for example the they leave a lot of words out and entire verses the uh the NIV has 55 000 fewer words than the King James okay that's more than just incidental that's I mean I don't know that I've ever I don't know that I've ever I've written a lot of stuff but I don't know that I've never written anything in 55 000 words yeah how could they take out that many words and not take out something important sure that in itself tells me there's something seriously wrong with these new translations they leave out all complete verses I've got list hero versus complete verses that are left out of the the NIV Bible for example in Matthew 17 when they're dealing with the the demon-possessed boy Jesus said how be it this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting that verse is completely missing in in the NIV that is a powerful tool that we use in our our battle against Satan and that Bible takes it away from us Matthew 18 says the son of man has come to save that which was lost I need that verse amen who told somebody they could take that verse out somebody didn't like that verse and just took it out when the Philip is baptized in the eunuch the eunuch says what do I have to do if I want to be baptized the verse that the NIV takes out says and Philip said if thou believest with all thine heart thou mayest and he answered and said I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God wow I need that as instructions for who I can baptize sure the NIV takes that out first John 5 7 talks about the Trinity there are three that bear record in heaven the father of the word the Holy Ghost and these three are one the NIV takes that verse out completely wow and if it doesn't take it out completely there are lots and lots of verses where they just put like a footnote that says this was not in the best manuscripts okay and those best manuscripts are you know through the average reader well I guess it should it should be that way if that's the best man but the best manuscripts in their mind are the ones that you find in the Pope's library and in garbage can um you have copyrights you pick up any of these new translations and you've got a copyright well why would why would a book have a copyright it says copyright so you can make exclusive money off of it publishing it the King James Bible is the only English Bible we have that doesn't have a copyright and so anybody it's public domain God gave it to us the Christians over the centuries have helped to preserve it for us and anybody can use it anybody can publish it anybody can make a copy of it so is your Bible Ministry or industry there you go you look at who endorses the new Bibles okay um anytime a new Bible comes out they get all these celebrity endorsements without fail it's some kind of a preacher that has false Doctrine they're in some kind of a rock and roll Church they are compromisers they don't follow the straight doctrine of the Bible and they are the ones who are always endorsing the new Bibles and so a lot of just just plain problems with the with the new translations they're just not accurate they're they leave things out they're messed up so what do you mean we talked about this before but what do you mean by a Bible sniff test all right so when I read the King James Bible it speaks to my heart sure it's beautiful it has lovely language when I pick up another version and I read it it just Falls flat Ronald Reagan addressed that I'm not sure if you knew this or not but Ronald Reagan was a radio commentator before he was president okay he had a nationwide uh like a five-minute commentary broadcast that was syndicated all over the nation and he once did a broadcast about a new version of the Bible that was coming out and he said what would you say if somebody told you we've got to rewrite all the works of Shakespeare so they're more understandable we got to rewrite all of Charles Dickens novels we got to rewrite the uh the Beethoven's Fifth Symphony so that it's more understandable you'd say well no those are Classics they need to they they are they have a beauty why would you tamper with that and he says well that's what people are doing with the Bible he mentions a new version of the Bible that had just come out at that time and he said the authorized version which is another name for our King James Bible is the one that came into being when the England of King James was scoured for the best translators and Scholars at a time when the English language had reached its peak of richness and Beauty he said this King James Bible that we've always used for hundreds of years is a beautiful thing even H.L Menken who was a Godless man of literature said the King James Bible was probably the most beautiful piece of writing in any language Reagan gives a couple of examples he said the King James Bible says the voice of one crying in the wilderness prepare ye the way this new version that was just coming out at the time said someone is shouting in the desert get the road ready he said it sounds like the straw boss announcing lunch hour is over just it's not special it's not rich it's not beautiful the Christmas story he says the wondrous words fear not for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy in this new version it said don't be afraid I'm here with good news for you it's a little casual yeah and you know you can look at some of these versions there's a version that takes Genesis where it says the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field and it rewords it to the serpent was one bad dude so it can get really ridiculous yeah it's even to the point of using profanity I mean there are modern versions that actually have swear words where the the King James Bible presents it in a way that's appropriate for for all ages and at the time the King James Bible the at the time the revised version the first of the big versions was was published there was a bishop in the Church of England who said when I read the new version when I have been reading the King James and I read the new version it feels like I have been writing down a blacktop Road in a beautiful Carriage with perfect suspension and when I go to the new Bible it feels like I'm I'm riding on a road that's Rocky and rough with potholes and there's no suspension on the wagon it's just clunky my grandmother read the King James Bible she could understand it she knew what it taught and she lived by it and it brought her to Salvation in Jesus Christ and she's in heaven today because she could understand the King James Bible they ran the King James Bible through a computerized analysis which they use for school textbooks to determine what is the grade level the the reading level the grade level the King James Bible came out after that analysis at about a sixth or seventh grade level based on the vocabulary this the the length of the sentences it is a very understandable book they ran the New International Version through the same filter and it came out much more difficult maybe a 9th or tenth grade reading level so it's literally harder to read these new versions that are marketed as easier to understand it's just a scam them to make money and I think of the hundreds of millions of dollars and the tens of thousands of hours that have been spent trying to rewrite something that didn't need to be Rewritten Lester Olaf used to say don't rewrite it re-read it and they they could have taken all that money they could have gone to the mission field they could have reached people for Jesus Christ but they I feel like that is such a tremendous waste of money to have Rewritten the Bible and to base it on garbage when when I pick up the Bible and I say well do I want this Bible that came out of the churches that have preserved it the Christians throughout the centuries have preserved it because they loved it and believed it or do I want this other Bible that came out of a Catholic garbage can do I want a Bible that has been checked and rechecked and reused and recopied lovingly so that they didn't miss anything or leave it out I mean they would take tens of thousands of manuscripts and compare them and they'd find out what the right wording is supposed to be you've got that many manuscripts to work with you can tell it's really not that hard you take this Bible which has everything is supposed to have or do I want a Bible that they leave out 55 000 words the sniff test this I can just tell by the way this makes me feel by the by the history by the the way it speaks to me I know this is a good Bible and the other Bible it just smells bad so the sift test applies to the history just a brief view of the history it just smells bad otherwise use the King James Bible when it comes to the contents within the flaws uh and also when it comes to the aesthetical beauty of it as well now the ultimate question is this have you been able to persuade anybody using these you know very brief arguments very interesting uh several times in my life I think of a couple I had a couple of co-workers one time okay secular workplace one of my co-workers was a Nazarene Pastor who was working a part-time job and uh he used another Bible another one of my co-workers was a Free Will Baptist who used another Bible and I just showed them Catholic garbage can 55 000 missing words and they got mad and they said who gave these people authority to take all those words out of the Bible why would I want something that was found in a garbage can why do I want something that sounds like you know to some fourth grade kid just reworded it and you know to be or not to be he said Shakespeare well you're going to be or not I mean there there's a beauty that comes with the real thing that a cheap imitation obviously doesn't measure up and both of those guys said we're using the King James from now on another guy that I met in Russia he was a Christian man not a fellow missionary but a Christian man used another Bible I showed him those things and and he got upset at the people that would tamper with something and tell him that the new one was better than the old one and he switched and he's a King James man to this day well I appreciate you it's giving us this little quick Bible sniff test so we can uh you know apply this to our lives and maybe there's some people out there searching and wondering and maybe people who are just totally ignorant on the issue and maybe this will shed a little bit of light for them thank you so much for joining us thank you and we'll continue on this topic and other episodes obviously getting deeper into it as well so if you want to check out our other conversations about this topic make sure you check out our Maverick University YouTube Channel and also the audio only podcast platforms make sure that you like and you subscribe as well thanks for joining us [Music]

Channel: Maverick University

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Length: 25min 12sec (1512 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 30 2022