Page 86 - Way of Life Encyclopedia of the Bible Christianity. Based on the King James Bible

BIBLE VERSIONS

ACHIEVE THIS GOAL IS WELL NIGH IMPOSSIBLE. light of the following documentation. The following
Therefore we must be content with what Reinhold portions of the Word of God should be read very
Niebuhr and others have called, in other contexts, AN carefully in this light, as they contain warnings about
‘IMPOSSIBLE POSSIBILITY’” (R.M. Grant, A Historical the believer’s association with apostasy: Ro. 16:17-18; 2
Introduction to the New Testament, 1963, p. 51). Co. 6:14; Col. 2:8; 1 Ti. 6:20; 2 Ti. 2:16-18; 3:5; 2 John
“...every textual critic knows that this similarity of text 7-11; Re. 18:4.
indicates, rather, that WE HAVE MADE LITTLE
PROGRESS IN TEXTUAL THEORY SINCE WESTCOTT- The following information is abbreviated from The
HORT; THAT WE SIMPLY DO NOT KNOW HOW TO Modern Bible Version Hall of Shame, which is available
MAKE A DEFINITIVE DETERMINATION AS TO WHAT from Way of Life Literature.
THE BEST TEXT IS; THAT WE DO NOT HAVE A CLEAR This information is the fruit of 25 years of research.
PICTURE OF THE TRANSMISSION AND When I first began studying the Bible text-version issue
ALTERNATION OF THE TEXT IN THE FIRST FEW in about 1979, I wanted to check my sources and base
CENTURIES; and, accordingly, that the Westcott-Hort my research upon primary documents as much as
kind of text has maintained its dominant position possible, and I have pursued that goal over the past
largely by default” (Eldon J. Epp, “The Twentieth
Century Interlude in New Testament Textual Criticism,” quarter century. Today my personal library contains a
Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol. 43, 1974, pp. large percentage of the books that have been published
390-391). in this field in English in the past 200 years. I have
Suggestions for further reading on this topic: (1) The researched this issue at libraries in many parts of the
Modern Bible Version Question-Answer Database goes world.
into the issue of modern textual criticism in some detail. Bible believers of the sixteenth, seventeenth,
(2) John Burgon’s exposure of the error of the Westcott- eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries were busy
Hort theories, as contained in The Revision Revised, is rejoicing in, preaching, and obeying the Scriptures. On
devastating. David Otis Fuller published an abbreviated the other hand, the textual critics were flying in the face
form of this in True or False? (3) Another scholarly of the doctrine of preservation. Rejecting the Traditional
critique of the Westcott-Hort textual theories is The Text that had been handed down to them by Bible-
Identity of the New Testament Text by Wilbur Pickering believing Christians, they were groping around in dark
(Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1977). This is available monasteries and papal libraries trying to rediscover the
online at http://www.esgm.org/ingles/imenu.html. supposed lost Word of God. Their ears were attuned to
Pickering, who has a Ph.D. in Linguistics from the the vain philosophies emanating from Germany, and
University of Toronto, dismantles the principles of they were applying secular principles of textual criticism
Westcott and Hort point by point. The research for the to the biblical text.
first edition of this book was done for a master’s thesis While not every adherent of modern textual criticism
Pickering submitted to the Dallas Theological Seminary is a modernist or a Unitarian or a skeptic or a
in 1968. The thesis was published in 1973 in True or rationalist, most of its chief architects and proponents
False? (We strongly disagree with Pickering’s support for have been. Evangelicals such as the Baptist A.T.
the Hodges-Farstad Majority Text and his proposed Robertson and the Presbyterian B.B. Warfield did not
revision of the Greek Received Text and the King James develop textual criticism but merely rehashed and
Bible, but one does not have to agree with all of passed along that which they received from the
Pickering’s conclusions to benefit from his extensive rationalistic fathers in this field. The same was true for
research in this field.) (4) Edward F. Hills’ The King Samuel Tregelles in England. Presbyterian scholar
James Version Defended contains a masterly refutation of Robert Dabney in 1871 observed that evangelicals
modern textual criticism. (5) An excellent brief adopted the critical text “FROM THE MINT OF INFIDEL
summary of the Westcott-Hort theory of textual criticism RATIONALISM” (Dabney, “The Doctrinal Various
is contained in Jack Moorman’s Modern Bibles--the Dark Readings of the New Testament Greek,” Discussions
Secret. This is available online at http:// Evangelical and Theological, pp. 361; this first appeared
www.wayoflife.org/fbns/fbcdarks.htm. All of these are in the Southern Presbyterian Review, April 1871).’
available in print from Bible for Today, 900 Park Ave., George Samson, president of Columbian College and
Collingswood, NJ 08108. Rutgers Female College, observed that “studied effort to
3. WE HOLD TO THE KING JAMES BIBLE BECAUSE undermine the integrity of the Textus Receptus began in
THE MODERN TEXTS AND VERSIONS ARE A Germany, among the rejecters of the supernatural
PRODUCT OF END-TIME APOSTASY. interposition clearly manifest in the Old and New
Another of the reasons why we reject modern textual Testament records,” and, “It was fostered by German
criticism is its affinity to and intimate association with speculative tendencies of thought” (The English Revisers’
end-time apostasy. I don’t see how this can be denied in Greek Text, 1882, p. 97).

86 Way of Life Encyclopedia of the Bible & Christianity