Response to Southwest Radio Church on King James Controversy, Part 2 (Dr. Waite)

Apostolic Defense of the Faith and the Program’s Topic

Alpha and Omega Ministries presents the Dividing Line radio broadcast. The Apostle Peter commanded all Christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us, yet to give this answer with gentleness and reverence.

Your host is Dr. James White, director of Alpha and Omega Ministries and an elder at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church. If you'd like to talk with Dr. White, you can call now by dialing 602 -274 -1360.

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Continuing the Response to Southwest Radio Church and King James Onlyism

And welcome to the Dividing Line. My name is James White and it's good to have you with us today. We are continuing with our response to the recently aired Southwest Radio Church programs in which the folks decided they needed, again, to respond to the King James Only controversy.

Now please realize, Southwest Radio Church has not only had now Ted Liedis and D .A. Waite on, they've also had Gail Ripplinger on, which I find absolutely fascinating, especially in light of the fact that Theodore Liedis has identified Gail Ripplinger as a wacko.

Well, I guess it doesn't really matter what someone has said in the past. As long as you defend King James Only-ism, let's all get together. And the lack of consistency is absolutely amazing. Last week, on the program, we started responding to the assertions made by D .A. Waite and Dr. Spargemino in the two programs that they did.

And we continue with that response this week. Obviously, we're archiving these responses. We hope that they will be very useful to people in the future. Our programs are listened to over and over again.

We're very thankful for the internet audience as well as our live audience, and we hope that these sayings will be very, very useful to people. Just to bring you back up to speed, we were looking at the assertions made by D .A. Waite, and right at the end of the actual response portion of the program, we were looking at the assertion made by King James Only advocates, that there are doctrinal changes in the modern translations.

That, for example, the common assertion that Dr. Waite makes is that the modern translations water down the deity of Christ, or in otherwise, lessen orthodoxy. And I pointed out the danger. The danger of this being that their understanding of theology becomes the filter through which the very text of scripture is to be determined.

And so their understanding of a particular text, their understanding of a particular doctrine becomes the standard, and scripture then has to be made to fit that. And when the manuscript evidence itself demonstrates that they're going with a later reading that was not the original reading, well, those earlier manuscripts just have to be corrected in light of what their own theology says.

Now, one of the assertions that is made is that the deity of Christ is not as strongly presented in the modern translations. And I wrote an entire chapter in my book, The King James Only Controversy. It's chapter 8 that deals with the issue of the deity of Christ, because this is very important to me.

I've written books on the doctrine of the Trinity. I've dealt with Jehovah's Witnesses and many others. And all of chapter 8, beginning on page 193 and continuing on from there, deals with this issue.

And that goes all the way to chapter 9, page 222. So about 25 some odd pages or more on this specific issue. And I have yet to get any kind of meaningful response from the King James Only camp to that chapter.

They simply cannot deal with it. The sad thing is I've encountered King James Only advocates who are willing to weaken the Bible's testimony to the deity of Christ for the sake of defending the King James rendering.

We saw that when Dr. Holland was on the program, and he defended the weak understanding of Romans 9 -5 because the King James doesn't have as clear a testimony to the deity of Christ there as you have in, for example, the New King James or the New International Version.

So it's an amazing thing to observe. And one of the passages that Dr. Waite is about to bring up in the comments we're going to play for you, 1 Timothy chapter 3, verse 16. And I spent quite some time in the book discussing this in two different places.

I provided an entire discussion of it beginning on page 207 of the book, laid out the reasons for the variant, pointed out that your modern translations have a footnote, tell you that manuscripts read God was manifest in the flesh, discuss the background of it.

You won't hear any of what I said in the book discussed by Dr. Waite. Instead, you will have a very, very surface-level assertion made that, well, it preaches good, but it really doesn't communicate any truth.

Listen to what he says.

They take the position, well, you know, it might be found somewhere else. Maybe it's not. For instance, in 1 Timothy 3 .16, great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh to us. God.

The New Versions don't have that. They just say he or he who appeared in the body, but not God.

Now, that kind of response doesn't tell the audience anything about the reasons for the textual variant at 1 Timothy 3 .16. It simply relies upon the hope that people go, well, that must mean that the New Translations don't want the word God to be there.

Instead of explaining to people that the text upon which the modern translations are based have a different word there, and there's a very logical reason as to why there is a textual variation at that point.

Now, that's what you do when you want to educate people and give them the tools to make the decisions for themselves, rather than simply trying to promote a traditional position. Folks, that's what you need to understand.

King James Onlyism, even though it's held by many fine people, is a tradition. It's a tradition of men. It's a modern tradition of men. It's a very modern tradition of men, and it is therefore to be judged as a modern tradition.

Now, Dr. Waite continues by saying, well, I don't buy this idea that, well, the doctrine of the deity of Christ is found elsewhere, therefore it doesn't matter about 1 Timothy 3 .16. Well, I would never argue that 1 Timothy 3 .16 isn't important.

We need to look at the reasons why there's a textual variant there. However, again, we need to turn this argument around and say, Dr. Waite, how about John 1 .18, where you don't have a reference to the deity of Christ?

How about Romans 9 .5, where the King James is not as clear as the New King James, the NIV? How about Titus 2 .13 and 2 Peter 1 .1, where the King James rendering is not as clear? How about these passages, Dr. Waite?

He needs to deal with those issues. Listen to what he says.

And so, they say, well, it may not be taught there, but maybe somewhere else. I don't buy that. I believe that the Lord wants us to have His doctrine taught in every place where it should be found. And that's why we stand for our Texas Receptors where the doctrines are sound and straight.

Where our doctrines are sound and straight. Hmm. In whose opinion? What is the standard here? The point, again, is I want to know what John wrote. I want to know what Paul wrote, not what a Baptist in the year 2000 thinks they should have written.

Again, if we're going to believe in Sola Scriptura, we need to have the Scriptura. And that's what the problem with Dr. Waite's position here is. The debate that Dr. Waite and I did, which, as I said, is on our internet site, kept coming up.

And what we're going to do right now is I want to play a section of what Dr. Waite said about our debate. And then what I've done is I've gone back to the debate, and I have a long section. Because not only does it illustrate how different the debate was from Dr. Waite's recollection of it, but it also gives a number of examples where, remember earlier last week Dr. Waite said, well, James White was amoeba-like.

He was amoeba-like. You couldn't nail him down. Listen carefully to the debate section and see who couldn't nail who down.

One of the things in the debate that I had with Mr. Waite there in 1994, the two hours on the radio talk show, one of the things he really rejected was that heretics had in any way... That's what Westcott and Hort says.

He says, no dogmatic thing is made for dogmatic purposes. None of these changes. And he's parroting this. And I quoted and changed the text. Dean Bergan mentions on Evianites, the various Gnostics, you know, the Martian, of course, the heretic that flourished in 150 A .D.

He was known for heretical production, his whole gospel. Cation and his diatessaron, Bacillides, Valentinus, Serentis, Heraclean, Theodotus, and the various Manichaean heretics. And all these things. And James White just threw up his answer.

Oh, you can't prove that. You can't prove... Well, what are we to conclude when you have things that are just doctrinally not...

Is that what happened in the debate? Listen carefully to this. We were discussing the last section of the book of Revelation, how Erasmus had translated from the Latin Vulgate, created all sorts of these interesting Greek words.

Listen to the debate and how it really went.

The Textus Receptus, Revelation, and the Debate Over Manuscripts

But you will admit that there are words like Orphanos at Revelation 22 -16 that basically he made up as he translated into the Greek, and they're still a part of TR. You wouldn't defend them as being God's words, would you?

Well, that's right. I go by faith in what God has preserved for us through the years. And it was accepted by the Church. We have over 37 historical links in our book, as you notice, down through the centuries.

And also that which is accumulated and proved by the evidence that is before us. Over 99 of the texts that we have, 5 ,210, go along with that text basically that underlies a King James Bible. And I believe that's what God has preserved for us.

I would agree, if you're talking about the majority text, that that certainly has a deep historical root. But the specific readings of the Textus Receptus, such as one I just gave you, Revelation 22 -16, or 22 -18, or 22 -19, or Revelation 17 -4, Revelation 14 -1, especially the book of Revelation, there are a number of problems where there is no Greek manuscript support.

And none of those readings existed prior to 15 -16. The Church had never seen Orphanos at Revelation 22 -16 prior to 15 -16. So I don't understand how it could be said that the Church accepted these things when the Church had never seen these readings in the first 1 ,500 years of its existence.

Well, I don't think that our discussion should center around one or two Greek words. I believe that the thrust of the text that underlies a King James Bible is the text that the early Church copied and recopied.

And the text that underlies these false versions, these versions that are not based upon proper text, is a text of the 4th century, they claim, 350 -375 A .D. And that text, basically the Egyptian text doctored by heretics, Egyptian texts, really, B and Aleph, those two particularly that they almost worship, those texts were never copied and recopied by the Church.

There are a measly 45 Greek documents, and that's as far as it goes, B and Aleph and 43 others. And they have kept themselves buried until Westcott and Horton and some of the others unburied them and said, Aha!

These are the texts that the Bible and the New Testament should be based on. And we believe that that is serious because the early Church realized that there were forgeries and falsities and errors abounding in those two Egyptian texts.

And they never copied and recopied them.

Well, Dr. Wright, certainly you're aware of miniscules that exist long after the time of the Egyptian texts that still maintain the Alexandrian readings like 1739, 1881 and others. But I don't agree that these texts were, quote-unquote, doctored by heretics and things like that.

I certainly see no evidence of that when I examine the texts themselves. I noticed that in your book you do feel that there are a lot of theological issues that are impacted by the textual readings that you choose.

You, for example, noted when the modern text will say Jesus and the King James says Lord Jesus, that you feel that this is, in fact, an attack or a denigration of his deity. Am I correctly representing what you said in your book on that?

Yes, I believe, Mr. Wright. I think that when these Doctrines or these Aryans or these Egyptians, all of whom were unorthodox in the area of Egypt, even according to some scholars on the other side, when they came to these places, they often removed the lordship, especially Lord Jesus Christ.

That was foreign to the Gnostics. And so, as far as the doctoring of the verses there, Dean Burgon, in his book called The Cause of the Corruption of the Early Manuscripts, lists on Chapter 13 quite a few of these heretics.

The Gnostics, the Ebionites, Martians, Thacians, Thessalonians, Valentinians, Syrinthians, Mericlians, Deodatists, Manichaeans, Manus, all of these. In fact, they said the greatest heretics and the greatest corrections in corruption occurred within the first hundred years after the Scripture was made.

But, sir, can you actually historically demonstrate that any of these heretics had anything whatsoever to do with what you would identify as the Alexandrian Manuscripts?

Well, I don't know by name. All I know is these men that were writing their own Gospels. Certainly, that's a change of the Word of God. Martian, for instance, A .D. 150, wrote his own Gospel and mutilated shamefully the Testament.

And his diatessaron tried to weave the four Gospels into one and thus polluted it. Thessalides, he was a heresiarch, a lead heretic, wrote the Gospel of Thessalides, 134 A .D. And Valentinus, 140 A .D., wrote his own Gospel.

I can't pin down that this man or that man, for instance, took away the word theos, God, in 1 Thessalonians 1 Timothy 3 .16. But that certainly is a heretical reading and it's certainly not a reading that ought to be accepted by the texts that we have.

God manifest in the flesh, not simply He appeared in the body.

Well, sir, I would happen to agree with you that the best reading of 1 Timothy 3 .16 is theos, personally. But I don't see that there is any theological reason to assert that some scribe who saw Hoth there, which is the other reading, was somehow a heretic.

But I don't think I really got an answer to what I was saying earlier. And that is, while we all agree that there were heretics in the early church, I ask where you can demonstrate that these heretics had anything to do with the writing of the manuscripts that are vilified by King James Only advocates.

In fact, the first one you mentioned, Marcion, you also mentioned Valentinus. They both flourished in Rome, not Alexandria, Egypt. And hence, could not one, if we're just citing names, assert that maybe that's why the Byzantine text does not contain a reference to the deity of Christ of John 1 .18?

I mean, could we not utilize that type of an argumentation? I mean, I wouldn't, but it would seem that if you're going to use that type of argumentation, it would have to go both directions, doesn't it?

Well, as far as 1 John 1 .18, I believe it is inimical to the deity of Christ. The reading that the only begotten God, to have God the only begotten, I believe is a travesty and a heresy and theological perversion.

I believe the only begotten Son is the proper reading. I believe it's the proper doctrine. And I think that what you said about those heretics in Rome, whether they're in Rome or where they are, they had an influence in the early church in some of these versions.

For instance, if you take 1 John 4 and verse 3, 1 John 4 and verse 3, every spirit that confesses not that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is not of God, this is the spirit of Antichrist. The words Christ has come in the flesh is left out of Aleph, or rather be, there's no Aleph here in this portion.

And I believe this is a great heresy. They do not want to believe that Jesus Christ, perfect God, perfect man, has come in the flesh, incarnate. And I believe that's the essence of 1 Timothy 3 .16 as well.

And you just mentioned 1 John 4 .3, if I just might turn our reader's attention to that. You just indicated that that phrase is not found in modern translations, and you're right, and you consider that heretical.

Isn't it significant, though, you indicated these manuscripts did not want to believe this. Why then do they all include it in verse 2, the verse immediately before the one that you read, which in all the modern translations speaks of the one confessing that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God?

Isn't it much more logical to understand that the reason that the Byzantine manuscripts have this same phrase twice was due to scribal error and not the other way around? And isn't it clear, no matter which direction you go on that, that since all the manuscripts of 1 John 4 .2 contain that phrase, there obviously was not some sort of conspiracy to attempt to deny the wonderful truth that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh.

In 1 John 4 .2, by this know ye the spirit of God, every spirit that confesses Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God, and every spirit that does not confess is not of God. I believe that wherever there is wrong doctrine, wherever there is heresy, I believe it should be included, whether it's twice, whether it's once.

I don't believe that we say that we can take out any portion of that which is solid and straight. I didn't name the versions that did remove Christ has come in the flesh, but the New American Standard Version is one, and certainly New King James and the footnotes.

I believe that we should take, for instance, another example of heresy and theological error, for instance, in John 7 .8, where the Lord Jesus is made out to be a liar by Allah and by the New American Standard Version.

I believe this is serious heresy against our Savior, the Lord Jesus, who loved us and gave himself for us.

Well, sir, again, if you're asserting that there is some heresy on the part of these manuscripts, when you have the phrase, Jesus has come in the flesh, right there in verse 2, obviously if someone wanted to take that doctrine out of the Bible, then they would take it out of the Bible, but they didn't.

In John 7, what you're talking about here, again, it is not calling Jesus a liar to take out the word yet, going up to the feet. That can be understood very plainly in other ways other than calling Jesus Christ a liar.

There would be no reason for anyone to attempt to do such a thing, but there would be a very good reason why later scribes would want to put that word yet in, so they wouldn't have to explain why Jesus put it the way that he did.

Again, one can understand the situation here without resorting to some sort of theory that certain manuscripts are somehow attempting to insert heresy. But you did just say something that intrigued me.

You said that whatever is, I think you put it, fuller or more strong and solid doctrine, that that's the reading that we should go with. Let me ask you possibly about another passage and see what your opinion on it is.

In Acts 4 .25, in the King James Version, Acts 4 .25, we read the following, "...who by the mouth of thy servant David hath said, Why did the heathen rage, and the people imagined vain things?". Now, the New American Standard Bible at Acts 4 .25 says, "...who by the Holy Spirit, who the mouth of our father David thy servant did say, Why did the Gentiles rage, and the peoples devised futile things?".

The modern translations teach very clearly here the role of the Holy Spirit in the inspiration of the Old Testament Scriptures. Could not a person, if they're using the same methodology and argument that I'm finding in your book, say that at this point, the modern texts are superior to, in both text and translation, to the King James at Acts 4 .25?

Well, Mr. White, you've said a number of things in this last question. Regardless of Acts 4 .25, I believe it's the way the text of the Septuagint has it, the King James has it, I'll let the readers, or let the listeners decide as far as the John 7, 8, whether Christ has made a liar or not.

Here it says, "...going up into this feast, the Lord Jesus in John 7, verse 8, was talking to his half-brothers.". The feast was at Jerusalem, and he said, "...I go not up yet unto this feast, for my time is not yet come.".

But Olive, the Sinai manuscript, there's no B here in this area, but they removed the one word, yet. And so does the New American Standard Version, so does the New King James in the footnotes, suggesting that we ought to take that away.

I'll leave it to the listeners' discretion to see whether or not the Lord Jesus says, I go not up into this feast, and yet he went up afterward, and if he says, I go not up, that would make him a liar, wouldn't it?

And regardless of what you say, you say the scribes added this or added that, I'm pointing out the theological errors in these versions and their superiority in theology in our King James Bible.

Well, sir, the going up in the feast, if you're familiar with that situation, as I've talked to the Gospel of John over the past couple of years, I explained that, and I think it's a very logical explanation, that when Jesus says, I'm not up, my time has not yet fully come, he's talking about the public displaying of himself to the people of Israel.

He went up, as the Book of John says, secretly and not openly. And hence there is a perfectly logical, exegetical reason for the reading that is found in the manuscripts upon which the New Translations are based, and there's no evidence of their attempting to cause Jesus to be called a liar.

But you said you feel in Acts 4 .25 that you should just stay with the Textus Receptus. Again, why is that the case? Do you feel that you should stick with the Textus Receptus, even when it goes against, for example, the majority of Greek manuscripts?

And if so, why?

Well, the Textus Receptus that underlies our King James Bible is the basic text of Biza, 5th edition, 1598, and it's been, for two reasons. It's been accepted by the Church down through the centuries, and it's been attested by the evidence.

And I believe the early Church in the apostolic times, we list over 37 historical links with the Textus Receptus in the early churches right down from the beginning, and I believe that that's the first reason.

The second reason is it's been attested by the evidence over 99 of the manuscripts that we presently have are underlying the King James Bible. The papyrus fragments, 85 of those go along with the King James.

The unshul, the big ones, over 97%. The cursives, over 99%. The lectionaries, 100%. That's over 99 of the whole manuscripts that we have. And I believe, by faith, that we have in this Textus Receptus, the Word of God, that the Church has accepted it.

If you reject to receive Greek text that underlies the King James Bible, what you're saying is the Church had no real Bible from the 4th century until 1 ,900, 1 ,500 years of a false Bible. I don't believe God works that way.

He promised to preserve His words, I believe He did, in the Hebrew Masoretic and the Greek Textus Receptus.

But, sir, you're making an error there in that I ask you when the TR varies from the majority text, when you talk about texts going back to the early Church, you're talking about the majority text, not the TR, not the specific TR where it differs due to Erasmus' mistakes or whatever from the actual majority text.

You're, at one point, you defend the TR, and at the next point you're defending what's actually the majority text, and they're not always identical to one another. There I have an entire list of readings where the TR is very different from the majority text.

And so I, again, have to ask when... Let me give you an example. Maybe it'll help if I have an example for us to look at. In 2 Timothy 2, verse 19, we have a passage where we have a quotation from... two quotations from the Old Testament.

The King James says, Nevertheless, the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, the Lord knoweth them that are his, and that everyone that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity. Now, maybe you know otherwise, sir, but to my knowledge, I have not been able to find a single Greek manuscript that says Christ in this passage.

The majority text reads Lord. All of the Nephilim, UDS, reads Lord. All the unseals, all the miniscules, all the lectionaries, they all read Lord at this place and not Christ. And so maybe this will help us to get the question more clearly.

Why should I believe that the correct reading here should be Christ when, to my knowledge, no Christian prior to 1516 had ever seen the reading Christ here? Everyone has thought it said Lord. You just said, you know, if you reject it, they receive text and you're saying the Church didn't have a Bible until the 19th century.

Why should I accept the T .R.'s reading at this point against all the Greek manuscripts? What was the verse? 2 Timothy 2 .19. 2 Timothy 2 .19. Again, the King James says, Nevertheless, the foundation of God is done.

Assure, having the seal, the Lord knoweth them that are his, and let everyone that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity. If you'll look at the Hodges-Farstad edition of the majority text, it will indicate there that that reading is a T .R. reading over against pretty much everybody else.

All the other manuscripts say Laird. My feeling is there's just an error on Erasmus' part. He was in a hurry, just like Revelation 14 was. But it seems to me that you're saying that because the T .R. was used for maybe, what, 200 years?

From the time of Erasmus onward, 300 years? That somehow we should accept that reading even when it doesn't have any Greek manuscripts in it.

Well, let me just say a few words without getting into any verse. I think it's not necessary that we go into verse by verse. Let me just say a little, think of something about the so-called majority Greek text, the Hodges-Farstad or Robinson and Pierpont.

There's two majority texts, as you know, floating around, vying for power. I guess the Hodges-Farstad is not even in print. At least, I guess it maybe has gone back recently, but it had gone out of print.

There are great defects in this so-called majority text.

Well, if you're wondering, did Dr. Waite ever address those passages? No. He just said, well, we don't want to look at specific words, we don't want to look at specific passages. Does that sound like the same person we're hearing on the Southwest Radio Church?

Doesn't sound like it to me at all. 1 -888 -550 -1360. 602 -274 -1360 in the Phoenix dialing area. We will be taking calls at the end of the hour. First come, first serve. We'll be right back. And welcome back to The Dividing Line.

We will be...just as we did last week, the last quarter hour. And last week, we had a few folks who called in. We weren't able to get to you. You make sure to call in. You'll be given priority so that we can get you on first.

But anyone who has questions concerning this issue of Bible translation, textual variation, the King James Only controversy, and especially the response provided by Southwest Radio Church and Dr. D .A. Waite, please feel free to get online now at 602 -274 -1360 or 1 -888 -550 -1360.

First come, first served, except for the two people who called in last week. So make sure you get online now. 1 -888 -550 -1360. Well, I think that segment from the debate, if you listened carefully to it, and I know you had to listen carefully, pretty much spoke for itself.

Every time I would present a specific passage, a specific textual variation, Dr. Waite's response was, well, we don't want to get involved with just, you know, specific passages and things like that. We don't want to get bogged down with things like that.

Let's talk in more general terms. And we believe that the King James Version is preserved, and I think it's very, very clear that in that particular clip that we just played that the person who would refuse to be pinned down and answer specific questions wasn't me.

It was Dr. D .A. Waite. And I assure you, nothing changed in the rest of the debate either. I again would invite you to go to our website, www .aomin .org, and listen for yourself and see if that was not characteristic of the entirety of the debate.

The Charge That Gnostic Heretics Altered the Manuscripts

Now, going back to the main issue in the review of my book that was nationally broadcast, Dr. Waite makes the assertion that the texts that underlie the modern translations, for example, Vaticanus, Sinaiticus, the papyri manuscripts like P66, P75, that these were purposefully altered by Gnostic heretics.

Now, I challenged him, Dr. Waite, who? Who connects a heretic with a papyri manuscript? Tell us how you've discovered this, and he could not do so. Well, he attempted to somewhat redeem himself in his review of my book.

Listen to what he had to say. We assume that the Gnostics of Egypt, which were prevalent in those days, made these changes for doctrinal purposes. If it were accidental, you would think, wouldn't you, Dr. Pagliarino, that the sentence would not make sense.

If there's an accidental omission or something, but when you make changes and everything else is perfect, wouldn't you assume that that's a purposeful addition by purpose?

Now, it is absolutely amazing to listen to Dr. Waite's explanation here. Again, he cannot demonstrate any connection between alleged Gnostic heretics and the text. When I challenged him in this debate, we specifically looked at John 1 .18, and it was pointed out to me, interestingly enough, by a person who supports the Byzantine text type, that the allegation that the phrase only begotten God at John 1 .18, that that particular phraseology is never found in Gnostic writings.

They do use the phrase only begotten Son, but they do not use the phrase only begotten God. So, let's use Dr. Waite's reasoning here for a moment. We have the earliest papyri manuscripts of the Gospel of John, and they all say, monogenes theos, using the term theos, God of Jesus.

But, Gnostics didn't like that phraseology. They never used it, but they did refer to the only begotten Son. And so, what do we have in the Textus Receptus? We have the only begotten Son. Thereby, logically, what must that mean?

Well, it must mean, using Dr. Waite's argumentation, that it is the Gnostics who changed the manuscripts into what the King James reads today. Now, is that how we do textual criticism? No, it is not. Now, furthermore, Dr. Waite is completely wrong about the nature of unintentional textual variation.

Most textual variations do not result in nonsense. Some do, certainly some do. But, for example, the King James Version is missing an important phrase at 1 John 3, 1, where we read in the modern translations that we are the children of God.

The King James doesn't have that phrase there, not because the King James is trying to deny anything or because heretics were involved, but in reality, it was simply a matter of an ancient scribe making a simple error of sight.

He went from one ending of a word to another ending of the word, but, unfortunately, he skipped the intervening words between looking at what he was copying, looking then at what he was writing, and then going back.

It would be like, when we do this all the time, I do this all the time when I'm typing at the keyboard. You're typing along, and you see a word that ends with I-N-G. And so you type I-N-G, and you look back at what you're copying, and two or three words later in the same line, or maybe on the line below, but frequently on the same line, another word ends with I-N-G, and your eye goes to the next I-N-G, and you skip the intervening phrase.

That's exactly what happened at 1 John 3, 1. We can tell that by simply looking at the type of variation it is, but still the sentence ends up making sense. The intervening words were not necessary to allow the sentence to make sense.

And so, again, there is no defense being offered here whatsoever of the unfounded assertion that P75, P66, all of B, have been changed by heretics to try to deny the deity of Christ or anything along those lines.