F4F | Rebuked by KJV Only Conspiracy Theorists

Welcome to another installment of Fighting for the Faith. My name is Chris Rosebro. I am your servant in Jesus Christ. And this is the channel that compares what people are saying in the name of God to the Word of God.

Now, I don't know if you know this but from time to time I get rebuked and I was recently rebuked by a channel that is dedicated to the concept of King James Version Only, the KJV Only group and If you've ever heard of KJV Only, go ahead and like the video, subscribe down below and all that important YouTube-y stuff.

Don't forget to ring the bell. What we're gonna do today is we're gonna take a look at the rebuke. There's a fellow by the name of, who goes by the name of Boat Rocker. I believe, let me see, is his name Brandon Boat Rocker?

Yeah, Brandon the Boat Rocker, the Boat Rocker, and I'm gonna be rebuked. I'm gonna be rebuked for my apparent mishandling of 2nd Timothy chapter 2 verse 15. We're gonna take a look at whether or not I mishandled that text, but then we're also gonna take a look at, you know, should we be only using the King James Version Bible Only?

Is that the only infallible Word of God for English speakers? Yeah, no, far from it. And we'll do a little comparative work, and then I'm gonna give you some links to some resources that I think will help you, if you've ever wanted to know, how can I trust the Bible?

And what do we do with all of these variant readings of the Greek texts that we have? You know, every time somebody digs someplace somewhere in the Middle East or in around the Mediterranean, they dig up a new old manuscript of the New Testament, and it's got variant readings in it.

What do we do with that? We're gonna use this opportunity to kind of deal with a bigger subject. So all of that being said, let me go ahead and zoom over here and let's fire up the web browser. And this is the beginning of my rebuke by Brandon Boatrocker over at the, what is this, the Last Days YouTube channel, and let's kind of let him start to make his case.

The KJV-Only Rebuke and the Conspiracy Narrative

Regarding my mishandling of God's work. And Chris, I watched your video about a couple weeks ago, it's one of your latest videos, in which you were trying to rebuke Todd White. I consider him to be a rank heretic.

Which, as far as I'm concerned, Todd White is definitely a heretic, but you yourself are also teaching things that are not true. All right, so apparently I'm a heretic.

He does go on later to say that I am a heretic. I'm teaching things that are not true, apparently. You are.

Completely tricking people and deceiving them, I believe,.

Unintentionally, but... All right, so I'm deceived myself, and because I'm deceived myself,.

I'm deceiving others, apparently. Teal, you, someone, I don't know if someone that's talked to you or not, or maybe you've just... Well, you're talking to me now, you know, so I guess this counts. I refuse to listen, but you are preaching things that you are trying to say are in The Scripture, which are not in The Scripture at all.

And the problem lies in you do not have the Word of God.

You have a corrupt... All right, so I don't have the Word of God. I'm going to back this up so you can hear the claim.

Here we go. You were trying to say are in the Scripture, which are not in the Scripture at all. And the problem lies in you do not have the Word of God. You have a corrupted book. You have a book with opinions in it.

You do not have a book that has any shred of truth. Well, I

All right, so I've got a book with opinions in it that hasn't got a shred of truth, but he's gonna qualify that.

It has an essence of truth from the King James Version Bible. Whatever truth is in the ESV, that's the book I'm talking about, that's the book you have. Any truth that's in that ESV is from the King James Version Bible.

Okay, so let's address this for a second here. If you've ever run into somebody who's King James Version only, by the way, the very first Bible I ever read, cover to cover, was a black bonded leather copy of the King James Bible.

So it was the first Bible I ever owned, first Bible I read cover to cover, and I think it's an absolutely fine translation, but at the end of the day, it's that. It's a translation. And so I have a degree in biblical languages.

Yeah, so I'm formally trained in Greek and Hebrew and have been reading both for decades. All of that being said, if you, and this is where I'm gonna make a careful distinction, if you prefer the King James Bible and this is your Bible of choice, this is the one you wanna study out of or preach from or whatever, you are free to do that.

I would note that the language being used in there is more and more becoming antiquated and more difficult for English speakers to understand. And so modern translations do make the Word of God more accessible.

But if this is just a personal preference, no problem. You have the freedom to study from the King James Bible. I reference it frequently in my sermon prep and other things because as part of my sermon prep, I look at how other translators have translated the texts I'm preaching on.

And so that's gonna include the King James Version. It's gonna include the NASB, the original NASB. It's gonna include the ESV as well as the Net Bible. And so I oftentimes frequently look at those to see how different translators have dealt with different texts.

That being the case is we need to note that when somebody binds your conscience and accuses you of heresy because you're not using the King James Version, now we're off into a different category. So they're binding your conscience and saying that you are not even a Christian, you're a heretic if you're using any other English translation than the King James, which is absurd on its face.

And if I could make a comparison, the King James Version only cult, I think you can kind of make the case that they behave like a cult. They oftentimes are found in the IFB, the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist Movement, very legalistic and things like this.

But the King James Version only cult, they are to Christianity as, well, flat earthers are to science. And if you've ever run into a flat earther, now recently, by the way, I was rebuked for being a heliocentric, sun-worshipping idolater because I don't believe the earth is flat.

No, I don't believe the earth is flat at all. And so, yeah, it's gonna go, what, he's not King James Version only and he doesn't believe in the flat earth? Click, I'm unsubscribing, Roseboro. I know, I can see the comments coming already.

And I'm just recording the episode right now, but you're watching this in its final form. All of that being said, if you've ever seen the Netflix documentary, Behind the Curve, it is well worth the watch.

And I'm not gonna play out portions of the video, I'll just reference this and we'll put a link to it down below. And the name of it is, Behind the Curve, Confirmation, Bias, and Flat Earthers. It's a very fascinating, it's a fascinating documentary because at the end of the day, those who subscribe to the flat earth do not do so because of objective science.

They subscribe to the flat earth because of the narrative surrounding the flat earth. And the narrative is a conspiracy narrative. NASA and world governments have conspired together to suppress the truth of the flat earth.

And so NASA is the bad guy. They are the Illuminati. They are the Bilderbergs of the solar system or something like, I don't know how else to put it. But everything is wrapped up in the narrative. And so in this portion, in this video, again, we'll put a link to it down below, Behind the Curve, Confirmation, Bias, and the Flat Earthers.

This is just a short little segment where one of the major leaders within the flat earth movement on YouTube and podcasting and he always speaks at conferences and things like this, he talks about if they could only afford a certain kind of laser gyroscope, they would once and for all be able to prove that the earth is flat.

And so he notes that if the earth is really a sphere, if you have a gyroscope, then every hour there's gonna be 15 degrees of drift on the gyroscope. And so the gyroscope they want is this laser kind of gyroscope.

And the flat earthers pitched in and somebody bought that for this guy, $20 ,000 gyroscope. And so he fired this thing up and guess what? Every hour there's 15 degrees of drift. And the thing is, is that once you buy into these conspiracy narratives, then there's no facts that can be presented to disprove the narrative.

And so when facts are presented that contradict the narrative, then other narratives are created for the purpose of basically destroying the authenticity or the veracity or the trustworthiness of whoever or whatever the facts are coming from.

And so what this flat earther, that's this fellow right here, I don't remember his name. That's his laser gyroscope, 15 degrees of drift. And here's a guy talking about it. And so what they found is that, yeah, they were getting 15 degrees of drift per hour.

And so they came up with a narrative as to why that was the case. And their claim was that the gyroscope was being influenced by, well, radiation and things from the firmament. And so they encased it in a particular box or a cylinder in order to limit the effects of those supposed rays.

And it still kept drifting 15 degrees. And then they changed the substance. They changed it to a, I forget what the name of this thing was. Let's see here. What do they call this? The bismuth chamber in order to eradicate the beams.

And it still kept drifting 15 degrees. The reason it was drifting 15 degrees is because the earth is round. It's a sphere. That's the thing, it's a globe. So that's the reason why even a $20 ,000 laser, what is the gizmo called again?

Gyroscope, that's what it's called. Laser gyroscope, the reason it drifts 15 degrees is because the earth is a globe. But the thing is is that once you buy into the narrative, no facts will ever overturn the narrative.

No facts whatsoever. They know NASA's evil. They know the government is suppressing this. And so there's something wrong with the equipment when the equipment shows that the earth is a globe. Same thing with the flat earthers.

Not the flat earthers, the King James Version only folks. It's not about with them. It's not about reliable manuscripts or any kind of scholarly science in regards to getting at and piecing together using textual criticism what the original manuscript said.

With them, it's all about the narrative. The conspiracy narrative among the King James Version only folks is that the Roman Catholic Church in cahoots with the Jesuits and others have set out to basically destroy the word of God and the sound biblical doctrine.

And they're the ones behind the discoveries of manuscripts like Codex Sinaiticus. Don't even get me started on Vaticanus and other things like this. And as a result of it, they've got this whole conspiracy narrative.

So the reason why according to them, the ESV has alternate readings than the King James Version has nothing to do with the Greek manuscripts. It has to do with the conspiracy. It's all about the conspiracy and no amount of facts will ever change the mind of the King James Version only people.

They are the flat earthers of the church. And it's sad, but it's absolutely true. So let me fast forward just a little bit here as he gets into the meat and potatoes of his rebuke of me for apparently deceiving people and being deceived.

All of this based on 2 Timothy 2 .15. And we'll take a look at his claim.

Handling 2 Timothy 2:15 and the Meaning of orthotameo

So today I'm going to prove that with what statements that you said on your video and with words from the book that you have. So I want to first start off by.

Yeah, did you ever notice Brandon Boatrocker that when I have a Bible on screen that if I'm in a New Testament text, I have the ESV usually in the center column and I have the Greek manuscript in the right column.

Have you ever noticed that? This is the Nestle Aland 28, latest version of Nestle Aland. And then when I have a Hebrew text open, ESV is in the center and I have the Biblical Hebraic Astute Gartensia over on the left.

Have you ever noticed that? There are reasons. And if you've been watching this channel for any length of time, then you'll note that I frequently correct the ESV. The reason being is because no English translation is going to get it 100 right because certain things are always lost in translation.

It's just how this works because Greek isn't a code where you have a one-to-one. Every Greek word has an English equivalent. There are words in Greek that there are no English equivalents for. And as a result of it, as a translator, you have to kind of rack your brain thinking, okay, I understand the concept or the idiom that's being spoken here.

How do I convey this so that an English speaker will understand it? But I'm getting ahead of myself. So let's come back then to Brandon Boatrocker's rebuke. Let's hear the rebuke.

Your statements that you made, you made regarding 2 Timothy 2, verse 15.

In Scripture, 2 Timothy chapter two, I believe verse 15,.

It made no sense to me whatsoever. And I saw what you were trying to do, but

Yeah, the reason it doesn't make any sense is because you bought into the conspiracy narratives that the King James Version Only cult has created. As a result of it, they are completely impervious to actual facts.

So that's the problem here.

Again, because you were using the ESV, you don't have the word of God.

I don't?

Oh, no.

You'll notice I don't take his claim seriously.

You didn't know how to, you don't know what to say. I mean, you're just saying what your book says, but that is not at all what God said.

Okay.

2 Timothy 2, verse 15.

So the King James Version Bible, I mean, it was good enough for the Apostle Paul, so it's gotta be good enough for me, right?

Uh-huh.

Yeah, see, the issue is is that Paul didn't write in King James English. That didn't even exist as a language at the time. He wrote in Koine Greek.

It has nothing to do with handling anything correctly.

One who can rightly handle God's word.

And that's what you read off the ESV. And you tried to make these words interchangeable.

Yeah, the thing is, Brandon, when you see why I said, yeah, you can say rightly handle, or you can say divide, I was basically giving an homage to the King James Version's translation for the reason that the Greek word behind this, there is no English equivalent.

And so both translations kinda get at it, but both translations end up falling a little bit short, and I wasn't gonna spend an entire 15 minutes explaining the intricacies of that particular word and why it's so hard to pull over into English, but we'll do that today.

You actually tried to say, you read handling as you read it, but you tried to say, oh, you can just say divide.

Rightly handling, or you can say dividing here.

These are two separate words, Chris.

Right, I get that. But neither one of those words are the actual word that's in the Greek.

They're not the same. They don't mean the same thing.

Yeah, actually, the concepts are very similar. And when you see what the Greek is saying here, you'll get it.

And I know you have the common sense to know this.

I hope so.

Handling means the action of one that handles something.

Right.

Or the manner in which something is treated.

Right, so reading to me the Oxford English Dictionary definition of the word handling isn't gonna be helpful here because the issue is the Greek word behind it.

That's what handling means. Dividing means to separate.

Yeah, yeah.

So how in the world are these both the same thing?

They're both attempts at conveying to an English audience a Greek word that doesn't have an English equivalent. Let's just take a look at that now, shall we? Okay, so we are going to go over to, let's see here.

I need to go to 1 Timothy. 2 Timothy chapter two, verse 15. Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved. Now, you'll note that the King James Version says study. The thing is is that no Greek manuscript actually has the word study.

But I think the King James Version is getting at correctly what this text is saying. Do your best to present yourself to one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling, and then here's our word, all right?

And this word, orthotameo, orthotameo, let's take a look at what it means because when you know what it means, you're gonna realize what a beast this is to pull over into English. So here's the Greek verb, orthotameo.

So where it is used, it means, plainly means to cut a path in a straight direction or cut a road across a country that is forested or otherwise difficult to pass through in a straight direction so that the traveler may go directly to his destination.

So if I were to just translate it literally and not consider the English audience for which I'm trying to convey what the biblical text says, I can say, be diligent to present yourself to God as one approved who needs not be ashamed, cutting a path in a straight direction, a road across a forested or difficult to pass through country in a straight direction so that the traveler may go directly to his destination, the word of truth.

Yeah, you'll note that in English, we do not have an equivalent of the word orthotameo. We don't have an English equivalent. So now the translator has got to roll up his sleeves and go, all right, what am I gonna do with this?

All right, because I got a Greek word that doesn't come over into English correctly. So what did the ESV do? Rightly handling the word of truth, okay, it's all right. Okay, but cut a path in a straight direction is a closer idea here.

So if we pull up the King James Bible, all right, the King James study to show thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. You see, dividing isn't quite there either.

The reality is that no English translation is gonna quite get there. So if we look at, let's take a look at how the NASB 1977 handles it. Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, rightly handling accurately the word of truth.

Okay, I like that translation, handling accurately, but at the end of the day, you can see what the concept is that's in the Greek, but pulling it into English, the reality is that the King James does a decent job.

The ESV does an okay job. The NASB, I think does better than both of them. And don't even get me started on the NIV. It's not, the NIV drives me nuts. Anyway, but all of that being said, at the end of the day, the issue is not that dividing and handling are two different words, therefore I'm contradicting myself.

The issue is orthotomeo is just a wee bit hard to pull into English. And every attempt to translate it at the end of the day is gonna fall a little bit short. And something's gonna get lost in translation.

This is why it's imperative that pastors and those who preach and teach in Christ Church know the biblical languages. And they need to be able to work with those texts in order to understand what was said in the original languages, where each English translation may fall short, and so that they can then preach and teach the truth in its fullness to those whom they are tasked with by Christ to preach the word to.

You get the idea. So, yeah, at the end of the day, the rebuke that I received here from Brandon Boatrocker shows that he does not understand how this all works. And he buys into the myth then that there's this vast conspiracy out there to destroy the word of God, and that the only inspired translation of the Bible in English is the King James Version only.

And anybody who is using a different translation is just silly and stupid. So, or heretical at worst, you know, you kind of get the idea. But he does call me a heretic. Let's listen a little bit more though to his rebuke here.

And you are tricking thousands of people into really believing this is the same thing. I mean, that's their fault for listening to you.

Yeah, I'm tricking people, uh-huh. Yeah, no, I just definitively proved that you don't know what you're talking about. And if you would actually apply yourself to real biblical scholarship rather than the wingnut wackerdoodle conspiracy theories of the King James Version only people, then you would leave the flat earth society and join real scientists and real scholars.

Because the issue here is that the Greek word, orthotomeo, doesn't have an English equivalent. So, every translation is making an attempt to kind of get at what the Greek text says there.

But as I listened to your video, which again, you were talking about, Todd, I was just amazed that you said that.

Yeah, rightly handling, or you can say dividing here. Right, because I know what the Greek text says. I can read it.

I mean, I say, does he not have the common sense to know that these are two separate words?

Maybe the issue is you don't have the common sense to know that the whole King James Version only conspiracy narratives are just nuts.

I mean, you went to school the same way I went to school.

No, I have a degree in biblical languages. You clearly don't. So, we did not go to school the same way. So, you know, I actually went to a real school, studied real biblical scholarship, have real biblical degrees, whereas clearly you don't, because if you did, you wouldn't be saying things like this and showing that you don't know what you're talking about.

And that's just the polite way to put it. So, let me kind of move out from here and let's take a look at a couple of things here. I put together just a quick couple of slides and attacking straight on one of the major parts of the conspiracy narrative of the King James Version only people.

They claim that Codex Sinaiticus denies the deity of Christ, that it's some kind of a Jesuit forgery of the modern world and all this kind of nonsense. But again, if you read Greek, and I have a copy of Codex Sinaiticus in my Logos system, and when I'm teaching Greek, I actually reference it and show it to my Greek students so that they can understand how these very manuscripts work.

And so, yeah, and all of that being said, let's take a look at just a couple of places where clearly Codex Sinaiticus affirms the deity of Christ. For instance, John 1 .1. Now, over here, you've got a photocopy or a graphical representation of Codex Sinaiticus in John 1 .1.

Anarche en halagas, kai halagas en pros tontheon, kai theos en halagas. My translation, in the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God and God was the Word. That's what Codex Sinaiticus says. So it doesn't deny the deity of Christ at all.

It affirms it quite clearly in John 1 .1. Another clear text, Titus 2 .13, and this is a wonderful portion of Titus where Paul says, we're waiting for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.

And here it is in Codex Sinaiticus. Tu megalou Theou, kai soteros heimon Christou Iesou. So what are we doing? The epiphaneion teis doxes, awaiting the glory, tu megalou Theou of the great God and Savior, kai soteros heimon of us, of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus, Christos Iesou.

It's right there. So here, Codex Sinaiticus 2 .13, the way it reads, absolutely affirms the deity of Christ. Last text, I won't read the entirety of it, but Philippians 2, five through eight, talking about have this mind in y 'all which is in Christ Jesus, who being by nature God.

And here you can see it, hasen morfe Theou. It's right there in Codex Sinaiticus, totally affirming the deity of Christ, that he is by nature God. He did not regard equality with God a thing to be grass.

He emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being found in the form of man. He humbled himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross. The point is this, and the reason I'm pointing this out is because these are facts that fly in the face of the wingnut, wackerdoodle conspiracy narratives of the King James Version only people.

And contrary to their claims, that Codex Sinaiticus is some kind of forgery, that it's an inferior text, it denies the deity of Christ. I just pulled up three of the major texts that affirm the deity of Christ.

And wouldn't you know it, Codex Sinaiticus totally affirms the deity of Christ. So you get the idea. Now, if you wanna do some research on your own on these topics, I'm going to put some links down below in the description.

And so these are books that anybody who wants to do serious study of the New Testament, and can the manuscripts be relied upon. Classic work by F .F. Bruce, The Canon of Scripture. We'll talk about how the New Testament came into being, and talking about how the canon of the New Testament was created.

Absolutely worth the read. The New Testament Documents, Are They Reliable? Also by F .F. Bruce. Just a fantastic stellar introduction to the concepts of textual criticism. An apologetic work along these lines by John Warwick Montgomery, History and Christianity.

Again, well worth the purchase. Small little book, quick read. And then also, we'll put links to these in the description. And Daniel Wallace, he's part of an institute on New Testament manuscripts and documents.

There's a two hour and 17 minute long video by Daniel Wallace called The Basics of New Testament Textual Criticism. Strongly encourage you to take a look at this particular lecture by him, because, again, it lays out with far more depth the basics of New Testament textual criticism, and how we can absolutely trust that the Bible, the modern translations that we have, that are good translations based on what's called the Nestle Alon, or the critical text, that we can absolutely be sure.

With greater than 99 assurity that they correctly represent the autographs of the original manuscripts of the New Testament. Very clearly, too. And so, he'll explain the science behind it, and how it works, and things like this.

And how the hundreds of thousands of manuscripts, and fragments, and things that we have are our friends, not our enemies. And so, this'll go a long way towards getting rid of the wingnut, wackerdoodle conspiracy theories of the King James Version only people.

So, again, do your homework on this, and you'll see that, again, like I said, the King James Version only folks, they are to Bible scholarship as flat earthers, or to actual astronomy, and physics, and things like that, real science.

Yeah, I think you get the idea. So, hopefully you found that helpful. If so, all the information on how you can support Fighting for the Faith, and share the video is down below in the description, and down below in the video.

Until next time, may God richly bless you, in the grace and mercy won by Jesus Christ, and his vicarious death on the cross, for all of your sins.

Amen.