What is The King James Only Controversy?

Bible, and this week we're looking at the subject of the King James Only Controversy. You may have never heard of the King James Only Controversy. If you haven't heard of it, then you're not from the South, because I was rather surprised a number of years ago to discover that there are entire churches that have split and continue today to split because of the subject of the King James Only Controversy.

We'll be looking at that subject today and examining the question, is the King James Version the only English translation that Christians should use? There are a large number of very sincere, believing Christians who actually believe that the King James Version is the only version you should use, and in fact, all other English translations are satanic misrepresentations and mistranslations of God's Word.

That's obviously an important subject, and we'll be looking at that today on The Dividing Line. There are a number of kinds of King James Only viewpoints that are represented in today's world that you may have encountered.

For example, there is a moderate viewpoint that would have as a representative, for example, Mr. Harry Sturtz. Mr. Sturtz defends the Byzantine textual tradition as being of equal value along with other text types.

He does not attack textual criticism or those people that involve themselves with textual criticism. He is one of the more moderate individuals, and I'd like to mention that last week we discussed the issue of where the Bible came from and things like that.

I had mentioned this week we'd look at New Testament textual criticism. Last evening at the offices of Alpha Omega Ministries, we did a seminar on the subject of New Testament textual criticism, and I realized earlier this week that it would be a subject that would be next to impossible to really present in a radio format because of the need to be able to examine documents, examine textual variants from Greek New Testaments, etc., etc.

So we decided to spend the next two weeks talking about the King James Only controversy, and to give you some background, I will need to remember to define certain terms. For example, in talking about the moderate viewpoint of Harry Sturtz, I just mentioned the Byzantine textual tradition.

Well, what is the Byzantine textual tradition? The Byzantine text is predominantly the majority text of the 5 ,000 manuscripts of the Greek New Testament that are in existence today. Maybe as high as 90 to 95 percent of those manuscripts exhibit a textual style, a textual flavor known as the Byzantine text.

The Byzantine text is the underlying text of what is known as the Textus Receptus, or also called the TR, which is the Greek text from which the King James Version was translated. So some of these individuals would defend the underlying Greek textual tradition, the Byzantine textual tradition, as being of equal value along with other text types, such as the Alexandrian text type or the Western or Caesarean text types.

This is terminology utilized by individuals who work with the Greek text of the New Testament. Another group of people you have are Textus Receptus defenders. These individuals defend the TR, the Textus Receptus, the underlying Greek text of the King James Version, as either the best text or they say that the Textus Receptus is completely inspired by God.

These may or may not feel that the actual English rendering of the King James Version is the only true rendering, but these individuals, the Textus Receptus defenders, will defend the TR, the Textus Receptus, as either being the best text or some will go so far as to say that that particular English text, which was predominantly compiled by Roman Catholic priests by Neodesiderius Erasmus, is inspired by God.

Then you have the King James Version defenders themselves. These defend the actual English translation of the King James Version as being specially inspired by God so that it is inerrant in the English translation.

All of these would also fall into the above category of Textus Receptus defenders as well. Most of these would question the sincerity and even the salvation of anyone who disagrees with them, because these individuals feel that the actual English translation, the translation that was published in 1611, that the translation itself was inspired by God and inerrant.

Then you have those that I have decided to call the traditional defenders, and these individuals simply like the King James Version better than any other version, and that's fine with me. I was raised on the King James Version.

Most of my memory verses still come out replete with these and thous, and I have no problem if someone just simply is more comfortable with the King James Version. That's fine with me. Then you have cultic defenders.

This would include, for example, the Mormon Church and others that say the King James Version is the only true version. As you may know, the Mormon Church will use only the King James Version and not other translations, except for Joseph Smith's translation, which someday may even take over from the King James, who knows.

But you do have some cultic defenders. Who are some of these individuals? You may not be familiar with them. One of the most best-known of the King James defenders, who passed away just a couple of months ago, I'm sorry to say, was a man by the name of David Otis Fuller.

He was the director of the Witch Bible Society and the author of the book, Which Bible?, along with the book, True or False. This gentleman was one of the better-known individuals, and as I understand, died about two months ago at the age of about 84.

Edward F. Hills is the author of the book, The King James Version Defended. Jasper J. Ray wrote a book entitled, God Only Wrote One Bible, which I agree with. I don't agree with what he says about it.

Peter S. Ruckman is well-known. He's the founder of the Pensacola Bible Institute and the author of The Christian's Handbook of Manuscript Evidence, another book called Problem Text, and a third book called The Bible Babble.

Yes, I said that correctly, The Bible Babble. Another gentleman is a gentleman by the name of Norman Ward. He is the author of a book entitled, Perfected or Perverted?, and another called, Famine in the Land, and those will be the two books we will be examining today and using as a representative viewpoint.

Then you have Jack Chick, Alberto Rivera, and Barry Burton. Jack Chick, you may be familiar with from his cartoon-type tracks and cartoon books that you will find in certain Christian bookstores. Alberto Rivera is a supposedly former Roman Catholic priest, and Barry Burton is a writer with Jack Chick.

They wrote, for example, a cartoon book entitled, Sabotage, that presents the King James only viewpoint and labels anyone who uses any other Bible than the King James Version as a member of the Alexandrian cult, and that booklet contains many, many errors in it.

Barry Burton wrote a book called, Let's Weigh the Evidence, which is undoubtedly the worst of all the books I've seen on this subject, with the most errors per capita of any book I've ever seen. These gentlemen are quite vehement to the point of being rabid concerning this issue.

Then you have someone such as Zane C. Hodges, who is the editor of the Greek New Testament according to the majority text, and I am a little bit careful to call him a King James only person because he doesn't fall into quite the same categories as the gentleman I've just mentioned.

Now these men, though undoubtedly honest for the most part, do not in any way represent the majority opinion of Christian scholarship today, and in many cases they attack the character and honesty of anyone who disagrees with them, and I'll provide examples of that today.

So as we begin to approach this issue, I'd like to present some preliminary thoughts. First of all, are translations inspired? Now you need to realize, as we mentioned last week, that when you open up the King James Version, or the New American Standard, or the New International Version, or any other version of the Bible that you may have, today's English version, and all these others, what you are reading is a translation of Greek and Hebrew texts, and that's all they are.

They are translations done sometimes by one individual, if you have, for example, the Moffat translation or something like this, or done normally by an entire group of scholars, such as the King James Version was done by a number of men, as was the NIV, NASB, etc., and etc.

Now these are simply translations. They are not themselves what was originally written in the Bible in their original languages. Paul did not talk in English. He did not say, God forbid. He said, may Genoa talk, and in fact, English itself did not even exist at that time.

So the question is, does inspiration, for example, in Paul's writings, when he says the scriptures are God-breathed, they are inspired, does inspiration extend to the subject of translations and versions?

Or maybe we could put it another way, why are there so many different versions? Well, of course, you understand that there's more than one way of translating Greek into English, and depending on the particular individual that you're using as your translator, things will come out a little bit differently.

I have a good example of this in the German language. The Germans have a saying that goes, Morgenstunden hat golden Munden. Now you and I don't probably know what that means unless you've taken German, but Morgenstunden hat golden Munden, if it was translated directly and literally into English, would be, morning hours have gold in their mouths.

That doesn't mean a whole lot to you and I, because we don't speak that way, and we've never heard of morning hours have gold in their mouths. That is a very literal translation that really doesn't get to the meaning of the phrase, because we have a phrase in English that is the the idiomatic equivalent of Morgenstunden hat golden Munden, and if we were to translate the meaning of that phrase, we would probably use the English phrase, the early bird catches the worm.

Now, both would be accurate translations. One's literal and goes to the literal meaning, even though it doesn't make much sense to us as we put it into English. The other goes for the meaning itself and sacrifices literality.

All Bible translations do the same thing to some extent or another. The King James Version and the New American Standard Bible, for example, would be very literal translations, sometimes even to the point of being somewhat unclear in what they're attempting to say.

But then you have freer translations, such as maybe the New International Version, where the NIV probably would not translate Morgenstunden hat golden Munden as morning hours have gold in their mouths.

It would probably say the early bird catches the worm. Another good example to be found in the Gospels is where Jesus says, literally he says, let these things sink deeply into your ears. Now, for an English-speaking person, that doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

I mean, we understand it, but the NIV, for example, translates the same passage, listen carefully to this. Now, it doesn't literally say, listen carefully to this, but that's what it means. And so you have an entire spectrum of versions, of translations, and each version will fall somewhere along the line, either more literal or less literal than some other translation.

So that's why we have so many versions around. Someone else might ask, what about the Eighth Article of Faith, the LDS Church? The Mormon Church says that the Bible is the Word of God as far as it is translated correctly, and I accept that portion of the Eighth Article of Faith as far as is understood correctly, which basically means I, for example, do not accept the Jehovah's Witnesses Bible, the New World Translation, as an accurate copy of the Word of God because it's not.

It is purposefully and maliciously mistranslated. So as far as that's concerned, I accept that. However, Mormons don't understand the Eighth Article of Faith in that context. They think that what the Eighth Article of Faith says is false, that entire books have been deleted or lost or doctrines changed, etc., etc., which simply is not true.

So there is a difference between translation and transmission. The Mormon Church is normally referring the Eighth Article of Faith to transmission instead of translation. Not even the King James Version translators themselves claimed infallibility, even though the King James Version defenders almost make it sound like they did.

Indeed, the translators themselves said this, and I am quoting from the preface to the King James Version, where the translators said, quote, "...some peradventure would have no variety of senses to be set in the margin, lest the authority of the Scriptures for deciding of controversies by that show uncertainly, should somewhat be shaken.

But we hold their judgment not to be sound in this point. Now in such a case does not a marginal reading do well to admonish the reader to seek further and not to conclude or dogmatize upon this or that preemptorily?

For as it is a fault of incredulity to doubt of those things that are evident, so to determine of such things as the Spirit of God hath left even the judgment of the judicious questionable can be no less than presumption.

Therefore hath St. Augustine said that variety of translations is profitable for the finding out of the sense of the Scriptures. So diversity of signification and sense in the margin where the text is not clear must needs be a good yes is necessary we are persuaded.".

So here the translators said, well, there could be some times when we're not exactly sure how to translate something in English, so we'll provide you with alternate translations as well. Many of the King James only people attack any type of notes that would give you an alternate translation found in the text of Scripture.

The next preliminary thought would be that divine inspiration is promised only for the original Scriptures, not their translators or copyists. God never promised to inspire monks sitting in monasteries making a copy of a manuscript of the New Testament a thousand years later.

He also never promised to inspire translators. Believe me, I have asked God to inspire my translations on many a Greek text, a Greek test, and so far he never came through for those. I still got things wrong.

I didn't get 100s on my Greek translations while taking Greek, and the Bible nowhere promises this type of translation infallibility for individuals who are translating the Bible. Translators are humans and copyists are humans, and they can make errors.

Inspiration is for that which was originally written by the Apostles and Prophets themselves. Another preliminary thought is that it can be proven that the King James Version itself contains mistranslations of the Greek text.

For example, in Titus 2 .13, the King James Bible, and I'm reading from the original 1611, which is still available today, it doesn't look much like the King James Version you have, but Titus 2 .13 says, "...looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ.".

Now, this is an example of something that we've discussed, I think, before we've talked about the deity of Christ, and that is something known as Granville Sharpe's Rule. Granville Sharpe's Rule basically tells us that both the words God and Savior in Titus 2 .13 refer to the one person, Jesus Christ.

Now, the King James Version sort of cuts the phrase in half, making it look like we're talking about the appearing of the great God, and then a separate personage, our Savior, Jesus Christ. But that's not correct.

If you look at a modern translation, you'll notice that it will translate, "...looking for the appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, applying both God and Savior to the Lord Jesus Christ.".

This is the same situation as found in 2 Peter 1 .1, where in both places the King James Version misses a very clear reference to the deity of Christ. Now, I do not believe in any way, shape, or form that the King James Version translators were attempting to deny the deity of Christ.

That's obviously not the case. They just simply didn't know about the Rule, and I would never accuse them of having attempted to deny the deity of Christ. Yet, every single King James Version -only writer will attack modern translations, saying that these translations attempt to deny the deity of Christ, when it is the modern translations, for example, that correctly translate Titus 2 .13 and 2 Peter 1 .1.

Finally, if the King James was verbally inspired, it isn't anymore, since it has been edited and updated numerous times since 1611. In fact, if you will go out and pick up the 1611 King James Version, you will find that it is very different than the King James Version that you have today.

You couldn't make out most of the words. I mean, Jesus is spelled differently than you'd be expected to, and Son is spelled S-O-N-N-E, and things are very different. In the 1611 original edition of the King James Version, it has been edited and updated many, many times, older spellings removed, etc., etc.

So, if the King James-only people are going to attempt to claim that the King James Version itself was verbally inspired, they better be carrying around the old 1611, and not a modern edition of the King James Version.

Now, to demonstrate what it is the King James-only people are saying, I have chosen two books that form a representative viewpoint. Both are by a gentleman by the name of Norman Ward. One is entitled Famine in the Land, and the other is entitled Perfected or Perverted.

Now, why did I pick these books? Well, they're both published by the late David Otis Fuller's Witch Bible Society, the best known of the King James Version -only groups. These books are representative of the majority of the King James Version -only people.

Famine in the Land is fairly short, it's only 55 pages, and lends itself to a fairly quick reading. And the other book, Perfected or Perverted, is even shorter, it's only 30 pages long, and so we will be able to utilize these to basically bring forward the King James-only position, and then be able to comment on it.

Now, the first book, Famine in the Land, is entitled Famine in the Land, A Shocking Exposé of the Modern Versions of the Bible, by Norman Ward, compiled by a concerned layman. And Mr. Ward, I believe, is a fine Christian man, I do not doubt his sincerity, though I doubt his scholarship and his accuracy in the extreme, as we shall see today.

But this claims to be a shocking expose of the modern versions of the Bible. The book is comprised of nine chapters, entitled Famine in the Land, which is the introduction, two chapters on the supposed preservation of the scripture, in his understanding, called The Bible Tells Me So, and the Importance of Divine Preservation.

Then he has some passages where he draws pictures of, draws a picture of the two views, supposedly, his view, and then the view of those that would oppose the King James only position. Then he talks about the mechanics of preservation, gives some preliminary considerations, the work of Satan, and here he attributes to non -King James Version -only scholars, demonic activity and demonic forces.

Then he talks about the majority tradition, two textual traditions, where he identifies the majority text versus the Alexandrian text. He talks about the Alexandrian tradition, and he paints all non-Byzantine texts as being corrupt, which is untrue, as we shall see.

And then he has a short conclusion. What I'm going to do is present to you his information, and then point out the many errors that would be found in this book. And this is not just in Mr. Ward's books, but they are in many other books as well.

In almost all the King James-only books, you will find these kinds of errors. And unfortunately, many people, many honest Christian individuals, aren't aware of these errors, aren't aware of these problems.

I know that even locally here, I've spoken with people where they have King James Version -only people in their congregations, and these individuals are not aware of the fact that the material that they are reading is in actuality false, or is faulty in its accuracy.

So on the very first page, Mr. Ward says, quote, if we compare these modern versions to the authorized version, King James Version, we note several disturbing differences. We discover that the modern versions change the words of God in as many as 70 ,000 places, unquote.

This is a common claim by the King James-only people, that the Bible has been changed in the modern versions. But you need to recognize that this is circular argumentation. Here, Mr. Ward makes the King James Version the standard, and then accuses the other versions of changes because they're not identical to the King James Version.

Well, obviously, if they're identical, they wouldn't be able to print it. On what basis does he use the word change? Why could not someone utilize, for example, the Bishop's Bible, which was published in 1568, over 40 years before the King James Version, and then accuse the King James Version of changes?

The question is not, are all these Bibles identical to the King James Version? The question is, is the King James Version and its underlying Greek and Hebrew texts as accurate as those texts utilized by modern translations?

So this accusation of changing the Word of God in 70 ,000 places just simply is untrue, and it requires the acceptance of circular logic. On the same page, Mr. Ward says, quote, while the authorized version exalts our Savior, the modern versions attack his deity, his virgin birth, his blood atonement, and his miracles, unquote.

Now, this is a very sweeping generalization, attacking all modern versions, and it's completely false on a number of accounts. First of all, no solid documentation or evidence is brought forward in this book, or in the other book by Mr. Ward, or in other King James Version -only books, to support such a charge.

An examination of other books by men of this viewpoint proves that few of them have ever struggled with a textual variant on their own. In fact, in talking to Mr. Ward this week, I discovered that Mr. Ward does not even own a critical edition of the Greek New Testament.

Second, this charge assumes that all other scholars who would dare disagree with the King James Version -only people are not Christian and wish to attack Christ. We'll look at more on that later. Third, I would challenge anyone to demonstrate on the basis of either text or translation that such translations as the New American Standard Bible or the New International Version demonstrate a doctrinal bias against Orthodox Christianity.

It just simply isn't true. Normally, what these people are referring to is the fact that the Byzantine textual tradition, upon which the King James Version is based, is a rather fulsome text. In other words, it is the largest of the texts with the longest readings.

In this, for example, scribes were very, very want to, if they ran across, for example, in a passage of Scripture that said, Jesus. Well, they'd like to make that Jesus Christ. If they ran across the phrase Jesus Christ, they'd want to put Lord in front of it, Lord Jesus Christ.

And it kept expanding and expanding these titles. Well, the modern translations that are based upon an earlier text will sometimes, from the King James Version -only viewpoint, delete the word Lord or the word Christ and they'll just say Lord Jesus instead of Lord Jesus Christ.

And they take this to be some type of an attack upon the deity of Christ or something like that, which is completely irrational. If these modern translations want to attack the deity of Christ, they'd remove all references to the deity of Christ, which they obviously do not.

And so this attack upon all modern translations simply is not true. On page 2, Mr. Ward says, quote,. Obviously then, these dozens of versions cannot all be the Word of God, exhibiting as they do such differences and contradictions, unquote.

Here, Mr. Ward mistakes translations for the Word of God. The Word of God was written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. It was not written in English, as I mentioned earlier. So he's, again, mistaking the difference between translation of the Word of God and the actual Word of God itself as it was in the original writings by the Apostles and Prophets themselves.

A translation is the Word of God as far as it accurately represents the original. It is not an either-or situation. You cannot sit there and say, well, if we don't all have the exact same translation, then we don't know what the Word of God is.

That makes no sense whatsoever. On pages 2 and 3, and 26 to 28, we read, quote,. The reader must understand, however, that few of these men have the honesty or the intestinal fortitude to give that simple or direct an answer.

He's referring here to scholars who are not, from his perspective, the King James only. They would be marked as being apostate and have to leave their pulpits, classrooms, and ivory towers and look for an honest line of work.

This is their excuse to sin. The antics of these poor fellows would be quite amusing were it not for the seriousness of the issue. Here we have the apostate scholar running around like a cockroach caught in a Chinese fire drill, trying to recover a text that was never lost in the first place.

Now the reason for all this double-dealing is because the apostate scholar or educator or pastor absolutely refuses to accept the fact that the perfect, inerrant, and infallible words of God have been perfectly preserved in a book that is available to anybody in any shopping center in the country.

Such a book would obviously free the Bible believer from a dependence upon the apostate's wisdom, scholarship, and godliness, and worst of all, the book would sit in judgment of the apostate rather than the apostate sitting in judgment of the book, unquote.

In fact, on pages 26 to 28, Mr. Ward uses the term apostate to describe those who would disagree with him a total of 11 times and uses the term huckster once. Now this is a truly sad aspect of the debate.

The King James Only people have made acceptance of their position a tenet of belief and on that basis feel justified in attacking the moral character, the Christian faith, the honesty, intelligence, and motives of anyone and everyone who expresses an opposing viewpoint.

In doing so, they cut themselves off from historic Christianity and even those who make up the basis of their own group. For example, if all who have taken the opposing viewpoint are apostates and against the Lord Jesus, then all the great conservative scholars last century were not Christians.

For example, Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield, the author of the book, Inspiration and Authority of the Bible, would not be a Christian. Dr. Machen, Dr. Hodge, even a man the King James Version Only people have claimed as their own, Dr. Robert Dick Wilson, all accepted modern textual theory.

The greatest Greek scholar America ever produced, Dr. A .T. Robertson, wrote an introduction to textual criticism that followed the modern theories that Ward here identifies as sinful, apostate, and satanic.

Now it is true that we must not worship scholarship itself. At the same time, we must not relegate our brains and our great Christian scholars to the scrap heap. So it is rather sad that the King James Version Only individuals are so willing to attack others.

And what was even more sad is this week in talking to Mr. Ward, who again I would want to emphasize is a kind individual and who is undoubtedly sincere, what was even more sad is my discovery that Mr. Ward probably cannot even read Greek, does not even own a critical edition of the Greek New Testament, and therefore could not possibly be making judgment calls on these issues because of his own expertise, but is obviously simply accepting the words of others and on that basis attacking the individuals who have translated, for example, the New American Standard Bible of the NIV, men who are good Christian individuals who love the Lord Jesus Christ, who love the Bible and believe in inerrancy, but they believe in the classic definition of inerrancy that refers only to the originals themselves and not to some copyist many years down the road.

On page four Mr. Ward says, quote, what we do have is a body of manuscript evidence comprising some 5 ,000 pieces. 95 of this evidence supports the Greek text, received text, that underlies the authorized version, the KJV.

The modern versions, however, are based on a variety of Greek texts such as Westcott and Hort's, Nestle's, and the Bible Society's, but are supported by only 5 of the evidence, unquote. Here and in numerous other places in this book we see a common example of the oversimplification and, as a result, the misrepresentation of the facts.

Ward here says that the modern texts are supported by only 5 of the textual evidence, while his majority text has 95%. Actually, the modern texts, such as the United Bible Society text or the Nestle Alon text, have the support of 100 of the textual data because they take into consideration all textual families rather than just one, such as majority text does.

The modern texts are not simply warmed over Alexandrian texts. Such a claim is either made out of complete ignorance or out of willful misrepresentation. Let's hope it is the former. On page 5 we read, quote, the last thing these men, that is the apostate scholars, want is for you to believe that you actually do have the Word of God because they make their living trying to convince Christians that God lied to them about divine preservation, unquote.

Ward here claims, rather obliquely I might add, that anyone holding to modern textual theory does not believe in the Word of God. What we can't believe in, Mr. Ward, is that the King James translators were infallible, or the scribes who copied the manuscripts upon which the King James Version is based were an errant, or that Desiderius Erasmus, the Roman Catholic priest who compiled the basis of the Textus Receptus, was divinely led in determining which readings he placed in his text.

Just because I don't accept those above items as being a part of my Christian faith does not exclude me from the kingdom of God. In fact, Jesus never said thou shalt accept the Textus Receptus as infallible and be born again to enter into the kingdom of God.

He didn't say that. It's rather sad that someone would claim that this is somehow, by reading the New American Standard Bible, I don't believe in the Bible. That simply does not make any sense. On page 8, Mr. Ward says, quote, God has promised to preserve his Word and what he has promised he is able also to perform, unquote.

Well, I agree, but the issue of preservation has been the bat that the King James Version only people have used to bash modern textual theory over the head and claim that anyone who disagrees with them is lost.

But does the Bible really claim that scribes will be divinely guided in their copying? No, it doesn't. The simple fact that there are not two manuscripts of the New Testament in the whole world that read exactly alike destroys the King James Version argument.

Even the ten or so manuscripts that Erasmus consulted in creating his New Testament contained many variant readings among them and hence Erasmus had to utilize some kind of textual critical process to come up with this text.

I'd rather accept the textual critical process of scholars who believe in the Word of God than just simply one individual, Erasmus, who sort of made things up as he went along. Also, the Textus Receptus itself disagrees with the majority text in hundreds of places.

How can the King James Version defender explain this? Finally, I see the very fact of the existence of textual variation, textual traditions, etc. as God's divine plan of preservation. You see, if all we had was just one text, that's all we had, then there would be a danger that somewhere along the line someone had gathered up all the manuscripts and changed them and deleted a teaching of scripture.

You see, that could never have happened. As soon as the originals themselves were written, copies of them were sent all across the known world and copies of those copies were made and then copies of the copies of the copies were made and so on and so forth.

The very fact that we have text from Egypt and from North Africa and from Spain and from Italy and from Antioch and all across the Mediterranean and Europe and North Africa and Palestine etc. etc. is the very way that God has used to keep the New Testament from being radically altered and changed by those who might wish to radically alter or change it.

This position taken by the King James Version only people simply does not jive with the promises of preservation that God has made. He did promise to preserve his word and we have no doubt whatsoever that the original writings are available to us today.

None at all. In fact, if Mr. Ward would be familiar with the modern textual critical theory and modern textual critical writers such as Dr. Aland, he very clearly says in his book that came out about 1982 called The Text of the New Testament that the question of textual criticism is not trying to come up with the original text.

We have the original text. The question of textual criticism is determining exactly what that is from the variant readings that we have. But the original is not lost. It's not disappeared. It hasn't gone anywhere.

Our job when we engage in textual criticism is determining which of the variant readings the manuscripts give to us is the original one and that can be done and done successfully. Now, on page 31, Mr. Ward tells us that the Alexandrian text is corrupt, that it represents a qualitatively different viewpoint of Jesus Christ, and that Bible-believing scholars have demonstrated the inferiority of these manuscripts.

Intimate, of course, that anyone who disagrees is not a Bible believer. Not one of these statements has any factual backing whatsoever. If we are justified in looking at every textual variant and assigning to it some theological significance, why can we not look at John chapter 14 verse 14 where the King James Version, because of its underlying text, does not have a reference to prayer to Christ and hence an example of his deity and say that the King James Version somehow denies the deity of Christ?

If the King James only people can do that, why can't we? I wouldn't do that because the King James Version translators obviously had no intention of doing that, but the King James Version only people won't give us the same benefit of the doubt.