By Neil Earle
The King James Version of the Bible or Authorized Version (AV) is the publishing success of the ages. Completed by 50 of England’s best minds by royal decree of the King and meeting in six committees scattered in three great centers of learning (Oxford, Cambridge, Westminster) it set the style for many of the serious translations that followed it.
The AV built on the work of others. It was intended to be a revision of Elizabeth 1’s Bishop’s Bible of 1568. But the path to 1611 is a fulfillment of such promises as John 16:13, Ephesians 4:11-12 and Matthew 24:35. These remind us that the Holy Spirit leads and guides the Church into all truth through pastors and teachers who exist in all generations to ensure God’s Word will never pass away. Before we look at the background to the KJV let us keep in mind certain key truths that will give us important background.
First, the purpose of God’s Word is to lead people to salvation. This is clearly taught in 2 Timothy 3:15. Though the Bible story is often set amid history and often makes insightful references to science and natural history, this is not its main purpose. Jesus said that even the Old Testament Scriptures were designed to lead people to him (John 5:39; Luke 24:27). This is seen most clearly in such striking passages as Isaiah 53, Psalm 22:1, Psalm 31:1, the life experiences of Jonah and King David, etc. While the process of canonization and translation is complex and diverse and needs highly trained professionals to make it effective, it is also true, as the noted Bible translator and writer R.K. Harrison said to me in 1992, “One does not need to be a Greek scholar to know that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners.”
The second principle flows from the first. According to the esteemed evangelical scholar I.H. Marshall, there is a middle position between those who teach “inerrancy,” (in the original writings the Bible is absolutely true in all it says about any subject) and the modernist or liberal position that the Bible is so riddled with errors and contradictions as to be almost useless. Marshall holds to the view of “entire trustworthiness,” that there are anomalies and imprecisions passed on that do not undermine the Bible’s overall purpose of communicating God’s will towards his creatures. The “inerrantists” make more noise today then even the modernists. Still, statements such as Matthew 27:9 (where Matthew attributes a quote to Jeremiah that belonged to Zechariah 11:12) or Mark 1:2-3 where he quotes two prophets rather than just Isaiah (corrected in modern translations) have to be reckoned into the equation...As Marshall concludes, “There is a vast difference between allowing that the Bible may contain a certain amount of imprecision and asserting that it is riddled with errors and contradiction” (Biblical Inspiration, page 66).
Even back in earliest days when the church father Jerome put the first Bible between two covers in his famous Vulgate, he was not deterred by such matters. With Mark 1:2-3 he simply accepted the Holy Spirit’s work in both testaments by saying “the prophets always spoke with one voice.” Such humility from a legendary translator who daily handled “the lively oracles” should make us all think twice. There are those who say the real answer is that once a scripture is in the text it is inspired, error-free or not.
Thirdly, the process of translation that wins out in the New Testament is in fact attested by the book of Nehemiah 8:8. There we see Ezra the scribe standing up in front of the people and reading from the Book “making it clear and giving the meaning so that the people could understand what was being read.” While the Old Testament transcribers of the Law, Prophets and Writings are known to be meticulous copiers of the books – they worked letter by letter not word for word – the revelation of the Gospel comes with such force and power that it often necessitates subtle judgments by the copiers. The job of translation was to convey meaning and to have the verse make sense to people more than any other factor. Take the sentence “enarcheologosestiv.” It literally means “in the beginning the word was.” Obviously this would never pass muster in English. So we have the more ringing and famous declaration: “In the beginning was the Word” (John 1:1).
Some say the story of how we got the Bible is as intriguing as its real message. And we have covered some interesting examples. The Bible as “a human record of a divine revelation” may be the soundest one-sentence summary (Marshall, page 10).
Now what about that King James tradition Christians have been celebrating this year, its 400th anniversary? It is indeed a long and glorious story that weaves through important secular as well as religious history. Here is a very brief outline.
95AD (roughly) – usual dates for John’s writings which end the NT period
367 – Saint Athanasius of Alexandria lists the 27 books of the NT
397 – Canon reiterated by the Third Council of Carthage
c.410 – Jerome’s Latin Vulgate finished – whole Bible under one cover at last!
1382 – Wycliffe’s hand-copied English Bible
1452 – Gutenberg’s printed Vulgate
1516 – Erasmus prints a Greek New Testament from Byzantine manuscripts
1522 – Luther’s German Bible
1526 – William Tyndale’s New Testament
1537 – Coverdale’s Bible
1538-43 – Henry VIII's “Great Bible” placed in all the churches of England
1560 – Puritans fleeing Bloody Mary create the Geneva Bible
1568 – Elizabeth revises Great Bible as Bishop’s Bible
1604-11 – King James I of England orders a new translation
Perhaps we can all think of lots of texts here that show God the Holy Spirit at work behind the scenes. Jeremiah One tells us God himself is watchful over his word. And it is interesting to read Proverbs 21:1, 25:2-3, 11 and 24:6 in this context. King James wanted a book that would read well in Church without Geneva’s sarcastic footnotes about kings. His team of translators certainly accomplished that, but notice how “the more things change the more they remain the same.”
Notice these comparisons in Psalms 23:2-3, for example:
Coverdale: “and leadeth me to a fresh water. He quickeneth my soul”
Great: “and lead me forth besides the waters of comfort. He shall convert my soul”
Geneva: “and leadeth me by the still waters. He restoreth my soul”
Bishop’s: “and he will lead me unto calm waters. He will convert my soul”
R-D (Catholic): “Upon the water of reflection he hath brought me up, he hath converted my soul”
KJV: “He leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul”
The KJV is the most majestic and elegant rendering by far. It readeth very well, which it was supposed to do.
But people always wonder: Why are there so many modern translations and why are there so many divergences between the AV and the Revised Standard Version, for example? Ah, this needs to be answered.
The AV, though perhaps the most professional and polished whole Bible yet to appear, had its weaknesses. The archaic “thees” and “thous” would become more distracting as the years passed. Words changed their meanings. “Let” actually meant “hinder’ back in 1611 (2 Thessalonians 2:6). More seriously, the translators of 1611 did not have access to the wide body of newly discovered Greek manuscripts and papyrus fragments we have today. They followed the Dutch scholar Erasmus in basing almost everything on one so-called “Received” text from the Greek area of Constantinople. By the1900s whole families of large Greek codices (Siniaticus, Vaticanus, Alexandrinus) were extant that would have strengthened the AV immensely, according to Philp Comfort (The Origin of the Bible, pages 256-257). Knowledge of Hebrew and Greek was not as wide-spread in 1611. This led to such bungled translations as “JAH” for God’s name, YHVH, in Psalms 68:4.
In 1870, the Church of England decided to officially revise the AV. The resulting Revised Version of 1881-1885 was perhaps the most accurate translation yet, but contained too many “Britishisms” to do well overseas (two sparrows sold for a “farthing” in Matthew 10:29 and “corn” for “grain” in Matthew 12:1). Americans pushed ahead with another version, the Revised Version of 1901. In 1946-1953 these were blended into the Revised Standard Version, which attracted much criticism when first released. The most glaring difference was in the now famous “shorter ending" of Mark 16. These changes were the result of 20th century translators drawing freely from other manuscript traditions. It should be noted in passing that the New Testament is the best-verified and most amply documented work of the ancient world by far. This is the claim demonstrated by F.F. Bruce in his indispensible little book, The New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable?
The fuss over the RSV settled down and it is now recognized as one of the best of its type and a great encouragement to other teams of translators. They would push ahead in the post-World-War period with the New English Bible, the New King James Version, the New International Version and others. Like Miles Smith, who wrote the humble Preface to the AV, most translators feel they are making a good translation better rather than completely reinventing the wheel. In that sense the spirit of 1611 lives on – the dedication to do the best job with the best materials at hand, and in His Majesty’s service.