Which Bible?

[Mark S.]

Originally Posted by beth ann

I had heard that the Catholic bible and Protestant bible might be different in the sense there are some books that the catholic bible has, that the protestatnt bible does not.

Any info on this?

The Catholic Bible has several deutero-canonical books that the Protestants chopped out during the Reformation. They are the books of Judith, Tobit, Wisdom, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), Baruch, 1 & 2 Maccabees, and the full versions of the books of Esther and Daniel.

[beth ann]

Originally Posted by Mark S.

The Catholic Bible has several deutero-canonical books that the Protestants chopped out during the Reformation. They are the books of Judith, Tobit, Wisdom, Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), Baruch, 1 & 2 Maccabees, and the full versions of the books of Esther and Daniel.

How could a man (or men) tamper with the Bible? How could anyone think it would be okay to just delete entire books from Sacred Scriptures?

Isn't that kinda like following a man-made Bible vs. The Word of God?

[Blueberry]

As someone else said, I pretty much use them all.

Started out with KJV, so most of my memorization has come from there. Bible college insisted on NASB because it's supposedly the most literal/accurate translation. Used NIV for easy reading. After really getting scriptural basics down from reading so much NIV, I really missed the KJV.

I love the richness in meaning of words in KJV. For ease, I now use NKJV because it's close to KJV. I always refer back to KJV for study purposes; I usually have a 4-version parallel handy. I'd really love to learn Greek and Hebrew, but don't know how good a correspondence course would be.

My favorite for kids: The International Children's Bible
It's a complete Bible which is an actual translation, not a paraphrase. Most of the language is easy for children to understand. This is what I use when teaching children!

Now, does anyone else have my problem. I have used so many versions over the years, and memorized in more than one, that although I know the verse or passage I'm thinking about, I sometimes have difficulty finding it (using computer software) because the words I'm searching for aren't in the version I'm using? Or else, I may use words from several versions when doing my search, so the program won't find anything? I once read that Christians aren't memorizing much Scripture now-a-days because they can't figure out which version to memorize.

[spike1611]

Being a Bible College student, I own every translation I can get my hands on.

And I'd like to say that I've read a significant portion of each one.

But I find it interesting to note that no one on this thread mentioned the change in the actual Greek Text from the first 11 Bibles to the rest of them.

You see, the King James was not the first English Bible; not even the 1611 version. (By the way, don't let people tell you that they read the 1611 only...it's middle-new English, and is somewhat difficult to translate into our English. What they mean is the 1789 King James...which is equally amazing.)

I'll skip a ton of history about Wycliffe and Tyndale and their Bibles and the blood they shed for them, just to save a lot of space and your time.

The first translation that really knocked people socks off in England was probably the Bishop's Bible or the Great Bible. Those were directly translated from the Textus Receptus, or, Received Text. Then there was, of course, the Geneva Bible. From this great Book came the King James Version. The only reason that the writers wanted this new version was to change some words, take out some marginal notes, and get the kings' approval for widespread publication.

And it worked. The King James Bible was different in this way: They had a panel of almost fifty amazingly brilliant scholars translate the text directly from the Textus Receptus, and they not only double and triple checked, but rather sextuply checked the texts by means of six totally different groups.

You can imagine how long it took. Well, just under a decade, actually.

And we have not had that careful scholarship since in our translating efforts. In fact, many of the Bibles today rely on one man or one group of similarly believing people. Which, although it can be credible, is not the safest way to do anything, especially something of such vast importance.

So, anyways, the King James Version was completed and approved in 1611 (Hence my screen name...celebratory of the last Textus Receptus Translation). It was revised into modern English, without consulting anything other than the Textus Receptus, up to 1789. And then...it happened.

Two men appeared on the scene, named Brooke Wescott and Fenton Hort. In 1881, they came up with the idea that the newly discovered Greek Texts, such as the Alexandrian and otherwise (one of which, the Sinaiatic Text, or, "Palimpset", was actually found in a trash pile in an apostate monastery),
were actually better than the old.

Now, granted, these texts appeared more well-preserved...they were written on better parchment. However, they had some glaring mistakes. Such as...leaving out the end of the book of Mark, and taking out a KEY verse in the Bible...Acts 8:37. Some of the newer Bibles based on these texts, such as the widely accepted NIV, completely skip over it, claiming that the original Greek is "unclean". But...try to read that passage without that one verse. It encourages Baptism without salvation.

Now, some people believe that. It is obvious that someone on the panel for the NIV did, no? But I'd rather read the OBJECTIVE truth for myself and then determine what I want to believe based on the whole text, not to have someone decide it for me. I'm sure you understand.

So...it is clear to me that just these few differences in the Alexandrian texts presents to me a whole world of error that I'd rather stay away from.

So I stay with the Textus Receptus.

It's unfortunate, too, that the most recent translation from the Textus Receptus is the 1789 King James. I often wish that someone would make another revision of the King James.

They almost did it, with the New King James. That was the panel's original intent -- to simply revise. However, after being 60% finished, they chose to insert some of the Alexandrian. And that settles it for me. I cannot read a Bible that draws from a text that is riddled with error.

So I read the King James (1789, mind you...), and sometimes the original Greek. I don't know enough Hebrew yet to read the OT in Hebrew, but the NT Greek takes only about a year and a half to learn, believe it or not. I encourage anyone to learn, as it sometimes paints a more poetic picture, such as the end of John...The "lovest thou me" discourse is much clearer in Greek.

So I read the King James, and that is why.

Thanks for reading, friend.