Issue #168-Letters on: Our Editorial Policy, KJV/O

Biblical Errancy Issue #168-Letters on: Our Editorial Policy, KJV/Other Versions & Manuscript Validity, Translating Errors and Validity, Rivers of the Nile, Septuagint Again, Prayer & Literal Interpreting

Nov 10, '08 2:17 PM
by Loren for everyone





Issue #168 Editor: Dennis McKinsey


Dec. 1996

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A national periodical focusing on Biblical errors, contradictions, and fallacies, while providing a hearing for apologists
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COMMENTARY


This issue will conclude for the time being our on-going policy of devoting an entire issue to letters from some of our readers.
DIALOGUE AND DEBATE
Letter #699 from DA of La Puente, California (Part a)
Dear McKinsey. You are really steamed over your "mistreatment" at the hands of the Christian Research Journal, but that treatment is identical to what you dish out to writers to your own periodical. You always get the last word, and you decide how many, if any, and which ones, of any critics' response gets printed. & (sic) you print nowhere near all the critic sends to you, or wants printed. "..it would only be fair if I were given the last word..." which you never give anyone writing to you.

Editor's Response to Letter #699 (Part a)
Dear DA. I'm wondering how you can make these accusations without ever having been in our office or seen our mail? Boy, are you off base! What did you decide to do? Just take a lot of shots in the dark and see if you could hit something? You might be interested in knowing that you missed on every round fired but one.
First, I do determine what goes into the periodical; that's true. But that's by no means anywhere near as sinister as you try to imply. Over the years I have made a scrupulous attempt to include virtually every letter sent to this publication. In fact, I have used so many that my current supply has been reduced to the bare minimum. The only letters excluded over the years have been those which were irrelevant, immaterial, incoherent, poorly written, too verbose or specifically excluded by request from the source.
Second, I get the last word in an individual issue, since I don't know of any other practical way it can be done, do you? If someone feels I got the last word unfairly, they are more than welcome to write another letter criticizing my closing in the prior issue. Some people, such as yourself, have done just that, as this very letter demonstrates. This tete a tete can go on quite a while. But I can't remember when I was the one who terminated the process. I need and expect critical letters and do not make a point of discouraging critics. Indeed, without them my Dialogue and Debate section would vanish and that would be unacceptable. Contrary to your unwarranted vilification, I did not get from CRI what I "dish out" nor do I necessarily get the last word.
Third, you allege that I "print nowhere near all the critic sends" to me. Wrong again. Except for critics, such as yourself, who think BE is a publication of 66 pages rather than 6, I can't think of anyone over the years who has not had nearly all of his material printed. In fact, a couple have had more printed than they preferred and sent me a subsequent letter expressing some displeasure. I need critical material. As I said, it is an inseparable part of this publication. How am I going to show biblicists the error of their ways, if I never hear from them and never confront their mistakes and misconceptions. D and D is of critical importance and I am not about to discourage critics from writing as a result
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of not addressing their letters. D and D deals with people where they are in order to escort them to where they should be.
Fourth, the word "steamed" is not only inaccurate but hyperbolic, unless, of course, you choose to characterize every objection as being "steamed." It connotes an aura of emotional outrage that is not in keeping with either my style or demeanor. If I was really "steamed," you'd know it by the employment of terminology that would be considerably less civil than you have experienced do far. Simply put, you overdramatized to the point of being deceptive and this is by no means the only time you have subtilely invoked this underhanded ploy.

Letter #699 Continues (Part b)
(In my response to Letter #678 I said, "Rarely is the KJV out on a limb all by its lonesome as is so commonly alleged by many biblicists." DA says in reply--Ed.).
It is rarely on its lonesome because it has been the most popular and influential Bible in English for centuries. Accordingly, its errors have been copied many times by many successors. But that does not alter the basic situation. The KJV is frequently wrong, and an error in the KJV is only an error in that book, not an error in the Bible.

Editor's Response to Letter #699 (Part b)
Now you are telling me the Greek and Hebraic translators of modern versions agreeing with the KJV are incompetent. You mean all they did to create modern versions was take the KJV off the shelf and duplicate its text. From whence comes that piece of wisdom? Any high school student could have done that. Versions are created by going back to manuscripts, codices, uncials, minuscules, papyri, and lectionaries written in Greek and Hebrew, not by taking an already existing version and copying its text.
Just because the KJV has been "the most popular and influential Bible in English for centuries" does not mean the creators of the modern versions to which you are referring immediately went to the KJV to discover what to say. Not by a long ways. There are thousands of extant manuscripts that are considerably closer to the "alleged" originals. Why would they bother to improve on what they had if all they intended to do was update the verbiage and copy the text of the KJV without checking its reliability with other sources closer to the alleged originals?
You assert quite authoritatively that the KJ's "errors have been copied many times by many successors." How do you know that? Where did you get that information? Were you on the translation committees? Were you even present when the translations were assembled? Of course not! You have already admitted that you don't even read Greek or Hebrew. You are talking through your hat again.
And then you say that "an error in the KJV is only an error in that book, not an error in the Bible." You don't know that either. More whistling in the dark! We have been over this ploughed ground repeatedly. As I have said several times before, how do you know the contents of any version is not an accurate reflection of the originals, since the originals no longer exist and copyist errors cannot be proven? Until you can make that comparison, that verification, we are left with nothing more than contradictions staring us in the face. You want us to replace contradictions in front of our eyes with theories, conjectures and speculations on what could have been. That's not how it is done, my friend. Until you come up with something tangible and quantifiable, the contradictions stand out bold as brass.

Letter #699 Continues (Part c)
(DA notes that in the same prior response I said, "The ASV [American Standard Version] and the NASB [New American Standard Bible] are especially powerful support for the King James" and then continues by saying--Ed.),
Which is why the KJV is such a weak source. Neither of these powerful supports is much more than a rewrite job, designed to modernize the language more than correct any flaws. To lean on them is to lean on a broken reed. Granted, that does make them superior to the Living Bible you also mention, which has been de-rided as having errors as frequent as the water in the sea. But the point remains that these supporters are not able to do much supporting.

Editor's Response to Letter #699 (Part c)
The more you speak DA, the more you expose your inadequacies. The ASV is the American Version of the English Revised Version of 1885. Let me quote what even the apologists McDowell and Stewart are willing to concede on pages 50-52 of their book entitled Reasons Skeptics Should Consider Christianity.
"The publication of the KJV of 1611 did not mark the end of new translations of the Bible. Sixteen years after the release of the Authorized Version (KJV), a 5th century Greek manuscript (Codex Alexandrinus) was brought to England. This manuscript was centuries closer in time to the writing of the NT than the handful of manuscripts used to translate the KJV. Moreover, the Greek Codex Alexandrinus was different in certain respects than the text which was used to translate the KJV.
During the next two and one half centuries, a great number of other new manuscripts were discovered, some dating as early as the middle of the 4th century (Codex Vaticanus, A.D. 325; Codex Siniaticus, A.D. 350).
With these discoveries and a refining of the science
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of textual criticism, it was inevitable, and even desirable, that voices would cry out for a revision of the KJV.
The purpose of the revision committee was revealed in a report submitted on May 3, 1870 by the Canterbury Committee.... 1. That it is decided that a revision of the KJV of the Holy Scriptures be undertaken.... 3. That in the above resolutions we do not contemplate any new translation of the Bible, or any alteration of the language, except when in the judgment of the most competent scholars such change is necessary....Any changes from the King James were to be done only when absolutely necessary....If such evidence warranted a change, the approval of at least two-thirds of the revisers was required before it would be incorporated into the text. The actual number of changes far exceeded the original expectations of the committee, but most of the numerous changes were merely grammatical (i.e., word order, sentence structure)....
The great value of the RV is that it set a precedent for further translations which could incorporate the latest manuscript and linguistic and historical evidence into their versions.
Regarding the NASB they say on page 71, "...the translators of the NASB attempted to bring the American Standard Version up to date, to be as faithful to the original languages as possible, and to present a clear and readable style...."
In essence, the above shows that you erred grievously when you asserted, "Neither of these powerful supports is much more than a rewrite job, designed to modernize the language more than correct any flaws." They most assuredly were designed to correct any flaws. In fact, that is precisely why they were written. They were designed not only to correct flaws but modernize language and the very fact that the overwhelming bulk of the changes dealt only with grammar and word order changes testifies to the KJV's basic reliability. New manuscript discoveries made in the 300 years following 1611 revealed the need for linguistic changes. You imply that the creators of the ASV and the NASB simply went back to the KJV and rewrote off the top of their head somehow what they thought needed rewriting. No they didn't . They went back to the manuscripts that were available, especially those discovered since the KJV was published, and made the needed corrections. The KJV was not their criteria for accuracy, as you strongly imply; the manuscripts were. When you say "a rewrite job," a rewrite job based on what, if not ancient manuscripts and new discoveries.
Then you say, "But the point remains that these supporters are not able to do much supporting." Wrong again. The very fact that they did not change the KJV significantly, other than in word order and sentence structure etc., even after 300 years of new manuscript discoveries, is excellent proof that the KJV was essentially correct from the start. The revisers were not wedded to the KJV. In fact, they were specifically told to correct it wherever necessary and the fact that the changes they made rarely went beyond grammar and sentence structure is potent proof that the KJV had it together from the beginning as far as the creators of the ASV and the NASB were concerned.

Letter #699 Continues (Part d)
(On page 2 of the July issue I said, "Remember what I said long ago? You could be the world's greatest Greek/Hebrew scholar and still find experts disagreeing with your interpretation. If you press your point (of saying I have to prove there is a contradiction in the originals--Ed.), instead of reconciling the problem, you will only succeed in proving the verse needs to be expunged from the Bible. That's the best you can hope for. The sentence becomes worthless, because you don't know how it should be translated." DA assails this by saying--Ed.),
Now there are two answers to that. a) We often do know which is the correct translation. Such matters have been studied for lifetimes, and answers discovered. We do not need to just throw up our hands when we discover that 2 different versions have different language. And b) You are asserting there are contradictions in the Bible, not obscurities. Accordingly, you are asserting that the meaning of the conflicting passages can be established. So you must abandon the claim for contradiction if you want to push a claim of obscurity....

Editor's Response to Letter #699 (Part d)
You have an overriding propensity to sophistically shift the focus every time a problem comes your way, DA. We aren't talking about instances in which the translation is not disputed. You know that as well as I. We are talking about instances in which it is up for grabs and fosters divergent translations. You focused on disagreements which can be reconciled in an attempt to give the impression that this is true of all conflicts in general, which is miles from reality. Your claim that "We do not need to just throw up our hands when we discover that 2 different versions have different language" is patently false in many key instances. Experts disagree on how many verses should be translated. Don't you understand that? So who is correct? If they all agreed, then you could keep your hands down. But since they don't, you are well within your prerogatives to raise them.
Secondly where did you get the idea that the only conflicts are between different versions. You are way off base again. Many contradictions are within versions, not between versions. Indeed, in so far as numbers within the same version are concerned, they are often in conflict. Entire versions of the Bible are internally contradictory, even though they were translated from beginning to end by the same people.
As far as your part b) is concerned you are continuing to play your game. In reference to me you say, "You are asserting there are contradictions in the Bible, not obscurities. Accordingly, you are asserting that the meaning of the conflicting passages can be established." In truth, I am not "asserting that the meaning of the conflicting passages can be established." Those who translated the verses in question are making that claim. They must be; otherwise, why would they have translated them that way. And after they translated them that way, I am saying we are left with contradictions. So we are not dealing with obscurities; we are dealing with contradictions.
Why would I even contemplate contending they are not contradictions but obscurities? Oh I know! It's because you think I will feel that my position is somehow weak and voluntarily switch from contradictions to obscurities.
We have a group of experts creating a version of the Bible which is filled with contradictory statements. You say they are not contradictory until we know for sure how they should have been translated, and until we know for certain they are nothing more than obscurities. Wrong again! They are contradictions staring us in the face and remain as such until you prove that the translations are in error. Linguistic scholars looked at the manuscripts and translated them as they deemed most accurate. Until you prove they erred (yet you admit you are unable to read Greek or Hebrew) or produce your own group of experts who can, the contradictions remain in tact and obscurity is not a factor.
I hope you realize that this whole rigamorole you have put us through is nothing but a variation on an argument we have confronted repeatedly; namely, contradictions are due to errors in translation. If you have read our back issues in this regard, then all I can say is that you don't listen very well or read very closely. If you have not read our back issues on this topic, then you certainly should have done so before leaping into the quicksand. I am increasingly encountering defenders of the Bible who have not read BE over the years and are merely revivifying arguments that have long since been buried. To all those inclined to attack future issues of BE I say, Please read our back issues first before you pick up the poisoned pointed pen to ride out and fight for Jesus.

Letter #699 Continues (Part e)
[ After citing Ezek. 30:12 ("And I will make the rivers of Egypt dry") on page 303 in my book, I asked,
"What rivers are in Egypt other than the Nile?"
DA responds by saying,--Ed.],
The KJV may say "rivers", but the NEB says "streams" and the RSV says merely "Nile". Here too, you can't escape saying which is correct if you want to claim a contradiction.

Editor's Response to Letter #699 (Part e)
My stars! Is there no end? Always trying to shift the burden of proof, aren't you? You want me to provide the definitive and inerrant translation of your book and then claim that until I do, I can't know for certain that a contradiction exists. In effect, you want me to "perfect" your book. That's one for the books if you will pardon the pun. I addressed a variation of this ploy earlier, and either you didn't read my response or you decided to ignore it. So, for your enlightenment I'll go through it again, although I feel no obligation to do so.
I don't have to say which is correct in order to claim a contradiction exists. All I need do is expose the contradiction. Reconciliation is your problem. You deviously say humanity does not know what is the correct translation, so we can't be certain that a contradiction exists. Your strategy is inadequate in several respects.
First, as I have said before, the contradiction is staring us in the face. People who know Hebrew and Greek far better than you (which shouldn't be very difficult since you aren't knowledgeable in either) have provided what they claim is the correct translation of the manuscripts. So the contradiction stands.
Second if you are going to rely upon those instances in which the scholars are in disagreement and the translation can't be known for certain in order for me to prove a contradiction exists, then all you have done is expose a section of the Bible that should be expunged from Scripture. There is no definitive answer as to what the Bible is saying in that particular instance and the relevant verses should be deleted in order not to jeopardize biblical inerrancy. But as I said earlier, once you adopt that strategy a large part of scripture will become history, but not in the normal sense. Second Kings 8:26, for example, says Ahaziah began to rule at age 22 while the same account in 2 Chron. 22:2 says he was 42. Obviously both can't be correct. Now what are the possibilities. (a) 22 is correct and 42 is wrong, which means the Bible made a false statement. (b) 42 is correct and 22 is wrong which also means the Bible made a false statement. (c) Both say 42 in the original or both say 22 in the alleged original. But you have no way whatever of proving either part of (c), because the originals no longer exist, if they ever did. And until you can verify one or the other, the contradiction stands. I am providing tangible, verifiable, obvious contradictions that lie on the page in front of you. You, on the other hand, are providing unsubstantiated, unverifiable theories based upon nothing more than some alleged writings that you never saw a day in your life, writings everyone concedes do not exist, and you have no solid mechanism by which to prove they ever did.
With respect to my question regarding the Nile, you
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assert that the NEB says "streams" (plural) and the RSV says "Nile" (singular), not rivers. Don't you understand that by adopting this kind of strategy all you are doing is saying that one group of scholars knows Hebrew better than another. How do you know which
is correct? How do you know either is? Perhaps there is an accurate third option? You don't know, and you never will, since the alleged originals are gone forever. As I mentioned earlier, even if you were the world's greatest scholar in one or both languages, you would still have scholars disagreeing with your translations. In effect, you would be on one team or the other. So who's correct? No one knows. And the only way to make sure the Bible is inerrant, the only way to remain on the safe side, the only way to create and maintain biblical consistency, is to expunge verses generating conflicts of this kind. Of course, once you start down this road you will all but eviscerate Scripture. There won't be enough left for a good evening's reading.

Letter #699 Continues (Part f)
& (sic) even if we decide the KJV is correct for once, the Nile within the Delta is more than one river (a common event for the delta of rivers). "Rivers of the Nile" is at least arguably correct.

Editor's Response to Letter #699 (Part f)
You paid no attention whatever to what I wrote in the July issue. Since when did the branches of a river's delta constitute many rivers? The delta at the end of the Mississippi River looks like a fan. Are you telling me each branch, each fork, of that delta is a separate river? If so, then by all means give me the names of all these rivers. I'm sure people living in that delta would like them as well.
You say "Rivers of the Nile is at least arguably correct." Another erratum. It isn't even arguably correct. The branches of a river's delta do not constitute separate rivers. They are all branches of the same river and get their water from that river.

Letter #699 Concludes (Part g)
(In Letter #679 in the June issue another apologist, NB, criticized me by saying, "whether or not the numbers in Hebrew were spelled out or not, you failed to note that 1 Kings 7:26, which makes the '2000-bath' assertion, is missing altogether from the Septuagint. You might at least have commented on why the Jewish scholars who compiled the Septuagint chose to omit this verse from the older texts. You didn't."
To this I said, "The Septuagint is nothing more than a translation like the King James, the NASB and hundreds of other versions. If I make this kind of notation with respect to the Septuagint, I might as well make it with respect to hundreds of others as well. Where would this stop? Are you saying the Septuagint is somehow more authoritative than any other translation and deserves special consideration? If so, upon what basis are you making this judgment? The reference to 2,000 baths is in the Jewish Masoretic Text. Should I have noted that also?" DA now wishes to come to NB's defense by saying--Ed),
The Septuagint is, however, over 1500 years older than the KJV (maybe 250 B.C.), making it an eyewitness by comparison. The scholar quotes the Septuagint when talking about meaning. By contrast, the KJV is quoted merely to be dismissed as wrong....

Editor's Concluding Response to Letter #699 (Part g)
You say "The Septuagint is, however, over 1500 years older than the KJV." That's supposed to prove it is more accurate? Following that "logic" the King James Version should blow away all these modern versions because it's over 300 years older than they are. It is over 300 years closer to the actual events.
Secondly, you refer to the Septuagint as being "an eyewitness by comparison. Oh my goodness! Have you no sense of historical perspective and contemporaneous events? There are more years between the Septuagint and the events related by it in Genesis than there are between the Septuagint and the King James Version. You want people to believe the Septuagint is nearly an eyewitness to the The Creation Myth, the Adam and Eve tale, the Flood, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, etc.? Where on earth did you learn your biblical history? I don't even know of any fundamentalist seminaries that are that far off base.
Let's face it DA. At this stage of the game you are so all-consumed by antipathy, so blindly opposed to what I am doing, that if I said two and two is four, you would deny that emphatically by saying it's 22. Few observations are more accurate than the judicious adage that there is none so deaf as he who won't hear. And your entire line of argumentation in recent letters clearly bears this out.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Letter #700 by E-Mail from RH of Dayton, Ohio
Hi, Dennis My Bible spouting friend on the Internet, Michael, said I was taking the matter of prayers too literally? Here is my reply.
Michael, you tell me I must take a broader view, I must not be so literal in my readings. Let's take another example. Look at Matthew 18:19 - "Again I say unto you, that if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in Heaven." OK, now I admit that I read this literally. "Literally" means "according to the letter." And to me, this verse says that two praying people who agree on what they are praying for will have their prayer granted (not answered, but granted, done) by God. This is the way I read the letters and the words which are there. You will have to educate me as to your method of more broadly and less literally reading this verse. How do you do this? Is it that after you broadly read it, it means "...it shall *maybe* be done for them of my Father," or perhaps "...it shall *sometimes* be done for them of my Father," or perhaps "...it shall be done for them of my Father *if they are worthy*" or perhaps "...it shall be done for them of my Father *if He thinks it best*" I have heard people who believe that prayers work and the Bible is true use all these rationalizations. They use them to make sense of the obvious problem that the verse says prayers will be granted, while the world shows that many prayers are not granted How would you, Michael, view this verse in your broad interpretation compared to my literal one? And wouldn't you think that any interpretation, however narrow or broad, must not change the meaning of the words that are in the verse itself? I have trouble with all these broad and non-literal readings and explanations. If you insist that to read it broadly you have to insert the sorts of weasel words that I have put between the asterisks above, then I do not see how you can avoid realizing that such a broad interpretation dramatically changes the meaning of the verse. Let us think about it; do we have any right at all to so dramatically change the meaning? In this verse, Jesus is talking to his disciples, his companions, the closest people he had to friends on earth. He wanted to convince them of just how powerful prayer was. And he told them exactly what his conviction of the degree of power of prayer: Pray together and you will get what you pray for. He was specific, he was concise, he used no other qualifying words. What would his disciples think when they heard him recite the verse? Is it not probable that they would get the impression that his words meant literally what they said, and that Jesus was telling them that when they prayed together their prayer would be granted? If you were there at the time, Michael, would you have advised them, "Well, OK, that's what our leader said, but we must not take him literally. We must take a broader view, because maybe prayers are not going to be granted in the way that he told us they would."? I do not mean to ridicule or be flippant, Michael, but how would you convince those who had heard Jesus speak these words, that they were not to be taken literally? They just heard Jesus say prayers would be granted; do you think you could convince them that he was somehow overstating the power of prayer?
Once you start on the non-literal interpretation, where do you stop? If the verse says literally "Love thy neighbor as thyself," and you decide that a broader, non-literal view must be taken, what is to stop you from using more weasel words to get its "true" broad meaning: "Love thy neighbor as thyself *when you can*/*if you feel he will reciprocate */*if he is a good Christian too* and so on? I think verses like these mean what they mean literally, or we can never be sure what they mean. I believe that those who wrote these books wanted us to look at what the words say, and not to add words of our own to get us past the hard parts.... For me, I admit that I can't understand how this verse could possibly be true. I can tell from it that Jesus seems to have thought it literally true and his disciples would have felt it was literally true, but my worldly experience convinces me that it is not literally true. Sure some prayers may seem to be granted, but I know of many that are demonstrably disappointing and futile. You must know this yourself, since you believe prayers are "answered in subtle ways" rather than granted. Believe this verse, believe this promise that Jesus made to his followers, and you have to believe that no such disappointments could happen. This verse, along with so many other specifics in the book, is simply not true. And to take a "broad" interpretation of it in order to make it true is to change the meaning of the verse so significantly that it can no longer mean what its original speaker and hearers thought. I welcome your thoughts on these issues, Michael, and thank you for taking the time to look them over.