What’s the big deal about Bible Translations- Pastor Caspar

Teaching on Translations of the Bible


Pastor Caspar McCloud -Upper Room 2009


 


Today we are going to establish our position as to why we only use the KJV Bible in this ministry. God will have His way with us Amen!  There are many omissions and changes that have occurred in all the modern translations and I will go as far as to state on record that if you speak, and read in English any other version of the Bible you do not have the real Word of God, you do not have a real Bible and I will prove it to you this morning.


 


Revelations 22:13-21 “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last.


 14Blessed are they that do his commandments that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.


 15For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth, and maketh a lie.


 16I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star.


 17And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.


 18For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book:


 19And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.


 


 


 20He which testifieth these things saith, Surely, I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.


 21The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.”


 


The KJV Bible is an amazing work based on the Masorectic Text for the Old Testament and the Majority Text or (Historical Text) for the New Testament.


 


The Lord gave the Jews the responsibility to preserve His Word in the Old Testament.  In the sixth century A.D. the tasks of preserving the Hebrew Scriptures was passed from the Scribes to a group called the Masoretes, who continued to preserve the Text for hundreds of years.


The King James translators used a sixteenth century publication of the Masoretic Text to prepare the KJV.


 


Now I do not think that King James actually really read his Bible. From what we know about him he did not appear to live the Christian life. However, back in the 1600’s, when King James authorized the first English translation, he chose 51 Bible scholars, we know who they were and they appeared to be godly men of their day.


 


By the time of its completion it was down to 47 as a few of them passed into Glory. The 51 scholars were made into six groups: two at Oxford, two at Cambridge, and two at Westminster. All of the clergy in England was allowed to oversee any and all translations being made from the Greek and Hebrew. They used as we just shared the Masoretic Text also known as the Antioch manuscript (Antioch was a place of refuge for the first persecuted saints). When they finished, the Authorized King James Version of the Bible came into being.


 


 


 


It was an amazing thing as common people got hold of the Word of God, revival happened, people got saved, people got healed and evil spirits were cast out in the all powerful name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth.


 


I was really inspired reading of some of  these accounts when I was in need of a healing miracle back in the 90’s as I came across documented accounts of people being healed and even the dead being brought back to life in England. Things that are supposed to be happening all the time as we the church, have been given this assignment by the Lord in places like John 14.


 


 John 14:12-15 “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.


 13And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.


 14If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it.


 15If ye love me, keep my commandments.”


 


But the truth is that many people do not study the REAL Bible to show themselves approved and as a result many have not loved the Lord and kept His commandments, actually we have all fallen short of His Glory.”


 


Thank the Lord for His mercy, grace and love. That He is so patient with us. So seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness while you can. Amen? Because a day of judgment approaches us sooner than most think it will.


 


Let us look at the translators of the translations. There are thousands of surviving Greek manuscripts of all or part of the New Testament. Also there are translations into different languages which date back to within 100 years of the disciples, as the Peshitta (a Syrian translation of the second century). In 1516 Erasmus compiled, edited, and printed the Greek ‘Textus Receptus’ (in 1611 the original KJV was translated from that text).


 


Wescott and Hort were two professors at Cambridge University in the 1800’s. They didn’t like the KJV, so they wrote their own revised Greek text. This text became the basis for the Revised Standard and other modern translations of the Bible.


 


B.F. Wescott was a London spiritualist that many historians and writers of occult books claim to be ‘the father’ of the current channeling phenomenon of the new age movement.


 


Wescott organized a club called ‘Hermes’ which many say was the entry point for many scholars and philosophers into the occult. Hermes was the original ‘hermaphrodite’. Wescott wrote 35 years after his institution of the club “there are differences between male and female character under which, we divine that there lies a real identity, and consequent tendency to fusion in the ultimate ideal.” He also started another group called the ‘ghostly guild.’


 


It was the training ground for much under-the-table hand holding between his students and London’s Madame Helen P. Blavatsky, another spiritualist, and then editor of ‘Lucifer’ magazine. She is considered the grandmother of the New Age movement. The editor of the New Age Dictionary, New Age leader Vera Alder, calls her the midwife of the New Age. Alder says “Blavatsky was one of the foremost to resurrect the ancient mystery teachings and interpret them for our time in a set of books which have become the Bibles, as it were, of the modern metaphysician or occultist.”


 


The Encyclopedia of the Unexplained says Blavatsky exhumed her Luciferian doctrines from Philo’s school in Alexandria, Egypt. This was the same school that produced manuscripts to conform to their esoteric teachings. Blavatsky in ‘Isis Unveiled’ says “That which for nearly 1500 years was imposed on Christendom as a book, of which every word was written under the direct supervision of the Holy Ghost; of which not one syllable nor a comma could be changed without sacrilege, is now being retranslated, revised and corrected and clipped of whole verses, in some cases of entire chapters.” Also in the same book: “The London committee for the revision of the Bible. . .shows the origin of the Bible to be occultism. . .and pagan.”


 


Satan is out to produce a new world Bible, one for all religions, a generic Bible. New Age leader, Vera Alder, in ‘When Humanity Comes of Age’ writes, “The research panel would develop a new ‘Bible’ of a world religion which will be the basis of future education.”


 


James Webb in The Occult Establishment said, “It is to restate a truism that what is avant-garde for one generation is taught to the next in the schools [seminaries]. By the third generation, it has become an accepted part of the unperceived assumptions on which everyday life is based.”


 


Here is more information about persons behind the modern Bible translations. Mr. Hort wrote to a Mr. John Ellerton on July 6, 1848, “the Romish view seems to me nearer, and more likely to lead to the truth than the evangelical. . .we dare not forsake the sacraments or God will forsake us.” Mr. Wescott said “. . .the vile Textus Receptus. . .”


 


Would you trust a translation of the Bible, where the director believed the following quotes from ‘The Authority of the Bible,’ by Professor C. H. Dodd, director of translation of the New English Bible? “God is the author, not of the Bible, but of the life in which the authors of the Bible partake, and of which they tell in such imperfect human words as they could command.” (p.17); (so God was not author of the Bible?)


 


“God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son — the expression evidently anthropomorphic. It is the mythological way of saying that in Christ God gives of his own being the utmost that it is possible for humanity to receive of God.” (Is John 3:16 a myth?)


 


“Moses has left us no writings, and we know little of him with certainty.” (p.27) (Exodus 24:4 says, “And Moses wrote all the words of the Lord.”) “For indeed the bare idea of vicarious expiation (substitutionary atonement) is not wholly rational. . .” (p.215)


 


(2 Pet.3:18 says, “for Christ also hath once suffered for sins. . .”)


Bishop Brooke, Wescott and Dr. Fenton Hort were the leaders of the revision committee of 1881 which came up with the revised version of the Bible. Most modern versions are taken from the revised Greek text which they wrote.


 


They did not believe the Bible was reliable. More quotes from their autobiographies: ‘Mr. Wescott in a letter to the archbishop of Canterbury March 4, 1890, “No one now, I suppose, holds that the first three chapters of Genesis, for example, give a literal history.”


 


Mr. Hort wrote “Evangelicals seem to me perverted rather than untrue. There are, I fear, still more serious differences between us on the subject of authority, and especially the authority of the Bible.” He also wrote these quotes “I have been persuaded for many years that Mary-worship and Jesus-worship have very much in common. . .” “I am inclined to believe that such a state as Eden (I mean the popular notion) never existed.” “The popular doctrine of substitution is an immoral and material counterfeit.” “But the book that has most engaged me is Darwin . . .my feeling is strong that the theory is unanswerable.”


 


Hort developed a passion for Coleridge, an opium addict. Wescott was ‘transported’ by beer, and Blavatsky was addicted to hashish.


The result is that all the modern translations of English Bibles are now based on these two men’s work.


 


Red flags should have gone up, but didn’t. Both men being members of “The Ghostly Guild,” a society whose purpose was to investigate ghostly appearances and other supernatural phenomena–the pursuit of which Scripture labels spiritualism, a practice that is absolutely forbidden. And this is merely the most obvious observation. Other issues came up, but were ignored as well. Just like a politician running for a government office, people have been conditioned to overlook certain things. For example, presidents, who lack faithfulness in their marriages and have known adulterous affairs before being elected.  Like they are going to be faithful to the country?


 


How will they prove faithful to a country? God says, “If I can not trust you in the little things, how, can I trust you with bigger things?”


 


Both Westcott and Hort had sons who wrote biographies about their dads and there is no evidence these men where ever saved. Why have we never heard of these problems with translations in the church? It appears very few people in the church and their pastor’s, are even aware of them. This may explain why we have so many problems facing us in churches these days. I mean if you are instructing the people with a Bible that is filled with errors, what is the percentage of chances you may bring in some heretical teachings into the church?


 


There was a man named Constantine, from 285 to 337. He fills a very dark page in the history of Christianity. This fellow Constantine worshipped “SOL”, (the sun god). Tradition says that when he faced his enemy another army headed by a man called Maxentius in 312, in a battle for the conquest for the throne, Constantine was very badly outnumbered by the other side.  He claimed he and his troops saw a cross in the sky and the words “in this sign, conquer.”


He claimed if the God of the Christians would help him win this battle, he would become a Christian. But the cross he described was the Ankh (a cross-shaped figure, with a looped handle, symbolizing life and prosperity), which was the Egyptian sign for the sun god.


 


Constantine won the battle with the help of these invisible demonic occultic beings he was in agreement with. Personally I think he may have had thoughts that were not his own of course, like “the more we persecute Christians and kill them the more they multiply.  If you can beat them, join them. So over night Rome becomes Christian. But it was not biblical Christianity.


 


Constantine’s way of evangelizing was to kill and do unspeakable horrible things to anyone who did not agree with him. In 313, Constantine issued the edict of tolerance (edict of Milan), saying he was giving total religious freedom. Yeah, right! Basically he was saying he was making himself the 13th and chief Apostle. Just don’t get too near him on Judgment day is all I can say.


 


He sprinkle-baptized his troops who, became instant Christians. They were singing songs like “ Instant Christian gonna get you, gonna knock you off your feet” Better get your act together ain’t it sweet.


So without knowing anything about repentance, or what the Christian faith was all about, the army becomes a Christian army. Wow!


 


Then in 325 he set up the Council of Nicaea and presided as ‘Sums Pontiff’ (the official title of the Pope, which is still called that even today). We have Constantine to thank for erecting church buildings. He must have figured if they had a building like the Jews and the Pagans have, it would make him appear more legitimate.


 


You can almost hear him speaking with an Italian accent. “I am a legitimate businessman. Making you an offer you can’t refuse.”


Historians continue to debate whether he was truly converted. The fact that he had his eldest son, his nephew, and his brother-in-law put to death does not help strengthen his case for true conversion in my book.


 


So over night Rome became a Christian world, the temple virgins become nuns, the statue of the goddess Easter now becomes the statue for the Virgin Mary, and on and on it went.


 


In Antioch (Syria), where the followers of Christ were first called Christians, the true believers were making exact copies of the original manuscripts. They sent missionaries to Egypt, which was the land of Isis (Queen of Heaven), Horus (the sun god), and Baal worship (which began with Nimrod). It’s in Genesis.


 


In Alexandria there were men known as the Gnostics, men that were proud of their wisdom. They formed a school of religion and philosophy, which became the ‘center of Christian learning and culture.’ Like some of the men today who form these cemeteries of higher learning, ever learning and never coming into the knowledge of the truth.


 


These Gnostics didn’t believe in heaven or hell, or that the Bible was the Word of God. So, they began making changes to Bible manuscripts, because after all, they were so wise and intelligent. Mr. Origen became head of this school (of which he had began as a student). Origen, who was an Arian, didn’t believe Jesus was God almighty, but a lesser god. In 184 to 254 he was responsible for corrupted Bible manuscripts.  He would basically cut and paste the Bible, before they had computers to do that. If he did not like a certain passage he would have his scribes take it out and he would insert things as he wanted them.


 


When other early church fathers (bishops) were condemning Origen, for being so ungodly a man named Eusebius praised him in his book ‘Ecclesiastic History’.


 


Constantine, the professed Christian, who not so secretly worshipped the sun god, ordered this same Eusebius (the bishop of Caesarea) to make 50 bibles for him. Eusebius had the choice of using the Greek manuscripts from Antioch or from Alexandria to make up the 50 Greek bibles. He believed the same as Mr. Origen, because he also was not a real Christian. He used the corrupted manuscripts of Egypt to make his bibles for the Roman Catholic Church.


 


From those 50 bibles came the Latin vulgate, written by Jerome. It became the official Bible for Roman Catholics. All others were outlawed!


 


There was one original copy of the Greek New Testament scriptures known as the original or “autographs.” These books were mostly in the region of Asia Minor (Syria), with six in Greece, and three known to be in Rome. Then numerous copies were made.


 


The scriptures themselves attest to the proliferation and early creation of a ‘majority text’. “The word of the Lord was published throughout the entire region” Acts 13:49. True believers copied them precisely and carefully. This multiplication continued throughout history.


 


The Majority Text or the Historical Text is the Greek reconstruction from the manuscripts copied by the Bysantine monks. This is the test used and copied by the Greek- speaking churches for many centuries. It is also called the Received Text. The KJV Bible is translated from this Majority Text.


 


The Alexandrian Text consists of a few manuscripts prepared in Alexander, Egypt. The main two are the Sinaiticus and Vaticanus,  copied in the 4th century and discovered in the 1800’s.


 


Sinaiticus  was obtained from St. Catherine Monastery at Mt. Sinai and contains over half of the Old Testament and all of the New testament, except Mark 16:9-20  and John 7:53—8:11.


It has the Testament Apocrypha and the two New Testament Apocrypha books contained in it as scripture.


 


Now the Vaticanus was known to be in the Vatican library since the year 1475 and no Protestant scholar was ever permitted to view it until the 1800’s The Vaticanus is missing Genesis 1:1-46;28, 2 Kings 2:5-7, 10-13, Psalm 106:27 – 138:6, Mark 16:9-20, John 7:53-8;11 and Hebrews 9:14 to the end of Revelations


 


Well brothers and sisters, this goofy thing is what Westcott and Hort  used to produce a Greek New Testament in 1881, based on the Sinaitcus and Vaticanus. This text was the basis for the Revised Version of 1881. This text and their theory of textual criticism underline the other Greek texts that have been produced since


(Nestle’s and the United Bible Society’s) from which all the modern English Translations, such as the NIV (the Not Inspired Version) and the NASB come.


 


There are substantial differences between the Alexandrian Text and the Majority Text. Which translates (no pun intended) that there are substantial differences in the KJV and all the modern English translations. These differences are more than just updating some archaic language of the KJV.


 


 


Westcott and Hort text of the New Testament differs almost 6.000 times from the Greek New testament text (The Received Text) used in the KJV translation. The number of changes in producing the American Standard Version which is based on Westcott and Hort text number well over 30.000. These changes are not in the thee’s and thou’s. They changed entire passages and deleted words as I will show you.


Later Greek text like the United Bible Society text have a total of word differences in over 8.000 words from the Received Text which is the KJV.


 


In other words that means there are over 38,000 errors. Do you have the discernment and understanding to use a Bible with that many mistakes in it?  Most of the differences are omissions of words found in the Received Text. Other differences are substitutions, additions and transpositions. At least a fourth of these differences alter subject matter.


 


Revelations 22:18-19 “For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, if any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book:


 19And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.”


 


Consider this, the KJV Bible is the only Bible that has no copyright law when all the others do.


 


Now when you study the work of the devil you must keep in mind that he is called the Great Deceiver for a good reason, which is the only good in him. If he tempted you with something too obvious you would never go for it.


In the late 1800’s the American army had a problem with the American Indians because they needed to take their land away from them. There is the sad story in its history where the army invited the Indians to make peace and served the entire tribe a steak dinner. Only the steaks had strychnine in them and the whole tribe soon keeled over and died, except one Indian who had discernment and escaped to tell about it. The devil works that way.


 


KJV – Luke 11:2And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth.”


 


The NIV and the modern versions leave out the word OUR. So what father are you praying to?


 


KJV- Luke 4:8 “And Jesus answered and said unto him, Get thee behind me, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.”


 


NIV – Omits ‘Get behind me, Satan.’ It says – Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.  With Get behind me Satan missing, what God is it you are serving?


 


KJV – Luke 4:4 “And Jesus answered him, saying, It is written, that man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God.”


NIV Omits –‘but by every word of God.’


 


KJV – Acts 8:36-37And as they went on their way, they came unto a certain water: and the eunuch said, see, here is water; what doth hinder me to be baptized?


 37And Philip said, If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.”


NIV leaves out verse 37 entirely.


 


KJV-Revelation 1:11 “Saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last: and, What thou seest, write in a book, and send it unto the seven churches which are in Asia; unto Ephesus, and unto Smyrna, and unto Pergamos, and unto Thyatira, and unto Sardis, and unto Philadelphia, and unto Laodicea.”


NIV – Omits- I am the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last; and what thou seest.


 


NIV – says “write on a scroll what you see and send it to the seven churches; to Ephesus Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea.”


 


KJV –6:47 “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.”


NIV-Omits ‘on me, it says “I tell you the truth, he who believes has everlasting life.”


Believes what??? Believes on who???


KJV- Romans 8:1 “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.”


NIV –Omits ‘who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.’


So the NIV is suggesting you do can life anyway you choose as long as you once said you believe in Jesus. How many people will not hear ‘well done good and faithful servant’ that day, but instead ‘depart from Me I never knew you’, because the NIV told them it’s ok to feel free to keep sinning because there is no condemnation?


 


 


KJV – 1Timothy 3:16 “And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.”


NIV – changes God to ‘He’.  So it reads “He appeared in a body, was vindicated by the Spirit, was seen by angels, was preached among the nations, was believed on in the world, was taken up in glory.”  Well that could be some celebrity or politician or movie star.


 


KJV- John 1:18 “No man hath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.”  


NIV –changes ‘Only Begotten Son to One and only.’ “No one has ever seen God, but the One and only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.”
The NASB reads “No man has seen God at any time; the only begotten God, who is in the bosom of the Father, he has explained Him.”


 


The Greek for “the only Begotten is in both the Majority and Alexandrian Texts but is translated one and only in the NIV. Son in the Majority Text is changed to God in the Alexandrian Text.


 


KJV- John 3:16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever, believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”


NIV-changes ‘should’ to ‘shall’. John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his One and Only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life”


 


KJV- Isaiah 14:12 “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!”


 


NIV – changes ‘Lucifer’ to Morning Star.  “How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the dawn.”


Again the NIV does not follow the Masoretic Text or the Old Testament here for this passage.


 


KJV- Revelation 22:16 “I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star.”


 


Now they can not both be called the Morning Star. Either Jesus is the called the morning start or Lucifer is. You decide which one is telling you the truth.


 


(Show DVD of Dr. Riplinger)


 


This majority text is called the Byzantine text by modern textual critics. This is because all modern critics acknowledge that this was the Greek New Testament text in general used throughout the greater part of the Byzantine period (A.D. 312-1453). For many centuries before the Protestant reformation, this Byzantine text was the text of the entire Greek church, and for more than three centuries after the reformation it was the text of the entire Protestant church. . .it is found in the vast majority of the Greek New Testament manuscripts. . the traditional text. . .is the true text because it is that form of the Greek New Testament which is known to have been used in the church of Christ in unbroken succession. . .that therefore the Byzantine text found in the vast majority of the Greek New Testament manuscripts is the true text.”


 


The King James version was translated from the ‘Textus Receptus’ or ‘received text’, that is, the majority of Greek manuscripts which agree with each other and have been accepted through the centuries. The variations among the majority text are very minor, but “the remaining handful of manuscripts are as diverse as dogs and dragons” according to G.A.Riplinger (New Age Bible Versions). This handful not only disagree with the majority text, but also disagree with themselves.


 


Included in these are the Vaticanus (b), Sinaiticus (Aleph), Bezae (d), and Papyrus 75. Dean John Burgeon (The Revision Revised) writes concerning these four minority texts mentioned above: “all four are discovered on careful scrutiny to differ essentially, not only from the 99 out of 100 of the whole body of extant manuscripts, but even from one another.”


 


Evidence for the New Testament is composed of 5,366 manuscripts and fragments, and 2,209 lectionaries (books used in churches), papyrus fragments, uncial and minuscule manuscripts (modified capitals and cursives). Each of them is given a name, an abbreviation and/or a number. There are 88 papyri, referred to as papyri 1-88 (e.g. P66, p46, p75); uncials (e.g. Aleph, b, c, d), lectionaries 1-2,209, minuscule 1-2,795. The overwhelming majority of these manuscripts, lectionaries, and writers agree with each other as to the reading of the New Testament. Manuscripts from the second century (p66) down through the middle ages (A.D. 1500) attest to the reading of this ‘majority text.’


 


The corrupted manuscripts are of the 1 percent minority of the Greek texts available and are also known as the Alexandrian manuscripts. The Vaticanus and Sinaiticus manuscripts are of this group. These are manuscripts used by Wescott and Hort in 1881 in their revised Greek translation. This ‘new’ Greek text using the 1 percent minority text of the Vatican manuscript (b), introduced by Wescott and Hort has been used as the Greek text for all subsequent versions of the Bible, and has supplanted the majority text with it’s almost two millennia standing.


Frederick Kenyon (The Text of the Greek Bible); director of the British museum, said of the majority text: “this is the text found in the great majority of manuscripts, entrenched in print by Erasmus and Stephanus and known as the Textus Receptus, or received text. . .until 1881. . .it held the field as the text in practical universal use and when its position was then decisively challenged, a stiff fight was made in its defense by advocates such as Burgeon.


 


This ‘new’ minority-type Greek text used predominantly. . .Aleph and b type readings. . .[the changes] amount to an extensive modification of the text. It has been the dominating influence in all modern critical editions. It is clear that. . .deliberate alteration. . .has been at work on a large scale in one text or the other. . .the Textus Receptus being habitually the longer and fuller of the two.” All new versions of the Bible ignore over 5,000 Greek majority texts for a few aberrant forms of the New Testament.


 


Further facts concerning the manuscripts that are the majority text, versus the Alexandrian manuscripts: The Alexandrian manuscripts (Vaticanus (b), SINAITICUS (Aleph), Bezae (d), and Papyrus 75) not only are a minority of a fraction of 1 percent of the Greek manuscripts available, but they are the witness representing only one geographical area, Alexandria, Egypt. The majority text manuscripts come from Greece, Constantinople, Asia Minor, Syria, Alexandria, Africa, Gaul, south Italy, Sicily, England, and Ireland.


 


As Wilbur Pickering (Identity of the New Testament) said: “A reading found in only one limited area cannot be original. . .if a reading died out in the fourth century, we have the verdict of history against it.”


 


K. W. Clark (Today’s Problems With the Critical Text of the New Testament) said “All are found on the same Egyptian recension.” Recension according to Webster means “revision.” The NASB Interlinear Greek – English New Testament refers to its ‘Greek text’ as a “recension.” Well, would you rather have the ‘original’ or a ‘recension?’


 


G. A. Riplinger said “Like ostriches, new age editors and those who unbraid the KJV have their heads buried in the Egyptian sand–seeing b and p75 to the exclusion of the thousands of other witnesses.”


The scholars who support the minority manuscripts even contradict themselves and at best try to give false impressions.


 


Carson (The King James Version Debate) makes this pretense; “the textual base of the T. R. [Textus Receptus, or KJV Greek] is a small number of haphazardly collated and relatively late minuscule manuscripts.” But who is he trying to fool? Chapters later, he writes, “95% of the mss [manuscripts] belong to the Byzantine tradition. . .the textual tradition which in large measure stands behind the KJV. . .there are far more manuscripts extant in this tradition than in the other three combined [Caesarian, Western, and Alexandrian].”


 


Then he disregards this fact to conclude: “God, it is argued, has providentially preserved the Byzantine tradition–that is true. . . God preserved the Byzantine text type for at least a millennium, during which time the others were unknown. . .true enough. . .is everything that takes place under divine providence morally good or necessarily true? Divine sovereignty is so all embracing that it stands behind all things, including Adolf Hitler.” Then he adds later “Of course one should be very careful and humble before dogmatically disagreeing with what the majority of believers have held to be true.” What a lot of nonsensical double-talk! What’s more, they claim that the Alexandrian manuscripts are the oldest (therefore more correct, because they are closer to the originals in writing) in existence, but that is not true. The earliest known manuscripts (i.e. P66 A.D. 175) agree with the KJV readings. The new versions are based on later alterations of the original, extant in the form of p75 (A.D. 200) and Aleph and b (A.D. 350).


 


The Vaticanus was written on tanned animal skins (known as vellum about 350 A.D.), and was found in the Vatican library in 1481. It remains in excellent condition, but omits numerous scriptures including: Genesis 1:1-46:28, Psalms 106-138, Matthew 16:2-3, Pauline pastoral epistles, Hebrews 9:14-13:25, and Revelation.


In the gospels alone it leaves out 237 words, 452 clauses, and 748 whole sentences. Against this, hundreds of later copies of the Greek scriptures all agree in all the scriptures missing from the Vaticanus, all missing words, phrases, or sentences being exactly the same and in the same places. The translators of the KJV knew the Vaticanus was not reliable. That’s why they didn’t use it.


 


The Vaticanus also contains the Apocrypha. The Sinaiticus (also written about 350 A.D.) was found in 1844 in a trash pile in St. Catherine’s monastery, near Mt. Sinai, by a man named Tischendorf. It contains all the N.T., plus adds the ‘Shepherd of Hermes’ [another name for Satan according to Luciferian H. P. Blavatsky (secret doctrine), and the conductor of souls to Hades according to Webster] and the ‘Epistle of Barnabas’, which was not written by the apostle Barnabas who traveled with the apostle Paul, and does not agree with the four gospels of the New Testament.


 


This text (Vaticanus) is extremely unreliable. On nearly every page of the manuscript there are corrections and revisions, done by 10 different people. Some were made the same time it was copied, but most were made in the 6th or 7th century. It has been rejected all through history. Yet, these two manuscripts are used in translating most modern versions of the Bible. An interesting fact is that these two texts disagree with one another over 3,000 times in the gospels alone. Another Greek text that was made from the Alexandrian texts (Vaticanus and Sinaiticus) is the Nestle’s Greek text.


 


In most modern translations, such as the NASB, verses that are in all the Greek texts except the Alexandrian texts, are found with a footnote, ‘Some of the oldest manuscripts do not contain vv.x-xx’, or ‘This verse not found in the most ancient authorities.’ Oldest doesn’t make the best. We know that they don’t agree with all the newer existing Greek versions that were handed down and copied correctly. Example: both the Vaticanus and Sinaiticus leave out the last twelve verses of Mark, concerning the resurrection; but not one other manuscript, either uncial or cursive leave out this passage. There are 18 other uncial (capital letter) manuscripts and 600 cursive (small letter) manuscripts that have that above passage in full. The evidence is 618 to 2. The NASB puts the section in brackets with a footnote that they were probably not in the original writings. Age is not the important thing, but reliability. Where did it come from?


 


You may ask about the questioning of the true Christianity of Origen, an early church father. To help substantiate this deduction, I quote from the New Standard Encyclopedia: “One of the most notable of Origen’s ideas was his logos doctrine. This idea had been expressed in John 1:1-5 and in other Christian writings but Origen gave it the fullest treatment. In Greek philosophy logos was the name of the divine principle of creations and rational order. Origen applied this principle to Christ’s person and work. Subordinating the son to the father, he treated Christ as the logos (created by God) who brings reason to the world. In this treatment he neglected the figure of Jesus Christ as a man who lived and taught on earth. This doctrine provided the foundation for the fourth century Arian doctrine.”


 


So it says Origen believed Jesus was a created being, like the Jehovah’s witnesses. Origen corrupted John 1:1-5 to say ‘The word was a god.’ I’ve read the things Eusebius and others said concerning him. Other ‘church fathers’, even ‘bishops’ spoke against him. We know there were two kinds of church leaders in that day, and in fact all the way back to Paul’s time, as shown in his writings.


 


Here are some interesting facts concerning the different manuscripts and the 1611 KJV translation. Between the prophet Malachi and the gospel of Matthew, Satan used families of Jews including the Maccabees and others who collected and worked on manuscripts, recording their current history during a period of about 500 years.


 


They recorded both secular history and Jewish legends, and pagan religious traditions from which came purgatory, prayers for the dead and other perversions of God’s Word now used by the Roman Catholic system. Some of these manuscripts became known as the Apocrypha.


 


The Maccabees were idolized as Jewish freedom fighters and their books were canonized by the council of Trent (Catholic). Their Apocrypha, which was always rejected by Christians from the first century and throughout the Protestant reformation as being devilish, has been accepted even by some Protestants in the 20th century because of the Jesuit conspiracy against God’s Word during the translation of the original 1611 version of the KJV.


 


Satan tried to put the Apocrypha in the Old Testament, but the Jewish Rabbis rejected and denounced it as counterfeit. It is no little thing that Jesus and the apostles never once in the writings of the New Testament quoted or recognized the Apocrypha as being scripture.


 


At the Council of Toulouse in 1229, the Catholic Church prohibited the people from possessing or reading the Bible in their native language. (1) “In early times the Bible was read freely by the lay people…New dangers came in during the Middle Ages…To meet those evils, the Council of Toulouse (1229) and Terragona (1234) forbade the laity to read the vernacular translations of the Bible. Pius IV required bishops to refuse lay persons leave to read even Catholic versions of Scripture unless their confessors or parish priests judged that such reading was likely to prove beneficial.” (Catholic Dictionary, p. 82).


 


(2) Council of Toulouse, 1229, Canon 14 – “We prohibit the permission of the books of the Old and New Testament to laymen, except perhaps they might desire to have the Psalter, or some Breviary for the divine service, or the Hours of the blessed Virgin Mary, for devotion; expressly forbidding their having the other parts of the Bible translated into the vulgar tongue” (Pierre Allix, Ecclesiastical History of Ancient Churches of the Albigenses, published in Oxford at the Clarendon Press in 1821, reprinted in USA in 1989 by Church History Research & Archives, P.O. Box 38, Dayton Ohio, 45449, p. 213).


 


Then, in 1546, at the Council of Trent, the Vatican declared the Apocrypha “Holy writ,” and an official part of their Old Testament canon. Anyone rejecting this was damned as a heretic and burned at the stake. This law is still in effect today!


 


When Bible believers were caught with copies of the Word of God, they were slaughtered and the scriptures were burned. The Catholic inquisition was used to search for copies of the Textus Receptus manuscript. It is estimated that between the years 1200 and 1800, 68 million people died because of the Catholic inquisitions.


 


Martin Luther sparked the Protestant reformation. All Protestants were called heretics by the Catholic Church. Luther translated the Textus Receptus manuscript into the German language, to give the people the Word of God.


 


In 1525 Tyndale used the Textus Receptus to translate the Word of God into the English language. The Catholic Church burned him at the stake for doing so. The Vatican’s power over the world was falling apart because of the Protestant reformation. All the preachers, including Luther and Tyndale, called the Pope the antichrist.


 


In 1534 Pope Paul III ordered a Spaniard named Ignatius de Loyola to set up the “Order of the Jesuits.” Their purpose was to stop the spread of Protestantism. In 1541 Ignatius Loyola became the first Jesuit general and his followers were dedicated to the complete destruction of the Textus Receptus by denying that the Word of God is verbally inspired by the Holy Spirit and by placing their own theology and philosophy above the Holy Scriptures.


 


In August of 1572, the Jesuits secretly engineered the massacre of St. Bartholomew. Using Roman Catholic troops and Dominican monks, they slaughtered the unarmed “Bible” believers in Paris. After a week of bloodshed, the Protestant movement in France was destroyed. The Catholic Church celebrated their victory. Their next target was England, to win it back to the Catholic Church.


 


The English royalty rebelled against the Pope’s temporal authority as the “Only lawful ruler of the world.” Because of it, the Pope sent undercover Jesuits to England to infiltrate key positions and destroy from within. They were to translate Origen’s Alexandrian manuscripts into an English Bible in 1582. They did this, but the English people rejected the Jesuit bibles.


 


Here is a review of some facts in a time line representing the battle between the Vatican and Protestant England for the destruction of the Word of God:


1534 The Anglican Church is established in England


1534 The Jesuit order is formed


1545 The Council of Trent is formed to denounce Protestantism and establish the laws of the Roman Catholic doctrine.


1533 A Roman Catholic queen takes the throne in England. Queen Mary murders the leaders of the Anglican Church reinstating Catholicism.


1558 Queen Elizabeth takes the throne, denounces Catholicism and reinstates the Anglican Church.


1560 The reformation sweeps Scotland and they join Protestant England.


1588 King Philip II of Catholic Spain sends the Spanish armada to destroy Protestant England. The English destroy the armada at sea stopping the Catholic intentions and saving England.


1603 James, who wanted a new Bible for the English people, became King of England. (He assembled a group of 48 of the greatest scholars of the time for the work of translating the Bible into English.)


1605 Catholics plotted to blow up English parliament, but it was exposed. Catholic plants, stationed in the English court leaked news that King James intended to authorize an English Bible based on the inspired manuscript (Textus Receptus).


 


The news electrified the Vatican. Jesuits, skilled in languages, were immediately ordered to join the Anglican Church. Certain advisors trusted by King James were deep catholic agents. Puritans suspected that some of these men chosen to assist them were not of God. They complained to King James, but he overrode their objections. The plot was to secretly switch the text containing God’s Word and replace it with their Roman Catholic (Vaticanus) Alexandrian manuscript. God stopped these undercover Jesuits from destroying the Word by having guards posted at their tables to watch their every move. Then they moved to place the Apocrypha into the Old Testament. Their last mission; which was to place the Apocrypha between the Old and New Testaments was temporarily accomplished, until the plot was discovered. The Jesuits believed that once the apocrypha was between the covers of the Protestant Bible, that the Protestants would finally accept it as holy writ, and then turn back to the Vatican as their final authority.


 


After the King James Bible was printed, the Jesuits swore to destroy the Protestant translators who opposed them. They systematically eliminated both them and their families. Later, two Jesuits were soundly converted and they informed the Puritans of the conspiracy against the Protestant movement and the Word of God. The Jesuits were afraid that an English Bible printed without the Apocrypha, read throughout England, would end Catholicism throughout the English speaking world, and would block any ecumenical movement in the future.


 


In 1655 the surviving Puritans brought forth the entire 1611 edition of the Bible without the Apocrypha that had been implanted. This was God’s victory over the Jesuit conspiracy.


 


Having lost this battle, the Vatican decided to attack the King James Bible, by making updates, saying that it was ‘obsolete.’ against protests, a committee was formed to create a “new and better” translation of the Bible. Two men on the committee, Hort and Wescott (both of whom were closet Catholics), put tremendous pressure on the others to accept the Alexandrian manuscript (Vaticanus) from which they produced their new Bible. The result was that Protestants were being given a Roman Catholic translation of the Bible. It was the first of many, called “the Revised Version.” From there they have continued with many new translations (as the NASB, TEV, NRSV, NKJV, etc.), each one more corrupted, and closer to the desired final version, which is to be the New Age Bible for all religions. It will be called the New Revised International Version.


 


Next the Vatican began sending Jesuits to infiltrate the Protestant theological seminaries and Bible societies. They did, and filled them with professors who teach Greek using the Nestle’s Greek text. It is used to teach how inaccurate the King James is. Naturally there are many differences, in fact there are thousands. As a result, most Protestants today use a translation of the Bible made for them by the Roman Catholics, to undermine and destroy their faith in God, by destroying the certainty of the infallibility of God’s Word, and by downplaying the deity of Christ, the virgin birth, salvation by grace through faith, the resurrection and second coming of Christ.


 


Again, the reason for the Catholic ecumenical movement, for the Jesuit order, and for all the corrupted manuscripts and Bibles, is to destroy the Protestant faith, and bring those who left Catholicism, back into their fold. The Lord Jesus told us in Luke 20:46 “Beware of the scribes.” Those who write the materials that the people read, have a great power to influence the reader’s opinions.


 


Everyone knows the power of the printed word, even secular newspapers. So today the false preachers are pumping out false doctrines and trying to cause men to disbelieve the Word of God and true biblical doctrines that will lead to salvation. Again Jesus told us in Matthew 24:4 “Take heed that no man deceive you.”


 


There are many warnings in the Bible about false preachers and prophets, and of “traditions of men” being exalted above the Word of God, and even of “doctrines of devils.” The words of Jesus sum it up best: 2 Corinthians 11:14-15 “And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works.”


 


What they do is add to and subtract from the Word of God. Yet we have this warning: Revelation 22:18-19 “For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, if any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: and if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.”


They remove key words and add words in key places, to bring a change in the meaning of the scripture to destroy the doctrines of the faith. This gives them loopholes for adding many questions and making all kinds of postulations.


 


All the new versions of the Bible have been copyrighted by the major book publishers who are out to make themselves rich off of gullible Christians, who they can convince by their propaganda that their new versions are better and more accurate and easier to read than the KJV. They are liars. Besides, how can man have the audacity to “copyright” God’s Word and make it their property for commercial profit? That in itself is proof that these translations are something besides God’s Word, and their purpose is questionable.


 


I believe all these new Bibles are disreputable and untrustworthy frauds and not the truth. They are an affront and offense to the true Word of God.


 


Just a few samples of what these new versions of the Bible have done to corrupt God’s Word will be given here. Then in separate documentation, let me give you more detailed comparisons between separate individual versions (as the NIV and the NASB) and the KJV, as proof of what is in them and what they have done to the truth.


 


One of the common deceptions is the failure to identify Lucifer as a name for Satan. Example: KJV-Isaiah 14:12 “How art thou fallen from Heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning!”


NIV “How you have fallen from Heaven, O morning star, son of the dawn!” Who fell from Heaven in this version? This verse exposes Lucifer as another name for the Devil, Satan. Take that Bible and try to witness to an occultist who worships Lucifer. You will not be able to show them in the NIV that Lucifer is evil or really the Devil.


 


Another common change is concerning the blood of Jesus. Hundreds of verses have been changed, and this is one of them.


Colossians 1:14 KJV “In whom we have redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins.”


NASB “In whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”


Where is the Blood? Redemption without the blood of Jesus?


 


Another example is the modifying of references to the saving power of Jesus Christ. John 6:47 KJV “Verily, verily, I say unto you. He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.”


NASB “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes has eternal life.” Believes what? In whom? And this is supposed to be a “better version.”?


 


What is the purpose of all these new bibles being published? It is to sow confusion and chaos, and to undermine the faith of God’s people. It is to make them think that God hasn’t or didn’t preserve His Word for them and that they will be confused about the truth, and think “Which version can I trust, if any.” Doubting the Word as truth (accurate and infallible) will destroy the faith of the believers. They will not know what to believe. They cannot be sure what they believe. Different people in the congregation having different versions of the Bible than the Pastor, reading along will see the differences in the versions and will question them.


 


Here is a good example of how this is done. Zechariah 13:6 KJV “What are these wounds in thine hands?”


NIV “What are these wounds on your body?”


NASB “What are these wounds between your arms?”


RSV “What are these wounds on your back?”


 


What a mess of confusion! But let me ask, is God the author of confusion? My Bible (KJV) tells me that He is not (1 Corinthians 14:33).


 


Only in this generation has God’s Word come under such a vile attack. Modern “scholars” who do not believe the Word of God, and are not believers, do not care about the truth. Many of the authors of these new versions believe everything from the virgin birth to Jonah are myths. They reject the miracles of Christ. Some are homosexuals, lesbians, New Agers, and the most liberal denominations of religion that promote abortion and socialism, and homosexuality.


 


Others are Catholics, who believe more in traditions of the church than in the Word of God, and make Mary the Mediatrix (female mediator) between God and man. Is it any wonder these new versions are so polluted and unreliable? We must “contend for the faith once delivered to the saints” Jude 3 and not allow them to destroy our faith in the pure and infallible Word of God that we have in the KJV and water it down and twist it to suit and prove their own doctrines of men and devils.


 


Many in the past gave their lives for the Word of God, that today we might still have it. Today, most Protestants don’t believe we have it.


 


 Caspar McCloud © 2008

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