Recognizing that the Bible is the very Word of the Living God to man, and understanding the priority of knowing and obeying its truths, the elders at Grace Community Church are deeply committed to study and teach with diligence and authority.

Thus, the central ministry of Grace Church is the continuous imparting of the Scripture to the people of God that they may know God and serve Him in worship and ministry.

Through their years of study, training and teaching, the elders have come to convictions regarding the major theological truths of the Bible. This little booklet presents one of these truths which reflects the heart of the teaching here at Grace.

John MacArthur, Jr.

We regularly receive letters from our Grace To You listeners who react to statements that, "The better and older texts say. . ." Our listeners conclude that the Greek manuscripts behind the KJV are not accurate. Often they send literature defending the KJV.

Here is a typical letter:

In response to these letters, we have developed this statement:

The Background

Why do these people write? Where do they get their information? There is a growing literature crusade which claims that "God wrote only one Bible." By one Bible, they mean the King James Version Bible written in 1611. They conclude that the King James Version is the only English version which faithfully preserves the original writings. It is often supported with claims illustrated by the title of this article, "My Stand on the Inerrancy of the King James Version."

They build their case upon such doctrines as the preservation of Scripture, the inerrancy of Scripture and one's continued commitment to God. I have one letter in my file whose letterhead reads, "Good News Baptist Church, Home of 'King James Bible Schools.'" The letter was written to promote the "King James Bible Preachers Fellowship." This group of pastors is characterized as, "Men who are unashamed to proclaim the King James Bible, A.D. 1611, as God's holy, perfect word. God still has a few men who have not bowed the knee to the Baal of scholarship."

The Circumstances

Some basic facts about the existing manuscripts of the New Testament will help us to understand the historical background of this issue.

1. The Old and New Testaments were not originally written in the English language. They were first written in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek.

2. We do not have the originals of any of the books of the Bible.

3. God never promised the perfect preservation of the originals, but He did promise to preserve their content. They are preserved within the body of currently existing manuscripts.

4. There are differences among the original language manuscripts that have come down to us in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. This is the chief cause of the problem.

5. These textual variations are almost always incidental and do not significantly affect the sense of what Scripture is saying. As a matter of fact, once the easily solved variants are removed, 99.9 percent of what is in our Bible can be confirmed without question.

6. It is usually easy to identify the cause behind a textual variant because the Greek New Testament has been preserved in far more existing manuscripts than any other piece of ancient literature. We are faced with, "an embarrassment of riches."

7. Many textual problems have already been resolved satisfactorily and are no longer in question.

8. No doctrine in Orthodox Christianity is dependent on the solution to any one variant.

The Controversy

The heart of the issue involves several questions, "Is one version inherently superior to another?" "Is one family of manuscripts superior to another and if so, which one?" And then, "How do we know?"

There is a host of background materials which we really need at this point to discuss the issue adequately. Neither space nor time permits, but let me suggest several volumes which you will find informative reading if you wish to pursue the issue.

J. Harold Greenlee. "Introduction to New Testament Textual Criticism." Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1964.

Bruce M. Metzger. "The Text of the New Testament." Second Edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1968.

Various Approaches

How do we choose between these textual variations? Several solutions have been offered to determine which manuscripts are most accurate in deciding which variant was in the original manuscript. They include:

1. "King James only"

2. "Majority-Text only"

3. "Thorough-going eclectic"

4. "Westcott-Hort"

5. "Balanced eclectic"

The "King James only" approach suggests that the English translation of 1611 is inspired of God. It equates the Word of God, in the very real sense of the autographs, with the King James Version Bible.

In the October, 1978 issue of "Bible Believers Bulletin," Peter Ruckman makes this statement: ". . . the Holy Ghost, who honored the English text above any Greek or Hebrew text. . ." By this he meant that the KJV translators were guided more accurately in their translation by the Holy Spirit than were those men who copied the original manuscripts.

The Bible Truth Mission in Millersburg, Pennsylvania has made a $10,000 offer on Bible versions. Their challenge is this, "We have decided to have a standing offer of $10,000 for anyone who can disprove, to our satisfaction, the authenticity and historicity of the facts surrounding the King James Bible as compared to other versions, paraphrases, translations, etc. We are making this offer to permanently silence the small group of biased news journalists, self-appointed scholars, Bible book stores and publishing companies, who question why the vast majority of born again Christians use the King James only."

A second approach is the "Majority-Text only" school. This reasonable approach also promotes the King James Bible. Zane Hodges, professor at Dallas Theological Seminary, would be the most qualified supporter. The Dean Burgon Society was recently formed to promote this position. Thomas Nelson Publishers of Nashville issued the New King James Version under the academic leadership of Dr. Arthur Farstad with this position in mind.

The "Majority-Text only" position advocates that God preserved His Word in the text which is found the largest number of manuscripts. Because the largest number of manuscripts are found in the Byzantine family, this family should then be considered the primary and favored external witness.

Next is the "thorough-going eclectic" school. Basically, these folks are liberals who reject any consideration of external evidence such as manuscript families, date of manuscript and so on. They concentrate all of their energies on internal consideration for a literary analysis of the text. They hold little sway among conservatives.

Fourth, the "Westcott-Hort" approach has long been publicized as the approach which modern conservatives hold. Westcott and Hort suggested that the Alexandrian family of manuscripts are the oldest and thus preferred. They also concluded that external evidence, that is, manuscript families, outweighs internal evidence and that the Alexandrian variant, all other factors being equal, is the one preferred. You can read their explanation in the Westcott-Hort Greek New Testament (pp. 1541-583).

There is a fifth approach, and it is actually the one that many conservatives currently espouse. This "balanced" position holds that each text type is to be evaluated independently without premeditated bias. It also posits that internal and external evidences are to be considered equally. It basically suggests that each textual variant is to be investigated thoroughly and considered on its own merits.

Support for KJV

Now, let's look at the major arguments normally used by those who support either the "King James only" or the "Majority Text only." These six summaries accurately portray their frequently used arguments.

1. The doctrine of the inerrancy of the Bible necessitates not only that the original manuscripts were without error, but also that there must be extant copies without error to preserve its inerrancy. Otherwise, even liberals can believe in the inerrancy of the originals but deny the inerrancy of the Bible we have today if all extant copies have textual errors. In the Greek, the inerrant manuscripts are the "textus receptus" (TR) which underlies the King James Authorized Version of the Bible.

2. Although God has allowed textual errors to occur in all of the Greek copies of the original New Testament manuscripts, He has preserved the best text in the vast majority of these copies. The best text is found by looking through all of the extant Greek manuscripts and choosing the wording of the majority of those manuscripts. With 80-95 percent of the manuscripts of almost identical readings for any given passage, it should be obvious that the majority text is God's providentially preserved text.

3. The Greek manuscripts underlying all the modern versions of the New Testament come from Alexandria, Egypt. They cannot be the best manuscripts because they have been in the possession of heretics such as Origen or the Roman Catholic church. God would not use such people to transmit the best text since they would alter the text to suit their own teachings.

Furthermore, the Alexandrian text was not in general use from the 8th to the 19th centuries. God would not allow the true text to be hidden from public view for such a long time. Finally, God would not use liberals, such as Westcott and Hort, to rediscover and resurrect the true text.

4. The TR manuscripts are the best manuscripts because they properly exalt the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, while the Alexandrian manuscripts do not. When the Alexandrian manuscripts are compared with the TR, many places are found where the words, "Lord" and "Christ" are missing in reference to Jesus. This shows that the people who copied the Alexandrian manuscripts did not want to believe Jesus as both "Lord" and "Christ."

5. The Alexandrian manuscripts could not be the true text because they teach doctrines different from those found in the TR. These errors include justification by works, Arianism and belief that the Apocrypha is part of the text.

6. The King James Version and the Greek TR text underlying it must be the best text because God has so blessed its use since the time of the reformation. In every major modern revival men have preached from these texts. God has not used and will not use the Alexandrian text to do such great works among men.

An Example

Recently we received a tape by a well-known pastor on this subject. It is impossible to summarize the tape in this limited paper, but the letter response which we wrote is included here.

What Is The TR?

One great problem with this whole issue is that the term, "textus receptus" is often misunderstood and misused.

The Trinitarian Bible Society exists for the purpose of circulating uncorrupted versions of the Word of God (namely KJV). Terrence H. Brown, the TBS secretary, makes this honest admission, "One problem is that many people use the term 'textus receptus' without defining it, and give the impression that this received text is available somewhere in a single manuscript or printed copy, but this is not the case. No copy, written or printed, was called the 'textus receptus' until the Elzevirs used this description in the preface to their addition in 1633. It should therefore be understood that the King James Version translators, who published their work in 1611, did not use an addition of the Greek text actually known by this name."

It is very interesting to note that there are about 290 differences between the "textus receptus" and the King James Version. Let me illustrate.

1. Note in Romans 12:11 where the TR has "serving in season" but KJV, along with all modern versions, has "serving the Lord."

2. In I Thessalonians 2:15, the TR has the pronoun "you" while the KJV, along with all other modern versions, has the pronoun "us."

3. The King James Version in Revelation 11:1 has the reading, "And the angels stood." The TR, along with all modern versions, does not include this phrase.

4. If you read 1 John 2:23 in the KJV, you note that the translators included in italics the phrase, "But he that acknowledgeth the Son hath the Father also." It is omitted in the TR but included as a part of the text in most modern versions.

5. Luke 17:36, "Two men shall be in the field; and one shall be taken, the other left" is included in the King James Version but it is omitted in the TR and all other modern versions.

6. Matthew 23:24 is a humorous example of a printing error, not a translation error. The King James Version reads, "Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat and swallow a camel." It's obvious to everyone that the word "at" should be "out."

7. The problem of 1 John 5:7-8 was discussed in the lengthy letter earlier so we won't discuss it here.

8. In Revelation 22:1 9, both the TR and the King James Version have the phrase, "Book of Life." That phrase is not found in any Greek manuscript, rather "tree of life" is the only text. Erasmus translated the last six verses from the Latin Vulgate because his Greek manuscript lacked these verses. Just a final note. Even the KJV translators did not claim for their work what modern promoters insist. The original translators at times were uncertain of the correct variant and made marginal notes to indicate other possibilities. In the preface to the original KJV, the editors acknowledged the profit from other versions. Here is what they wrote:

"Therefore as S. Augustine saith, that varietie of Translations is profitable for the finding out of the sense of the Scriptures: so diversitie of signification and sense in the margine, where the text is not so cleare, must needes doe good, yea, is necessary, as we are perswaded."

Evaluation of TR Arguments Against W-H TR advocates have argued forcibly against Westcott-Hort. Let's look at some of the arguments used by TR supporters against their theory and our response from a "balanced" approach.

1. The oldest manuscripts all come from Egypt, but this does not prove that the same text type existed in the rest of the world. Response: True, but it doesn't prove the opposite either. And the Alexandrian manuscripts are the oldest we presently possess. We would expect that if there were other early families, they would have circulated to Egypt and thus would have been preserved there also.

2. The age of a manuscript does not guarantee its value. Response: True. A late manuscript could be a copy of a very ancient one, whereas an older manuscript might be a copy of one not much removed from it in time. All things being equal, however, the oldest manuscripts are closer in time to the autographs. The shorter time interval means fewer copies and fewer chances of error. This principle is used in all literary textual criticism, not just the Greek New Testament.

3. There is no evidence that the TR resulted from a revision and is thus a secondary text type. This had been the supposition on the part of Westcott and Hort to account for the Byzantine text. Response: True. This revision is discounted by most today. It is the most obvious error in the entire Westcott-Hort theory.

4. Manuscripts tend to multiply in more or less regular fashion. The text type with the most descendants must have existed the longest, hence, the TR must represent the oldest text type. Response: This is historically naive in that no evidence exists to demonstrate it. It assumes the uniformitarian approach to the transmission of manuscripts. This history of literature just does not support it.

5. God's providence has kept the TR as the authoritative text. He would not have allowed the church to have the "wrong text" for so long. Response: God's providence has preserved all text types and the Christian message is preserved in all text types. The TR was not "the" text of the early church in Egypt, Palestine or the West. God's providence has allowed the church to lose things of much more importance than differences between these competing text types such as the doctrine of justification by faith. Also, as we discovered earlier, the TR manuscripts differ even among themselves. If God had preserved His Word inerrantly in the TR manuscripts, then there should be no variation whatsoever in all of the various manuscripts.

6. Our oldest manuscripts survived only because they were faulty and hence were not used and did not wear out. Response: Scribal corrections on these manuscripts disprove this claim. Logic demands that faulty manuscripts would have been destroyed rather than just shelved for future use or discovery.

7. TR readings are earlier than we once thought. Response: True, but this does not make them necessarily superior to other text types but would just allow for an even treatment. New papyrii discoveries from the 2nd and 3rd centuries do evidence Byzantine text type variants. It does demonstrate that they were available, but it does not recognize them as superior.

8. The critical text or the Westcott-Hort text or any other text besides the "textus receptus" deletes or plays down the deity of Christ. Response: Not true. It is interesting to note that of all the versions, only one version, the New World Translation done by Jehovah's Witnesses, consistently deletes from the text any support for the deity of Jesus Christ. We would expect that from JW's because it is not a part of their doctrine. It is highly unlikely and totally unexpected that one would be so inconsistently selective as to leave so many obvious references to the deity of Christ in a manuscript if their purpose was to remove it.

9. Textual critics are all rationalists and therefore incapable of desiring God's truth or determining to preserve it. Response: Not all textual critics are rationalists nor are they unbelievers. There have been many godly men such as Westcott, Tregelles, Tischendorf, Robertson and Machen who worked years earlier. Before me is a list of godly men who worked on the New International Version. They include such men as Laird Harris, Charles Ryrie, Gleason Archer, Kenneth Barker, John Davis, S. Lewis Johnson, Ken Kantzer, Homer Kent, Meredith Klein, Alfred Martin, Leon Morris, Barton Payne, Merrill Tenney and Leon Wood. It is simply not true that the issue of the King James versus modern translations is equated with the issue of Fundamentalism versus Modernism.

Summing It Up

What approach should be used to determine the variant which accurately represents what God originally wrote? It is our opinion that the "balanced approach" is best. It gives equal weight to both internal and external evidence. It gives unbiased consideration to the various manuscript families.

The argument that defends the Byzantine tradition, by appealing to the fact that most manuscripts in the Greek New Testament attest the Byzantine, is logically and historically weak. It is not a truism that a majority of manuscripts necessarily preserve the best text.

The argument that defends the Byzantine text by appealing to the providence of God is theologically false. The determination of the best variant in an individual case is not a theological issue alone, but primarily a textual issue.

Textual arguments that depend on adopting the "textus receptus" and then comparing it to other text types are guilty of bias. To argue that because a modern version does not include something that's included in the TR, or adds something which the TR does not add, is to argue that the modern versions and their translators are guilty of adding to or subtracting from the true text.

It could be equally true that those who translated the TR were the ones who actually deleted or added. The charge that the non-Byzantine text types are theologically in error is wrong. This was evidenced earlier in our lengthy letter. There is no necessary connection between the adoption of the Byzantine text/King James Version and the inspiration of Scripture. There are equally godly, scholarly men on both sides of this issue who all strongly embrace the historic, orthodox understanding of the inerrancy and infallibility of the Scriptures.

Adoption of the TR or King James Version should never be made a point of theological orthodoxy or ecclesiastical fellowship.

A believer should continue to use an accurate English translation which is personally most readable and understandable such as KJV, NASB, or NIV.

A Final Note

As a capstone to our discussion, we quote from the helpful brochure published by Grace Theological Seminary and written by its president, Dr. Homer A. Kent, Jr. "It needs to be remembered that the differences between the Alexandrian and Byzantine text types are not nearly as great as might be supposed. If one could remove the old English style from the King James Version so that the comparison would be fairer, the differences between these text types can be seen by noting the difference between the King James Version and the American Standard Version. The gospel is crystal clear in either version. It is regrettable that an issue is being made over this matter in evangelical circles, especially when some extremists are making one's attitude toward the King James Version an article of faith, and unwarrantedly raising suspicions against those who do not. The issue is forcing many Christians to make a choice where they lack the necessary knowledge and skill to do so. How much better it would be to thank God that His Word has been preserved intact for centuries, and that the wealth of manuscripts assures us that none of the words have been lost. In a few cases, we may not be certain which of several variants is the original, but our problem is an embarrassment of riches, not of loss."