The Puritan

Puritan history is wonderfully stubborn about refusing to fit into modern KJV-Only categories. The Puritans did use the King James Version—but they were not KJV-Only, not in theology, not in practice, not in how they handled manuscripts, and not in how they handled textual differences.

1. What Bible translations did the Puritans actually use?

The Puritan era (1550s–1680s) spans more than a century, so their Bible use changed over time. Here are the translations they used:

a. The Geneva Bible (1560) — the Puritan favorite

This was the Bible of the Puritan movement for decades, well into the 1600s.

• Heavily used in England and Scotland

• Printed with study notes

• Translated by exiles in Geneva

• Used by John Knox, the early English Separatists, and most Puritan preachers before 1640

The Geneva Bible contains numerous renderings that differ from the KJV.

b. The Bishops’ Bible (1568)

Used in Church of England parishes. Some Puritans heard it read in worship while privately using the Geneva Bible.

c. The King James Version (1611 onward)

Gradually accepted across the Puritan world, but not instantly.

• Adoption was slow

• Many Puritans continued using Geneva Bibles for personal devotion for decades

• In New England, the Geneva Bible was still popular into the mid-1600s

The idea of “only the KJV is the preserved Word of God” would have made no sense to them.

d. Latin and Greek editions

Puritan pastors were scholars. They used:

• Erasmus’s Greek New Testament

• Stephanus (1550, 1551) editions

• Beza’s Greek editions

• Hebrew Rabbinic texts

• Latin Vulgate (for comparison, not authority)

None of these agreed word-for-word. Puritans knew that and worked with it.

2. Were the Puritans KJV-Only?

Not even close. Historically impossible.

a. They continued to use other translations

Puritans cited the Geneva Bible for preaching even after the KJV existed.

b. They openly acknowledged textual variants

John Owen, the greatest Puritan scholar, wrote entire treatises discussing manuscript variations. He argued that textual differences do not destroy the doctrine of preservation.

He says in Of the Integrity and Purity of the Hebrew and Greek Text:

“There are differences in some copies… yet the general providence of God hath so preserved the text, as that no part of the truth is lost.”

That is not “a perfect TR text exists with no variants.”

Owen's position was characteristic of the orthodox Protestant view of his era, which affirmed:

1. Existence of Variants: He openly recognized that human scribal errors led to "differences in some copies" or "various lections" (variant readings). He was responding to the publication of the London Polyglot Bible by Brian Walton, which highlighted a large number of these variations.
2. Providential Preservation: Despite the variations, Owen maintained a strong doctrine of preservation through God's "general providence." This means that the essential truths and all necessary articles of faith were preserved intact in the entire collection of available manuscripts (apographa).
3. Rejection of Corruption: His main concern was to defend the biblical text against the Roman Catholic charge (and later, the emerging critical view of scholars like Louis Cappellus) that the Hebrew and Greek originals were so thoroughly corrupted as to be unreliable and therefore needed an authoritative church body (a Magisterium) to interpret.
4. No Absolute Text: Owen did not argue for a single, perfect printed edition (like the Textus Receptus) that was devoid of any scribal imperfections. Instead, he argued that the entire Word of God, down to every "jot and tittle," remained discoverable and was preserved within the total body of manuscripts possessed by the church.

Therefore, since Owen explicitly states there are "differences in some copies," he did not hold the view that a single, printed text (like the TR) was perfectly preserved with "no variants."

c. They allowed and valued translation differences

The KJV translators themselves—many of whom were Puritan sympathizers—said this in their Preface:

“We do not deny the translations out of which ours is made… nor speak of them as bad.”

They saw translation variety as a help, not a threat.

The KJV translators explicitly stated in their original 1611 Preface ("The Translators to the Reader") that they viewed previous translations as a help and did not condemn them.

Their entire project was not to scrap previous Bibles, but to build upon them. Their goal was not to make a new translation or make a bad one good, but:

"...to make a good one better, or out of many good ones, one principal good one, not justly to be excepted against; that hath been our endeavour, that our mark."

They saw the variety of translations as beneficial, quoting St. Augustine:

"Augustine saith, that variety of Translations is profitable for the finding out of the sense of the Scriptures."

In short, they viewed the cumulative work of their predecessors (Tyndale, Coverdale, the Bishop's Bible, the Geneva Bible, etc.) as a necessary foundation and a resource for achieving the best possible translation, not as a threat to be eliminated.

d. They used multiple Greek editions

Owen compares Erasmus, Stephanus, and Beza directly and notes differences. He never grants perfection to any one edition.

e. KJV-Onlyism did not exist yet

The idea that the KJV is the single perfect form of Scripture didn’t show up until the 20th century. No Puritan ever taught it.

3. Why the Puritans could not be KJV-Only theologically

Puritan theology does not support KJV-Onlyism.

a. Their doctrine of preservation applied to the entire manuscript tradition

They believed the autographs are inspired; copies are reliable but not flawless. Preservation was providential, not mechanical.

b. They grounded Scripture’s authority in inspiration, not in a specific translation

Westminster Confession of Faith 1.8 (1646):

“The Old Testament in Hebrew and the New Testament in Greek… being immediately inspired by God, and by His singular care and providence kept pure in all ages.”

Notice:

• The authority is in Hebrew and Greek, not English

• “Kept pure,” not “kept perfect in one printed edition”

If the Puritans believed the KJV was perfect, they would have said so here. They did not.

c. No Puritan taught that vernacular translations were without error

They explicitly taught all translations are subordinate to the original languages.

Calvin, Cranmer, Bucer, Knox, Perkins, Owen, Baxter—they all taught this.

4. How the Puritans maintained unity with multiple translations

They didn’t insist that all believers use one Bible. They insisted on doctrinal unity, not textual uniformity.

Thomas Manton warned against treating translation differences as heresy:

“It is not good to brand things with the name of error until we have proved them so… If matters were dispatched by arguments rather than censures, we should have fewer differences.”

He often argued for judiciousness and discernment rather than rash condemnation. In his commentaries, he frequently discussed different translations and interpretations (as seen in his analysis of the Septuagint and other versions of Psalm 119:66) without branding the variations as error or heresy.

He believed that non-essential differences (like minor textual or translation preferences) should not be the basis for dividing the church or accusing fellow believers of doctrinal error.

The phrase about preferring arguments over censures is a clear call for intellectual humility and careful, reasoned debate rather than merely denouncing opposing views as heresy (a "censure").

In the context of the larger Puritan and post-Reformation debates over scriptural text and translation, Manton stood among those who affirmed the providential preservation of the core truth while acknowledging the reality of minor textual variants and the propriety of multiple translations—a position that necessarily warned against treating those differences as heresy.

That is the exact opposite of a KJV-Only spirit.

5. Summary

What Bibles did the Puritans use?

Geneva Bible, Bishops’ Bible, KJV, plus Greek and Hebrew texts.

Were the Puritans KJV-Only?

Absolutely not.

Why not?

Because:

• They used multiple translations side-by-side

• They studied and debated textual variants

• They saw no translation as perfect

• They grounded authority in the original languages

• Unity was based on doctrine, not one English version

• KJV-Onlyism didn’t exist until 300 years later

If a Puritan walked into a modern KJV-Only church, they would be bewildered—not by modern translations, but by the idea that one translation should be made the exclusive gatekeeper of orthodoxy.

Go ahead and debate with John Calvin if you want to

 1. What Bible translations did John Calvin actually use?

Calvin lived from 1509–1564—long before the KJV (1611) and before the later “Textus Receptus” editions that KJV-Onlyists treat as perfect. He used a mix of translations and original-language texts.

a. Latin Vulgate

This was the standard Bible of Western Christianity for a thousand years. Calvin knew it thoroughly. He respected it but openly corrected it wherever the Hebrew or Greek differed.

A 4th-century Latin translation revised by Jerome. It contains many textual differences (variants) from the Hebrew Masoretic Text and from the Greek manuscripts that later formed the TR.

b. Erasmus’s Greek New Testament (1516, 1519, 1522, 1527, 1535)

Calvin used Erasmus frequently because it was the first widely printed Greek NT in Europe.

Erasmus compiled his text quickly from a handful of late medieval manuscripts. He filled in missing Greek verses by translating the Latin Vulgate back into Greek (e.g., Revelation 22:16–21).

It was full of variants, and Calvin knew these.

c. Robert Estienne’s (Stephanus’s) Greek New Testament (1546, 1549, 1550, 1551)

Calvin was in Geneva when Stephanus produced these editions. Calvin used them and discussed their variant readings.

The 1550 edition became the basis for later TR editions, including Beza’s and eventually the KJV translators. But in Calvin’s lifetime it was not considered perfect, inerrant, or final.

d. Beza’s Greek New Testament (beginning 1560)

Calvin worked closely with Beza in Geneva. Calvin used Beza’s early editions.

Beza’s text differs from Erasmus and Stephanus in hundreds of places.

e. French Bible translations

Calvin used Olivétan’s French Bible (1535), which he helped revise.

This translation differs from the Vulgate, from Erasmus, from Stephanus, and from modern translations.

f. Hebrew Old Testament

Calvin had strong Hebrew training and regularly used the Rabbinic textual traditions.

The Masoretic Text itself was not absolutely uniform at the time; Calvin often noted variant readings and uncertainties.

Calvin's interpretive approach was to be a linguistic scholar who worked from the original languages, a theologian who corrected the traditional Latin Vulgate, and a pastor who promoted the best vernacular translations like the Olivétan French Bible.

2. Did the translations and manuscripts Calvin used contain variants?

Yes—in abundance. The Greek texts Calvin used disagreed with each other. The Latin Vulgate disagreed with the Greek. The Hebrew manuscripts had variations in spelling, word division, and marginal notes.

Calvin frequently:

• compared readings

• rejected certain readings

• preferred others

• explained why some manuscripts were better

• acknowledged uncertainty in a number of passages

He treated textual variation as normal and expected.

3. Did Calvin believe in a “perfect Bible text”? Was he promoting a perfect Greek or Hebrew edition?

No. Calvin never claimed:

• a perfect Greek manuscript tradition

• a perfect printed edition

• a perfect translation

Calvin’s doctrine of Scripture affirmed infallibility and inspiration of the autographs—not perfection in any one manuscript or printed edition.

He explicitly acknowledged imperfections in the manuscript tradition.

Calvin: “It is well known that the manuscripts differ.”

Calvin's Actual Quotation (from his Commentary on the Catholic Epistles on 1 John 5:7):

“The whole of this verse has been by some omitted. Jerome thinks that this has happened through design rather than through mistake, and that indeed only on the part of the Latins. But as even the Greek copies do not agree, I dare not assert any thing on the subject.”

A man who believed in a perfect text would never say this.

4. What was Calvin’s view on Scripture, manuscripts, Hebrew, and Greek?

a. Scripture is perfect in its divine origin, not in any one manuscript

Calvin: Institutes 1.7.2

“Scripture obtains full authority among believers only when men regard it as having sprung from heaven, as if the living words of God themselves were spoken.” 

His grounding of inerrancy is divine inspiration—not a perfect transmission.

He wrote: "Nothing, therefore, can be more absurd than the fiction, that the power of judging Scripture is in the Church, and that on her nod its certainty depends." (John Calvin and Henry Beveridge, Institutes of the Christian Religion, vol. 1 (Edinburgh: The Calvin Translation Society, 1845), 91.) As said by Calvin. Do you have the authority to judge the ESV and NIV? No!

b. Manuscripts contain human errors

Calvin repeatedly admits scribal mistakes.

Commenting on 1 Samuel 13:1:

"I confess I do not know what the meaning is, nor am I sure what the true reading ought to be... for the Hebrews are in the habit of counting according to the order of years, not according to the perfect years of the life of each individual. Perhaps, however, a number has been omitted by the fault of the scribes."

Calvin acknowledges problems in the text without panicking or inventing a doctrine of perfect preservation. He indeed confesses that he cannot determine the true meaning or the correct reading of the verse, acknowledging a potential scribal error or textual corruption in the Hebrew text. This confirms that he openly acknowledged the presence of scribal mistakes in the Old Testament manuscripts.

c. The Hebrew and Greek texts must be studied, compared, and corrected where needed

Calvin constantly corrects the Vulgate based on Hebrew and Greek, and sometimes corrects Greek based on better Greek manuscripts.

5. How did Calvin unite the church while multiple Bible translations existed?

He united the church by refusing to make one manuscript tradition or one translation the basis of Christian fellowship.

Calvin believed:

• all faithful translations are servants of the Word, not the Word itself

• textual variants do not destroy doctrine

• Christians can use different translations without suspicion

• unity is in doctrine, not in identical printed Bibles

Calvin: Preface to the French New Testament (1543)

“The Word of God must be accessible to all… translated into every tongue, so that all may hear and understand.”

This reflects John Calvin's passionate argument for vernacular translation of the Bible.

This idea is central to Calvin's theology and the broader Protestant Reformation. He strongly advocated against the Catholic Church's practice of restricting the Bible to Latin (the Vulgate) and denying it to the common people.

He argued that the Holy Spirit speaks to all, not just the educated elite.

He championed the principle that the Word of God should be made plain and common so that every person could read and understand the doctrine necessary for salvation, confirming the statement that "all may hear and understand."

His support for the French translation was a direct, practical application of the doctrine of Sola Scriptura (Scripture alone) and the priesthood of all believers, which necessitates that every Christian have direct access to the Bible in their native language ("translated into every tongue").

He did not say: “Use the exact same edition, word for word, or you are corrupting Scripture.”

Calvin saw translation diversity as a blessing, not a threat.

Calvin: Commentary on Psalm 19:7

He wrote: "...without the aid of the word, would profit us nothing, although it should be to us as a loud and distinct proclamation sounding in our ears..." God speaks to us in the Scriptures in a way suited to our weakness. That includes God’s willingness to speak through imperfect but faithful translations.

6. Summary: Why Calvin’s practice completely contradicts TR-perfectionism and KJV-Onlyism

Calvin used multiple Greek editions that disagreed.

He openly acknowledged textual variants and rejected some readings.

He never taught that one manuscript family or edition was perfect.

He never promoted a “received text” as later TR-advocates define it.

He believed the church could be united despite using different translations.

He grounded the authority of Scripture in inspiration, not in a perfect transmission.

Calvin’s theology, practice, and textual scholarship all contradict the modern claim that the Reformers believed in Perfect TR or a perfect vernacular translation.

If anything, Calvin stands as a witness against the modern movement that tries to freeze the Bible’s purity in one textual edition and exclude the rest of the church over it.

The Reformers trusted God’s Word deeply, but they never treated any translation or printed text as flawless. Their faith was in the God who speaks—not in a particular 16th-century printing press.

Letter to a sweet lady - Miss Jet. Fry. Cool

Your article condemns faultfinding and troublemaking, and the warnings you cite from Scripture and the Puritans are valid in themselves. Division born of pride, rivalry, and cynicism is a real danger. But the irony is unavoidable: the very behaviours you describe are the ones produced by the teachings you yourself promote. The issue is not that others are “faultfinding” because they question you; the issue is that KJV-Onlyism, Perfect TR ideology, and Verbal Plenary Preservation as defined by your system have objectively fractured Christian fellowship and rewritten the boundaries of orthodoxy to centre your preferred textual theory.

You accuse others of stirring up strife, yet the division did not exist until you introduced a doctrine that elevates a specific English translation and a specific printed edition of the Greek text to a level of authority Scripture never claims for itself. When someone insists that their particular textual tradition is the only faithful one and that all others undermine the Word of God, conflict is not caused by the people who resist that claim; conflict is caused by the claim itself.

If a man were to teach that salvation depends on his preferred hymnbook, the ones who raise objections aren’t the “faultfinders.” The one redefining the standard is.

Your article defines a “faultfinder” as someone who “habitually looks for flaws in others rather than the evidence of God’s grace in their lives.” That is precisely what KJV-Only polemics do. They assume that scholars who have spent lifetimes serving the church are deceived or malicious. They assume that pastors who use modern translations are unfaithful. They assume that anyone who disagrees with a particular textual theory is spiritually compromised. This is not a diagnosis from outside your system; it is the internal tone of your own teaching.

Jude’s warning about grumblers does not place a halo around anyone who defends his position loudly. It warns against those who claim zeal for God while elevating themselves as gatekeepers. KJV-Only rhetoric has repeatedly painted the rest of the church as corrupted, worldly, deceived, or apostate simply because they use manuscripts that differ from the TR. That is precisely the tendency toward spiritual suspicion that the Puritans called uncharitable censoriousness.

You quote Matthew 7:3, the “beam and mote.” The beam here is not doctrinal clarity; the beam is the assumption of moral and spiritual superiority. When you treat brothers and sisters as spiritually deficient because they do not grant absolute perfection to a particular textual tradition, you are not contending for the faith—you are measuring other believers by a yardstick Scripture never created.

You describe troublemakers as those who “sow discord among brethren,” yet the textbook example of sowing discord is redefining Christian fellowship around secondary issues. The early church debated real doctrines—Christology, the Trinity, justification. No council ever declared that a believer must commit to a particular printed Greek text to be orthodox. That idea is a modern invention, and its divisive effects are the fruit of that invention, not the fruit of those who resist its imposition.

You quote Calvin on those who disturb the kingdom of Christ by drawing men away “from the unity of truth.” But this breaks against your own argument: the unity of truth has never been defined by the KJV or the TR. Calvin himself used differing textual variants, noted them, discussed them, and held no view remotely resembling modern TR-perfectionism. You appeal to the Puritans as if their heritage endorses your view; historically, it does not. The Puritans used the best scholarship of their day and never suggested that their textual base was inerrant in every letter. You are asking the church to accept a claim the Reformers themselves rejected.

You warn that faultfinders “rob the church of peace.” What robs the church of peace more effectively: the person who says “multiple manuscript streams can faithfully convey the Word of God,” or the person who says “all but one manuscript stream is corrupt and untrustworthy?” If unity is the concern, then the teaching that makes all other believers suspect is the source of the strife.

You call believers to “edify, not break,” yet KJV-Onlyism treats disagreement as rebellion, not discussion. It frames brothers as enemies. It casts suspicion on pastors for using translations like the NIV, ESV, NKJV, or NASB—translations that have borne immense spiritual fruit across the world. If a teaching causes good pastors to be slandered and faithful Christians to be distrusted, the problem is not the pastors or the Christians. The problem is the teaching.

You conclude that “the Christian is called to be a peacemaker, not a troublemaker.” That is true. But biblical peacemaking is never appeasement of theological absolutism that Scripture itself does not require. Peace comes from truth, but truth must be something Scripture actually teaches. Scripture never elevates a seventeenth-century translation or a sixteenth-century printed Greek edition to the status of perfection. That elevation is your own construction. When you bind the consciences of others with what God has not commanded, and when those others resist that new law, it is not they who are disturbing the peace.

You have correctly described the danger of faultfinding and troublemaking. The tragedy is that you have misidentified the culprit. The faultfinder is the one who makes narrow tests of faith where God has left freedom. The troublemaker is the one who introduces new boundaries into the church and then accuses the rest of the church of rebellion for not submitting to them.

True unity will not come by requiring Christians to bow to a doctrine the apostles never taught. It will come by recognising that the Word of God is preserved not in one edition or translation, but in the entire, diverse manuscript tradition God has providentially given His people. This is not lowering the doctrine of Scripture; it is simply refusing to raise human tradition to the level of Scripture.

The Epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians

CHAP. VI.—THE DUTIES OF PRESBYTERS AND OTHERS.

And let the presbyters be compassionate and merciful to all, bringing back those that wander, visiting all the sick, and not neglecting the widow, the orphan, or the poor, but always “providing for that which is becoming in the sight of God and man;”15 abstaining from all wrath, respect of persons, and unjust judgment; keeping far off from all covetousness, not quickly crediting [an evil report] against any one, not severe in judgment, as knowing that we are all under a debt of sin. If then we entreat the Lord to forgive us, we ought also ourselves to forgive;16 for we are before the eyes of our Lord and God, and “we must all appear at the judgment-seat of Christ, and must every one give an account of himself.”17 Let us then serve Him in fear, and with all reverence, even as He Himself has commanded us, and as the apostles who preached the Gospel unto us, and the prophets who proclaimed beforehand the coming of the Lord [have alike taught us]. Let us be zealous in the pursuit of that which is good, keeping ourselves from causes of offence, from false brethren, and from those who in hypocrisy bear the name of the Lord, and draw away vain men into error.

15 Rom. 12:17; 2 Cor. 8:21.

16 Matt. 6:12–14.

17 Rom. 14:10–12; 2 Cor. 5:10.

Polycarp of Smryna, “The Epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians,” in The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, ed. Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe, vol. 1, The Ante-Nicene Fathers (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Company, 1885), 34.

Why do you claim to have a flawless Bible?

When someone insists they have a perfect Bible, they’re usually leaning on emotion, tradition, or fear rather than evidence. The word "perfect" sounds reassuring, but it collapses under the weight of history.

If we take the KJV as the example: its own story proves it isn’t perfect. It was built on a small set of Greek manuscripts that were centuries younger than many we possess today. Those manuscripts were copied by hand, which means they contain human mistakes—spelling slips, skipped lines, accidental repetitions, marginal notes that drifted into the text. None of that destroys the message, but it absolutely destroys any claim to perfection.

The KJV translators themselves admitted this. The original 1611 preface is practically a humble shrug: they knew they were doing their best with what they had, not delivering a flawless revelation in Elizabethan English. The KJV has been revised multiple times because the first edition had printing errors, mistranslations, and archaic phrasing that had to be corrected. Perfection doesn’t need revisions.

The underlying Greek text used for the KJV—the Textus Receptus—had its own issues. Erasmus compiled it in a hurry using only a handful of manuscripts. In one case, he didn’t have the end of Revelation in Greek, so he back-translated the Latin into Greek like a student filling in homework at the last minute. That back-translation created readings that no ancient Greek manuscript supports. If “perfect” means “historically pure and error-free,” the Textus Receptus fails that test immediately.

But here’s the twist: you don’t need a perfect translation for the Bible to be trustworthy. You need a reliable, well-supported, historically grounded text. Modern translations draw from thousands of manuscripts, from many geographic regions, some much older than anything Erasmus saw. They’re not perfect either, because translation always involves choices. Yet they draw from a far richer manuscript foundation.

The idea of a “perfect Bible” sounds noble but misunderstands how Scripture works. Perfection in the mathematical sense is a myth. What we have is better: an extraordinarily well-preserved collection of ancient writings whose meaning hasn’t been lost despite being copied, carried, translated, debated, and cherished across two millennia.

If someone claims the KJV is perfect, the burden of proof is on them—and the evidence simply doesn’t cooperate. The manuscript history doesn’t support perfection. The translation history doesn’t support perfection. The translators’ own words don’t support perfection.

What is supported is that Scripture remains faithful in its message even while its human vessels show their seams. The mystery is not in perfection but in endurance. The horizon here is wider than any single English edition.

Is Your Church Perfect? Then Why Demand a Perfect Bible Translation?

Across Christian communities, translation debates flare up with surprising intensity. Some believers insist a specific English version—often the King James Version (KJV)—is the only legitimate or “perfect” Bible. Others are accused of compromising their faith simply for reading the NIV, ESV, CSB, or another translation. Arguments like these tend to do more harm than good, and they often rest on assumptions that do not hold up under scrutiny.

Before demanding a perfect translation, it’s worth asking a simple question: Is your church perfect? Of course not. Churches are communities of imperfect people shaped by history, culture, language, and tradition. They preach an unchanging gospel, but they do so with human voices, human limitations, and human understanding. Nobody expects a church to be flawless in order for it to be faithful.

If imperfect churches can faithfully preach God’s truth, imperfect translations can faithfully convey God’s Word. Perfection is not the criterion for usefulness, accuracy, or spiritual transformation. The Scriptures were originally written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. Every translation requires decisions, interpretations, and compromises because languages do not map cleanly onto one another. Anyone who has ever translated between two modern languages understands this reality.

This is why claiming one English translation is flawless while all others are suspect creates a problem. It raises the standard for Bible translations higher than the standard for the people reading them. If no believer is perfect, why attack other believers for the translation they use? And if no church is perfect, why insist that the Bible must only be read in one specific English rendering from the 1600s?

The hostility toward readers of the NIV or any other modern translation is unnecessary and spiritually counterproductive. The NIV is not a betrayal of Scripture; it is an attempt—like every translation—to communicate ancient truth in contemporary language. You may prefer the KJV’s style, cadence, or theological clarity, and that preference is valid. But preference is not the same thing as divine mandate.

We do not need a “KJV-only” church because no translation has ever been perfectly preserved in a single English edition. The authority of Scripture does not rest on a translation’s perfection but on the reliability of the manuscripts behind it and the faithfulness of translators striving to render the text accurately for readers in their time.

Christians can hold strong convictions without falling into division. Loving Scripture means valuing truth over tribalism. If the gospel itself can reach imperfect people, it can certainly handle being spoken in more than one translation. The real question is not which English version is perfect, but whether the people reading any version are living out the truth it teaches.

Healthy churches understand that unity in essentials outweighs uniformity in translation. The larger mission of the church is not served by attacking one another over English word choices. It is served when people read Scripture—whatever faithful translation they choose—and allow it to shape their lives.

An appeal from a pastor

The pastors are already walking through a battlefield most people never see. Their shoes are worn from hospital corridors, midnight phone calls, family tensions, spiritual darkness, self-doubt, and the constant weight of “Did I do enough today?” They don’t need more stones thrown at them from inside the camp. They need brothers and sisters standing beside them, not snipers perched on their own theological hillsides.

Teachers who promote KJV-Onlyism, so-called “Perfect TR,” and rigid versions of verbal plenary preservation often don’t intend harm—but harm is happening. When a pastor is told, “Your Bible is corrupt,” or “Your preaching is invalid unless it comes from this one English translation KJV,” it tears at the roots of ministry. It burdens them with fear instead of freeing them to preach Christ. It distracts them from the gospel and dumps them into endless, fruitless debates about which English version earns God’s approval.

This is not how the family of God is meant to treat its shepherds.

Pastors today stand in an age dripping with confusion and hostility. The world mocks faith. Temptations coil everywhere. Discouragement shadows even their early mornings. Many struggle with exhaustion, depression, and private battles they don’t dare voice. The enemy knows their names. The enemy knows their weak spots. And the enemy is not gentle.

To pile on top of that by accusing them of unfaithfulness because they aren’t preaching from one particular 17th-century English Bible is not zeal for truth. It is cruelty disguised as conviction.

It’s time to stop.

It’s time for teachers who spread these burdens to reconsider what spirit they are serving. Scripture preserves the gospel message faithfully across languages, traditions, and centuries—not by perfect sameness, but by God’s sustaining care. Demanding that modern pastors submit to a single English translation as the only “true” Word of God twists preservation into oppression.

The church should be a refuge for its shepherds, not a courtroom.

So let the call go out: Pray for your pastors. Lift their arms when they droop. Encourage them when they stagger. Remind them that Christ holds them tighter than their critics do. Stop stumbling them with man-made tests of orthodoxy that the apostles themselves never required.

We are all servants of the same Master. We all march under the same grace. If we break our own shepherds, we starve the flock.

Let those who teach, teach with humility. Let those who rebuke, rebuke with love. Let those who follow, follow with trust. And let every heart grow strong and courageous, knowing that the Lord who called us has not abandoned us.

There is a bigger battle at hand. The family of God does not have the luxury of fighting each other when the world already wars against us.

Strength to the weary. Peace to the wounded. Courage to the called.

Textual Variety in the Earliest Christian Scriptures and Why It Undermines KJV-Only Claims

From the very beginning of the Christian movement, the Scriptures were translated, quoted, copied, and preached in a world of linguistic diversity. Jewish Christians lived in a Hebrew–Aramaic environment; Greek was the common language of the eastern Roman world; Egypt spoke multiple varieties of Coptic; Syria used Syriac; and the Western churches gradually moved toward Latin. Because of this multilingual landscape, the earliest Christian translators did not translate the Scriptures word by word. They translated meaning by meaning, sentence by sentence, sense by sense. Their goal was not mechanical precision—it was clarity and understanding.

This pattern shows up everywhere in early Christian history. When the Hebrew Old Testament was translated into Greek (the Septuagint) centuries before Christ, the translators chose natural Greek expressions rather than rigid Hebrew structures. When Greek was later translated into Syriac, Coptic, and Old Latin in the second century, the same thing happened again. These early versions show flexibility in word order, vocabulary, and phrasing. They preserve the meaning faithfully, but not the exact sequence of Greek words. This was not considered a defect; it was simply how translation worked in a world without modern theories of “formal equivalence.”

Even more striking is how the earliest Christian writers—known as the Apostolic Fathers—handled Scripture. Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, and Polycarp of Smyrna lived in the late first and early second century, close to the time of the apostles. When they quote the Old Testament or New Testament, they rarely reproduce the wording exactly. They paraphrase. They adapt. They blend together similar verses. They quote from memory. They shift between different Greek textual forms. None of this was controversial in their time. Their goal was to communicate the truth of Scripture, not to replicate every syllable precisely.

Their writings show no anxiety over the idea of “one perfect copy.” They had no expectation that every manuscript would match. They lived comfortably with the reality that Christians in different cities used Greek texts that varied slightly in wording. They never hint at a single authorized stream of perfect text. Instead, they show that Scripture’s authority does not depend on one fixed translation or one exact manuscript tradition. Its authority rests on the message it carries.

This is the clear historical picture:

• Early translators did not translate word for word.

• Early translations do not match each other exactly.

• Early Christian writers quoted Scripture freely and flexibly.

• Early communities used different manuscript forms without conflict.

• No one claimed to possess one perfect, uniform line of text.

Because this is how Christianity began, it is historically impossible to insist that only one English translation—the King James Version—is the true word of God. The KJV was produced in 1611, more than fifteen centuries after the apostles. It was based on a small number of late medieval Greek manuscripts that were not identical to the earlier manuscripts known today and not identical to the manuscripts used by the early church. The KJV is a beautiful, historic, and influential translation. But it is one translation among many, created in a specific era for a specific audience.

To claim that all other translations are corrupt or devilish does not fit the facts of history. It contradicts everything we know about the early church, the early manuscripts, the early translators, and the early Christian writers. There never was a golden age of perfect textual uniformity. There was never a single pure stream of manuscripts untouched by variation. There was never a time when Christians believed that one translation embodied perfection while others threatened the faith.

The earliest Christians lived with textual variety without fear. They treated Scripture as sacred and authoritative even when its wording differed slightly from place to place. They believed the Spirit guided the church through meaning, truth, and message—not through rigid, mechanical uniformity.

The conclusion follows naturally:

Insisting on KJV-onlyism is historically incorrect, theologically unnecessary, and spiritually harmful. It denies the multilingual reality of the early church, ignores the flexible quoting habits of the earliest Christian leaders, and rejects the way Scripture has always spread—through many languages, many communities, and many faithful translations. The gospel has never depended on one translation. It never needed to. The truth is stronger, deeper, and more universal than that.

A faith rooted in the real history of Christianity does not fear multiple translations. It welcomes them, because they echo the diverse, multilingual world in which the good news first took root.

Syriac Translation (Early 2nd century)

Syriac and Greek sit close enough to be cousins, yet far enough apart to make translation messy. When the first Syriac Christians translated the Greek New Testament (early 2nd century), they didn’t produce a mirror-image copy. They produced something more alive—half literal, half idiomatic, shaped by a Semitic mindset rather than a Greek one.

The Old Syriac is not a word-for-word translation of the Greek. It’s meaning-for-meaning, with occasional literal streaks, and it preserves several readings that differ from later Greek manuscripts.

Syriac vs. Greek: Did they match exactly?

They didn’t. The Old Syriac Gospels (Sinaiticus and Curetonian) show that translators often aimed to communicate the sense of the Greek text rather than reproduce its grammar or word order.

A few reasons:

• Syriac is Semitic, like Hebrew and Aramaic, and its natural sentence structure pushes the text in its own direction.

• Greek idioms often sound bizarre in Syriac if translated mechanically.

• The early church didn’t yet have a fixation on “exact syllable uniformity.” They cared that meaning survived, not every grammatical wrinkle.

So when we compare Old Syriac readings with the later Greek families—Alexandrian, Western, Byzantine—we see shifts that belong to the translator’s hand and the translator’s Greek manuscript, which was early and not identical to later forms.

Were there real textual variants?

Some Syriac readings reflect:

1. early Greek variants that no longer survive

2. harmonizations—places where the Syriac smooths out differences between Gospel passages

3. Semitic rephrasing that clarifies or sharpens the meaning

4. shorter or longer readings because the translator likely used a Greek manuscript that predates the Alexandrian–Byzantine split

Syriac didn’t emerge from a “standardized” Greek text. It grew from whatever Greek copies were circulating in Edessa and Antioch in the early 2nd century—texts sometimes rougher, sometimes freer, sometimes older than anything we have.

A few concrete examples

1. Matthew 1:16 – genealogy wording

Old Syriac Sinaiticus shortens the phrase about Joseph compared to Greek manuscripts.

Not a corruption—just a reflection of an early Greek line.

2. Matthew 12:47 – missing verse

The Old Syriac omits a verse found in later Greek manuscripts (“Someone told him, ‘Your mother and brothers are outside…’”).

This reflects a Greek manuscript without that line—a shorter early tradition.

3. Luke 24:36 – “Peace be with you”

Some Syriac witnesses lack Jesus’ greeting found in later Greek copies.

Again, this traces to a Greek base text that didn’t have the phrase.

4. John 12:15 – wording of the prophecy

The Syriac uses an Aramaic-like phrasing of Zechariah’s prophecy that is smoother in Syriac but not identical to any major Greek family.

These aren’t accidents. They show the Syriac translators were handling early Greek material—sometimes cleaner, sometimes messier, always historically illuminating.

Literal or idiomatic?

Early Syriac translations blend both.

You can think of them as “70% meaning-for-meaning, 30% literal.”

• When Greek syntax can be transplanted into Syriac without sounding alien, the translators keep it.

• When Greek idioms would sound absurd or unclear, they rephrase naturally.

• When a Greek word has no good Syriac equivalent, they paraphrase.

This isn’t sloppy or careless. It’s faithful translation performed in a Semitic cultural environment where clarity carried more weight than exact grammatical mimicry.

The Old Syriac feels like someone translating for their church—not for a scholar’s microscope.

The deeper implication

The existence of Syriac variants in the 2nd century proves something important, something that cuts directly against modern “perfect translation” claims:

Textual diversity isn’t a sign of corruption; it’s the normal condition of the early church.

Syriac Christians heard the gospel through a Semitic lens. Greek Christians heard it in their own rhythm. Egyptian Christians heard it in Coptic phrasing. None of this frightened the early believers.

They trusted the message, not the exact inventory of particles and conjunctions.

The first translations of the New Testament

The earliest translations of the New Testament sprang up surprisingly fast, because Christian communities were multilingual from the start. 

The first translations of the New Testament weren’t Latin. They were Syriac and Coptic.

The earliest Christians outside Palestine were in Syria and Egypt, both Greek-speaking regions, but both had large populations whose first languages were Syriac (Aramaic) and Coptic (Egyptian). That’s where translation began before Latin became dominant.

So the earliest translation timelines look like this:

1. Syriac (Early 2nd century)

Probably the first major translation.

Syriac is a dialect of Aramaic, meaning it is very close to the language Jesus Himself spoke. The earliest form is called the Old Syriac, represented by:

• the Syriac Sinaiticus (late 2nd or early 3rd century)

• the Curetonian Gospels (3rd century)

These reflect translations that likely began sometime around AD 120–150.

2. Coptic (Early to mid-2nd century)

Egypt was packed with Christians by the second century. Greek was common in the cities, but the rural population spoke different Coptic dialects. So Christians translated Scripture for them early on.

Earliest dialects:

• Sahidic Coptic — likely begun AD 150–200

• Bohairic Coptic — slightly later

• Other regional dialects appeared through the 2nd–3rd centuries

The Sahidic translation is extremely important because it preserves early Alexandrian readings—sometimes even older than surviving Greek manuscripts.

3. Latin (Late 2nd century)

Latin was not the first.

The earliest Latin translations, now called Old Latin or Vetus Latina, were made around AD 180–200, mainly in North Africa and Rome. These came before Jerome’s Vulgate (late 4th century), which replaced the many competing Old Latin versions.

4. Later translations: Armenian, Georgian, Gothic, Ethiopic

These appear from the 4th century onward and do not belong in the “earliest possible” tier.

Why Syriac and Coptic came first

Greek was the lingua franca of the Roman East. Most converts in the earliest decades could read Greek. Translations only became necessary when Christianity reached deeply into regions where Greek had not penetrated strongly.

That’s why:

• Syriac emerged in the East (Edessa, Nisibis)

• Coptic emerged in the South (Egypt)

These are natural “first translation zones.”

Did the original autographs get translated directly?

Not likely.

Translators would have used early local Greek manuscripts, not the original autographs.

This means:

• Syriac Christians translated from early Eastern Greek texts

• Coptic Christians translated from early Alexandrian Greek texts

• Latin Christians translated from Western Greek texts

None of these were identical. That’s why the early translations preserve different “families” of readings.

This is one of the strongest historical proofs against the idea of a single, perfect textual line (e.g., a strict “KJV-only” claim). The textual world was diverse from the beginning.

The surprising truth

The first Christians had no problem with this diversity.

They cared most about the message, not absolute uniformity of every syllable.

Textual variety is not a late corruption.

It is a feature of Christianity from its earliest decades.