Translations and Translating

Many scholars today feel that the kind of Greek text underlying the AV reflects the original Greek New Testament less accurately than that underlying more recent editions, which make greater use of manuscripts copied within a few centuries of the apostolic period. This is not to say that the AV is therefore a bad or misleading translation. It can be safely asserted that no major doctrine is endangered by the type of manuscript variations found in the text used for the AV. It is especially important to realize that one should not argue for the superiority of one translation on the basis of the supposed superiority of a text, Greek or Hebrew.

The argument that asserts that the AV is the best English translation because it preserves key doctrines which all others tend to slight is not really valid.⁴⁹ In fact the opposite is often true. This kind of argument is often used with more of an emotional basis than a scholarly one. One must be careful of becoming an instant scholar and expert in areas that take many years to master and in which there are complex issues.

Perhaps a helpful assessment would be to say that the AV is one among many important and helpful English translations. It is not “the Word of God” more than another theologically sound translation, for we do not possess the first manuscripts of any of the revealed Word. That is what we would need in order to have the exact “Word of God.”

Further, it must be remembered in evaluating or advocating the AV that languages other than English have and need translations. The AV is usable by only a portion of the world’s population. It would be fallacious to argue that no translation into another language could have the spiritual impact of the AV.

The original translators of the AV admitted the need for continual refinement and revision of any Bible translation.⁵⁰ Changes in biblical scholarship (discovery of manuscripts, new knowledge concerning languages, etc.) and in language itself necessitate this.⁵¹ Bible translation is never finished. The most up-to-date (language-wise) translations today will not be entirely satisfactory for readers a generation or two hence.^52[1]

 

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AV Authorized Version (=King James Version)

AV Authorized Version (=King James Version)

AV Authorized Version (=King James Version)

AV Authorized Version (=King James Version)

⁴⁹ See Donald A. Carson, The King James Version Debate: A Plea for Realism (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1979), 99; Marchant A. King, “Should Conservatives Abandon Textual Criticism?” Bibliotheca Sacra 130 (1973): 39; Douglas S. Chinn and Robert C. Newman, Demystifying the Controversy Over the Textus Receptus and the King James Version of the Bible (Hatfield, PA: Interdisciplinary Biblical Research Institute, 1979), 16–18.

AV Authorized Version (=King James Version)

AV Authorized Version (=King James Version)

AV Authorized Version (=King James Version)

AV Authorized Version (=King James Version)

AV Authorized Version (=King James Version)

⁵⁰ Bruce, 101–3.

⁵¹ See Kubo and Specht, 19–20.

⁵² For further material on evaluating the AV, see Carson.

^[1] Paul S. Karleen, The Handbook to Bible Study: With a Guide to the Scofield Study System (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), 69–70.