[PaulB]

As far as I see it there is no middle ground. Believers are willingly standing either in one of two camps:

1) The ones who believe we have the very word of God in our hands today.
2) Those who are happy to profess & argue the point that we are left with nothing other than its mortal remains.

If I speak to a person face to face I am encountering that person first hand, but if I exhume their body from the grave then I am looking at their remains and nothing more!

If the Bible that we have today is the inspired & preserved word of the living God (as all KJB believers testify). Then, why is it that the promoters of the modern versions get mad at us for sticking to the historical profession of the true church, when they are the ones that are guilty of altering that profession?

And if the Bible has not been preserved then why even bother translating it in any form of language, (as all that is being achieved at best is the production of something that is a misrepresentation of those infallible originals?)

Their argument doesn’t make sense when it tested, because by their own profession they say “we no longer have the originals” and then they use their “majority theory” to prove that modern versions are closer to those none existent originals.

What I mean by the majority theory is that they claim that the sheer volume of modern versions out number the KJB in their witness as a way of singling out the KJB as being in error!
That’s like saying 99 out of 100 people can’t all be wrong when they disagree with a particular individual who, not only disagrees with them, but never claimed to one of them.

I don’t believe for one minute that the reformers of old died such horrible deaths and suffered such prolonged persecution because they thought that they could bring an alternative rendering to the long lost originals. No, they suffered and died knowing full well that they were delivering the people that were in darkness out of their bondage and tyranny, by providing them with the very words of God.

It seems to me that a crowd of conflicting witnesses has been purposely created so as to make the genuine article appear to be both unbelievable and without authority. It’s the word on trial once again just like Christ was before the rulers prior to His crucifixion, (false witnesses were brought forward to condemn and destroy the Just!)

If what they profess is true when attempting to justify themselves to be believers of preservation (i.e. that the word of God has been preserved throughout the entire body of translations). Then at what point was that line drawn? And if it hasn’t yet been drawn then surely the body of witnesses isn’t complete (as new versions continue to be released!)

Anyhow, who gets to determine the measuring line that disqualifies New World Translation as a valid version? And if we are so sure that the NWT is a false representation of those “original” manuscripts then by what standard was it proved to be so seeing as we no longer have the originals?
And if we are to measure all things by the what the Scriptures say, then why do the promoters of the modern versions get so uneasy & accusative of us when we apply the test of truth upon their false beliefs?

When something isn’t to be questioned or critiqued that sounds very much like a cult (the very title that they like to tar us with even though we do answer their questions and allow our stance to be critiqued!)

But when they are left unchallenged and given the freedom to do as they wish, it’s as though their liberties result in the production of versions that are expressions of the purchasers rather than the supposed author.

These days translations are turning into a religious fashion industry, where the feminist can have a version that suits them, a gay can have a version for themselves also, my question is what will be next “the new terrorists standard edition”?

Instead of a people (as a whole) coming under the authority of the “one book” like they used to (a book that everyone can memorise together), we now have made the “purchaser” into the final authority and their view as the thing to be memorised!

Like I said, it boils down to what is believed (i.e. an absolute standard by which we measure all things including ourselves – or the belief that there is no absolute truth other than the absence of that absolute.

It is practically postmodernism disguised as a profession of Christian faith.