Ridiculous KJV Bible Corrections:
Isaiah 7:14, A Young Woman?

by John Hinton, Ph.D.
jhinton@post.harvard.edu

Isaiah 7:14 KJV Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.

Most modern versions follow the cue of anti-Christian Jews who wished to deny the implications of this verse. Many Jews have turned to Christ as a result of this very verse and for this reason the argument that "almah", the word translated virgin, does not mean virgin at all, but young maiden was presented. The whole argument was devised to keep Jews from converting to Christianity, but modern professing Christians do more to perpetuate it than the ancient Jews ever did! I hate to keep repeating myself, but I'll say it again: the reality of the modern world is more absurd that anything that a satirist can invent. The following two examples should suffice, since there is very little variation between the modern versions that do not have virgin.

RSV Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, a young woman shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Imman’u-el.

New World Translation: Therefore Jehovah himself will give you men a sign: Look! The maiden herself will actually become pregnant, and she is giving birth to a son, and she will eventually call his name Im.man´u.el.

Naturally, a young maiden in biblical times was a virgin. however, it it is not impossible for a maiden to get pregnant, and "young woman" by no means implies virginity. The American Heritage^® Dictionary of the English Language Fourth Edition 2000 defines maiden as being 1a. An unmarried girl or woman, and b. A virgin. Unfortunately, in modern parlance being an unmarried woman does not imply virginity, which makes the distinction even more important than it ever was before. These modern translations are demonstrating, once again, that they are liars when they claim to be updating the language. Young woman or maiden no longer means what it meant in ancient times. The evidence is from the Bible itself makes it obvious that an almah is an unmarried young woman who is, of course, a virgin. Any argument to the contrary is absurd, but many modern critics have no fear of absurdity. If we are to rely on modern lexicons and commentaries to resolve this issue, it would end in a stalemate, since these sources are almost exclusively the products of Bible skeptics, but we do not have to worry about what man's judgment on the issue is. The KJV's word on Isaiah 7:14 should be enough for Bible-believing Christians, but we have the authority of the New Testament to settle the issue once and for all.

Matthew 1:23 Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.

Every Greek manuscript that is not missing this chapter, has parthenos, which we know to mean virgin. In other words, the issue is settled and almah means virgin exactly as the King James Bible and countless other ancient versions say that it does. The RSV, NLT, CEV (in a footnote), and many others have young woman, or the like, for Isaiah 7:14, but virgin for Matthew 1:23. What does this say to us? It tells us that these committee members and paraphrasers do not believe that the New Testament is divinely inspired. If they did, they would listen to Matthew 1:23 and not to the atheist Bible-scoffers, anti-Christian Jews, and skeptics who have traditionally argued the verse. The usual concocted argument is that Matthew was quoting from the Septuagint instead of from the Hebrew, but there is no evidence whatsoever of this. In fact, it is a ridiculous suggestion since the LXX was almost certainly written well over a century after the completion of the New Testament. Most seminary rubes (the carnie slang makes for an appropriate analogy) fall for the indoctrination that they are given by their apostate teachers that the LXX was written in 200 B.C., but we have no reason for believing this date. These same teachers will all concede that the descriptions that we have for the compilation of the LXX are mythological and that the text that we have is a product of Origen, one of the worst heretics in church history, or some of his Alexandrian cronies at the very earliest. It should be added that the text of Origen's Hexapla, from which the alleged LXX was copied, was itself not copied until half a century after Origen's death, so it is unlikely that it is an accurate copy of Origen's text, let alone one from 200 B.C. Nevertheless, for some strange reason the judgment of seminary theologians is suspended on the issue of the date of the LXX. Even if we are to accept the early dating of the LXX, why on earth would we assume that it was the LXX that Matthew was quoting and not another Greek translation? There were other Greek translations that also were known. More importantly, why would we assume that Matthew did not translate the Hebrew himself. Matthew certainly knew the Old Testament Hebrew scripture far better than the pompous asses that are coming out of modern seminaries. Who do they think they are that they can say that they know how to translate Isaiah 7:14 better than Matthew and the other divinely inspired authors of the New Testament, who also were considerably more qualified to interpret the Hebrew than any translators since? Why is it that some character in a modern seminary thinks that his measly seminary Hebrew studies would make him a better Hebraicist than those who lived in the Near East during biblical times? Sadly many preachers and laymen with Strong's Concordances have the same idea when they couldn't even translate a Hebrew clause, let alone a whole sentence on their own! An arrogant gentleman recently responded to my article on Psalm 8:5 by suggesting that he was indeed made a little lower than God, and he implied that Hebrews translated it wrong by presenting the LXX translation. If it is the LXX translation that is quoted in Hebrews then it is done so because it is the correct translation. This same gentleman wrote the usual unscriptural nonsense about the KJV allegedly not being theopneustos (God-breathed) because only the now nonexistent originals were inspired and that God did not preserve his word, in spite of the fact that he said that he would (an issue that I will reserve for a later date). This is nothing more than the usual attempt by Bible "correctors" to substitute sound reasoning with high sounding Greek words that are meant to make them sound more lofty and educated than the masses. Apparently this gentleman believes that the New Testament is not theopneustos either. If it were inspired by God than it would not contain an erroneous translation of Psalm 8:5, or an erroneous paraphrase. This gentleman is suggesting that it has done exactly that. Unfortunately for him, but fortunately for Bible believers, this is not the case because the New Testament is God-inspired and God does tell us that he magnifies his word above his name. In other words, he does not consider himself to be a little lower than God, but a little above God. No doubt he also would have to deny that Isaiah 7:14 was prophesying the virgin birth of Christ. After all, the same versions that argue with the New Testament's interpretation of Psalm 8:5 do the same with Isaiah 7:14. This is a blasphemy that he shares with the majority of modern church-goers during this time of rebelliousness. I pray that if he is a pastor somewhere that God tame his rebelliousness before he leads his flock down the same prideful path to destruction.

Note: My thanks to Teno Groppi for his added comments on the LXX and the dictionary definition of maiden.

The preceeding is part of a series of examples of KJV verses that arrogant would-be scholars have tried to correct and showed themselves to be fools. These examples are for the benefit of those who would like more ammunition to defend God's Word against the attacks of the arrogant Bible "correcting" modernists. I hope that some of you find them useful.

Your servant in Christ,
John Hinton, Ph.D.
Bible Restoration Ministry
A ministry seeking the translating and reprinting of KJV equivalent Bibles in all the languages of the world.