I find myself to be slidden into a remote “PBEM” debate, let’s call it a cross examination, with Pastor Bryan Ross.

As such, I will be engaging with this specific content, where he gives his thoughts about me and my work (Bible Protector and the Pure Cambridge Edition) and also addresses me directly in his appendix: Lesson-280-Assessing-the-Printed-History-of-the-King-James-Text-PCE-Vintage-Bibles.pdf

I will refer to his document by page number as to the focus of what is being discussed.

I have a website full of materials about the Pure Cambridge Edition (PCE) of the King James Bible. Ross has been doing a series of video lectures with PDF notes, with additional notes added, all which probably he will compile into a future book on the subject.

This has been going specifically in the last few months of 2025 and into 2026, his notes are from Sunday 1 March.

Ross I think is sceptical of the claims of the PCE, though I think he would recognise the Cambridge Bibles which I have called “Vintage Bibles” as normal KJBs to use, and the specific context is he is discussing my book Vintage Bibles. See it at: bibleprotector.com/VB.pdf

Note that I think Ross is using a previous edition of my book, as the current edition is:

“First published 2025

With further minor adjustments, corrections and improvements 2025”

It won’t matter, but I just point this out.

The context is that Ross seems to have a more negative view towards me than what I have towards him. Some of what he interprets is wrong, and often I see this arising from his wishful thinking that I am wrong rather than reality.

Ross also seems to have taken some memes and criticisms of him a lot harder than I have intended. I speculate in part because what I have said and done has probably not aided the distribution of his ideas expressed in his book about Verbal Equivalency versus Verbatim Identicality.

He further seems to have wrongly placed me in his world view as a charismatic and as some sort of verbatim identicality extremist. Besides these things, I know that culturally we are coming from different perspectives: I am a traditional Pentecostal, Word of Faith, King James Bible primacist, pro-English language, Historicist, Multiple Fulfilmentist, Monarchist, Weslyan-Finneyian Sanctificationist, Puritan Providentialist, Church Restitutionalist, etc., which are views which are going to differ to Ross’. I expect we do hold in common important things like use of the KJB, evangelicalism, fundamentalism and pretribulation rapture.

CAMBRIDGE PRESS’ INTENTIONALITY — (page 1)

Ross states, “Cambridge University Press did not intentionally produce a uniquely ‘pure’ edition, nor is there documentary evidence of a single editorial event creating the PCE.”

Ross’ claim is actually interpretative. Did CUP make an edit in the KJB near the beginning of the 20^th century? Yes. Was it intentional? Obviously. And regardless of claims for what I might now here call “special purity”, was the Press seeking purity in editing? Yes, not because we have specific evidence, but because that is consistent with their thoughts and behaviour. (It is not empirical but rational evidence.) During the Parliamentary Inquiries of the 19^th century, purity and accuracy of printing were factors striven for. And also logically so, no one would edit but for that reason, it is obvious.

In examining that Edition, that is to say, what we can see of the editing, it is remarkably clear that this editing was not like other editing or current editions that would be coming from other presses at that time (e.g. Collins, National, Eyre and Spottiswoode, etc.).

The evidence for an editing having taken place is in the material artifacts, that is, in the printed Bibles we have. This does not require us to have papers or citations in materials from Cambridge to show editing happened. David Norton knows something happened.

I think Ross is being poorly-scholastic in implying that unless Cambridge produces some notes or document saying an editing took place, that such reality can be undermined.

Of course we don’t expect Cambridge to have some notes saying to effect that now the father of all perfection in the whole world is here.

ROSS REPEATS AN ERROR — (page 1)

Ross specifically misrepresents reality, saying, “Cambridge continued printing multiple textual streams—Victorian, Near-PCE, and PCE —well into the late 20th century”, when the Victorian text only survived in the RV/AV parallel until the late 20^th century, and near-PCEs were surviving into the 1950s, which could not be said to be “late 20^th century”.

ROSS PERSISTS IN MISUNDERSTANDING THE 12 TESTS — (page 2)

Another error that Ross keeps making is to misunderstand the 12 tests. He says, “identifiable by historical tests … each argued as restoring textual and theological coherence across canonical cross-references … and the semantic precision of biblical English …, thereby serving the Church’s mandate to teach “whatsoever I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:20) with exactitude.”

First, the 12 tests were designed for people looking up any edition of the KJB anywhere, to see whether an edition was indeed a “Pure Cambridge Edition”. It would have to satisfy all these markers.

Now, it is very easy to look up other references to see more quickly, but not certainly, for example, looking up Ezra 2:26 as “Geba” and 1 John 5:8 as lower case “spirit” is going to do a lot to make it probable. Let me illustrate: say I am in a large second hand shop and I pick up a Bible, this is how I can eliminate the time of having to look up every copy for the 12 tests: if it says Oxford, Nelson or whatever, I might look up 1 John 5:8. If it says Collins, or some edition I don’t know, I might look up Ezra first. If it is an older looking Cambridge Bible I also do that, or look at Romans 9:9 for “Sara”. I am using that method before even doing the 12 tests. I can still be quick, for example, in Collins I can look up the Ezekiel test, or in a Cambridge Cameo look up Acts 11:12 and Acts 11:28 as well. These mean I am able to be reasonably certain. Of course, I don’t have hours to look up everything in all KJVs that might be there so, having lots of experience with knowing different kinds of Cambridge and Collins styles of editions, I know quickly what is likely to be PCE. In unusual and different Bibles I can also be quick, before looking more deeply.

So the entire way that Ross is looking at the 12 tests is wrong. These are markers of conformity, there is nothing expressly specifically special about them, as though “flieth” is of significant doctrinal importance itself. I mean, it is important as every word of God is important, and I guess it could be significant in that it is a test marker, but it’s purpose in the list is for comparison. I think every place in the Bible is important, and every PCE specificity is, such as that “Sara” is better than “Sarah” at Romans 9:9. The importance of the 12 tests are that they are all present in PCEs where they are not all present in other editions. 

Ross wrongly understands the 12 tests as new changes, because he says, “restoring textual and theological coherence”. The fact is that 1 John 5:8 was lower case “spirit” in many editions from 1629, including in many Oxford printings, until it was changed in Oxford printings in the 1890s. (Scrivener also had it capital “Spirit” in his edition too.)

So the 12 tests are not specific places that were changed to make the PCE. Some places were changes made in making the PCE, but they were changes (or things) that sometimes appeared in other editions, whether in 1611 and/or in later ones. Take for example “or Sheba”, that could be found in all kinds of historical editions, though mainly Cambridge and Oxford were printing “and Sheba” in the Victorian era.

This mistaken belief about the 12 tests has led Ross to point to other editions which match some of the tests, which is exactly what is known and to be expected. Ross has made reference to this elsewhere.

Ross goes on to link specifically the 12 tests with the Great Commission commandment to “observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:20). This is not what I have said at all. It is obvious first of all that the Church has been teaching what Jesus said way before the PCE existed, but to the point, I am showing that Christ is prophetically pointing to a specific form where we will have the entire Scripture exactly so that we can observe it, in a legal, full sense. That’s not the 12 tests, that’s the PCE with all its correct jots and tittles. (Again, this does not negate all the obedience that has happened with Christians using Greek, Latin, English, Oxford KJVs, etc.)

Therefore the 12 tests define what a PCE is. I do not mean someone getting an ESV and changing the 12 places, like a trick, I mean genuinely any copy of the KJB is going to match an editorial standard because it obviously derived from an editorial prototype (the first edited PCE from the circa early 1900s). Thus, many different PCE copies exist, because they match on the 12 tests and because they conform throughout e.g. see bibleprotector.com/editions

It’s bizarre that just a little later, Ross says, “They compiled key textual markers to distinguish the PCE from Oxford editions, Victorian Cambridge editions, and modern altered forms.” Meaning, identifying 12 distinctives that must all be present, and then being able to know between the PCE and otherwise.

So, the PCE was an editing which took place, it seems somewhere early in the 20^th century, where the current Cambridge text of the Victorian era was concertedly changed, with seeming knowledge of Scrivener’s work, and largely restoring 1611 readings.

Ross even goes on to quote me saying what the 12 tests are for, on page 3 of his notes.

He even says, “All the differences between PCEs are not confined to the twelve-reading list, i.e., other differences exist outside of the twelve-reading check list.” That is, differences between PCEs and other editions of the KJB.

ROSS DOESN’T SEEM TO UNDERSTAND THE SITUATION — (page 4)

Ross says, “This means that after determining which readings belonged to the PCE”. This doesn’t make sense. I already knew what the PCE was from the outset. In 2000 and 2001 I already knew Cambridge was the best from getting information from different KJBO people. The issue that remained was whether what CUP have as the post-1985 Cambridge is correct, or the pre-1985 is correct, in relation to 1 John 5:8. There were no other readings to resolve as far as “and Sheba” versus “or Sheba” at Josh. 19:2, etc.

In making an electronic text that is a separate process because various files had mistakes in them. That’s beside if they were PCE, Oxford, Concord Cambridge or whatever else.

At the same time, there are mistakes in printed Bibles. Cambridge makes very few errors of the press, but I do have a cameo with a missing dot for example.

Ross says, “Verschuur still had to establish a perfectly accurate master text, since even genuine ‘vintage’ PCE printings sometimes contained small press errors.”

This is not exactly right, because the variations of mistakes in printed copies of “Vintage Bibles” is not the same as mistakes made more prolifically in OCR scanned, hand typed or other electronic KJB files. I compared lots together.

I used multiple printed Vintage Bibles as a guide to correct the text files. I did this many, many times. I even repeated the entire project to make multiple “draft” “PCE” text files that could then be compared. This comparison process was very exhaustive so that no typographical error could exist, with computer comparison, manual checking, multiple checking, etc. resulting in exactness hitherto not achieved in the history of the world, clearly surpassing Larry Pierce’s work.

ROSS MISREPRESENTS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN EDITING AND COPY-EDITING  — (page 4)

Ross says, “the reader is given no independent or scholarly proof that the author’s editorial decisions are uniquely correct”.

To clarify, the editorial differences that make the PCE were done by Cambridge. It is not my role in the book Vintage Bibles to go into all the detail as to correctness of the editing. Ross tries to imply that proof is being withheld or it doesn’t exist, but in fact, such information has already been gone into in my other works, and of course I don’t have an exhaustive treatment that explains every Cambridge editorial choice and why they are correct in the PCE. I do argue things like that many of their choices that I look at are correct, but Ross is unreasonably demanding a level of editorial justification which is unwarranted. I have said that if the PCE is shown to be right where we know it is right, then it is right where we don’t know, or haven’t gone into detail.

For example, and this isn’t just a PCE issue, I essentially have argued that “throughly” is different to “thoroughly” and both are right where they are used in the KJB. I only did a fuller study on this recently, and you know what, the PCE was indeed right the way it has it! (The study on this topic is on my website.)

As for my copy-editing to eliminate errors, I don’t know what kind of proof would satisfy Ross, but no one at all has found any typographical error in the PCE text, I think Ross is being unreasonable to ask for “independent or scholarly proof” for correct copy-editing, since the proof is self-evident, if he wants to “third party” “stress test” or “peer review”, I am sure he won’t be able to find a wrong comma or missing letter or something. 

And just a side point, I worked on italics separately, to get them right as well, but that is different to the actual letters and punctuation claim for the PCE as far as the doctrine about God’s words, I also wanted to ensure God’s words have correct formatting conformed to the Vintage Bibles. Honestly, this is a natural desire of publishers let alone a theological desire for Christians.

ROSS MISREPRESENTS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN EDITING AND COPY-EDITING, CONTINUED  — (page 5)

Ross tries to attack me by saying, “Verschuur did far more than ‘copy edit’ the text.”

So, this is what I did,

1. Eliminated typographical errors from electronic files and could therefore present all “Vintage Bibles” without any error the press any might have.
2. Standardised the PCE on where persistent copy-editorial differences existed between them, which included things like a few hyphens, a space between a word, different typeface for Jesus’ Hebrew (not Aramaic) cry on the cross or the case of the letter “A” on the word “And” in a verse in Genesis.
3. Regularised the word “LORD’S” with small cap “ORD’S” to have a lower case “s”.

I obviously didn’t go around doing anything than whatever was already in PCEs, that is primarily in Cambridge, secondary in Collins PCEs, with tertiary reference to Norton and Concord, and general comparison to Scrivener’s book and text, Oxford (mid-20^th, 1917 Scofield and late 19^th century), mid-20^th century London, late 19^th century London, early 19^th century London, Bagster, D’Oyly and Mant, 1769 Oxford, 1629 Cambridge, 1611, Bishops, Geneva, the RV/AV Interlinear, etc.

If he wants to present it as “sub-editorial” that could be apt. The point is that I didn’t change any words, I didn’t use Hebrew or Greek, I didn’t make up anything but what already existed in printed PCEs, save yes the lower case “s” on “LORD’s”, which is also in Norton and modern versions.

There is a common view that “his” is used in relation to certain words, as the possessive form, such as is seen in The Translators to the Reader. It is therefore suggested that the “his” is contracted to the apostrophe “s” form. However, there is a post-Enlightenment-based view that has a different explanation. Having said that, the former, widespread and 1611-based view would apply for the masculine title like LORD.

Further, in line with the Enlightenment suggestion, since we are reading in English where the Hebrew does not use a possessive, but in every formation of the tetragrammaton we see the four main letters, so then it only follows that the apostrophe little “s” is an English necessity, and thus, rendered as normal text not as that which indicates the title of the deity (and the name of the Father).

The lower case “s” therefore can be viewed to represent both the traditional view and the orthographic view because of the peculiarity of the fact that English letters are representing a factor to do with the Hebrew source.

The aim is precision of English presentation (in line with English exactness), which is what the KJB has, but ironically it is also likely for the Hebrew-based reason that modernists prefer LORD’s, which is, I believe, correct English and accurate. I do not claim to be a translator, or editor and I have not made a Hebrew-based argument all these years as such, but it is kind of obvious in English that the small capitals must mean something in English, my approach is from English grammatical correctness and formatting correctness. Therefore it is a satisfactory approach in all ways.

So far Bryan Ross hasn’t conceived to make a case against “LORD’s” so I expect he won’t. I haven’t heard yet from the 1611 people who might rail against apostrophes.

Again, this sort of formatting work is copy-editing. I’ve been an editorial assistant and a professional typesetter in my life, and it is pretty clear that this work (as lowly as someone might consider such a position) requires as much, shall I say, anointing as someone doing glamorous things like writing, teaching and lecturing.

But then, 1 Cor. 1:

26 For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called:

27 But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;

28 And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are

See also Exodus 35:30-35, it is obviously the gift of God.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN EDITORIAL AND COPY-EDITORIAL — (page 6)

Ross seems to not grasp the difference in these concepts, saying “he dismisses Oxford and Victorian Cambridge readings as unacceptable departures, yet waves away the same kind of differences inside the PCE stream as trivial “press errors” that do not matter.”

So, to be clear, a press error is not the issue. (These are easily dealt with.) We are talking now about whether some PCEs have a hyphen in a word or not. That is still a copy-editorial issue really, it is dealing with punctuation, not with full on editing. And Ross wants to put that issue on the same level as all the differences between an Oxford and a Cambridge, which are clear editorial issues.

Now, yes, copy-editing does indeed enter the scholarly realm, investigating different historical editions and reasons inducing for judgment one way or another. But these are still the sorts of things that happen on a copy-editorial level.

Ross then says, “the framework tolerates variation within the tradition he favors, reclassifies it as correctable slip, and condemns similar variation outside that tradition as corruption”.

Ross is trying to make out as if there is a loyalty to the PCE like a white and black situation. Whereas the reality is that Scripture has existed long before the appearance of the PCE, making Ross’ claim of a sort of blinkered, to the point of excising all else, view of the PCE wrong.

NIT PICKING — (page 7)

Ross tries to argue as if there isn’t provided proof of the millions of copies of printed PCEs, when the numbers of various printings of the Cameo and Pitt Minion indicate tens to over hundreds of thousands of copies per year, which easily equal many millions over the decades.

While in a scholastic sense Ross is right that all things are to be proven, in a general sense, especially broadly treating a subject, one is not going to lay out all proofs to the nth degree for every point made. In a deeply academic work like a thesis, yes, in a book that’s more particular, I think Ross is just being a bit contrarian.

ROSS’ JUSTIFICATION OF CAMBRIDGE’S 2010 LETTER — (page 9)

In 2010, a representative of CUP wrote a letter stating, “I am always puzzled when I see occasional references made to the ‘Pure Cambridge Edition’. I have seen no real evidence to suggest that there was any distinct revision process undertaken … which justifies the claim that ‘an edition’ was consciously developed at that time. … For a brief period of time it is possible that most Cambridge Bibles did conform to the version of the text that adherents of the ‘Pure Cambridge Edition’ regard as perfection but we have no means to identify which — if any — Cambridge editions or typesettings of the early 20th century might have been the one that prompts the ‘Pure Cambridge Edition’ notion. … Insofar as I have been able to evaluate these it appears that there are three current or recent Cambridge editions which come close to the PCE. Some new Cambridge editions were originated during the 1920s and 1930s, apparently using as their pattern copy a version that (nearly) accords with your expectations. Our Cameo and Turquoise (now called Presentation Reference) and Pitt Minion editions fall into that category. … The other 3 Cambridge editions, Turquoise, Pitt Minion and Cameo, all agree with the PCE (insofar as I have been able to check) except in one particular — they each have ‘Spirit’ rather than ‘spirit’ at 1 John 5:8. The evidence I have is that this is a quite deliberate representation — and indeed accords with most modern KJV settings, and also with all modern versions of the Bible that I have in this office. In fact, the Pitt Minion Text Edition originally had ‘spirit’, but by the 1950s the Pitt Minion Reference edition, using the same basic setting, had been amended to ‘Spirit’ — presumably to conform to the new Concord, and also the older Turquoise and Cameo editions. (It is possible that those last two originally had a lower case ‘s’, but I have no means of confirming or denying this.)”

Ross tries to say that CUP was talking about unfamiliarity with the term “Pure Cambridge Edition”, but in the letter the Press bewrays significant ignorance of the Edition and its own recent history.

Ross wants CUP-based evidence for the PCE, yet at the same time, CUP admits to knowing next to nothing.

HAND CORRECTING COPIES — (page 12)

Ross makes out as if I have only said some copies could be hand corrected or disallow someone to change any other KJV. This is Ross misreading and misrepresenting what I have said. I expressly spoke of easily correcting copies with only a few places. That is easy. But to change a different edition requires a bit more work. I have a large print TBS NT that I made pencil corrections in, that took perhaps over an hour to correct by hand.

It isn’t about imparting some mystical quality of this Bible being “a PCE”, it is about having correct presentation, as far as practically so. Ross seems to continually be caught up in a mechanical notion about “verbatim identicality” when that is clearly his mistaken accusation onto what having accurate printing and correct editing is all about.

ROSS STILL CONFUSED ABOUT NEAR-PCE — (page 12)

The near-PCEs are in several categories. They are KJBs which were made or conformed to the PCE but with a test or two being out due to the printing plates not being amended properly. They could also be post-PCEs where a person should change 1 John 5:8, Acts 11:12 and verse 28 to match the PCE, if that is all that is different. In other words, a near-PCE and post-PCE would be very close to bibleprotector.com/editions with a few places needing to be hand corrected.

Again, this wouldn’t stop someone taking any KJB, and either on their computer if electronic, or with a pencil, or whatever, making changes to any KJB, to make it match the PCE. Obviously, some editions are going to be hard work to do it, it’s a matter of pragmatism. Surely buying a PCE would be easier.

But Ross makes strange demands trying to work out what percentage an edition needs to be to be “near”, and perhaps he is also confusing the 12 tests with differences the whole way through as well. All in all, Ross is trying to make a point that common sense shows is silly.

ROSS PUSHING A HYPER PEDANTIC STANDARD — (page 13)

Ross says, “Together with Verschuur’s explicit statement that the PCE is “not based on any single first edition” but on many printings over years, these catalogue data support my conclusion … that the PCE functions as a retrospectively standardized ideal; on that basis, … [my lesson] identifies the 2006 electronic file as the first fully unified implementation, rather than any single historical Cambridge Bible.”

Ross wrongly understands the difference between copy-editing correctness, that is, the exactness of a setting, and the idea of an Edition being presented across many printings. Ross is trying to make out as if either the first printing of the PCE is to be slavishly conformed to, which of course we don’t know and would have typos, or else he is saying that since the electronic form has no typos but copies do, that only the copy without typos (the electronic file published in 2007 but made in 2006) is the “real” PCE.

Ross has got this wrong, because the PCE is an editorial form, and is a set of editorial decisions, which is to say, began with some Cambridge editor, and was printed in many editions (styles, print runs) over the years. Whereas, the electronic text I made was based on those many editions, which all matched the same set of editorial choices, but my copy doesn’t have an error of the press like a missing full stop or something that might appear in one or other printing.

Ross continually does not accept this view, but tries to present a clumsy view that continually jumps around.

We don’t have a “prototype” or copy of the first editing. We have a series of settings which is reflective of a singular editorial type or form, so each of the known printings presenting a consistency, which might be termed the “syncritype”. Upon this we do have a critical “archetype” or “constitutype”, which is to say, a resolution in a typographically correct presentation of the editorial form, that is, a correct representation of the Edition with a capital “E”.

Rather than attempting to reconstruct a hypothetical prototype, the present text is a constitutype: a critically constituted, typographically accurate representative of the Edition, derived from the full syncritype and intended to present the archetypal editorial form without accidental error or remedial variation.

This is not the kind of language I use, but I am instructing those who need to have a(n) hearing ear.

In my writings, I don’t tend to emphasise the correctness of the KJB text versus other versions, or KJB translations in English versus other translations, but I do expressly push that the PCE is the best edition of the PCE, that it is right, and also, as separate but not unrelated, that there is a scrupulously correct setting of the PCE. Ross continually does not adequately see difference between the two, and that leads him to make nonsensical arguments against the PCE or its correct setting.

For example, a correct setting argument is not an argument against the Oxford Edition. That would be confusing two different concepts, but Ross has done so continuously, for example confusing the difference of purity of Scripture, Version, Translation, Edition and edition/setting/copy-editing with each other seemingly continuously.

No wonder he propagandises that I am anti-Oxford Edition when I am far more tolerant of “the” Oxford Edition since I am pro- the translation and version as present in “the” Oxford Edition. The editorial problems of the Oxford Edition are “diddly squat” compared with the problems of the NIV.

ROSS PUSHING FILLER WHILE SUMMARISING — (page 13)

Ross describes my catalogue, but it sounds a bit like filler (spackle), he begins “Beyond textual loci” and ends “rather than millimetric measurements alone”. I think this is a strange way to talk about a catalogue, no one would begin a sentence that way nor finish a paragraph that way. I think it is AI-produced waffle.

ROSS RAISING QUESTIONS — (page 14)

Ross says that my work “raises questions”. This is a usual trick, in that anyone claiming that there are questions does it for rhetorical reasons, not because there are any questions.

Ross’ tactic for raising questions sure does raise a lot of questions. See how this works?

ROSS WAVES HIS HAND — (page 15).

Ross says, “although Matthew Verschuur argues in Vintage Bibles that the PCE represents a providentially preserved, perfected form of the King James Bible, the actual historical evidence does not support this narrative.”

What he means is that he wants to interpret data differently. He is just stating his opinion, of course, because he does not want to admit that there is correct editing or accept that God could be outworking specifically for correct editing. All he wants to do is reject my information, and just leave a vacuum. He doesn’t fill the vacuum with anything other than obviously he must just think that all editions are fine and that’s it. He doesn’t really say.

ROSS LIKE RICK NORRIS — (page 16)

Ross says, “The digital PCE text created in 2006 turns out to be a harmonized construction—compiled from multiple inconsistent Cambridge printings—rather than a reproduction of any single historical edition. Chapter 4’s catalogue unintentionally reveals that no uniform PCE text ever existed.”

The term “inconsistent” is one which is clearly wrong. Cambridge printings are not inconsistent at all. What Ross is trying to do is create the fake requirement for jot and tittle perfection in any printed copy, which of course is ludicrous.

Even though the PCE does exist and has existed since at least 1911, if not earlier, he again uses false Rick Norris-style pedantry and claims that “no uniform PCE text ever existed”. This is obviously a statement against reality, because editorially consistent editions appeared continuously. Now Ross is trying to use typographical minutiae to invalidate the reality of millions of historical Bible copies.

He says, “Taken together, the evidence shows that the PCE is not a historical edition preserved by Cambridge, but a modern editorial construct developed to impose textual uniformity where the printed record shows diversity.”

This is now entering the realms of falsehood. Ross is actually stating that there is no PCE, that is, that there is no editorial conformity as present through many printings, which indeed match an entire editorial scheme, including having the 12 tests in common, and yet he will so severely perjure himself to say that there is no Pure Cambridge Edition existing from the early 20^th century!

It’s hard now to say that Ross is mistaken, but effectively, he seems to be deliberately speaking against the objective evidence. This is now more than Ross trying to push a different interpretation, but it seems now he is denying there is a historical editing and conformity to that editing with very consistent markers.

“No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, and their righteousness is of me, saith the LORD.” (Isaiah 54:17).

THE APPENDIX (page 17)

Ross now tries to engage with me directly on some points.

He says, “My point was that your argumentation has changed over time”. Except it hasn’t. I’ve just found more information to clarify aspects, which build up the argumentation, there is nothing contradictory or changed in that respect.

He says, “you place the edition [sic] princeps ‘circa 1900,’ which reads like a single-event origin claim.”

This stems from Bryan Ross’ confusion between an Edition and editions. First, the PCE comes from a common event origin in circa 1900. I have never sought to necessarily “reconstruct” or seek to get in hand that first edition, or set of editor’s notes, in that while such things are good, it is the editing itself which is important. That editing is witnessed to in many ensuing editions/printings/settings.

He says, that in 2024, “you discuss a 1920s consolidation across Cambridge settings”. This is pointing to known extant printings which even Cambridge points to like the Cameo. That is the era of the first known printings that we could see, it was not a limitation on when the actual editing took place. We knew it happened, but logically we don’t know except what we can find or reason out. Therefore, honesty compels us to speak of the fact that the PCE existed in the 1920s, in dominance, but it was only in 2025 I some earlier printings.

He says, that “you explicitly say the PCE is ‘not based on any single first edition,’”. I don’t know if Ross is misreading, but just to make it clear, the PCE is based on a single first edition that represents the editing and that it was printed in many copies, so that the PCE we know and define represents all the known copies, and that is what my electronic text represents. Thus, I am saying, my electronic text is not made by looking at or trying to reconstruct a first printing or editor’s notes, but is based on looking on lots of ensuing copies that represent that first editing.

Again, this is relevant when looking at Edition versus setting, and how my work is copy-editing and not editing to make an Edition.

Ross says, “Because you now present the PCE as a family profile (rather than a single c.1900 printing)”. I always did so, to imply differently is wrong. The editing that took place is the way to date an Edition, which is circa 1900s (though on occasion I also said circa 1900).

Ross has continually tried to make out there is some change in things, when I have always shown the same view on this matter.

Ross says, “it follows—on your own framing—that the first fully unified, single-file form of that profile is your 2006 e-text, which harmonizes across multiple PCE printings and resolves their setting-level differences”.

But the PCE existed all the time before then, and in different settings.

But I am reminded of Ross’ other claim, which is very challenging in this context. He wrote on a previous page, “Taken together, the evidence shows that the PCE is not a historical edition preserved by Cambridge, but a modern editorial construct developed to impose textual uniformity where the printed record shows diversity.”

Okay, so either the 2006 text file is presenting the same Edition as is shown in many editions/settings, or it isn’t.

Bryan Ross’ own testimony doesn’t agree with itself. What need have we to continue?

He keeps making the same wrong accusations, and worse, he thinks his attacks stand. This is enough writing for now.