INTRODUCTION

There’s a real problem in the King James Bible supporting camp of people who want to “correct” its editions to the point of making changes to some editorial choices that have occurred, to some italics, to some archaic words and maybe even some translations in places.

This approach is fraught with danger, because one change is dangerous enough. Any change should be dealt with the utmost of caution, in fact, it is something that should not happen at all. After all, who is qualified to make any changes, and will it receive widespread consent.

When Benjamin Blayney made his editorial changes throughout the Bible, he did not change the translation and he did not change the underlying text. His changes were vast but also conservative.

Having myself operated in the space of analysing the editing which created the Pure Cambridge Edition back in the early 20^th century, and having copy edited it into a stable electronic form, now used by printers and publishers internationally, I know how needful changes have been very conservative, and I have myself done one thing which no one has yet objected to, which is make the “s” at the end of “LORD’s” a lower case “s”. That’s the last “change” that has happened, and if that is to be accepted, then that’s it.

I do not want the door to be open to arbitrary changes. Some Cambridge Bibles these days have “Hammath” at 1 Chronicles 2:55. That’s something which would have to go away (even though that exists in many of their PCE printings as well).

But people have this itch. Maybe it’s because they believe there are “false friends” in the KJB, or hard words that need to be changed, or inconsistencies in the italics or some other changes. To admit one change like this opens the door for a thousand, and where do we go from there. It is much better for us to accept and stick with a standard edition as an ensign than to delude ourselves that there are all these minor faults that “we” can correct. That is pride, a spirit of personal exaltation and deception.

Now I know that there can be good Christian believers, ones who uphold the KJB, who may think of this, who may think to themselves that they could be the one to do this.

If I were of that old Jesuitical spirit, and I wished to question to the subtlest point, the grounds of something in the editions of the KJB would be the last “hail Mary” attempt to do this.

KENYON BOWERS AND HABAKKUK 3:19

Kenyon Bowers has written an article where he begins from the Hebrew as his authority, and his own mind as the judge, stating, “In my own study, I found a particular KJV reading that made no sense in light of the underlying Hebrew.”

What he is going to do is claim that the reading of “LORD God” in the 1611 Edition, 1769 Edition and PCE are wrong. He wants it to be “Lord GOD”.

First, he shows pictures of the Hebrew. The Hebrew shows of course that the KJB is right, if we are to do that method of looking at Hebrew, we can easily see “LORD God”, that is to say in Hebrew, JeHoVaH ADoNI, which of course obviously would be “LORD God” in that construction.

Kenyon Bowers then shows the motivation he has is essentially to impose his understanding of the alleged Hebrew and this leads him to reject the Pure Cambridge Edition specifically (in other words, he is going out of his way to attack the PCE not merely the 1769 which has fed into all present editions which have the same thing as the PCE.)

It is also clear that Kenyon Bowers considers “LORD God” to be “the KJV”, so he’s really attacking the KJB itself by his own admission. (In fact, he says he is not KJV-only even though at one time he was.)

We can see why “LORD God” is correct because it matches exactly to the Hebrew. We can see that in the LXX they had “Lord the God” which is inverted as “God the Lord”, we can see in Latin it has “Lord God”. Luther simply has “LORD”. In Coverdale’s Bible it read “The LORDE God”, but the Geneva and Bishops’ had “The Lord God”. Thus, in 1611 the KJV rightly had “The LORD God”.

In 1629 however, the editors decided to change it to “Lord GOD”. We don’t know who they were, but we know in 1638 some of the surviving translators were involved. Even Scrivener suggested that the 1629 editors were wrong.

Now there are places where the Bible has “Lord GOD”, but there’s obviously a reason why “LORD God” is right here. It certainly matches the historical evidence, besides the fact that the editorial aberration appeared from 1629 through to 1762 (Cambridge), 1769 (Oxford), and earlier editions. (The Paris of 1762 is not the same as the Parris of 1743.) Some editions, not following Blayney, persisted with the aberration, but obviously the PCE and various other editions from the 19^th century, 20^th century and this century are following Blayney.

It’s very sad that Kenyon Bowers has rejected the correctness of the KJV, and that instead of being able to accept that “LORD God” is correct, he has accepted the wrong notion of the alleged Hebrew and his own thinking rather than a correct understanding of the text, the acceptance of the correctness of the KJB and that there are good but occasionally incorrect things in the editing of 1629. If the 1629 was right, why was there a 1638 and a 1769?

CONCLUSION

We must humble ourselves to understand that God speaks and shows truth, not to try to impose our own will.

Human reasoning and being tossed about on the sea of no final authority is hardly a way to be, but as God has outworked to manifest things, then we ought to conform to that.

It would be rather silly if someone decided to bring out a new edition of the KJB, and make one change like at Habakkuk 3:19, and if one change, why not let the man who would love to be a consulting editor, Mark Ward, make some “gentle” changes. Where does it go from there? It is clear that if a little leaven is allowed, it will go the whole way through.

I am confident, however, despite the deceptions of the NKJV foreword and other attempts, that nothing will unsettle the KJB. In the words of John William Burgon, “It may be confidently assumed that no ‘Revision’ of our Authorized Version, however judiciously executed, will ever occupy the place in public esteem which is actually enjoyed by the work of the Translators of 1611, — the noblest literary work in the Anglo-Saxon language. We shall in fact never have another ‘Authorized Version.’”

That’s quite different to having a defined-style or critical Bible, where things are put as footnotes or whatever, to give the notes on important variations in editions and definitions for difficult words, and so forth, but whether such a project eventuate as a help and handmaid, I think we are safely served by what we have right now.

Even Burgon suggested it, but I am not very convinced, “we hold that a revised edition of the Authorized Version of our English Bible, (if executed with consummate ability and learning,) would at any time be a work of inestimable value. The method of such a performance, whether by marginal Notes or in some other way, we forbear to determine. But only as a handmaid is it to be desired. As something intended to supersede our present English Bible, we are thoroughly convinced that the project of a rival Translation is not to be entertained for a moment. For ourselves, we deprecate it entirely.”