Ask Dusty Peterson about his articles on Bible Translations

How has God preserved His word? How has the enemy tried to pervert the word of God?
Dusty
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Post by Dusty »

Hiya David. Thanks for your query. Have you had a chance yet to read the three articles pertaining to this thread? You should find your query answered in Parts 2a and 2b. (I'm afraid current time constraints oblige me to limit my BB input to queries arising from my articles.)

Zach, thank you for your postings. They are a help to me.

You rightly say that "Both family A & B are detested by those on the far right and left." My question remains though. If, as you say, "The disputes are [merely] over things like spellings, city names, etc." then why on earth do some people on *both* sides of the debate detest the other side's text-type so strongly?

Of Westcott and Hort, I notice you have not withdrawn your claim that "Their knowledge on an intellectual level was acknowledged and respected by many scholars on both sides. But that is as far as it goes with the majority of most scholars of modern translations (by modern I mean those produced after Westcott & Hort)."

Here are some quotes on the matter from "mainstream" scholars in the camp to which you refer:

Frederick Kenyon: "Westcott and Hort's theory was epoch-making in the fullest sense of the term. In spite of certain criticisms and modifications, which appear to be well founded ... this theory holds the field among scholars today" [Textual Criticism of the New Testament, p. 308, emphasis mine]

Bart Ehrman: "Apart from a handful of passages, principally in Luke ..., our current printed editions (i.e., the UBSGNT4 and NA26) differ little from Westcott and Hort's of 1881" [New Testament Textual Criticism, Exegesis, and Church History, edited by B. Aland and F Delobel, 1994, p. 122, f. 16, emphasis mine]

Bruce Metzger: "[T]hough the discovery of additional manuscripts has required the realignment of certain groups of witnesses, the general validity of their [W&H's] critical principles and procedures is widely acknowledged by textual scholars today" [The Text of the New Testament, 1964, p. 137, all three quotes are taken from D.W. Cloud, The Bible version Question/Answer Database]

I can produce more of the same if you need me to. I'm afraid I also can't allow the following claim of yours to go unchallenged:
"These scholars [Burgon and Hort] are on the extreme far right and left. You can't get any more extreme in their views regarding this topic."
That's simply not the case with regard to Burgon. One can certainly find more extreme views than his. For instance, he wrote, "Once for all, we request it may be clearly understood that we do not, by any means, claim perfection for the Received Text. We entertain no extravagant notions on this subject. Again and again we shall have occasion to point out (eg. at pg. 107) that the Textus Receptus needs correction." [The Revision Revised, p. 21, note 3; italics his]. Until I have published the remaining articles in my series, I'm reserving my own opinion of Burgon's position here. I simply quote it to show that Zach may need to do a bit more homework :shock:

The fact is that the differences between the TR and the critical Greek are *not* minor, as I demonstrated at some length in Part 2b. In love, I do urge Zach to make sure of his ground if he's gonna post further comments on this thread before reading that article :?
wackzingo
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Post by wackzingo »

Dusty,

Thanks for the reply, I'm almost finished with part 2b. I'll let you know my thoughts on it as well as part 2a.
You rightly say that "Both family A & B are detested by those on the far right and left." My question remains though. If, as you say, "The disputes are [merely] over things like spellings, city names, etc." then why on earth do some people on *both* sides of the debate detest the other side's text-type so strongly?

In my opinion both sides are not looking at what I consider small errors like spellings, city names, places, and occasionally a line or two. These people look at things like, "if it's harder to read than it must be correct", "It hasn't been copied much so it can't be God's true word." These people are so focused on trying to prove that either family A is all correct and family B is all wrong (vice versa) that they have failed to see that the two family are not all that different and should all be considered on a specific text by text basis.


[Dr. Hort, whose authority on the point is quite incontestable, estimates the proportion of words about which there is some doubt at about one-eighth of the whole; but by far the greater part of these consists merely of differences in order and other unimportant variations, and "the amount of what can in any sense be called substantial variation ... can hardly form more than a thousandth part of the entire text" (BF Westcott, FJ Hort,Paperback, Introduction to The New Testament in the Original Greek, p. 2).]

Of Westcott and Hort, I notice you have not withdrawn your claim that "Their knowledge on an intellectual level was acknowledged and respected by many scholars on both sides. But that is as far as it goes with the majority of most scholars of modern translations (by modern I mean those produced after Westcott & Hort)."
Burgon wrote a lot about Westcott & Hort but never attacked their intellectual knowledge of Greek and Hebrew. In fact almost no one has questioned their knowledge of textual criticism. Did Burgon have a problem with Hort’s textual criticism of secular texts? No, Burgon only disagreed with applying the same techniques to the bible. Today most translators know that Westcott and Hort were very knowledgeable in their field of work. They recognize that they were experts and had a lot of respect for them. I certainly do. But very few translations rely solely on their work. They recognize that their view left out certain aspects that are important when dealing with God’s Word. So I yes they do lean more towards Westcott & Hort’s view of textual criticism.

So…yes, I guess I saying “that’s as far as it goes it not correct, but neither is saying “they rely upon their work”. Most scholars of modern translations are not saying, “I only follow Hort” or “I only follow Burgon” but rather “We respect both sides”.
I can produce more of the same if you need me to. I'm afraid I also can't allow the following claim of yours to go unchallenged:
Quote:
"These scholars [Burgon and Hort] are on the extreme far right and left. You can't get any more extreme in their views regarding this topic."

That's simply not the case with regard to Burgon. One can certainly find more extreme views than his. For instance, he wrote, "Once for all, we request it may be clearly understood that we do not, by any means, claim perfection for the Received Text. We entertain no extravagant notions on this subject. Again and again we shall have occasion to point out (eg. at pg. 107) that the Textus Receptus needs correction." [The Revision Revised, p. 21, note 3; italics his]. Until I have published the remaining articles in my series, I'm reserving my own opinion of Burgon's position here.
If I understood Burgon’s view correctly, he believed that family A set of texts is the only true Word of God and Family B is corrupt and not God’s word. This is what I was referring to. We are talking about family A and family B and you say there can’t be a middle. So I pointed out that there can’t be more extreme views than saying A is the only correct one or vice versa.
I simply quote it to show that Zach may need to do a bit more homework
I’m sure we all do……
wackzingo
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Post by wackzingo »

I need to clarify the quote in the previous post.


One word of warning, already referred to, must be emphasised in conclusion. No fundamental doctrine of the Christian faith rests on a disputed reading. Constant references to mistakes and divergences of reading, such as the plan of this book necessitates, might give rise to the doubt whether the substance, as well as the language, of the Bible is not open to question. It cannot be too strongly asserted that in substance the text of the Bible is certain. Especially is this the case with the New Testament.

[Dr. Hort, whose authority on the point is quite incontestable, estimates the proportion of words about which there is some doubt at about one-eighth of the whole; but by far the greater part of these consists merely of differences in order and other unimportant variations, and "the amount of what can in any sense be called substantial variation ...can hardly form more than a thousandth part of the entire text" (BF Westcott, FJ Hort,Paperback, Introduction to The New Testament in the Original Greek, p. 2).]

The number of manuscripts of the New Testament, of early translations from it, and of quotations from it in the oldest writers of the Church, is so large that it is practically certain that the true reading of every doubtful passage is preserved in some one or other of these ancient authorities.
This can be said of no other ancient book in the world. Scholars are satisfied that they possess substantially the true text of the principal Greek and Roman writers whose works have come down to us, of Sophocles, of Thucydides, of Cicero, of Virgil; yet our knowledge of their writings depends on a mere handful of manuscripts, whereas the manuscripts of the New Testament are counted by hundreds, and even thousands. (Sir F Kenyon, Our Bible & the Ancient Manuscripts, p.34)
Dusty
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Post by Dusty »

Hiya Zach. I'll look at your points in the order you raise them...

HORT'S VIEW
You appear to be saying that Hort was "so focused on trying to prove that ... family ['B'] is all correct and family [A] is all wrong ... that [he] failed to see that the two families are not all that different". But you then quote a document Hort co-authored which makes plain that he did indeed believe that the two families are "not all that different". Here is the relevant bit of the quote again: "the amount of what can in any sense be called substantial variation ... can hardly form more than a thousandth part of the entire text".

Please, PLEASE could you explain to me once and for all why Hort called the TR "vile" if the differences between it and his text are unimportant? PLEASE could you tell me why he claimed that, if the Christian Church were to replace one of these two manuscript families with the other, it would be so significant as to produce a whole "new period in church history"? [Source references supplied in Part 2a]

"THAT IS AS FAR AS IT GOES"
Next you take up a whole paragraph to say that Westcott and Hort's intellectual powers are respected. I have never disputed this! Indeed, my articles confirm this very point. Surely the emboldening employed in my last posting makes clear that I was purely challenging your claim that "that is as far as it goes"?

I am grateful that you have finally admitted (albeit in a rather obscured way :( ) that you "guess" this claim of yours is "not correct", but you instantly follow this up by remarking, "neither is saying '[modern scholars] rely upon their [i.e. W&H's] work'". I have never said this! Are you trying to put words into my mouth? The funny thing is that YOU appear effectively to say that modern scholars "rely on their work" when you note that "very few translations rely solely on their work" - the implication being that plenty of scholars rely on their work to a significant extent.

Again, you seem to be setting up a straw man when you say "Most scholars of modern translations are not saying, 'I only follow Hort'". When have I ever claimed otherwise?

"LEAN MORE TOWARDS ... HORT"
To say that modern scholars only "lean" towards Westcott & Hort’s view of textual criticism is quite an understatement! Here are some further quotes to help prove this:
"The international committee that produced the United Bible Societies' Greek New Testament, not only adopted the Westcott and Hort edition as its basic text, but followed their methodology in giving attention both to external and internal considerations" [Bruce Metzger, cited in Bible Interpreters of the 20th Century]
"[T]he text, built up on the work of the 19th Century, has remained as a whole unchanged" [Erwin Nestle and Kurt Aland, Novum Testamentum Graece, 24th edition, 1960, p. 62]
"It is fair to say that ... the mainstream of NT textual criticism since Westcott and Hort has moved toward modifying and advancing their work" [Gordon Fee, Studies in the Theory and Method of New Testament Textual Criticism, p. 12, all three quotes are from Cloud again]
As before, there's more where those came from. As Colwell admitted, "The dead hand of Fenton John Anthony Hort lies heavy upon us".

"YOU CAN'T GET ANY MORE EXTREME"
You say, "If I understood Burgon’s view correctly, he believed that [the] family A set of texts is the only true Word of God and Family B is corrupt and not God’s word. This is what I was referring to. We are talking about family A and family B and you say there can’t be a middle. So I pointed out that there can’t be more extreme views than saying A is the only correct one or vice versa."

Zach, I'm sorry I misunderstood that, by the phrase "this topic", you only meant the question of which family (if either) is the sole repository of God's Word. However, please remember that Burgon felt family B's Codex B did have value. (See footnote 70 of Part 2a for proof.) This is certainly not the most extreme position I have ever come across on family B.
Last edited by Dusty on Tue Jan 16, 2007 8:27 am, edited 1 time in total.
Dusty
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Post by Dusty »

Whoops! My emboldening and italicization went a bit haywire there. Sincere apologies.
jimbaum
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Post by jimbaum »

Dusty,

You can edit your posts if you want to change the bold type.

Again. I appreciate that you are willing to take part on this discussion board.

Zach and I are just regular folk. I don't claim to be a scholar and I don't think Zach does either. Sometimes Zach and I agree and sometimes we don't. But I do believe that these things are too important to be left to the experts... only!

Of course, each one of us could learn, by the grace of God, to be more rigorous and more precise and more logical. The Lord will help us.

I recognize there are hundreds of discussion forums you could devote your time to. We will be grateful for how ever long you have the oomph to devote to this one. There is lots to learn.

Jim
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Post by Dusty »

Hiya Jim. Many thanks for that.

As you can see, I've made various tweaks to the offending posting of mine.
wackzingo
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Post by wackzingo »

I will say again, I don't give much thought to your articles because they are deceiving.

You begin making the case that the two family--A & B are in “two camps”. To support that you quote “two pre-eminent scholars in favour of each family”(emphasis mine):
It is often said that the differences between these two families are unimportant. Here are some initial observations about that claim. I will start by quoting two of the most pre-eminent scholars in favour of each family – i.e. Fenton John Anthony Hort (1828-1892) and John William Burgon (1813-1888). Hort was a leading member of the revision committee which produced the ‘Revised Version’ of the Bible in the late 19th Century. Hort said that, if the Christian Church were to replace one of these two manuscript families with the other, it would be so significant as to produce a whole “new period in Church history”.9 Likewise, but from a supporter of the other family, Burgon said the result would be a “seriously mutilated” text.10
This quote from Hort was not about family A but about the TR. The TR was vile and had serious errors and used would produce a whole “new period in Church history.”

Burgon even agreed.
"Once for all, we request it may be clearly understood that we do not, by any means, claim perfection for the Received Text. We entertain no extravagant notions on this subject. Again and again we shall have occasion to point out (eg. at pg. 107) that the Textus Receptus needs correction." [The Revision Revised, p. 21, note 3; italics his].
And you personally agree too:
The fact is that the differences between the TR and the critical Greek are *not* minor, as I demonstrated at some length in Part 2b. In love, I do urge Zach to make sure of his ground if he's gonna post further comments on this thread before reading that article


However, you do not demonstrate that the “differences between the TR and the critical Greek are *not* minor”. What you do is demonstrate that the differences between family A and family B are *not* minor. What you have done in articles part2a and part 2b is deceived people. The differences between family A and B are not that different but you mix in quotes that were meant for the TR only and group it together to lead people to believe that it was meant for the entire family A. Your footnotes show this:
7 For simplicity I have combined the ‘Neutral’ and ‘Minority’ families into one (see earlier footnotes), not least because many experts today do not distinguish between the two. For this short overview of textual criticism, I have employed another simplification – viz. I sometimes relate comments made specifically about manuscript ‘B’ simply to family B, and likewise I sometimes relate comments about the Textus Receptus (a Greek text derived from family A manuscripts) to the whole of family A. However, neither simplification alters the final outcome.

The majority of you 2nd article is from the position that the two pre-eminent scholars on both sides denounce the other family of texts. This is not true as I quoted that Hort himself did not believe there were major differences between the two families. He did believe that the TR has huge errors and there were major differences though.
One word of warning, already referred to, must be emphasised in conclusion. No fundamental doctrine of the Christian faith rests on a disputed reading. Constant references to mistakes and divergences of reading, such as the plan of this book necessitates, might give rise to the doubt whether the substance, as well as the language, of the Bible is not open to question. It cannot be too strongly asserted that in substance the text of the Bible is certain. Especially is this the case with the New Testament.

[Dr. Hort, whose authority on the point is quite incontestable, estimates the proportion of words about which there is some doubt at about one-eighth of the whole; but by far the greater part of these consists merely of differences in order and other unimportant variations, and "the amount of what can in any sense be called substantial variation ...can hardly form more than a thousandth part of the entire text" (BF Westcott, FJ Hort,Paperback, Introduction to The New Testament in the Original Greek, p. 2).]

The number of manuscripts of the New Testament, of early translations from it, and of quotations from it in the oldest writers of the Church, is so large that it is practically certain that the true reading of every doubtful passage is preserved in some one or other of these ancient authorities.
This can be said of no other ancient book in the world. Scholars are satisfied that they possess substantially the true text of the principal Greek and Roman writers whose works have come down to us, of Sophocles, of Thucydides, of Cicero, of Virgil; yet our knowledge of their writings depends on a mere handful of manuscripts, whereas the manuscripts of the New Testament are counted by hundreds, and even thousands. (Sir F Kenyon, Our Bible & the Ancient Manuscripts, p.34)
You appear to be saying that Hort was "so focused on trying to prove that ... family ['B'] is all correct and family [A] is all wrong ... that [he] failed to see that the two families are not all that different"
Let me make this clear since it seems so important to you to prove me wrong. “I WAS WRONG”.

Now that we’ve settled that….we can both agree that Hort and his colleagues knew how he thought better than I do. So, by proving me wrong it proves you wrong also because this quote now shows that Hord did not in fact believe that there were major differences between family A and family B.

It doesn’t appear that Burgon thought family B was all bad either according to you:
However, please remember that Burgon felt family B's Codex B did have value.
Please, PLEASE could you explain to me once and for all why Hort called the TR "vile" if the differences between it and his text are unimportant?
This is because as I have just attempted to show…you have been deceiving people (whether intentionally or not is not my business) by mixing terms together. In your article I never remember you referring to the TR specifically but the whole family A but in this discussion you have mentioned it specifically several times. Let me make this clear, family A is more than just the TR.

He called the TR vile because it is in a sense. The minor differences he was speaking about as you failed to show in your article were about family A. Family A texts are not that different from family B. The TR is vile and seriously mutilated. The TR is a modern Greek translation made less than 100 years before the KJV. It should not be considered even apart of family A any more than the KJV.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Textus_Receptus
PLEASE could you tell me why he claimed that, if the Christian Church were to replace one of these two manuscript families with the other, it would be so significant as to produce a whole "new period in church history"?
This is why we have problems. You are asking why he said this about the TR but in your article you quoted him as saying this about the entire family A. This is misleading. If we replaced our bibles with texts based on the TR than it would produce a whole new period in Church History. If we replace our texts as you mention in our article with the family A or family B it wouldn’t make much difference because they aren’t that much different and only contain minor error that don’t affect doctrine.
the implication being that plenty of scholars rely on their work to a significant extent.
Yes, this is correct. Many scholars rely on their work and many don’t. Many don’t want to admit how much. Most modern scholars say they don’t, although they probably do. Because of articles like your scholars, professors and students alike try to distance themselves from either side because the average layman reads an article like your (that is deceiving in my opinion) and begins to think that any work that is based on Hort is perverted. So translators try to distance themselves so that people won’t instantly cast off their work simply because they read an article like yours.


In the end Hort didn’t think there were major differences between family A & B. I think you logic in the article part 2a & 2b are flawed seriously. I think your article is misleading and deceiving. I’m not going to speculate nor do I care if it was intentional.
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Post by Dusty »

Hi there Zach,

Thanks for your latest. I'm afraid it's wrong in just about every important respect, but let me back off for 24 hours to give you a chance to reconsider it (and hopefully look more fully into the history and content of the TR) before I reply in detail.
wackzingo
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Post by wackzingo »

Dusty,

Thanks, I’ll go over what I wrote above but the only thing that will change would be the details. I still believe the points. Your article is deceiving because the readers can't tell when your quotes refer to a specific text from family A or the entire family because as your footnote says, you lump them all together. Second, Hort didn't think there were major differences between the two texts. Third, Burgon obviously didn't completely detest family B as you say because you also say he "felt family B's Codex B did have value".

Finally, modern history supports Hort's quote that using the TR would result in a "Whole new period in church history". The KJV was based on the Textus Receptus as published by Erasmus. Just ask the KJV only movement and they will tell you how different their bible is from ones based off of other texts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_James_Bible
Like the earlier English translations such as Tyndale's and the Geneva Bible, the King James Version was translated from Greek and Hebrew texts, bypassing the Latin Vulgate. The King James Version's Old Testament is based on the Masoretic Text while the New Testament is based on the Textus Receptus as published by Erasmus. The King James Version is a fairly literal translation of these base sources; words implied but not actually in the original source are specially marked in most printings (either by being inside square brackets, or as italicized text).

Compared to modern translations, there are some differences which are based in part on more recently discovered manuscripts, e.g. the Dead Sea Scrolls in 1947. Some conservative fundamentalist Protestants believe that the newer versions of the Bible are based on corrupt manuscripts and that the King James Version is truer to the original languages. This preference is partially due to the fact that many modern versions often excise or marginalize certain verses deemed by modern scholarship as later additions to the original text and thus are seen by traditionalists as tampering with the text. (See King-James-Only Movement.)



When I started this discussion I didn't think the families were all that different. Now I am even more confident and feel even more strongly that most modern translations are accurate and trustworthy. I also believe even more strongly that the KJV only movement is completely wrong and so are those who say we must choose family A and B.

If there are "nearly 6000" differences in the texts that are "major" in your opinion then why don't you show just a few of those. Although it really is closer to 5000 not 6000. Your footnotes say, 11 Estimates usually vary between 5,300 and 5,900 changes. Waite counted 5,604 [D.A. Waite, Defending the King James Bible, (The Bible For Today Press, 2004), p. 40].

And for the record you source for these numbers is a King James Bible defender. That means your source is someone defending a translation based off a texts that your main pre-eminent scholars says this about:
"Once for all, we request it may be clearly understood that we do not, by any means, claim perfection for the Received Text. We entertain no extravagant notions on this subject. Again and again we shall have occasion to point out (eg. at pg. 107) that the Textus Receptus needs correction." [The Revision Revised, p. 21, note 3; italics his].
Last edited by wackzingo on Thu Jan 18, 2007 12:29 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by wackzingo »

Dusty,

Again I will admit I was wrong, but your article is still misleading.

Let me correct my first point. Below is what I first wrote with what is being corrected in red:
You begin making the case that the two family--A & B are in “two camps”. To support that you quote “two pre-eminent scholars in favour of each family”(emphasis mine):


It is often said that the differences between these two families are unimportant. Here are some initial observations about that claim. I will start by quoting two of the most pre-eminent scholars in favour of each family – i.e. Fenton John Anthony Hort (1828-1892) and John William Burgon (1813-1888). Hort was a leading member of the revision committee which produced the ‘Revised Version’ of the Bible in the late 19th Century. Hort said that, if the Christian Church were to replace one of these two manuscript families with the other, it would be so significant as to produce a whole “new period in Church history”.9 Likewise, but from a supporter of the other family, Burgon said the result would be a “seriously mutilated” text.10
This quote from Hort was not about family A but about the TR. The TR was vile and had serious errors and used would produce a whole “new period in Church history.”
This quote was not about the TR but about his own work. He was being criticized for making corrections which the TR had failed to correct. Those differences are in the range of around 5300. This "nearly 6000 errors" is actually referring to the variation between the TR and the New Greek texts which Westcott & Hort produced. Let me summarize this just in case someone doesn't understand what I'm saying.

Hort and Westcott looked at all the texts available to them. They didn't believe the texts were all that different. But through their textual criticism they believed that the best and most accurate choice of texts were the family B (ALEXANDRIAN TEXTS). From that family they produced a Greek Translation. This translation differed not from family A (Byzantine texts) in 5300+ places but from the TR (Textus Receptus). The TR is a modern Greek Translation of family A texts and The New Testament in the Original Greek is the Greek translation of Family B. This translation of family B is where we get the "nearly 6000" differences, but those differences are from the TR. Hort, seeing the great number of errors in the TR and attempting to correct them said as a result of his work "it is no doubt, a new period in church history".

This is where your article is misleading. Your article makes the reader believe that family A & B differ in "nearly 6000" places. This is not correct. Only the two modern Greek Translations differ in nearly 5300 places. The battle isn't whether or not we need to choose between family A or family B but rather shall we trust the TR or The New Testament in the Original Greek. We know that both scholars agreed that the TR had errors. And we also know that almost all complaints about Hort's text comes from those who compare it to the TR.

I honestly would like to know if there is anyone who has attacked Hort's Character other than those who are devout believers that the KJV is God's only true English translation. I haven't been able to find any.
Last edited by wackzingo on Thu Jan 18, 2007 12:30 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Dusty »

Hiya Zach.

Thanks for your latest postings. I appreciate the correction in your last (and the deletion of its predecessor!), but the correction doesn't actually change the core issues. I can 100% assure you that almost every significant point you raise in it (as well as in the two postings with which you preceded it) is mistaken – and hence that your overall position is in error.

I genuinely want to save you the embarrassment of having these errors publicly documented, so I think it would be right to continue holding off answering those matters until first thing Saturday, DV. This should give you ample time to realize, for instance, that the TR is virtually indistinguishable from the great bulk of family A manuscripts (which is one of the very reasons it is called the “Received Text”), and that your viewpoint is therefore fundamentally flawed.

In the meantime, I notice that you are unhappy with the way I am replying to your comments. Since you are apparently having some difficulty understanding why it is indeed important for me to prove your points mistaken, let me explain my rationale:

(1) I want to encourage you to check your facts in future, as this will improve the quality and effectiveness of the thread. Offering false or confused statements which are easily corrected by a modicum of research simply obfuscates matters and, I fear, wastes everybody’s time :shock:

(2) Many of the points that I’m disproving are absolutely central to your rejection of my articles. If your overall viewpoint hinges on certain notions, and if I then prove these notions wrong, I was hoping you’d have the wisdom to see that you need to reconsider your basic position :?

(3) If you are wrong on a non-negligible point but have trouble admitting it unless I spell it out in detail, then I feel obliged, for your own spiritual welfare, to do precisely that. A Christian's reputation is needlessly damaged if they wriggle instead of owning up to their error :cry:

Zach, I am shocked by your second to last posting, for you indicate there that I’ve been wasting my time in trying to serve you. You suggest that, no matter what I say, you aren’t open to correction…

Even though I have alerted you to the fact that I am preparing to prove that most of your recent comments have been wrong, and even though you demonstrably have a poor track record of getting your facts right in this thread (5604 is NOT closer to 5000 than 6000!), you STILL say “I’ll go over what I wrote above but the only thing that will change would be the details”. In other words, no matter what information you unearth as you check your comments, and no matter how devastating that material proves to be to your arguments, you are categorically saying up front that you will refuse to change your position. I counsel you to read Proverbs 15 urgently!

For now, let me leave you with just one example of your need for more homework. I offer it to encourage you to become a bit more teachable: You have asked, in this thread, “What about the Dead Sea Scrolls?”, and I notice you have also now included a quote that refers to them, yet none of the Dead Sea Scrolls is known to contain ANY of the New Testament canon, so their mention is totally irrelevant to our present discussion.
wackzingo
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Post by wackzingo »

Hiya Zach.
I genuinely want to save you the embarrassment of having these errors publicly documented, so I think it would be right to continue holding off answering those matters until first thing Saturday, DV.
Don't think that I, nor anyone else actually believes you are waiting on me.
In the meantime, I notice that you are unhappy with the way I am replying to your comments.
No, this is not true.
Since you are apparently having some difficulty understanding why it is indeed important for me to prove your points mistaken, let me explain my rationale:
I only have difficulty understanding your motivation.
(3) If you are wrong on a non-negligible point but have trouble admitting it unless I spell it out in detail, then I feel obliged, for your own spiritual welfare, to do precisely that. A Christian's reputation is needlessly damaged if they wriggle instead of owning up to their error
Please spare me the notion that you actually care about my “spiritual welfare”.

Zach, I am shocked by your second to last posting, for you indicate there that I’ve been wasting my time in trying to serve you. You suggest that, no matter what I say, you aren’t open to correction…


That is not at all what I suggested. For everyone else’s understanding and yours especially I simply posted a statement that thanked Dusty and others for participating in this thread. I then said I would be stepping away from this discussion because from my own opinion neither of us was getting anywhere and it is only turning into each of us trying to convert the other people to our own position rather than honest discussion. I care far more about my relationship to with God and the study of His Word for personal application than I do about proving my point to someone.

Even though I have alerted you to the fact that I am preparing to prove that most of your recent comments have been wrong, and even though you demonstrably have a poor track record of getting your facts right in this thread (5604 is NOT closer to 5000 than 6000!), you STILL say “I’ll go over what I wrote above but the only thing that will change would be the details”.
There are many quote between 5100-5500 and occasionally some to 5900 as your footnotes mentioned.
Estimates usually vary between 5,300 and 5,900 changes. Waite counted 5,604 [D.A. Waite, Defending the King
James Bible, (The Bible For Today Press, 2004), p. 40].

In other words, no matter what information you unearth as you check your comments, and no matter how devastating that material proves to be to your arguments, you are categorically saying up front that you will refuse to change your position.
I hardly see “I’ll wait another 24 hours” as being devastating to my position. I reluctantly admitted I was wrong on one point because you obviously missed the entire point I was making.
I counsel you to read Proverbs 15 urgently!
I found the following to be more insightful and helpful for me and thus I will be ending this discussion depending on whether or not I need to respond to something directly. At the very least for the time being…

I Timothy 6:20
20O Timothy, guard that which is committed unto thee , turning away from the profane babblings and oppositions of the knowledge which is falsely so called; 21which some professing have erred concerning the faith. Grace be with you.

For now, let me leave you with just one example of your need for more homework. I offer it to encourage you to become a bit more teachable: You have asked, in this thread, “What about the Dead Sea Scrolls?”, and I notice you have also now included a quote that refers to them, yet none of the Dead Sea Scrolls is known to contain ANY of the New Testament canon, so their mention is totally irrelevant to our present discussion.
Again you show that you are more interested in pointing out error than honest discussion. I only brought up the Dead Sea Scrolls once because what we once new about certain documents have been changed drastically by recent finds in documents. Things we once thought about the old testament were not 100% accurate as we now see by the Dead Sea Scrolls. Your article talks about the TR (covered as the entire family A). I bring up this information to show that we have many more texts available to us today whether it’s because of new finds or because of technology which allows us to see more in one week than previously in a lifetime. I was wanting to find out how you felt about the newly discovered texts that changed the way we once thought about particular documents.

As for the recent quote, that is ridiculous. I can’t believe you missed the point. I was pointing out that Hort was right in saying a new period in church History is beginning. Look at the difference between the KJV based off of the TR and modern translations based more on Hort’s work (although not completely). So I quoted a section from the wikipedia showing that the KJV is based off of the TR. In that very large quote it happens to mention the Dead Sea Scrolls as an example of newer finds in manuscripts.

Dusty, do me favor and humor me and answer this question even if you don’t think it has anything to do with the discussion.

Do you believe the KJV is God’s only preserved Word in the English language?
jimbaum
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Post by jimbaum »

Everybody should talk nice and be motivated by love.

Even me...

Jim
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Post by Dusty »

Hiya Zach. Thanks for your latest.

I'm very sorry my posts have caused you to get so upset. I am genuinely trying hard to write timely, accurate, documented, reasoned and (hopefully) gracious posts that stay relevant to the two reasons you cited towards the start of this discussion for rejecting the entirety of Parts 2a and 2b in my series of articles. After all, these articles are surely the very point of this particular thread. To be honest, it doesn't help hugely when you jump around to other issues before we have had a chance to work through this pivotal matter. Doing so inevitably obscures an already somewhat involved question, such that even my own ministry partner is having difficulty following the debate.

As I say, I shall reply more fully to your postings first thing tomorrow your time, DV. Every blessing, D
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