The Vatican behind the proliferation of Bibles?

Haven't seen any more about new revelations about the modern Bibles from Chris Pinto but on his radio show for March 19th he remarks that he believes all the new Bibles are part of a plan to make the true Bible unrecognizable (he says this in a short section of the program from about 2:40 to about 7:30). He attributes the plan to the Vatican. If he has specific evidence about efforts in this direction I'd love to hear it, but I'm already convinced something destructive of the Bible and of the Church is going on -- although I usually don't attribute it to a conspiracy.

It may well be the case, however: Pinto has recently convinced me of other conspiracies that are certainly taking us to a New World Order and the rule of Antichrist, so why not this too?

Some think the aim of the new Bibles is to deceive people with particular New Age translations. He on the other hand thinks the plan is to progressively make the Bible more and more a paraphrase. That may be so but it seems to me that the simple fact of having so many different Bibles has already achieved the aim of destroying the Bible for many, because already we have a babel of tongues created in the churches by the use of many different "translations" even in one congregation.

Beyond that, some of the translations do insinuate an altered message into the minds of readers. Where did I recently see the statistic that 34% of Christians use the NIV, probably the worst of the false Bibles out there, so bad that almost every church I've been in has warned against it, even though they have no problem with many of the other translations.

So I was glad to hear this from Chris Pinto and I hope he does have some inside information on the creation of these bogus Bibles that I'll eventually get to hear.

Upcoming Revelations about Westcott and Hort from Chris Pinto?

Chris Pinto, whose revelations of the -- organized intentional sophisticated -- satanic/pagan underpinnings of just about everything in the world have been knocking the wind out of me for a few weeks now, gave a hint recently that one of his upcoming projects is going to cast the same kind of light on our Bibles. Westcott and Hort I'm guessing. I keep away from the usual accusations of W&H as occultists and so on because I just don't have access to the necessary evidence (and neither do some who don't let that bother them but make the accusation anyway). I'm content to point out what W&H did to the Bible, which is indictment enough of evil intentions.

But when Pinto does research his research sticks. He leaves no stone unturned. It appears that he actually reads through voluminous documents that most just wouldn't take the time for, being content to find a few relevant quotes here and there instead. He gets questions answered that it hadn't even occurred to you to ask. He gets deeply into the lives of the people involved, tracks down any likely affiliation. He finds connections that take him all over the world and far down history. He musters representatives of both sides of the argument and you end up with NO doubt that all kinds of stuff you felt uneasy about but couldn't really pin down has literal intentional Satanic roots. Satan truly is the "prince of this world" in a far more literal sense than we usually let ourselves suspect, and just about ubiquitous too, with his hand in just about *everything.* So if Pinto calls out Westcott and Hort for such affiliations I won't be a bit surprised and I'm looking forward to the revelations.

Read Burgon

Quotes against Westcott and Hort from scholars of their time

INVENTION UPON IMAGINATION UPON CONJECTURE: Prebendary Scrivener, assessing the textual theory of Westcott and Hort that defends the use of the Alexandrian Greek texts in the revision of 1881:

1) There is little hope for the stability of their imposing structure, if its foundations have been laid on the sandy ground of ingenious conjecture. And, since barely the smallest vetige of historical evidence has ever been alleged in support of the views of those accomplished Editors, their teaching must either be received as intuitively true, or dismissed from our consideration as precarious and even visionary.

2) Dr. Hort's System is entirely destitute of historical foundation.

3) We are compelled to repeat as emphatically as ever our strong conviction that the Hypothesis to whose proof he has devoted so many laborious years, is destitute not only of historical foundation, but of all probability...

4) "We cannot doubt" (says Dr. Hort) "that S. Luke 23:34 comes from an extraneous source." Nor can we, on our part, doubt, (rejoins Dr. Scrivener) that the System which entails such consequences is hopelessly self-condemned. [quoted in Burgon's Revision Revised as the frontispiece, from Scrivener's "Plain Introduction, 1882 edition].

The "System" he is talking about is the same reasoning that is now enshrined as Text Critical gospel in such ideas as that the texts underlying the KJV were "conflated," which is an idea they made up in order to support the other ideas they made up, such as that the Alexandrian texts they favored were closer to the original [Burgon denounces them as corrupted], and, to explain how it is that it wasn't the Alexandrian texts that got passed down through the centuries, but the texts that fed into the Textus Receptus, they added the further ingenious conjecture that eminent leaders of the early churches must have gotten together to decide on the text that came down to the translators of the KJV, now called the Textus Receptus, which ingenious conjecture was treated as fact by them. [Burgon has a lengthy section in Revision Revised demonstrating the utter stupidity of such a conjecture for supporting W&H's ideas, and showing how in fact if it were true it would demonstrate the authenticity of the Textus Receptus instead]. There isn't a shred of support for their insane historical fantasy/theory, it is all "ingenious conjecture" as Scrivener says. But over and over on Christian radio I hear otherwise good preachers reject the KJV's choice of a word ON THE VERY BASIS OF HORT'S insane purely imaginary theory.*

Bishop Wordsworth, another of their contemporaries, commenting on the English translation of the Westcott and Hort revision:

CHANGE FOR CHANGE'S SAKE:

I fear that we must say in candour that in the Revised Version we meet in every page with small changes, which are vexatious, teasing and irritating, even the more so because they are small; which seem almost to be made for the sake of change . . . .

[The question arises,] -- Whether the Church of England, ---, which ... sanctioned a Revision of her Authorized Version under the express condition ... that no Changes should be made in it except what were absolutely necessary, could consistently accept a Version in which 36,000 changes have been made; not a fiftieth of which can be shown to be needed, or even desirable. -- Bishop Wordsworth, Address to Lincoln Diocesan Conference (quoted in Revision Revised, p. 368)

Just as I hear good preachers on the radio rationalize preferring a false word based on the 1881 fraud over the KJV's, I also cringe abd groan over the multitude of UNNECESSARY WORD SUBSTITUTIONS I hear in every quoted portion of scripture that comes from one of the modern versions.

But hey, it's supposed to be just WONDERFUL that we have all these OPTIONS. Who needs a standardized Bible anyway, that all English-speaking people could share with each other without stumbling, could memorize and trust? Who cares that centuries of English preaching not to mention literature of all sorts QUOTE THE KJV where these idiotic substitutions now reign in its place and make a confused wreck of English history? Who cares that language has been trashed like this? Who cares that the Bible has been turned into a Babel of awkward phrasing and meaningless word downgrades anyway?

Excuse me while I scream and tear out my hair.

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After that rant I realize I have to add, to make it clear again, that I AM NOT IN FAVOR OF KEEPING THE KJV AS OUR STANDARD JUST AS IT IS. THERE NEEDS TO BE AN UPDATING OF SOME OF ITS LANGUAGE AND A REVISION OF SOME OF ITS ERRORS, which they COULD have done in 1881 but didn't. I've been wondering if perhaps Scrivener detailed what he thought were the NEEDED CORRECTIONS to the KJV in the 1881 revision because that might be the place to start. The revision that is needed would be as conservative as the revision of 1881 was supposed to be. It would respect the historical value of the KJV and not affect the best known of the KJV's expressions unless there is some absolutely compelling need for such a change. There would not be anything like 36,000 changes, probably less than a tenth of that many, even only a fiftieth if Bishop Wordsworth is correct, in the revision that is still needed. And the Alexandrian texts would have no part in it but go back to the wastebasket to be burned where Tischendorf found one of them anyway. And of course all the modern versions that have built upon Westcott and Hort need to be retired.

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* I've been getting the impression for some time now that we might as well think of the 19th century as the century of fantasy being taken for theory. That's what Darwinianism is -- just pure conjecture off the top of his head that is now enshrined as fact, and that's what Marxism is too, utterly out of touch with reality but the darling of way too many who think of themselves as scholarly, intellectual and compassionate. Same with Westcott and Hort, who were true to the mindset of the 19th century when they concocted their view of textual criticism and the history of the texts out of hot air, based only on their feelings about it and the one and only fact that the Alexandrian texts happen to be older copies, and somehow it's now THE scholarly position and the ENTIRE CHURCH follows them, with few exceptions.

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This post is intended to be a reminder of the theme of this blog since I haven't been getting to it lately. These quotes alone ought to alert anyone who is half awake that there is something very very wrong with today's W&H-contaminated Bibles.

When I can get to it I want to add some quotes from Burgon I've also posted elsewhere, showing the corruption of the Alexandrian texts.

Conspiracy Thinking or actual tampering with scripture by early heretics?

I once mentioned Burgon to a pastor who responded that Burgon was a conspiracy thinker. I don't think he'd ever read anything of Burgon's but he had that idea about him from somewhere.

The accusation no doubt comes from the fact that Burgon did attribute some of the errors in the Alexandrian manuscripts to tampering by heretics in the early centuries of the church. He also made it clear that this was the consensus of others besides himself, and he documented the reasons for thinking this, including the fact that some of the early fathers specifically testify of those they knew to have altered the texts of scripture to suit their heretical views. This is no mere supposition of a conspiracy, but something known to have occurred.

Edward Hills in his book The King James Version Defended reports that the story of the woman taken in adultery whom Jesus forgave was left out of some early manuscripts by some who objected to it on moral grounds, as condoning adultery, and gives much evidence that this actually occurred. He also shows in the case of the last twelve verses of Mark -- another passage that is omitted from those Greek texts preferred today by those under the spell of Westcott and Hort -- a strong likelihood of its having been eliminated by early followers of Docetism (the heretical doctrine (associated with the Gnostics) that Jesus had no human body and his sufferings and death on the cross were apparent rather than real).

The arguments for these historical occurrences take up many pages in both Hills and Burgon and gleaning the most pertinent quotes for my blog is beyond me at the moment, so this has to be just another post strongly recommending that these arguments be read, though I'd like to come back and give some more information if I can.

READ BURGON!

READ HILLS!

READ CLOUD TOO!

These are the ones who have the evidence and the right perspective, not White, not Wallace, not any of the rest of the defenders of the modern versions.

Burgon's Revision Revised OUGHT to set the terms of the debate

It continues to puzzle me how it could ever have happened that the Westcott and Hort production of 1881 came to have such influence in the churches -- of course it was first accepted in the seminaries and then later by the churches, but I have the same question about that --how? What sort of blindness led so many to accept it?

Most discussions of Bible transmission and reliability assume the validity of their work; the anti-KJV-only literature also assumes the validity of their work. Westcott and Hort's Greek text is not used in its totality any more but is accepted at least to the extent of forming part of the Critical Texts in use today, such as Nestle-Aland. Even their textual theory with its purely invented claim of "conflation" in the Textus Receptus is taken seriously, and much of their English translation even continues to be carried over in subsequent translations.

After reading Burgon this all strikes me as such a dreadful mistake I mourn for the churches. I can't help thinking that if Burgon's work had been made generally known from the beginning this could not have happened. Hardly anyone reads Burgon now -- he's become pretty much the property of KJV-onlyism and few others read him. He gets footnotes in just about every discussion of Bible translation and transmission but an actual quote from his Revision Revised is a very rare find, let alone a discussion of anything he said.

Was it also the case at the beginning that Burgon was simply ignored? What happened back then? How did all that prodigious work of Burgon's get so utterly and completely buried and forgotten? Was it that the propaganda about the 1881 Revision managed to get itself falsely disseminated as the legitimate updating of the KJV it was supposed to be but never was, simply bypassing such criticism as Burgon's?

I can't help thinking that so many great men of the church who have accepted the Westcott and Hort position can't have read Burgon, such as B B Warfield, J Gresham Machen, John Warwick Montgomery, James I Packer, R C Sproul, John MacArthur and John Piper. How was it first presented to them? As above I suppose, as the legitimate updating it was supposed to be but wasn't, bypassing the criticism as if it didn't even exist. Only the one voice was heard in other words. I can only guess that must have been the case.

So is it that the horrific errors and stupidities of Westcott and Hort are unknown because nobody reads Burgon? Or, depressing thought, is it that they have read him and decided against him in favor of Westcott and Hort? In that case I would have to have a very bad opinion of their judgment, which I'd rather not have. But in either case I'd like to know what really happened, how it came about as it did.

The Bible Versions debate that has raged for a few decades now is miscast, it seems to me, it gets fought around the fringes of what's really important. Somehow from the anti-KJV-only side the debate has been cast in Westcott and Hort's own terms. They have been made the standard, simply assumed, not open to question. Burgon's work should set the standard. He should be the one who has to be answered, he should be the one whose thinking defines the terms of the debate.

As I understand it, KJV-onlyism rose up in reaction against the early uncritical acceptance of the translations that followed on the Westcott and Hort production, and skewed the focus of the debate in the wrong direction from that time on. It became a doctrinal war when it really ought to be recognized as primarily a problem of scholarship. Of course there are doctrinal issues involved but Burgon's arguments are focused on the bad scholarship of the revising committee of 1881, on their superstitious and irrational judgment of the Greek texts, their reliance on pure speculation and assumption instead of evidence, their inadequate understanding of both Greek and English, and on and on.

To read Burgon is to become acquainted with a man of careful scholarship who DOES rely on evidence and put in prodigious work mustering his evidence, but also a man of solid biblical spirituality whose judgments come across as trustworthy in a way his opponents' simply do not. He SHOWS the Westcott and Hort textual decisions, English decisions and insane Theory to be unworthy of anyone's consideration. He PROVES it.

Yet that very Westcott and Hort Trojan Horse of incompetence, bad judgment, literary philistinism and spiritual obtuseness is what is now dominating our English Bibles, while the debate rages on about a hundred irrelevancies or at least secondary issues instead.

How I wish I had the ability to do this subject justice.

Doulos -- Wrongly translated by ALL the English Versions but one?

This isn't going to be a well-researched post, just off the top of my head, so I may have to eat some of it later, you never know.

Heard part of an interview with John MacArthur on Christian radio recently, about a new book of his titled Slave -- first time I'd heard of it -- in which he apparently goes into great detail about this particular Greek word doulos that is translated "servant" in all our English Bibles (but one I'll get to), but which he insists should have been translated "slave." He seems to believe that a great deal of modern theological error that has Jesus being at OUR beck and call rather than we being at His, might never have developed if this word had been properly translated "slave." It's an interesting point.

Of course there is a technical side to this that I am not in a position to judge. I looked up the word in Burgon's Revision Revised to see if he had anything to say about it, and found him mentioning it in a paragraph about many Greek words the 1881 Revisionists had glossed with marginal notes, in the case of doulos notes that point out that it means "bondservant" although apparently in the text they had rendered it "servant" in keeping with the King James. Burgon's comment in effect was that there was no need to bother the reader with such an obvious piece of information, which implies that he thought the implication of "bondservant" quite apparent in the term "servant" already.

And perhaps it was more apparent in the English-speaking mind then than to us today, that's a historical and linguistic question, but now it doesn't carry that connotation so clearly. A servant now is someone who is hired, paid money for his work to spend as he sees fit, and independent of the employer when off duty; but a slave, and I think also a bondservant, is bought, not hired, and always at the command of the owner.

Perhaps Burgon had this in mind as attaching to the word "servant" but I don't know. In any case, John MacArthur makes some very good points in favor of the word "slave" since we are told in scripture we were "bought at a price" and are OWNED by our Lord Jesus, not merely hired by Him, and certainly we don't tell Him what to do but we are always to be like good slaves (or servants) who "wait upon" our Lord to understand His command and execute it promptly.

MacArthur is certainly right that Christians don't often live as if this were the case, but instead pray for Him to do OUR bidding more often than not rather than waiting upon HIS will. And there is this horrible contemporary theology that has sprung up that describes the Christian life as trusting Jesus to take care of what WE want and what WE think we need, to make our lives happy, improve our marriages and our finances and so on, that even objects to the idea that we are to submit to Jesus as Lord, and makes Him into our servant. I do think that this ought to be clear enough from scripture apart from however the term doulos is to be translated, but it's always good to hear this way of thinking put down and John MacArthur is always good at doing this sort of thing.

SO. Perhaps doulos would be clearer if translated "slave," if only because "servant" may have lost in our time important connotations of absolute submission to the Lord that it used to have, and perhaps that is one to put on the list for the revision of the King James I keep wanting to happen but suspect won't.

MacArthur says there is only one English Bible version that translates doulos as "slave" and that is the Holman Bible. He calls it a "wonderful" translation but it would have to have a lot more going for it than merely getting one word righter than other translations for me to consider it.