King James Onlyism?

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What do you guys think about this Protestant movement? It’s mostly found among the Fundamentalist Baptists but apparently also among some traditionalist Anglican and Methodist groups as well as among some Mormons. They believe the KJV Bible is the only true English Bible and that all other English Bibles are fundamentally corrupt, they often argue the superiority of the textus receptus tradition over other textual traditions of the Bible.
 
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There’s a lot of wackadoo nonsense in the KJV-Only movement, such as the more fringe elements believing that the KJV has, by the providence of God, superseded even the Greek and Hebrew manuscripts.

I think the only good thing that is tangentially connected to some of the subsidiary controversies is that some scholarly interest was maintained in the Byzantine text type, which serves as the basis of the KJV and also Eastern Christian (EC, EO, OO) scriptures.
 
A point to refute that doctrine cannot develop perhaps? Since this movement by itself seems like a doctrine in itself.
 
There is a joke I was told by an American exegete:

A KJV Onlyist walks into a religious bookshop.

The shopkeeper asks him what he’s looking for.
“The original text of the New Testament”, he replies.
“Oh, I’m very sorry, we’ve just sold our last copy of the Greek Nestle-Aland, 28th edition.”
“Really? Have they even translated it into Greek now?”
 
They’re not all the same, but even so, I think their position is ridiculous. Followers of Peter Ruckman think that the KJV is better than the original manuscripts penned by Paul (he’s just one example, but they believe it’s better than all of the original writings). I am worried that KJV onlyists may be making the KJV into an idol. They get very nasty when they are challenged to prove something and they regularly engage in ad-hominem attacks.

To make a long story short, I am not a fan of what they believe, but I suspect that they are still my brothers and sisters in Christ, so I love them by default.
 
OddBird said:
“Really? Have they even translated it into Greek now?”
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In 1941-42 the BBC broadcast a 12-part drama series, The Man Born to be King, an adaption for radio of the Gospels, written by Dorothy L. Sayers. Years later, when I was at school in London, there were one or two teachers who were old enough to remember the stir it caused. Because of the accusations of blasphemy, the name of the actor who played Jesus had been kept secret at the time, for his own protection. It also became clear that many of the people protesting were evidently convinced that the Authorised Version (as the KJV was generally known at the time) was the original text of the Bible, meaning that it was also blasphemous to paraphrase the Gospels in modern English.

 
There are different groups here:
  1. Those who think KJV the best, most inspiring to read, English translation.
  2. Those who, for different reasons, think it’s the only true accurate English translation.
  3. Those who think it’s not a translation at all, that the text was in the mind of God from all time. The Hebrew and Greek manuscripts are a human translation.
#3, no comment. Re: #1, Chesterton said that while the modern translators had a better knowledge of Greek and Hebrew, the KJV translators had a better knowledge of English.

To its “credit”, the New American Bible will never be idolized, rarely be memorized by anyone.
 
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There is a similar subset in the Catholic Church, called the Douay–Rheims only movement, which has similar views of the Douay Rheims Bible as the only valid translation. It was actually discussed on Tumblar House

 
I love those plays. No need to wait for them to come to the theater; they make for great reading on their own. As for KJV only? I know a few people who subscribe to that position; we pray for each other and keep our focus away from arguments about translation when discussing the Bible. They are serious Bible readers and have memorized many of their favorite parts and are surprised to discover that a non-KJV friend also reads and refers to Sacred Scripture. My goal is to keep the door open.
 
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You have a number of different threads that argue for KJV Onlyism. Some try to argue that it relies upon a superior textual tradition, others say that it is a superior translation into the English language, others that the translators were inspired by the Holy Spirit in their translation work. I am sure there are other positions than these. Ultimately though I think it just comes down to one thing, this is my tradition and I hold it sacred. It is a fringe movement. I don’t find that it holds an intellectually rigorous position that can be defended outside of its bubble of adherents.

Interestingly, you also see this mindset at work in people who hold a similar view of the Latin Vulgate or Vulgate based translations.
 
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It was a real wrench for me at my conversion to stop using the KJV because it is so beautiful and so many of its phrases are part of everyday English even among people who don’t use it.

But… it was skilfully crafted by Protestants with Protestant theology in mind and it can sometimes be quite insidious.
 
We used the Good News Bible for GCSE, but for A-level we had to use either the New Revised Standard Version or the New Jerusalem Bible. I guess that tells you that the Good News Bible is aimed roughly at the reading ability of an average 16-year-old at most.

(My guess is the New Jerusalem Bible was a prescribed translation partly because the standard textbooks for the biblical papers were written by the general editor of the New Jerusalem Bible. I guess also because a relatively large proportion of entries for A-level were probably from Catholic schools.)
 
True story: a guy in my A-level English literature class told the teacher that he hadn’t been able to do his homework because he hadn’t finished translating King Lear into English. He got straight A’s and a place at Warwick, though to read business studies, not English!
 
White_Tree said:
I think it’s hilarious to assume that any translation is the only authentic or authoritative version of a book
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Not sure it is that hilarious, for some would cite in same fashion the assumption of only one “authentic or authoritative version” of church.
 
Though, by my memory and experience, there was once a time when the KJV was no problem at all. Esp. if one had a father who was a Baptist Sunday School teacher and had a chunky religious library.
 
Yep. My one and only.

I recall that we (mom and kids) gave him a set of the Interpreter’s Bible for Christmas one year.

The adult SS class he taught for almost 30 years would give him a little Christmas present each year (a check) for his services. Which he would use to buy (wait for it)…religious types of books. Used to take me to the store when he did so.
 
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