All Doves:
In my post, I somehow deleted a sentence in my notation about Rome rewarding one of the Westcott & Hort duo, the red hat of cardinal. It should have read, John Henry Newman, a colleague of Bishop Westcott and Dr. Hort, were leaders in the 'Oxford Movement' initially, however, Newman defected to Rome and took with him 150 Church of England pastors in defection, and thus was rewarded with the 'red hat' of a Catholic Cardinal.
Somehow, with my impaired vision I held down the backspace key too long in editing.
Another point I would suggest to the reader over the manuscripts used to translate the Authorized KJV Bible; while my post focused on three passages that preceded and dated by as much 150 years those used by Westcott & Hort, which confirmed and proved that the Textus Receptus to be oldest manuscripts for the Bible. We students of the Bible need to remember, there were between 5,300 and 5,500 existing copies of the Textus Receptus in use by 340 AD, a point that is never mentioned by Westcott & Hort fans.
Never lose sight of the fact that religious publishing is about profits, not prophets! There is no lucrative profits to be made or gained by pumping out KJV Bibles year after year. The reason for such is that the KJV has no copyright, which means no commissions for anyone quoting from the KJV Bible. Every other translation produces profits to their publishers and editorial committees.
Go into a Christian bookstore someday and compare the price of a leather-bound or imitation leather-bound KJV against a similar quality NIV or NRSV Bible. The price difference will surprise you if you have never given it a thought. It could vary by as much as $40. Nearly all, or most Christian book stores will recommend the higher priced Bible every time when asked what Bible should I consider? The new Christian is at a loss of what to buy when entering a bookstore and relies on the sales clerk or the manager. That vulnerability is at the bookstore's benefit. I know of what I speak. I was a store manager for the chain Family Christian Stores, with 281 stores in 261 cities, also once known as 'FBS'. Part of my training as a manager was to 'sell up' and away from the KJV Bible because we made more on a sale. I was expected to sell the NIV, which was owned by our corporate offices, headed up by Rupert Murdoch, who also published the 'Satanic Bible' as well. I was "tracked" as a manager for the 'ratio-spread' of Bible sales at my store.
The publishers make big bucks off the copyright aspect, and anytime an author quotes more than a short verse or two, they have to pay royalties to the Bible's copyright owner. But this really begs the larger issue, because the KJV is not copyrighted here in the States. Every new translation that comes out has a publisher's copyright built into the publishing process. The greater the sales volume of each new translation, the greater the coin in their pockets.
As I am typing this, I checked the 'CBD' web site to see how many different Bibles they have inventoried. The figure has jumped since I last quoted them. "CBD' stands for Christian Book Distributor, and they are the largest dealer of Christian "product" in the USA. This morning they listed 8,661 Bibles in their catalog. This number is mind-blowing but it is indicative of why new Bibles keep coming out like bunnies. Publishing Bibles is a profitable business to say the least. But it is even more lucrative if you are not publishing the KJV Bible. There are "nitch" Bibles for just about every segment you could ever imagine. Bibles are big business. If you are interested, the top three selling Bibles are:
1. NIV
2. NKJV
2, KJV
The above is based on $$dollar sales.
In terms of unit sales, the top selling Bibles are:
1. NIV
2. KJV
3. NKJV
The statistics for the variation in second and third place proves my point that I am making above. Folks, it is all about money. The money is made in publishing a Bible that earns lucrative profits for its publisher and its editorial committees and consulting theologians and professors. Why do you suppose the late Dr. D.J. Kennedy, with more degrees than I probably have in teeth, would lend his name to promote the 'dog' of the Geneva Bible. Even the Puritans and Pilgrims wanted a better translation. Dr. Kennedy knew that, but it didn't keep him from lending his name to its re-release a decade ago. He really got big bucks for his endorsement, but he didn't get much time to spend them as he died shortly there after.
It's all about the profits, not the prophets! I left my position as a store manager for Family Christian Stores because they began selling Roman Catholic product, despite the fact that there were Catholic bookstores in existence. As a store manager, I actually was promoting the New American Standard Bible, because it was a "word-for-word" translation and I considered it to be a better Bible for today's readers. The NASB and The Living Bible have been my favorites for as long as they have been published. That fact not withstanding, I always defer to the Textus Receptus (Masoretic Hebrew text/Antioch (Byzantine Stephanos Greek text) on textual matters of interpretation. The Textus Receptus are the only manuscripts that have been proven to be true mathematically through computer and scientific analysis. However, the theological community, religious and publishing world do not want that information out there to become widely known because of what it would do to their profits! Proving the KJV Bible by mathematics and computer science to be the True Word of God can only hurt the sales of new translations of the Bible, and greatly reduce the need for many theological academics.
The Westcott & Hort duo used manuscripts that were associated with the Alexandrian school in Egypt, from which the majority of the Gnostic writers originated or were located. They were 'johnny-come-latelies' and as I have noted in my posts on "God's Heptadic Design Feature", they do not bear the Signature of God, i.e. the use of "seven" as a metaphorical DNA. The History Channel, the Discovery Channel, A&E Channel, have given the Gnostic writers and the Alexandrian school a platform to showcase their spurious work. This began in the early 1990's as a concerted effort to undermine and discredit the KJV Bible. They regularly showcased scholars that were known atheists, and not even mainstream orthodox Christians. One such individual that comes to mind is John Shelby Spong, a retired Episcopal Bishop. There are others like Dr. Elaine Pagels, a professor at Princeton, a Harvard PhD, who is a major 'big-time' advocate of the Gnostic writings and feminist issues in the Sophia movement.
God bless,
Pastor Bob