Please explain this statement: 'If it ain't King James, it ain't the Bible.'?

A lot of people just feel that since the King James version was good enough for the Apostle Paul, it should be good enough for us today.

:-) I'm kidding, of course...but only slightly. There are people who really do believe that God wrote a divinely-inspired English translation, and that all other versions are part of a conspiracy to alter the meaning of the scriptures. I have even heard it asserted that since the KJV is divinely inspired, all foreign-language translations of the Bible should be based upon it--I wish I could tell you I was making that up, but I'm not.

The reason many people have been resistant of other translations is because people associated them with liberal theology and attempts to water down the basics of Christianity by "changing" the Bible. They would see that certain words were missing or that the meaning of a verse was altered here or there---often in rather inconsequential ways--and they would be alarmed. They would often conclude that this was an effort to corrupt established Bible doctrines, not realizing that there is more than one set of manuscript evidence, and that not all of the current manuscript compilations agree word-for-word with one another.

Then, along came "paraphrases", and versions which actually did seem to be taking way too many liberties in interpreting the meaning of the scriptures. Some versions would, in an attempt to elucidate the scriptures, end up dumbing-down the vocabulary to an extent that seemed excessive. People were naturally leery of these as well.

No matter what people choose to believe, there are good translations out there that attempt to closely reflect the meaning of the available renditions of the manuscripts--but they don't all exactly agree word-for-word, and some people are simply not willing to deal with any margin of ambiguity. The truth is that all translations are going to reflect, to some extent, the views of the translators.

The King James version is a very good translation--I use it myself, but it is not perfect (no translation is). It uses words that are now obsolete and words whose meanings have changed over the years. Furthermore, we now know the meaning of some of the words and even grammatical forms in the manuscripts that were not known at the time of the KJV translation. There are times when one thinks he knows what a verse means in the KJV when it actually meant something else do to these factors. Comparing verses in the KJV with other good translations like the American Standard Version or the English Standard Version can help clear these issues up and lead to more reponsible Biblical scholarship.

It is not Valid. King James is just a translation. Some people believe that this is how they talked in ancient times, "Thou, Thee, Thy" This was just considered proper English during the 1500s-1600s.

Jesus never had the opportunity to read the scriptures from the King James translation. So why would this be considered the real Bible?

You could, and probably have, seen extensive research on this. The way I would put in a nutshell the controversy is that it has to do with how the "source documents" are to be handled.

The source documents on which the KJV is based are considered by the King James folk to be the most reliable...they like the way the texts were interpreted, translated, handled, transmitted through the years...and so on.

Other source documents, and later scholarship, are discounted in value in their view, and highly suspect...either due to a Catholic bent, or due to some inclusions or exclusions that they feel are not warranted.

Why the "aura" of authenticity is so linked to a version that also has its own weaknesses....that is the mystery to me...

And I often wonder if folk of a language or native tongue other than english have such squabbles...I hope not !

If you still have questions, there is much material written on the origins of the Bible texts that would take years to read...my own personal response has been to read KJV when around such believers, and to read my own favorite translations, or versions...when they are not around. Shalom to all who love the LORD !

The King James Version is only ONE translation of the Bible. Furthermore, it doesn't even have God's name Jehovah where it should be. If its at Psalms 83:18, Why is it not in all the other places??

It is just their opinions. They do not believe in the other translations.

I do not hold with this opinion. We need the other translations so we can compare them to each other so we can understand what it being said better.

It is really stupid because the very Bible Scholars

who said this have themselves studied the bible and have found written it down for themselves to understand better from their findings so why is it bad for people to share their notes on what a scripture says in another format translation of the Bible for those who do not know how to study the bible. It is just a lot of secret society stuff.

God's word needs to go out in a format that all can understand. God is for progress. It is men wanting to be the only ones that know anything.

I hate that kind of stuff.

It's not valid of course. But the KJV played a *huge* role in the past. People came to consider it the true word of God, rather than just a translation. It's been hard to accept that it might be flawed....and maybe not even the best.

Funny thing is, the KJV had footnotes, listing alternative translations.

EDIT: According to this, http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/5951/KJVOnly... the footnotes were remove in later versions.

No other Bible has been tested by any worthy means. The KJV was translated under the scrutiny of a King. I have compared all others and they leave things out or the word choices are weak. God was also smart to guide its translation at the time of Shakespeare plays. What does that have to do with anything? Every high school in America and most English speaking countries teach Shakespeare where as the Bible is tossed out of schools. If you can read a Shakespeare play and understand it then you can read the KJV Bible and understand it. Pretty smart God I would say

The followers of John Wycliffe undertook the first complete English translations of the Christian scriptures in the 15th century. These translations were banned in 1409 due to their association with the Lollards.[10] The Wycliffe Bible pre-dated the printing press but was circulated very widely in manuscript form, often inscribed with a date from before 1409 to avoid the legal ban. As the text translated in the various versions of the Wycliffe Bible was the Latin Vulgate, and as it contained no heterodox readings, there was in practice no way by which the ecclesiastical authorities could distinguish the banned version; and consequently many Catholic commentators of the 15th and 16th centuries (such as Thomas More) took these manuscript English bibles to represent an anonymous earlier orthodox translation.

In 1525, William Tyndale, an English contemporary of Luther, undertook a translation of the New Testament.[11] Tyndale's translation was the first printed Bible in English. Over the next ten years, Tyndale revised his New Testament in the light of rapidly advancing biblical scholarship, and embarked on a translation of the Old Testament.[12] Despite some controversial translation choices, the merits of Tyndale's work and prose style made his translation the ultimate basis for all subsequent renditions into Early Modern English.[13] With these translations lightly edited and adapted by Myles Coverdale, in 1539, Tyndale's New Testament and his incomplete work on the Old Testament became the basis for the Great Bible. This was the first "authorized version" issued by the Church of England during the reign of King Henry VIII.[14] When Mary I succeeded to the throne in 1553, she returned the Church of England to the communion of the Roman Catholic faith and many English religious reformers fled the country,[15] some establishing an English-speaking colony at Geneva. Under the leadership of John Calvin, Geneva became the chief international centre of Reformed Protestantism and Latin biblical scholarship.[16]

William Tyndale translated the New Testament into English in 1525.These English expatriates undertook a translation that became known as the Geneva Bible.[17] This translation, dated to 1560, was a revision of Tyndale's Bible and the Great Bible on the basis of the original languages.[18] Soon after Elizabeth I took the throne in 1558, the flaws of both the Great Bible and the Geneva Bible became painfully apparent.[19] In 1568, the Church of England responded with the Bishops' Bible - a revision of the Great Bible in the light of the Geneva version.[20] While officially approved, this new version failed to displace the Geneva translation as the most popular English Bible of the age - in part because the full Bible was only printed in lectern editions of prodigious size and at a cost of several pounds.[21] Accordingly, Elizabethan lay people overwhelmingly read the Bible in the Geneva Version - small editions were available at a relatively low cost. At the same time, there was a substantial clandestine importation of the rival Douay-Rheims New Testament of 1582, undertaken by exiled Roman Catholics. This translation, though still derived from Tyndale, claimed to represent the text of the Latin Vulgate.[22]

In May 1601, King James VI of Scotland attended the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland at St Columba's Church in Burntisland, Fife, at which proposals were put forward for a new translation of the Bible into English.[23] Two years later, he acceded to the throne of England as King James I of England.

People claim that this Version is the real version, for the reason it is popular among people.

I have never, nor will ever, say that King Jimmy's version is the ONLY correct version, or even a version worth reading. Contrary to our "learned" "tommiecat" and "theophilus", numerous Bible versions would stand more true than King Jimmy's, including the Revised Standard Version (RSV) and the Douay-Rheims Version, both Roman Catholic and much more complete than the abbreviated protestant versions. God, as in Jesus our Christ, Bless you.

King James version 1611 is the original transllated version from the Hebrew manuscripts..therefore people consider it as earliest and accurate version...