why are there are several verses missing from the niv bible?

There are many manuscripts that people use to translate the Bible. It seems that some of the better manuscripts do not have this verse so they omitted it in the NIV. It doesn't make an NIV invalid because the main message of the Bible is unchanged. This is why most Bible scholars rely upon a variety of Bibles and also concordances so they can research the original Hebrew and Greek also.

The first answer is correct - though very terse.

Very brief history:

a - New Testament Bible documents written in Greek

b - over the following centuries, a few additions are made to those documents (unauthentic verses added by someone other than the authors centuries after the authors had died)

c - someone assigns verse numbers to the Greek New Testament in the 1500s - and he assigns verse numbers to all of the verses, both authentic and unauthentic, because he doesn't know that some verses have been added over the centuries. This verse numbering system becomes the standard.

d - the KJV New Testamenat is translated from those Greek documents - again, including the unauthentic verses because the translators did not realize that verses had been added over the centuries

e - in the 1800s, scholars discover - by comparing hundreds of copies of the Greek New Testament - that several verses have been added (those verses don't appear in *any* of the oldest copies, and instead begin appearing in copies only centuries after the authors had died).

f - Because of the discovery made in [e], beginning in the late 1800s scholars start producing Bibles that do not include those unauthentic verses. They still use the standard verse numbering system, though - so, when they do not include an unauthentic verse, they also do not include the verse number. This makes it seems to someone who doesn't know better that the verse is missing - but, instead, what is true is that the verse was never part of the original Bible document, and it is omitted because it does not actually belong in the Bible.

- Jim, http://www.bibleselector.com/

Some who embrace the King James Version as their bible of choice object to the NIV (and often to all other recent translations). They maintain that the NIV has "changed" or "removed" certain verses. That, of course, is based upon the unproven assumption that the four-century-old King James has the best textual sources.

That line of thinking completely overlooks the fact that recent Bible translations, like the NIV, have all the same manuscripts the King James translators used, plus many other helpful manuscript discoveries since the KJV was published.

Some King-James-only people claim that the NIV has altered verses to diminish the proof of the deity of Jesus. I have studied that topic out at great length for decades. I can without hesitation assert that the NIV does a BETTER job proving the deity of Jesus Christ than the King James does.

There are more than 200 verses missing from the NIV, plus over 6000 changes. An example of what is missing: Acts 8:37.

The NIV has been derived from the corrupt Alexandrian manuscripts. There is evidence that all of these verses existed before Vaticanus and Sinaicus but liberal theologians have chose to ignore that evidence.

Here are just a few examples of what has been changed....

1) "Miracles" has been changed to "signs" 20 places

2) "Master" has been changed to "teacher"

3) "Sodomite" has been changed to "temple prostitute" 4 places

4) "Worship" has been changed to "bow down" only when refering to Jesus Christ but left "worship" when refering to Satan, devils, beast and idolatry

5) "Hell", which appeared 54 times in the KJV, appears in the modern Bibles as few as 12 times.

Choose the KJV if you want God's true Word.

Because the manuscripts the NIV used are actually poor copies of ancient texts used in Egyptian churches and were copied quickly and words got lost. Two of the texts used disagree over 4,000 times in the gospels alone.

The KJV used a pure text known as the Textus Recptus and that was the traditional text used by true Christians back to the apostles. That text did not remove any words and was carefully translated with the work of over 500 men over the decades. The text was the only acceptable text for use of translating the KJV as they rejected the texts used for the NIV because of the missing words.

This is an answer I gave to another asking about which Bible translations are the best to read. In part it applies to your question as well. I hope it will be beneficial to you.

My friend I tell you truthfully ... the KJV and the NKJ versions are taken from the Majority Text and Textus Receptus which make them the closest to the original literal writings. Here is an answer I gave to another asking about translations. Hope this helps.

All your other modern translations are from the manuscripts taken from Alexandria, Egypt, which are only partial manuscripts. If you will notice when reading a Bible as footnotes it has LXX, M, MT, NU, TR. It's important to know what these mean and how it affects the reading and context of the Scripture.

LXX =Septuagint ... an ancient translation of the OT into Greek

M = Majority Text

MT = Masoretic Text ... the traditional Hebrew OT

NU = the eclectic Greek text in the twenty-sixth edition of the Nestle-Aland Greek NT (N) and in the third edition of the United Bible Societies' Greek NT (U)

TR = Textus Receptus or Received Text

Example of the difference in NKJV vs. NASB and NIV

Mark 16:9-20 9 Now when He rose early on the first day of the week, He appeared first to Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had cast seven demons. 10 She went and told those who had been with Him, as they mourned and wept. 11 And when they heard that He was alive and had been seen by her, they did not believe. 12 After that, He appeared in another form to two of them as they walked and went into the country. 13 And they went and told it to the rest, but they did not believe them either.14 Later He appeared to the eleven as they sat at the table; and He rebuked their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they did not believe those who had seen Him after He had risen. 15 And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. 16 He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned. 17 And these signs will follow those who believe: In My name they will cast out demons; they will speak with new tongues; 18 they will take up serpents; and if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.”19 So then, after the Lord had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God. 20 And they went out and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word through the accompanying signs. Amen.

These verses are NOT accepted by NASB or NIV. These are not the only passages that have been thrown out or discarded. Pay attention when you read your Bible and pick up on the subtleties that the translators have made with God's Word.

99% of all the manuscripts accept verses 9-20.

18,000 manuscripts have all.

8,000 manuscripts from Latin have them (all but one).

1,000 Syrian manuscripts have them (all but one).

All coptic have them (but one).

KJV and NKJV are the best literal translations. This is why I use the NKJV and also because it's in modern day English. The translators of the NKJV have corrected the "errors" errors in the sense that Old English words are outdated or mean others things than what we perceive them to be. The only advantage the KJV has over the NKJV is that is has more helps because of the Old English.

May I suggest that you purchase a Strong's Exhaustive Concordance and a Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words Unabridged Edition these will help you in your word studies to get the author's intention.

They're not missing. They were actually added to the manuscripts that the KJV was translated from.

There are several books missing from the bible. For example "book of Thomas". "Book of Mary". And many others. The early Christians left them out of the bible because it tell them what they wanted to hear.

Why the heck did they initiate the move for another version in the first place, they were not happy with the rest that was there already.

Oh I forgot that "they" does not mean God.