Rating: 
Summary: Funny You Should Mention The Ruckman/White Debates...
Review: ...because it wasn't White that backed out.Read Ruckman's own words:
http://aomin.org/ruckcor.html Tsk Tsk Tsk Ruckman.
Rating: 
Summary: Sound, sober, and gracious scholarship
Review: As a biblical scholar, I commend James White for his careful and accurate scholarship. Don't be misled by some of the negative reviews, as well-intended as they may be. James has done his homework well, and he has NOT retaliated against those who differ with him. Many of my ministry colleagues use the King James Version as their primary Bible, and I memorized more than 4,000 verses from the KJV within the first two years of being saved. Hence, my argument is not with the use of the King James but with what James rightly calls King James Onlyism. Living in Pensacola, close to the headquarters of Peter Ruckman, I can testify to two things: 1) His church members are zealous and outspoken about Jesus, completely unashamed. They should be commended for this! 2) They can be downright nasty to the point of using foul language if you challenge them on King James issues -- even with a gentle spirit. The record needed to be set right, and the pseudo-scholarship of the Gail Riplinger's exposed. I have seen many churches deeply hurt by these errors, and James White is to be thanked for taking the issues on in a forthright, irenic, and scholarly fashion.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent work, the facts are documented!
Review: Dr. White's book is a thoughtful, meticulously documented, educated response to the anti-intellectual crowd that ignorantly promotes the destructive false teaching of King James Onlyism. You will find the truth on the KJV controversy in Dr. Whites Book, carefully explained, and well documented for further study. Finally, someone rational enough to actually provide SOLID EVIDENCE for what they believe instead of hot air and rhetoric. His critics have been silenced and shown to be without merit (see aomin.org). The "King James Only Controversy" is a very well written book that shreds every KJV Onlyist argument I've been told by misinformed believers. This book is NOT merely a critique of Riplinger or Ruckman as the detractors would have you believe. Dr. White has responded to Holland's EMBARRASING "review" which was full of misrepresentation, misquoting, and straw man arguments. An honest examination will allow you to quickly realize who is the most honest and convincing. Dr. White's book has really opened my eyes to the wonderful and amazing way in which God inspired and preserved his Word. I learned a great deal about the King James translators, and Erasmus (the Roman Catholic priest and textual critic), who contributed to the Greek manuscripts used for the KJV translation. I have renewed confidence in the accuracy and faithfulness of the excellent, reputable, modern translations: NIV, NKJV, and NASB which uphold all of the same fundamental doctrines of the King James Bible. White shows the folly of forcing a 17th century translation on modern Americans who haven't the foggiest idea what words like astonied, bolled, chapiter, eyeservice, handstaves, hungerbitten, magnifical, nitre, phylacteries, sodpdoiler, winebibber, and wot just to name a few that do not even appear in my dictionary, even mean. Not to mention all of the perplexing phrases ("superfluity of naughtiness," "at your hand," "taken with the manner," and "in the gate", "compass about") and even common words that have changed definitions over the last several hundred years (readers, even pastors sometimes THINK they know the definition, but they actually do not). Dr. White has convinced me that God does not want confusion, he wants a clear presentation of the WHOLE truth, from Jesus Christ who died for our sins to Revelation, and all the way back to Genesis. We should learn and love God's Word, giving it to EVERYONE in the LANGUAGE THAT THEY SPEAK TODAY. This is the bottom line.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent, but one important point missing...
Review: Every Christian who believes that the Bible is God's Word should read the first part of this book, whether they agree with the author's stance or not, or whether they are interested in the controversy or not, since it covers quite a bit of background information relating to the history and nature of New Testament translation, including its history, major translations, translators, and other key figures, information about the nature of the greek manuscripts, and so on. Most of what I would comment about on this book has already been said, so I won't push the point much further. However, I would like to add another point which James White seems to have overlooked in his book, I assume because of his lack of international/missionary experience: I come from Singapore where not everyone is fluent in English, or even knows English, much less read English. For the ethnic Chinese who only reads and understands the Chinese language, the only Bible they can read would obviously be on that is translated to Chinese. Unfortunately (or fortunately?), none of the Chinese Bibles, as far as I know, are translated from the TR, and you cannot find a Chinese Bible translated from the King James version. Now that's just the Bible in Chinese, where there are a few versions/translations. How about those other Bibles in languages where there's only ONE translation (mostly translated by UBS, and not translated from TR/KJV)? Those who insist on KJV Only should perhaps remember that there's a whole world out there that does not and cannot understand English, much less KJV English. I supposed they are doomed, unless they learn English, KJV English. That said, my opinion is that this is probably the best book on the subject. Read it, unless your mind is already made up (see those 1 star reviews).
Rating: 
Summary: Good but not the whole story
Review: I am a reviewer who is undecided on the controversial "war" between the Westcott-Hort side of textual criticism and the John Burgon side, and while my leanings are with the reasoned eclecticist side that James White staunchly upholds and defends, I can honestly say that this book hardly settles the question definitively on whether the textual basis for the modern conservative versions (NASB-U, ESV, NIV) *really* is better than the "received" Reformation text that underlied all English bibles up until 1881.
The KJV-Onlyism of Ruckman and Riplinger is absurd. Hands down. That they would say that the 1769 Oxford edition of the KJV is inerrant in its English renderings is just so silly as to be beyond comment. (Okay just one: What is it about the years 1525 to 1769 that permited ordinary scholarly revision of the English bible, and that 'locked' in the exact wording of the KJV ever since, making all revisers evil adulterers of God's word with no final authority?)
Riplinger, Ruckman, and Waite do better when they accidentally follow the position outlined by TR-Only extremist Edward F. Hills that states the Greek underlying the KJV is inerrant in all its particulars and it is immune to revision because it is already a 100% providential restoration of the bible.
While I don't think that view explains the manuscript data very well, I suppose it is at least a possibility that we Protestants should handle in the ordinary doctrinal manner (seeing what the bible teaches about itself, concerning how it will be preserved after the autographs have been destroyed) as well as compare our resultant doctrine with the sheer raw data of the Greek manuscripts, early foreign language versions, and Patristic citations.
If White's book against Ruckman/Riplinger already only indirectly and somewhat unsatisfactorily deals with the more sophisticated preservation arguments of Hills, then White's book is almost hopeless at refuting the preservation arguments of the more plausible dean John Burgon and his latter day followers (Maurice Robinson, Wilbur Pickering, Theodore Letis, etc.) which in my experience is by the far numerically the main school of thought that is KJV-Only.
Burgon, whose best work is "The Revision Revised", repudiates the 1881 Revised Version of the New Testament's underlying Greek text (which was very close to Westcott-Hort's and the modern UBS text). The central pillar of Westcott-Hort is that the "traditional text" a.k.a. the Koine Byzantine text type a.k.a. the Majority Text (of which the Greek NT of the Protestant Reformation *more-or-less* is an exemplification of), is secondary to and derivative from the Western and Alexandrian text types, and the product of a formal-or-informal recension in Antioch and/or Constantinople in the 4th century.
This proof allowed textual critics to ignore the koine [common] text almost entirely and only need to determine which of the putatively parent Alexandrian or Western text type variants are authentic autographical readings. The reasoning is sound _if the proof was good_. The Westcott-Hort text of 1881 assume this proof fully. The modern eclectic text of the NT (the UBS 4 or the NA 27) upon which all modern conservative version except the NKJV are based does not accept this argument in its full consistency, and includes approximately 500 Byzantine-only variants in its main body Greek text. Yet even so, today the the Majority reading on the one hand (when one exists) and the "Received" reading of the Reformation on the other hand is routinely considered to be inferior upon analysis to the earliest Alexandrian text type readings.
If you reject the proofs offered that try to argue the oldest manuscripts are worse textually than earlier ones, and further offer arguments for providential preservation that seem to require the dominant text type of the middle ages to be VERY faithful to the autographic variants, then suddenly defending the Greek underlying the English bible and further, the KJV itself, starts making a lot more sense.
On one very popular line of reasoning, exemplified by the central figure John Burgon, the Byzantine Majority text form (which he calls somewhat biasedly 'the traditional text') is not only even more ancient to the *derivative* Alexandrian and Western text types, but is the ONLY faithful text type. Burgon argues the other two early text types were the products of corruptions intentional and unintentional and that both the surviving variants of the Alexandrian and Western text types are nearly USELESS to the practice of textual criticism, include all the early documentary evidence that supports the non-Byzantine readings. In summary, Burgon argued that the very latest manuscripts were the best and most accurate to the autographs, and that the earliest ones we have preserved into the 19th and 20th centuries were the absolute worst and only survived so long because they sat in total obscurity and were not being re-copied.
This line of thought, which is accepted by most KJV defenders, would turn textual criticism on its head, and mean that specifically constructing manuscripts based on the Western and Alexandrian text types (as is essentially the practice since 1881) is guaranteed to lead you to an inferior and corrupted and altogether lousy New Testament, exchanging gold for copper. How stupid of us to do that!, (they say).
Daniel Wallace, a Wescott/Hort/UBS/Nestle-Aland advocate, has three articles up online at http://www.bible.org/author.asp?author_id=1 that respond directly to this serious attack initiated by Burgon on the central pillars undergirding the theory and practice of modern textual criticism. Look for the articles called "Some Second Thoughts on the Majority Text", "The Majority Text and the Original Text: Are They Identical?", and "Inspiration, Preservation, and New Testament Textual Criticism".
James White's book is not strong at refuting Burgon, because the Riplinger/Ruckman tandem are so inferior to the fiery Burgon. It is not even that strong at refuting Hills type positions which is closer to Ruckmanism, being grounded on the same a priori preservation arguments. The actually decent review of this book by KJV-Onlyist David Cloud (who embraces a Hillsian TR-Onlyism) picked up on this immediately (up at http://www.wayoflife.org/fbns/examining01.htm ) and he was right to consider White's book shallow.
The King James Only Controvesy is an interesting book, but its place in this larger controversy (ignoring small bit players like the extremists Riplinger and Ruckman) is small, since the book targets two extremists with "refutations" that a lot of the time only work if you already buy into the system of reasoned eclecticism that James White holds to be true.
White responds to two insignificant highly negative reviews of his book by extremists in the D.A. Waite/Peter Ruckman mold at http://www.aomin.org/DiVietro.html [11 printed p.] and http://www.aomin.org/Hollandrep.html [16 printed p.]. But they are good to show the generally shallow and captious type of response this book has provoked from extremists.
In the end, James White, D.A. Carson, Norm Geisler, B.B. Warfield, C. Van Til, Greg Bahnsen, and many others may be right in thinking that one can embrace textual criticism while *still* being a conservative Protestant convinced that the immediately inspired autographs of the OT and NT were by the singular care and providence of God kept pure in all ages in the manuscript tradition. (This question is ultimately the real one, because KJV-Only writers rely on fideistic appeals to say the Greek beneath the KJV is best and by accusing all positions that don't lead to KJV-Only as being rationalistic and atheistic.)
However, we shouldn't dismiss out of hand John Burgon (even if he is a bit rough around the edges) and others who argue that providential purity required by conservative theology *requires* the koine majority text of the middle ages Greece to be substantially alike to the autographs, just because Gail Riplinger, Peter Ruckman, and D.A. Waite are almost caricatures for how NOT to defend the King James Bible. If Burgon was even half right about W&H, then we would be making a hugely ironic mistake in editing the Textus Receptus by the standard of corrupted early manuscripts, corrupt ancient translations, and early Fathers who used corrupted texts.
Rating:
Summary: Thank God for James White!
Review: I applaud Dr. White for this much-needed gem of a book. It explodes the false theology of the heretical KJV Only Cult. Dr. White is a very learned Christian gentleman who treats the subject with reverence, grace and sound argumentation.
It's hard to believe this book would actually have any critics, but sure enough, I see that a few KJV Only Cultists have chosen to make fools of themselves by submitting critical reviews which are full of the same old silly, groundless accusations I've heard time and time again. (Obviously, these goofballs didn't really read this book). For decades the Godly Christian scholars behind the modern translations, as well as their defenders such as Dr. White, have been railed against by KJV Only Cultists who have not a fraction of their learning. Without even attempting to find out for themselves the REAL reasons why the modern versions read as they do, these shameless, ignorant heretics go off half-cocked and throw about wild charges of satanic conspiracy. Their asinine, unfounded and hate-filled accusations clearly reveal a spirit totally at variance with that of Christ. Consequently, these people couldn't be very close to the Lord. How will the KJV Only Cultist be able to stand in the Day of Judgment in light of this?
KJV Only Cultists seem to be completely ignorant of the histories of the Biblical text and the venerable King James Version, or if they are not, they shut their eyes to them in favor of fabricated histories appealing to their inane prejudices. They should read the preface to the original KJV 1611 edition written by the translators themselves. It serves as a rebuke to them.
KJV Only Cultists should know this: their Final Authority is NOT the Word of God, as is so often proudly claimed by them, but in reality the King James Version TRANSLATORS are their Final Authority (along with nuts like Ruckman, Riplinger and Gipp to name a few). This is a necessary consequence of their theology. The position of historical, evangelical Christianity down through the centuries to the time of Christ has ALWAYS been that Divine inspiration ONLY pertains to the ORIGINAL documents actually written by Moses, the prophets, the apostles, etc., and not to any copies of these documents or translation of copies of these documents. KJV Onlyism is a comparatively new belief system, having only been around for a century or so, and its theology and claims grow increasingly more outlandish as time passes. The next thing you'll hear from these crackpots is that one's salvation requires reading the KJV! It is really nothing more than a cultish system of idolatry.
In point of fact, KJV Onlyism is based on assumption and rampant circular reasoning, fueled by extreme ignorance and driven by emotion. It is wholly unworthy of anyone claiming to be Christ-like. So why have so many fallen for this false teaching? The answer, as Dr. White points out in this book, is simply because it preaches well. KJV Onlyism's arguments, as presented by its wacko proponents, seem as if they must be true to the uneducated Christian who is ignorant of the history of the Bible and how translations of it are actually made. The irrational and ignorant Christian is easy prey for this foolishness.
If you logically think about it, you'll realize that the ONLY REAL WAY one could hope to prove that the King James Version is alone the inerrant Word Of God is to actually find a verse in it, supported by manuscripts of some weight, that says, in effect, that the KJV is alone the inerrant Word of God. That's laughable, of course - for obvious reasons. Besides, what context would such a verse have? This factor alone would cause any Bible scholar or rational layman to regard the verse as totally spurious. However, while KJV Onlyism is therefore impossible to prove, it is quite easy to DISPROVE in a myriad of different ways. Dr. White amply does just that in this enlightening book.
Congratulations, Dr. White!
Rating:
Summary: Worth reading at least twice!
Review: I first purchased this book, shortly after publication, because I had a number of friends who were in the KJV Only camp. It seemed to me that my friends' arguments were not at all solid and I got this book to help me better understand the issues so I could better discuss it with my friends.
This book provided me with exceptional information about the controversy, so it surpassed my expectations in that regard.
What I didn't know then was that now, in 2004, I would pick up the book to read again. This second reading was not to better understand the KJV Only issue, but to refresh my understanding of the history of the Bible translation in general and the translation to English in particular. Again, my (second set of) expectations were surpassed.
This book is an excellent introduction to the history of Bible translation. Prior to the second reading, I had been contemplating which translation of the Bible to purchase for my new Bible as my almost 40 year old eyes are not seeing the print of my old compact (NKJV) Bible as well as they did in my early twenties. I was contemplating purchasing an NASB. I already owned a fairly large print edition of the NIV but wasn't sure I wanted that as my primary Bible.
After reading The KJV Only Controversy a second time, it is clear to me that I can, in fact, "Trust the Modern Translations", even the NIV. James White goes back to the Greek to compare the KJV with the NIV and/or NASB in numerous verses. It is manifestly evident that the NIV and NASB are both good translations of the same Scripture, namely the Word of God. James White has given me a deep respect for those involved in the translation process.
If you, or someone you know, want(s) to learn more about the KJV Only issue or Bible translation, I can recommend this book without reservation. You will not be disappointed.
Rating:
Summary: A Five Star Book By A Christian Liar
Review: If you waste your time, effort, or money on this book, be sure to read the book that answers this one called "The Scholarship Only Controversy: Can You Trust The Proffessional Liars?" by Dr. Peter S. Ruckman. James White attempts to justify Bible corruption with the same attitude toward the holy words of God that was seen in D.A. Carson and Stewart Custer. Carson asked in 1979 "Since no translation is perfect, how can we know what the Holy Spirit inspired the Biblical writers to write?" Nowhere in his book does he answer his own question. James White's book is twice as long and twice as pathetic.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent for layman to scholar
Review: James White has done a excellent job covering the subject. He is thorough in providing manuscript evidence, yet readable enough for the average layman. Instead of resorting to name-calling and circular reasoning, White lets history and the manuscript evidence speak for themselves. Especially insightful is his chapter on the deity of Christ ("The Son of God, the Lord of Glory"), which decidedly proves there is no conspiracy by modern translators to denegrate our Lord Jesus Christ. Even if you do not come away agreeing with every conclusion, you will understand why modern translations read the way they do. The modern conservative versions are not "New Age", but sincere attempts to come closer to God's truth.
I highly recommend this book for anyone who is trying to resolve this issue for themselves, or to someone seeking material to present to a Sunday School class or Bible study.
Rating:
Summary: Very Good, An Easy Read, Destroys The KJV Only Argument
Review: James White has written a book that will be useful for probably another 100 years. He blows a mortal wound into the traditional and Pharasaic idea that there is only one Bible in the English language that can be used. He rebuts - from their own words - the spectra of KJV Only people from the vicious Ruckman to the gracious Hills. He demonstrates the conspiracy theory mindset of Gail Riplinger and shows that her charts, "research" and conclusion are fatally flawed. There are, however, a few weaknesses in the book. The biggest one is that in trying to defend the modern conservative translations, White goes too far and implies that in EVERY instance where there is a textual variant, the KJV rendering is inferior. The only exception he appears to make is at I Timothy 3:16 where he grants superiority to the KJV rendering of "God" as opposed to "he." Although White makes a disclaimer, it is hard to swallow given that he cites only the aforementioned example of a KJV superior read. The book also could have dealt with more mainstream KJV Defenders such as Thomas Holland, Thomas Strouse, and Theodore Letis. I will be interested in a re-issue and his much needed response to Pensacola Christian College's ill-informed video series. All in all, a good book and worth the read.
|
