Category Archives: Editorial

Editorial

King James Bible believers need come to another level of academia

I have seen the need among KJBO to come to another level of academia. There are also dangers with that, because modernist infidelity is everywhere.

With Oxford now making the Bodleian 1602 MS available, we see Tim Berg and his friends now looking at it. I must give a shout out to Bryan Ross and Christopher Yetzer, who are among the few who have been looking at this matter.

At the same time that Tim Berg has been talking about the Bod 1602 MS, Steven Anderson arbitrarily said that the KJB had a persistent typographical error. This has directly led to Mark Ward discussing the Bod 1602 MS, and is leading back to this point: Do we rely on almost 400 years of editing in the KJB as we have it, or are we going to turn back to the Bod 1602 MS, like modernist editor David Norton?

I believe in the Providence of God, that the editing of the KJB, the detection and eliminating of typographical errors is complete, and that we do not need to turn back to any old annotated document to change anything in the KJB as it now stands.

The words, spelling, the punctuation are now fixed, and we don’t need and will not allow any new alterations or corruptions under the guise of “editorial revision”, “discoveries” or so-called “modern scholarship”.

KJBOs say that the influence of academia has been a problem for Bible-believing churches. We recognise that we must reason spiritually and Biblically, not merely on subjective history, rationalism and empiricism, etc.

So a KJBO would ask me to explain why do we need to go to another level of academia? (What’s the assumption here? It is that academia = worldly error.)

It’s a good question, I am only too happy to answer it. When I got involved with KJB discussions online back in 2007 (and having read everything I could from the internet on the subject to that time), I knew there wasn’t the academic rigour from Ruckman, Waite or Riplinger, etc. like what was needed. They made good points, but they all had issues.

KJBO had a lot of holler but not so much book learning (although there were some names like Hills, Holland and Vance). I knew that the movement had to go to a higher level, because anti-KJBO were able to run rings around KJBOs. In fact, most anti-KJBOs today, like J. Burris, T. Berg, M. Ward, etc. are all former KJBOs. But because KJBO believed things like kinda double inspiration, “Antioch stream” and that both “he” and “she” were both correct in 1611 in Ruth 3:15, and other such ideas, once they were shown the errors of those things, they would naturally reject all KJBO. (There are other factors too, around IFB versus Reformed, but that’s another issue.)

When I first tried to find answers around why there were word differences in present King James Bible editions, there was very little info. People were fighting about textual criticism and translation methods, but were not so much knowing about the history of the KJB itself. I read Scrivener, I corresponded with David Norton and read “secular” histories.

When Rick Norris would make some accusation about some word that had been edited in the KJB, I found there were very few that could deal with him, like Steven Avery, Will Kinney, Brandon Staggs, etc. But in the main, Norris, like a fore-runner to Mark Ward, was really quite effective in putting doubts in people’s minds about the KJB.

So what do I mean academic? I mean the fact that it was the KJB men who were the crowning glory of the educational institutions in their day. I mean that it was our people who edited the KJB like Joseph Mede. By academic I don’t mean merely using citations and quoting people in context, and that latter point is a given.

I am advocating for the high heritage. It is very easy to think that the modern scholars and secular studies now rule, but they are both and all usurpers from us. I say just because it appears the enemy dominates the academic field like a flood, we should not reject true scholarship.

Matthew 13:52 Then said he unto them, Therefore every scribe which is instructed unto the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is an householder, which bringeth forth out of his treasure things new and old.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLfPWY1WEx4

Editorial

Anderson, Ward and the truth

I received an email stating that King James Bible supporter Steven Anderson, who has a rather bad reputation in the USA, has come out and said that the KJB has an error in it.

“And if a man have committed a sin worthy of death, and he be to be put to death, and thou hang him on a tree:” (Deut. 21:22).

Apparently his going to the Hebrew has led him to reject the words “to be”. (As if the KJB men didn’t translate properly or typographical mistake persisted in the KJB for over 400 years!)

The great enemy of the King James Bible’s perfection, Mark Ward, has come out with a video, explaining why he thinks Steven Anderson is wrong, and why the words in the KJB are right.

We don’t need Mark Ward “helping” people when much of the time he is hindering people.

So, let’s get this straight from a believing perspective:

Most importantly, the entire history of the KJB that has “he be to be”, so it is not a recent edition which has made a change, or some printing error which has arisen. It is not an edition issue, but something which belongs in the entire history of the KJB.

Often people go to the Hebrew, go to the Geneva and the Bishops’ and consult Webster’s dictionary, Gill’s and other commentaries, etc. But that is not our method here.

Let’s look at the plain language, grammar and logical progression in the passage itself.

It is obvious in Deuteronomy here, that the judicial process is where someone is found and declared to be put to death, and that that’s clearly what the KJB is saying.

Here is the sequence:
1. A man does the deed,
2. He is found guilty and sentenced (i.e. he be to be executed), and
3. He is hanged

And all of that takes place in the past tense, because the actual context is about the body now hanging on a tree, that it doesn’t remain strung up, because that’s the actual point of the passage, which is in verse 23. The passage is written from the perspective of what happened leading to the body being hung.

So then, talking about the present corpse, in the past tense:

1. the “man have committed a sin worthy of death”

2. the judging process declares that “he be to be put to death”

3. and then the executioner “hang him on a tree” …

“His body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but thou shalt in any wise bury him that day; (for he that is hanged is accursed of God;) that thy land be not defiled, which the LORD thy God giveth thee for an inheritance.” (Deut. 21:23).

Which of course explains this:

“Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree:” (Galatians 3:13).

The English is plain and clear, Steven Anderson would be wrong to think there is anything wrong in the KJB, it is not a typo. It is, in fact, good and proper grammar.

As for Mark Ward, one must wonder at his real motives, is it to rejoice at Steven Anderson’s error? Is it yet another opportunity for him to make some backhanded comments about those who allegedly make mistakes with the KJB’s perfect grammar and vocabulary?

With Mark Ward not having the KJB as his final authority, there’s every chance he will contort to accept that Steven Anderson’s opening the door to change the KJB is possible and legitimate.

UPDATE:

You can find the usage “he be to be” used out there, for example, in old books here: https://archive.org/search?query=%22he+be+to+be%22&sin=TXT

Mark Ward’s video is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vphp-bJn9GE&t

SECOND UPDATE:

Steven Anderson answered Mark Ward’s video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPcWH20v648

Which has led to Mark Ward retracting part of what he said and altering his opinion in a new video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2GC18_o5zs

There is a whole side issue being discussed as well, which is about whether a person is dead before the corpse is hung. From a New Testament perspective, we know actually that Jesus died while being hung on cross, however it seems usual that in the Old Testament people were stoned before being hung. But to make some sort of theology that Deuteronomy 21:22 was saying people cannot be killed by hanging because of “the Hebrew” is nonsense.

Editorial, General

Amminadib

An examination of the Pure Cambridge Edition of the King James Bible on the specific issue of the word Amminadib in Song of Solomon 6:12, by Matthew Verschuur.

INTRODUCTION

Along with the case of the spelling of “Geba” at Ezra 2:26 in the Pure Cambridge Edition against most other editions, is the issue of the word “Amminadib” in Song of Solomon (Canticles) 6:12, for its obscurity and minuteness.

If we can argue that the Pure Cambridge Edition is right in every other place, then we can argue that it is right in this one also.

Again, if we can argue that Providence has supplied the Pure Cambridge Bible as it is (as presented on the Bible Protector website, bibleprotector.com, no less), then we should trust that God has got the truth to us.

And again, the same Holy Ghost who inspired, the same Holy Ghost who preserved is the same Holy Ghost who is at hand today witnessing and attesting, showing and revealing, yea, interpreting and bringing to heart the knowledge of the certainty that even in this very precise particular, the very letters and marks in the Pure Cambridge Edition of the King James Bible, as we have it in full verity, is correct.

THE PLACE ITSELF

We now step forward, to the passage itself:

12 Or ever I was aware, my soul made me like the chariots of Amminadib.

(Song of Solomon 6:12).

This book is part of the poetic interrelation between the lover and the beloved, which is both the story of Solomon and the Shulamite, and also is said to be a picture of Christ and the Church.

In the narrative, the lover goes to the where the nuts and fruits grow, and then describes the feeling of his soul, saying his soul was like the chariots of Amminadib. We can understand the driving force of chariots, the powerful feeling of them.

The commentators, pre-1611 translations and the margin offers us meanings. There are primarily two, the first is that there was a person called Amminadib who was renowned for driving chariots, the second is that the chariots were of a class or category of being princely/noble or willing. Those who dive into the words and their meanings say that there are two Hebrew words, being “Ammi” (my people) and “nadib” (willing).

There is no problem to suggest that the word Amminadib might mean “my willing people”, but that cannot be derived from Scripture so easily.

Instead, we have to ask the more pertinent question as to why this word is presented to us as a Hebraic-cum-English proper noun, a name, and not “translated”, as is done in many other Bible translations.

From this we can conclude that the translators themselves, and the Holy Ghost, intended for us to know that this is a proper name, and that the pertinent information is not in what the rabbis say “Amminadib” means, but what our English teachers, Providence and the Spirit says/shows it to mean.

Very clearly, the chariots are not just chariots, they are qualified into some special class, they are not just chariots, they are Amminadib chariots, and what class that is, we can understand from the context, must be the best sorts, an elite or special class.

The next verse speaks of armies, so we know the chariots are not some jerry-rigged rickshaw contraptions.

THE GRAMMATICAL SITUATION

The word Amminadib, we are told, is made up of two components from Hebrew. We also have another word, which is very similar, which is found multiple times in the Bible, which is Amminadab and Aminadab.

If we use the 1611 King James Bible line brakes as a guide, where the word is hyphenated in such cases, we observe the brake on Ammi-, in Song of Solomon 6:12, and with Amminabab at 1 Chronicles 15:10.

Now, while in 1 Chron. 15:10 we see “Ammi-“, we see the whole word in the next verse.

The issue is that in Bibles, lets say some examples from the late 19th century, the word “Ammi-dabib” is made a compound name thus, but Amminabab is not presented in its places as a compound name.

In the Pure Cambridge Edition we can find those copies which have “Ammi-dabib” and those which do not have a compound, being “Amminadib”.

There are four examples. The first are some early PCEs, which have “Ammi-dabib”. The second are the pronouncing editions, which have “Amminadib”. The third are the clear editions, which have all the pronouncing words listed in the front, and then have the text at that place read “Amminadib”, and the fourth are Collins editions, which are all pronouncing as well, with “Amminadib”.

PRONUNCIATION

While it is listed in commentaries, etc., that the word components are “Ammi-“ and “Nadib”, and we find the pronunciation markings, and that in theological circles, the pronunciation consistently is the same as the Redpath markings in the Collins and Cambridge Bibles, which is like “Ammin’adib” not “Ammi’nadib”.

Even though the first 1611 Edition broke both “Amminadab” and “Amminadib” when at the end of the line at “Ammi”, that is not how it is pronounced by any known source.

THE QUESTION

Some Pure Cambridge Editions have “Ammi-nadib” compounded, and others (primarily pronouncing editions) do not compound the word. Examples of non-pronouncing editions with no hyphen or compound dash exist. There are other contemporary editions to the PCE, like the Cambridge Concord and the London Edition, which also do not compound the word at that place.

The standard representation, which is a critical and precisely correct representation, of the Pure Cambridge Edition is the text files supplied by Bible Protector on the bibleprotector.com website, which does not hyphenate or compound the word “Amminadib” at Song of Solomon 6:12.

Remembering that this a minor variation that exists within the Pure Cambridge Edition printed tradition, it is not a situation where such a Bible is “invalidated”, but indeed such printed editions are used Bible Protector’s chief man Matthew Verschuur and at the church he attends. However, the official, proper text is that on the website, and many of the ordinary every day printed PCE KJBs in use from Collins, Cambridge, Holman and Church Bible Publishers all do not compound, hyphenate or break the word after “Ammi”.

A CHRONOLOGICAL EXAMINATION

The Geneva, and more importantly, Bishops’ translation, which was used as a basis for making the King James Bible, did not have the word “Amminadib” at all, but had translated it various ways, much like the margin of the KJB has it.

In 1611, we find the word at the end of a line, so on that basis we cannot assert whether it is a compound name hyphen at all, and if examining the close word “Amminadab”, one could easily infer no compounding, it was just treated as one word.

In November 2023, when this is written, numerous scans of early KJB editions became available online, which were not available for previous examinations on this topic. Here we find at Song of Sol. 6:12:

Barker (London) 1612 “Amminadib” (no break)

Barker (London) 1613 “Amminadib” blackletter (end of line break)

Barker (London) 1617 “Amminadib” (no break)

Norton and Bill (London) 1618 “Amminadib” (no break)

Barker (London) 1618 “Amminadib” (no break)

Barker (London) 1619 “Amminadib” (no break)

Barker (London) 1621 “Amminadib” (no break)

Barker (London) 1622 “Amminadib” (no break)

Barker (London) 1626 “Amminadib” smaller size (no break)

Barker (London) 1626 “Amminadib” larger size (no break)

Norton and Bill (London) 1628 “Amminadib” (no break)

Bill, Hills and Newcombe (London) 1628 “Amminadib” very different setup with clear roman typeface (end of line break)

Missing front page 1929 “Amminadib” (no break)

Barker and Bill (London) 1630 “Amminadib” (no break)

Barker (London) 1631 “Amminadib” (no break)

Barker (London) 1631 “Amminadib” different size (no break)

Barker (London) 1631 “Amminadib” another one (no break)

Missing front page 1631 “Amminadib” (no break)

Thomas and John Buck (Cambridge) 1631 “Ammi-nadib” blackletter (has the break)

Barker (London) 1634 “Amminadib” (no break)

Barker (London) 1634 “Ammi-nadib” blackletter (has the break)

Source: https://archive.org/search?query=holy+bible&page=2&and%5B%5D=year%3A%5B1607+TO+1639%5D

As the Cambridge edition of 1637, and the edit of 1638, had “Ammi-nadib”, we can conjecture that the first Cambridge edition of 1628 and the edit of 1629 pioneered this pattern.

We can conclude on the basis of the 1612, etc., that the end of line break of “Ammi-“ in the blackletter editions was never intended to be a compound name, but that was introduced probably in 1629, as it was certainly there in the Cambridge of 1631 and 37 which are online, and 1638 as is stored in the State Library of Victoria.

Thus we may safely and certainly say that the 1611 Editions and the 1613 Edition would be for the non-compounding of the name.

The name was compounded from the Cambridge Edition of 1629 and that of 1638, through to the 1769 Edition. We now leap forward to the late 19th century, where most editions were compounding the name, as the were directly influenced by the 1769, and yet we find that the PCEs from Cambridge and Collins, which had H. A. Redpath’s pronunciation scheme, did not hyphenate or compound. Neither did the London Edition of the 1950s, nor the Cambridge Concord Edition.

What is interesting is that while early editions would break the word at the end of a line at “Ammi”, there is an Oxford edition, probably from the 1950s, which breaks “Amminadab” at Numbers 10:14 at the end of a column “Ammin-adab”, which is similar to the word in question, which is compounded in that Oxford edition, as “Ammi-nadib”.

CONCLUSION

We can therefore conclude that if an editor was forced to choose the safest course, that he should not hyphenate at all, but have “Amminadib”, and that the evidence is in line with the PCE having no hyphen or dash there.

The fact that some editions of the PCE do have a hyphen there is not a reason to doubt the Bible Protector work, but on the contrary, the Bible Protector work is indicating what is plainly printed in 1612 and other Barker editions, which in turn indicate that the end of line hyphen in 1611 and 1613 was just that, and not a compound word.

The pure word is pure, and it is right, correct and precise to the very jot and tittle.

18 For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.

(Matthew 5:18).

Editorial, General

Scanned Pure Cambridge Edition available online

Here’s an example of a Pure Cambridge Edition King James Bible online:

https://archive.org/details/holybiblecontain0000unse_z7h7/mode/2up (with the Apocrypha, no italics though.)

Just out of interest, here’s a 1637 Cambridge Edition online:

https://archive.org/details/16371638TheKingJamesBibleCambridgeDarlowAndMouleNumber402/mode/2up

These are both fully, freely downloadable. The second link is only for nerds, scholars and book magpies, the first is the one I want to talk about.

While the correct PCE text is available on my website, to have a historical copies laid out by professional printers is a valuable resource.

There are also some examples of historically printed plain text PCEs, here’s one:

https://archive.org/details/holybiblecontain0000unse_v9q2/mode/2up (Login, no download.)

There are doubtless more, and in time, there will be more.

Also, there are PCEs to buy online, both new (from Holman publishers from and Church Bible Publishers) as well as vintage copies… I’ve just picked up a number of great copies including the huge one photographed below through ebay!

A quarto lectern Bible, pica typeface, with references.

Finally, a bonus, you can obtain scans of an original 1611 printing here.

Editorial

The “middle roaders”

WHO ARE THE MIDDLE ROADERS?

There are plenty of Evangelicals (and Pentecostals in particular) who are genuine born again people, who believe a lot of good things well, but have need to know things more perfectly. This reminds me of Apollos, “And he began to speak boldly in the synagogue: whom when Aquila and Priscilla had heard, they took him unto them, and expounded unto him the way of God more perfectly.” (Acts 18:26).

The “middle of the road” Evangelicals/Pentecostals are the kinds who don’t compromise the Gospel on one side (e.g. reduce Church worship to entertainment or doubt the literalness of Bible narratives), but don’t go far enough with their views to align with “perfection” on the other.

These are the well meaning Evangelicals/Pentecostals who shouldn’t be disparaged for being “lukewarm”. Why? Because there is a great chance these people can hear the Spirit of God, and do as Smith Wigglesworth did, and “come out” of their current condition. He said, “Unless Pentecost wakes up to shake herself free from all worldly things and comes into a place of the divine-likeness with God, we will hear the voice of God, ‘Come out’ and He will have something far better than this. I ask every one of you, will you hear the voice of God and come out? You ask, ‘What do you mean?’ Every one of you knows without exception, there is no word for Pentecost, only being on fire. If you are not on fire, you are not in the place of regeneration. It is only the fire of God that burns up the entanglements of the world.”

One of the views of these “middling” Evangelicals/Pentecostals is that people shouldn’t get caught up in side issues. Now I agree there is a problem where some people go way off the track on unimportant issues, and get into dangerous extremes of doctrine.

The middling types console themselves that they are not “off the track”, “in the weeds”, because they are in the middle, but being in the middle can still be a dangerous place, because it can lead to compromise and the eventual slide out of orthodoxy and truth.

Being sensible is good, but those with a middling attitude are in danger of being fence sitters. There are black and white doctrinal positions where believers must take a polar position.

There is a big opportunity for all of us to assess and discern where we are at. Jesus said, “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.” (Revelation 3:20).

BIBLE VERSION/TRANSLATION ISSUE

Recently, an Australian Pentecostal ministry effectively said that people shouldn’t get hung up on side issues (they would say using the King James Bible alone is one of these issues), yet at the same time put out a teaching on their website that made it very clear that modern versions/translations are good, and the King James Bible is not so good. In fact, the particular Pentecostal theologian who wrote the article spent over half the time talking down the King James Bible.

I’d like to respond to that, not with a point by point refutation of their many alleged criticisms of the King James Bible, but on an appeal to the work of the Spirit.

The background to this issue is really about the rise of Infidelity. Infidelity is the spiritual condition of being not only unfaithful to God, but of rejecting God. Infidelity was popularised and promoted in the Enlightenment which led to the French Revolution. However, the creeping work of Infidelity was afterward seen slowly coming in through science, education and the churches of the English-speaking world. It is now marching though Evangelical Christianity.

Old time Pentecostals were among those most against Infidelity, but sadly, Infidelity has been creeping into Pentecostalism too.

Politically speaking there is a view called modern conservatism. This is the same attitude as is seen with the middling Pentecostals. It is often likened to being “less progressive” and “having your foot on the brakes while heading towards the political left (or, worldliness)”.

The problem then is in time middling Pentecostalism while arrive to the same position that the fake modern entertainment so-called Pentecostals now inhabit. But possibly, the middling Pentecostal could actually go the other way, and come to stand for all the right doctrines, including the use of the King James Bible.

SOME REASONS IN FAVOUR OF THE KING JAMES BIBLE

When I was very young, the King James Bible was the main Bible used in Australian Pentecostalism. However, cracks had begun to appear. Pastors would turn to a paraphrase, or talk about what the Greek “really” means, and by time of the late 1980s, the KJB was largely replaced in Australian Pentecostalism.

Older people still had their KJBs, and some American preachers still used it, and some even used it when Rodney Howard-Browne rolled through in the mid-1990s.

The old time Pentecostals, including the fathers of Richmond Temple in Melbourne, all used the King James Bible, so why sell this birthright for a mess of pottage? Why abandon good meat for dainties?

When middling Pentecostals complain that tongues and gifts are vanishing out of Pentecostal churches, and bemoan the rise of smoke machine Sunday clubs, shouldn’t they have the same desire for the old Bible?

There is a danger in the seductive message about getting in on the “new thing” that “God” is apparently doing, where people abandon what was good in the old ways.

Tradition, doctrine and holiness are not bad, in fact, they are works of the Holy Ghost. Pentecostals have too often attacked “tradition” as being “religious”, when there is clearly and evidently good traditions and true religion.

“If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man’s religion is vain.” (James 1:26).

“Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle.” (2 Thessalonians 2:15).

CLAIM THE LAODICEAN PROMISES!

Jesus pointed to three areas that were problems with the Laodiceans. We can also take a spiritual interpretation of the same passage as applying to the Church today, and on these three areas, the middling Evangelicals/Pentecostals must take heed.

17 Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked:

18 I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see.

19 As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent.

(Revelation 3:17-19).

The first problem is that the middling Evangelicals/Pentecostals can claim spiritual richness, like “we have a superabundance of scholarship, we have many modern versions and translations”. Yet, Jesus says we ought to obtain the real richness, which is His pure word.

His pure word is available today, it is the King James Bible!

The second problem is that middling Evangelicals/Pentecostals have issues with upholding holiness standards. The Evangelicals often disparage themselves as “sinners saved by grace”, and the Pentecostals often talk about not judging people and how God is apparently wavering his standards. That type of view is a reaction against uncharitable legalists and old fashioned rigidity. They say that people got caught up in holiness standards in the past (about fashion and cultural behaviour) that they got their eyes off Jesus. But now the opposite is the problem, they have their eyes on all these perceived slights of alleged “Pharisees” and “condemners” that they are not looking so intently at Jesus at all. Preaching sermons against “being religious” and making a religion out of “I’m in a relationship” is probably a worse condition than the alleged problems of Charles L. Greenwood “women ought to wear hats” culture, and has become anti-legalism legalism. Free grace is not licence.

The old Holiness of Wesley, Finney, Wigglesworth and Greenwood is still here today, it is an integral part of Faith Pentecostalism!

The third problem is that middling Evangelicals/Pentecostals are being blinded by what they think is good hermeneutics and exegesis. They are in danger of not understanding doctrine properly because when they look to the Scripture, there is a filter on that says, “know the Greek”, “bow to Jewish culture” and “follow Gordon Fee’s methods”. But the haze of error and the fog of the devil can roll in.

When Jesus said to hear what the Spirit is saying to the churches, He meant we can hear clearly without all these interventions and contrivances when we interpretate Scripture. And we can perceive clearly today!

14 And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias, which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive:

15 For this people’s heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.

16 But blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear.

(Matthew 13:14–16).

SOME MORE IN FAVOUR OF THE KING JAMES BIBLE

Middle type Pentecostals are not bad Christians, they are not false brethren or heretics. They certainly have good doctrines, they use the Scripture in their teaching and they believe it to be the inspired, infallible Word of God.

But on the Bible version/translation issue, too many are ignorant or misled.

When they say that textual variants in the old manuscripts don’t matter, it is strange, because there are a lot of important Pentecostal doctrines in the end of Mark, and for a long time many Pentecostals knew modernism was attacking them by minimising those verses.

The charge that King James Bible words have changed meaning since 1611 is wrong, in that the old meanings of words still exist and are still known. We are able to educate people on the meaning of doctrinal words, why is it suddenly bad that people have to be aided in knowing some King James Bible words? Also, we actually believe that the Holy Ghost is helping people to understand the Bible, since when should we act like He is not at work, and are therefore obliged to lay aside our King James Bibles?

Since the Holy Ghost has been at work through history and present since the day of Pentecost, we should believe that by the Church practice and by divine providence, proper copies of the Scripture have passed down to us, and that the translation was able to be made right in 1611, and that God has prepared the English language to be capable to spread His exact words and meanings to a global audience for the latter days. God is good, awesome and able to bring about perfection, right?

I have to shake my head if some Pentecostal theologian says that “the KJB has been revised three times” and that “there is not just one version of it”. As a Pentecostal, and having done a lot of study on this, I can confirm that the KJB has in fact gone through many different editions. Yet in all that, no one could honestly say that the 1611’s underlying text and translation has been changed in the KJB. Yes, there’s been errors of the press and corrections of them and yes spelling and grammar has been standardised, but no the King James Bible today is not a different “version”.

I note the irony that the middling Pentecostals and in full agreement with the McArthurite anti-Pentecostalists on the Bible version/translation issue.

Evangelicals and Pentecostals will be doing well if they turn towards the King James Bible, and stop this strange drive of producing unedifying materials against the KJB (blogs, videos, etc.)

Editorial, General

Believers and good works

The Word and Spirit movement has two sides of errors to deal with.

On one side, those who are so aware of the law of God, yet do not understand the message of salvation properly. A variety of traditional and mainline denominations represent salvation as if Christians are barely saved, as though a Christian is a forgiven sinner in the present tense.

On the other side are those who say they are so in the Spirit that they need not obey standards, hold doctrines or submit to any kind of constraints. Apparently, in the Spirit, they are free to do anything. All sins are forgiven so almost all things become permissible, as though Christians may call themselves righteous regardless of what they do.

Both these extremes are wrong, and both present dangers and lead people into error. On one side, a person may sin, be aware of it, but say it is because he is a sinner and console himself that God will overlook it. On the other side, a person may sin, be ware of it, but say that he is justified and the devil is just trying to condemn him with feelings of guilt. Both these views are extreme errors and are very troubling.

SINNERS SAVED BY GRACE ERROR

One famous Presbyterian minister wrote, “Christians have nothing to be smug about; we are not righteous people trying to correct the unrighteous. As one preacher said, “Evangelism is just one beggar telling another beggar where to find bread.” The chief difference between the believer and the unbeliever is forgiveness. The only thing that qualifies a person to be a minister in the name of Christ is that that person has experienced forgiveness and wants to tell of it to others.”

This quote is wrong doctrine on so many levels. First, actual Christians should not be in pride, so they should not be “smug”. Second, the Bible teaches very clearly that Christians should judge. Judgment should be right, and it is good. Third, Christianity is all about correction, both against the world and within the Church.

Fourth, true Christianity elevates Christians to be sons of God, to be seated in heavenly places, so Christian evangelism is not being done by “beggars”. Rather, to be Christian is to be righteous, to be good, to be elevated. The difference between the believer and the unbeliever is vast and stark.

Christ does not keep Christians in a beggarly condition, as salvation is of power to make the sinners righteous.

So then, Christians were sinners, but being saved, they are actually saved, not in the thing any more that was sending them to hell. As the old holiness preachers said, salvation is about saving people from doing the things that were damnable, not merely saving them from hell. Jesus came to save people from sin and from sinning.

FREE GRACE ERROR

There are those who teach in order to be saved, you don’t have to do anything. Apparently, no works are required at all. Since actually believing, or expending calories in praying aloud, or doing anything at all such as repenting of your former life is allegedly a “work”, they say that such things ought not be done.

Even though salvation is about submitting to the rule of Christ, there are those who deny that Jesus must be made one’s Lord.

“That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.” (Romans 10:9, 10).

So clearly “grace” is not without some reciprocal action on our part. Laying hold of salvation is actually required, it doesn’t just fall on us by chance, or by just thinking that you agree to it.

If one should confess the “Lord Jesus” then that means recognising his mastership and rule in your life.

HYPERGRACE ERROR

As for Christian living, are we to obey God’s rules, or are we just “free in the Spirit” to do whatever we or allegedly He leads us to. (Allegedly He because it seems that in many cases people who live this way are really living after their own desires or listening to an evil spirit.)

The problem of no-effort and lack of sanctification has arisen in charismatic circles, and has robbed Christians of all kinds of blessings. Instead of growing up spiritually, this lying spirit will teach things like “you don’t have to tithe” and so on, which seems to accord with the satanic doctrine, “do as thou wilt”.

Being a son of God does not mean being free from obedience. When the Bible spoke of being free from the works of the law, it meant works to earn salvation. It did not mean that we should abandon standards or morality as Christians. On the contrary, the Bible states that we should “abound to every good work” (2 Cor. 9:8). Again, “That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work” (Col. 1:10). And again, that God “Comfort your hearts, and stablish you in every good word and work.” (2 Thess. 2:17).

Proper sanctification is the process of actual continuous obedience to the Gospel, which is to say, that sanctification leads to holiness.

LOW COMMITMENT CHRISTIANITY ERROR

Those who really wish to make the cost of following Christ cheap, to have no apparently onerous requirements, are falling into the error of being lukewarm. Lukewarm Christianity has taken over much of Evangelicalism, and it is a form of Christianity that has minimum requirements, little prayer and little Bible reading, and probably non-committal Church attendance.

Satan has been very accommodating. The COVID-19 lockdowns were a perfect excuse for people to quit Church. Yet the Bible stated, “Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is” (Heb. 10:25a). And again, “And Jesus said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.” (Luke 9:62).

One Evangelical minister from Wales stated, “If you do not desire to be holy I do not see that you have any right to think that you are a Christian. It is a part of God’s design that we be prepared unto good works.”

The whole of Christianity is about the works we do because of Christ.

Editorial

A hard word on Gordon Fee’s legacy

Recently I heard that Gordon Fee had passed away. I saw Christians praising his theological work, so I thought it would be good to lay down a counter to this, and show the grave errors of Fee’s work.

One of the greatest compromisers who brought the enemy into the midst of the camp has been Gordon Fee. Gordon Fee, a Pentecostal theologian, has most famously written about “How to read the Bible for all its worth”. His other less known but equally misguided book is “How to choose a translation for all its worth”.

Besides various commentaries, Gordon Fee codified the entire unbelieving approach of modernist-influenced Evangelical-Pentecostal interpretation in his 1983 book “New Testament Exegesis”.

In reading the Bible, it needs to be interpreted. Fee’s approach is first to practice exegesis, which is to say, what did the transmitter intend to communicate. His second step is to practice the application and apply the relevance to the receiver. This would in some ways be acceptable. In Fee’s teachings, all of this comes under the broad unbelieving approach as tainted by modernist thinking called “hermeneutics”, which is to say, the field of study of modernist-influenced interpretation.

Let’s state two facts about the writing of Scripture, first that it is from God, and second that it was written by people at certain places at certain times. However, we cannot take a modernist-influenced view, which leans heavily towards natural elements and the human aspect, when in fact all things that exist in the natural are under the divine order of God. Pure modernism is purely naturalistic, which is not, of course, as far as Fee (and much of modern evangelical-Pentecostalism) has slidden.

Fee’s view, like much of modernist-influenced “orthodox evangelicalism”, exists between true belief and unbelief or Infidelity. As if to fulfil the very warning to the Laodicean Church, much of such theology exists in a middling, lukewarm place, that is neither cold nor hot. In this place we find people who do believe in Christ, who are probably saved, yet who have slipped not only in individual doctrines (whether it be on creation, Bible version and translation accuracy, Bible prophecy understanding, etc.) but more importantly on the very overarching approach and understanding of theology, Christian “philosophy”, the full counsel of God, universal learning, pansophy and attaining of wise counsel itself.

When you begin from “we cannot know the full truth because we are sinful, fallible, limited beings” type foundation, you are already defying myriads of scriptures and the work of the Holy Ghost Himself!

So then, Gordon Fee had a view about how to understand Scripture laced with the unbelieving leaven of naturalistic, human-based Enlightenment philosophy. And further, he taught his method, even as he had learned it from a variety of more advanced unbelieving masters (including the notorious Karl Barth).

In fact, Fee was just the latest espouser of unbelief drawn from a long line of compromisers with the German Rationalistic Unbelief (i.e. theological influenza).

To take a brief excursus, the modernistic error, known as “Biblical hermeneutics”, arose in the late 18th century, with the text-based Grammatical School of J. A. Ernesti, and the Historical School of J. S. Semler.

These German schools of thought deviated from proper interpretation in two ways. The Grammatical placed emphasis upon words in a robotic fashion (and ultimately in the original languages, therefore not in the received vernacular that Protestants had so long strived to provide), while the Historical practised historical revisionism by trying to read the Scripture in light of its contemporary audience (as Noah Webster himself indicated that since the early writers were ignorant of geography, then geographical statements were indicative of their ignorance, and scripture certainly not to be taken as ultimate truth).

These were men who were thoroughly infected with Deism and French Infidelity!

The rationalist German theologian Karl A. G. Keil followed Ernesti, and sought to read the Bible like any other book, but in the light of the Higher Critical ideas of Semler. This led to a mediation of both schools of thought to form the Historical-Grammatical School.

Schleiermacher, a theologian at the beginning of the 19th century, tried to accommodate the rationalist view while rejecting its excesses. In 1834, the two schools were drawn together in a new, eclectic position under the guidance of Schleiermacher (the father of Modern Liberal Theology).

The Swiss theologian Cellerier attempted to formalise the Grammatico-Historical School (1852), though his work was so tainted by the unbelief of German Criticism that Fairbairn criticised it, but the influence filtered through. And so the virus spread: Fairbairn (1859), Doedes (1862), Immer (1877), after which came Farrar (1886), Terry (1890), Tenney (1957), Mickelsen (1963), Ramm (1967), Berkhof (1969), Kaiser (1981), Fee (1983), Carson (1984), Moo (1986), Osborne (1991), Tate (1991), Zuck (1991), Klein (1993), Silva (1994), etc.

Sitting down the line in this unillustrious company was none other than Gordon Fee, who had learned somewhat poorly from his masters, for Fee wrongly called the application of Scripture “hermeneutics”, which in fact was the term to be used for the entire science and art of interpretation of Scripture.

Therefore, we are left with two positions, either the believing interpretation of Scripture or the art and science of hermeneutics. Essentially hermeneutics is in contradiction to believing interpretation.

Now in brief, because of the unbelief and assumptions of Infidelity, Fee and many other Christians were adamant that there was no exact text or textual reconstruction of Scripture, likewise that there was no precise translation of Scripture. There was not, in their view, one final English Bible, nor could there be.

Modernism says you can choose your translation, which slips too often to post-modernism which is, I will make the scripture say what I wish it to say (and I will chose a translation accordingly). Once on the slippery slope, people like Fee had no everlasting arms upon which to rely in order to stop the full slide into humanistic atheism.

So when these people say that the culture of Bible times differs to our own, we may easily counter: the Holy Ghost was communicating truth to us when the Scripture was written. The Bible was written for us, not merely for the contemporary audience. The Holy Ghost is able to communicate to us today, and the Scripture has been designed as such. In fact, in whatever was written, the Holy Ghost had us, future believers, in mind! (That’s what Paul said.)

This comes to a greater view, that Scripture not only was prewritten by God in Heaven before it was ever inspired on Earth, which itself counters all the unbelieving interpretation-clouding imposed by modernistic hermeneuticists, but in fact, Scripture existed in the mind of God before, beyond and outside of all creation.

That’s why I believe in the manifestation in history of a perfect 66 book Bible version, translation and edition. I believe that this answers inside of creation to the concept of the perfect God having the full knowledge of the perfect Scripture outside of these temporal bounds.

When Jesus said “Ye shall know the truth” (John 8:32), He really meant it. He actually meant it in two ways. First that we should know or have the perfect Scripture ultimately before the end of creation come about. And second, that the Holy Ghost speaks to each person to have them be the best dispenser of the love of God they can be, as manifested in the grown up Church (see the Book of Ephesians throughout).

There is no limit on advancing to perfectibility, because the enemies of Christ are through time being made His footstool (see Psalm 110). Therefore, there are two works of God through history. One is the work of His perfect word and it being made known to the nations. This is what the Historicist interpretation of the first half of Revelation is all about. The other is that His work is in perfecting the saints, the perfectly functioning Church, which is seen in the victory of the saints in the second half of the Book of Revelation.

Gordon Fee did not believe in the perfect text, perfect translation or perfect interpretation. He was of a whole panoply which is intrinsically against ultimate perfection.

I believe a mighty and spiritual hail is coming to destroy all such unbelief, Infidelity and Left-wing ideology.

I believe in the day of visitation and the latter days glory of the saints.

A wise man will hear, and will increase learning; and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels:

To understand a proverb, and the interpretation; the words of the wise, and their dark sayings.

(Proverbs 1:5, 6).

Have not I written to thee excellent things in counsels and knowledge,

That I might make thee know the certainty of the words of truth; that thou mightest answer the words of truth to them that send unto thee?

(Proverbs 22:20, 21).

Editorial

Separation of church and state? – part 2

Is there a separation of church and state? Those who advocate for Christians getting involved in politics means they don’t believe in a separation. Yet, strangely, some such lobbyists and organisers say they do believe in the separation of church and state.

Political organiser Dave Pellowe claims that the separation “is only rightly understood as a synonym for religious liberty, not Christian political suppression.” What he is doing is using the wrong terminology, “the separation” to describe the free marketplace, free concourse and neutrality view of the Australian Constitution.

The Australian Constitution is open to religion, religion in politics, politics in religion, just not to making specific laws about establishing a religion, imposing religion, prohibiting religion or religious tests. All of that does not prohibit or disallow religion, nor does it stop any steps to endorse and support a religion, as long as it does not strictly violate Section 116, The Commonwealth shall not make any law for establishing any religion, or for imposing any religious observance, or for prohibiting the free exercise of any religion, and no religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth.

It is disturbing that in his quest to promote religion in politics, Dave Pellowe turns to the most unlikely source, the social agitator and dubious activist, Martin Luther King Jnr, who could hardly be a good representative for the Christian Right.

Pellowe agrees with King, quoting him favourably, “The Church must be reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the State, but rather the conscience of the State. It must be the guide and the critic of the State, and never its tool.”

In the USA there is a strong doctrinal and philosophical doctrine against the dominion of any specific brand of Christianity in the political system. The fact that the Church is demoted from being an authority or having mastery is to pander to the French Infidel approach. That’s the view of the Left too.

Why would Australian Christian lobbyists/activists who are pushing ostensibly for a Right-leaning view draw upon or allow the poison of a Left-leaning ideology?

We must take a much stronger view. One where a more authoritarian Christianity thrives under the liberty of the state. We need to turn back to our direct roots, rather than to the USA, as a starting point.

In Bobrick’s book on the Cromwellian era Puritans, Wide as the Waters Be, he wrote that, “the Church had been looked upon primarily as an instrument for securing, by moral and religious influences, the social and political ends of the State. Under the Commonwealth, the State, in its turn, was regarded primarily as an instrument for securing through its social and political influences the moral and religious ends of the Church. The aim of the Puritan had been to set up a visible kingdom of God upon earth. In the Puritan theory, Englishmen were ‘the Lord’s people’; a people dedicated to Him by a solemn Covenant, and whose end as a nation was to carry out His will. For such an end it was needful that rulers as well as people should be ‘godly men’. Godliness became necessarily the chief qualification for public employment.”

In the Elizabethan, Stuart, Jacobite and British Empire view, the Church was a partner with the state. As with the Eastern Roman Empire, the Church and the Empire were inextricably linked.

In the Puritan view, it was the common faith, which was partner with the state. The common faith manifested as a particular brand of Christianity with tolerance or openness toward a wider practice of various Protestant beliefs.

In the Australian Constitution the Protestant toleration view has moved far to total religious toleration. That no doubt could include Wiccans, Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and so forth.

If a particular brand of Christianity is truly right and truly empowered of God, then it will prevail. That’s what the Australian Constitution allows. It allows that every member of society and government can all be part of the same religion. As long as no laws are being made specifically to enforce or bar, it could be so.

In order to defeat Infidelity’s leavening of society (and the Left’s long march through the institutions), then Christians have to understand the national implications of its message. No more should Christians fear fake labels put on them like “dominionism”, “Trumpism”, “triumphalism”, “Christian nationalism”, “theocracy”, “fundamentalism” and so forth.

It is estimated that only 10% of the British population were Cromwellians, yet they ruled the day in the 1650s. There is a broad minority which today has “values” in Australia, including Hindus, Catholics, Mormons and Protestant groups. Of that minority, there are a minority of Christian activist types, Evangelicals and Pentecostals, who are trying to take political participation to the next level. Good on them for wanting to participate in democratic processes, of course, but in the big picture such movements are generally weak, talking about “separation”, quoting Martin Luther King Jnr., upholding Bonhoeffer and being obsessed over single social issues.

Let Christians and Christianity get itself right before it does anything too much in the democratic free market of politics. Current Christians are really so chaotic and largely in an identity crisis that to take them as they are and have them make a real change through political activity is undesirable. The Christianity that has the right and the power to become THE Christianity in Australia is not yet openly manifest. Until such a Christianity is birthed, any major reforms through Christians having constructive influence in politics is going to be negligible. People may mean well and do good, but the capacity of rising bad examples is just as real.

A theological revolution around Christ’s enemies being made his footstool is required. Until adherents know how to press into the kingdom and believe in establishing a national church with particular beliefs, then the current blunderbuss of religious conservatism will suffice as a broad front of influence.

Until the coming bishops and the superior Christians are at hand, there is still the need for the ongoing preparations for this day of visitation. As it is, the current system itself would be incapable of producing the King Arthur-like “last” Christians. The answer therefore does not depend upon slick Christian political websites, the talent pool of well funded mega-churches or the online and travelling fame circuit. It is much more that out of the desert the prophets come.

“Gird thy sword upon thy thigh, O most mighty, with thy glory and thy majesty.” (Psalm 45:3).

Editorial

Separation of church and state? – part 1

In recent times, generic Christian political speakers have been discussing issues around the influence of Marxism in society and how Christians should be more politically engaged and involved in politics.

In the 1840s, the only politics was Catholics versus Protestants. Proto-Victoria’s fledgling political democracy was the battleground around fundamentally religious issues. How far things have fallen!

Margaret Keech runs an organisation promoting Christians being involved in politics. But she says Christian Left or Christian Right doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter?! Her own partner in her “ministry”, Dave Pellowe, has called fake conservative moderates “Marxists”. There is not much room for the “Left” according to Dave Pellowe.

City on a Hill, an Anglican Church sub-movement which began its Geelong operation in a pub recently promoted a series of political lectures. They took a mixed look at issues like illegal immigration. One of their own leaders was famously fired from a football club for his involvement with City on a Hill, with that leader saying he disagreed with his own church on fundamental issues. This lack of clarity or conviction on standing with the Christian Right is concerning.

Dave Pellowe tries to explain that he believes in the separation of church and state. He’s not the only Christian political activist to claim to believe that. Today that separation is said to mean (by secularists) no spirituality and no religion in politics. That’s the French meaning. But historically in the USA it meant that no single denomination, as in a state church, like the Anglican Church, should be part of the political apparatus.

Pellowe has an Australian-specific definition, because he uses that term to mean something entirely different than how it has been used. He uses it to mean he supports what the Australian Constitution says about religion. However, it is actually misleading to use such terminology to describe an Australian meaning, when the other secular and traditional US meanings are known.

If a Christian in Australia is saying they believe in the separation, it seems to be cover for them to appear to agree with the secularists, or at least to believe what the American Baptists and American founding father’s believed, viz., that no single religion should have total political control.

In fact, we should reject those meanings altogether, and say we reject the separation of church and state.

Pellowe is really meaning that he supports these words from the Australian Constitution, known as Section 116, The Commonwealth shall not make any law for establishing any religion, or for imposing any religious observance, or for prohibiting the free exercise of any religion, and no religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth.

The first notion, of not establishing any religion, is the American doctrine (as opposed to the French secularist doctrine of anti-religion). The second notion, of imposing, seems close to the French view, but is a historical secularist view, which essentially is based upon religious neutrality. The third, on prohibiting, makes that clear. The final corollary that no religious test be required was designed to undo the limitation against Catholics, which was a long time practised method, by certain oaths (not believing in the central Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation), having hindered Catholics from public office.

The Australian traditionally-based religious neutral-secularist approach is one for allowing open grounds to both truth and error.

Dave Pellowe is wrong to use the terminology of separation of church and state because the Australian Constitution allows all, any or no religion, and therefore religion is not separate to the state.

Therefore to espouse a “separation” is to firmly place Christianity as not having its rightful place in Australia. But the constitution does not affirm a separation at all!

What is scramble-brained about those who claim to support separation while promoting religion in politics and talking about politics in church is that there is no separation at all. They should get this word “separation” out of the way, since it is not right, and not mentioned in the Constitution at all in any way in Section 116.

These Christian political lobbyists have a choice. Either they really are promoting Christianity, or they are promoting compromise.

Surely, the real and underlying motives of such Christians in politics is all about making politics Christian? Being honest would go a long way. Who of them will say, “I want Australia to be a Christian nation. Christian from the top to the bottom,” or similar?

If we treated the Australian Constitution as a providential document, and said that the words of 116 ought not be altered, then what does it mean?

First that the Commonwealth does not have to make a law, yet it may be that all the people in political office were in one brand of Christianity, and that the authority of such was placed in bishops, not in laws of some parliament. Second, that outside of Commonwealth laws, the executive power (e.g. the Governor General or the Sovereign) could establish without Parliamentary laws a particular brand of Christianity. Third, that any or all states could establish and make laws, meaning that the State Parliaments with State Governors could establish a particular brand of Christianity.

Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance. Psalm 33:12