Republished April 10, 2000 (first published April 8, 1999) (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, Michigan 48061, fbns@wayoflife.org) – The article I published recently on the preservation of the Holy Scriptures ("Preservation Is Missing in Standard Works on Textual Criticism," March 30, 1999; see the Bible Version section of the Fundamental Baptist Information Service topical listing at the Way of Life web site) struck a sore spot with some men. I could tell by the vehemence of their letters to me. I refer to those who believe it is heresy to claim that the standard old English Bible and its underlying Greek and Hebrew text is the preserved Word of God. These men, as a rule, don’t get very upset about the rationalism of modern textual critics. (They will even quote approvingly from the writings of heretics such as Bruce Metzger, Fredric Kenyon, and F.F. Bruce, rarely, if ever, warning their readers that these men deny the supernatural infallibility of Holy Scripture.) But they become exceedingly fierce and bold when a man claims that the King James Bible and its underlying text is the preserved Word of God and when he refuses to correct it. Friends, I believe something is wrong with this picture.

I will illustrate from recent correspondence I have received:

LETTER FROM READER: "The mystical need of the KJV & it’s underlying TR should be replaced with the honest truth that it is as fallible as the men who put it together. The Lord Jesus Christ will give us that perfect Greek and Hebrew text at the proper time. I honestly believe we will have to reach the perfection that comes with death or the rapture to be able to fully appreciate it without worshiping it" (Don D. Srail, Northwest Independent Church Extension).

COMMENT BY BROTHER CLOUD: Mr. Srail thinks the Received Text is as fallible as the men who put it together. For him, the infallible Word of God does not exist anywhere in the world. He believes it is mystically scattered throughout the manuscripts and versions; and though he says he hopes it might be recovered some day, he fears that men would worship it if it were ever recovered! Those who accept the King James Bible and its Received Text as the preserved Word of God are close to idolaters, in this man’s book. He told me I am in danger of falling into the error of the Jews who worshipped the Brazen Serpent. What unmitigated nonsense! I don’t worship the King James Bible. I worship the God of the King James Bible. But I do revere the King James Bible and its Received Text as the infallible Word of my God, and God Himself has stated that he has magnified His Word above all His name!!! This man does not revere any Bible as the holy infallible Word of God, because he does not believe such a thing exists. There is something wrong with this picture, friends. There is something wrong with a position on Bible preservation that leaves a man with no preserved Bible, that motivates a man to mock those who hold an existing Bible as the inspired Word of God, labeling them idolaters and heretics.

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LETTER FROM READER: "God willed that His Church should enjoy the benefit of His written word, at once as a rule of doctrine and as a guide unto holy living. For this cause He so enlightened the minds of the Apostles and Evangelists by His Spirit, that they recorded what He had imprinted on their hearts or brought to their remembrance, without the risk of error in anything essential to the verity of the Gospel. But this main point once secured, the rest was left, in a great measure, to themselves" (Doug Kutilek, quoting F.H.A. Scrivener without qualification).

COMMENT BY BROTHER CLOUD: Kutilek believes both the inspiration and preservation of the Bible are human enterprises by and large. God helped a little, but man was left "in great measure" to himself. That is his flimsy view of Bible inspiration and preservation. How does Kutilek know that the Scripture was inspired in such a hazy manner? His doctrine certainly did not come from what the Bible itself says. We know that God used the personalities of the writers of Scripture somewhat, but the Bible nowhere says that the Spirit of God inspired the Scripture in the manner described by Kutilek. Nowhere are we told that inspiration involved only the Spirit’s general guidance. The Apostle Peter tells us authoritatively and dogmatically that Scripture was written by holy men who "spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost" (2 Peter 1:21). That tells me that the Spirit of God guided every single word. What they spoke and wrote was Holy Ghost language. The Apostle Paul also said the Scriptures are inspired in the very words (1 Cor. 2:13). 2 Timothy 3:16 says the Scripture "is given by inspiration of God." The Scripture is said to be wholly the product of divine inspiration." Nothing is said about the writers being left to put the message into his own words. They were moved by the Holy Spirit in every detail they wrote, every word, every jot, every tittle. Let the unbelievers mock this as "mechanical dictation," if they so please. I will tell you a little secret here that will help you discern belief from unbelief. Dr. Bruce Lackey explained this to me as a Bible school student 25 years ago. It is this: Unbelievers emphasize man’s part in the writing and preserving of the Bible. Believers emphasize God’s part. Kutilek is denying (in practice, at least) the verbal inspiration of Holy Spirit. No wonder he does not understand Bible preservation. He does not even understand Bible inspiration.

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LETTER FROM READER: "Many see you as Ruckman’s equal because we can not tell any difference in your conclusions. I cannot see when either of you have had enough desire for truth about Bible translations to point at a passage in the KJV and flatly say ‘this is an error'" (Ron Minton).

COMMENT BY BROTHER CLOUD: To be an "honest Bible believer," to those with the mindset of Minton, a man must believe there are errors in the Authorized English Bible. Amazing! By this perverted standard, a "Bible believer" must believe there are errors in every Bible. What a strange kind of "Bible believer"! As for Dr. Ruckman, I have had at least as much trouble from him and those who support him as from the modern version crowd. I have written a report disagreeing with him on many points, and he has mocked me in his paper; but I definitely don’t fault him for believing God has preserved a pure Bible. If that is a fault, I will have to be guilty of it.

Of course, I am a simple Bible preacher, and though I am a diligent student, I am not a scholar of the biblical languages. On the other hand, men like Dr. Donald Waite and Dr. Thomas Strouse have credentials in the biblical languages that excel that of the men I am quoting in this report, and they don’t believe there are errors in the KJV, either. I will stand with them. I am deeply afraid of any position on biblical preservation that leaves a man with no preserved Bible today, that, in fact, makes him the enemy of those who do believe there is a preserved Bible.

It is not heresy or idolatry to accept the King James Bible and its Received Text as the preserved Word of God. If you hold that position, you are in good company. Millions of Christians have done just this in the past several centuries. When the great confessions of faith were written in the 17th and 18th centuries, the Protestants and Baptists of that day claimed that God has preserved the Scriptures infallibly. They were holding a King James Bible and were pointing to the Received Text when they made those claims. For example, the Philadelphia Confession of Faith (1742) stated:

"The Old Testament in Hebrew (which was the native language of the people of God of old) and the New Testament in Greek (which at the time of the writing of it was most generally known to the nations), being immediately inspired by God, and by His singular care and providence kept pure in all ages are, therefore authentical; so as in all controversies of religion, the Church is finally to appeal unto them."

The Greek and Hebrew which the 18th century Philadelphia Baptists called the preserved, pure Word of God was the Received Text underlying the King James Bible.

The Orthodox Creed of 1679 was written by a group of General Baptists in England, with a desire to emphasize doctrines that were held in common by all Bible-believing Christians. The following is what they believed about the Bible:

"And by the Holy Scriptures we understand the canonical books of the Old and New Testament, as they are now translated into our English mother-tongue, of which there hath never been any doubt of their verity and authority in the protestant churches of Christ to this day. All which are given by the inspiration of God, to be the rule of faith and life."

Friends, it sounds to me that these 17th century English-speaking Christians accepted the King James Bible and its Received Text as the preserved Word of God!

For centuries, Bible-believing people did not express any reservations about the authenticity or infallibility of the Received Text. It was left for the 19th century rationalistic textual critics to deny the preservation of the Received Text. Those who want to appear scholarly today refuse to reject the heretics that gave us modern textual criticism, but I don’t have that problem. Any man who denies the supernatural infallibility of Holy Scripture is an arch heretic in my book (and the vast majority of influential textual critics are in this category), and I refuse to follow his counsel. I am a diligent student and I see no advantage in ignorance, but I am not concerned with credentials or with achieving repute as a scholar. I could have advanced degrees if I pleased. My Bible Encyclopedia alone would make several good theses. I don’t despise knowledge, but I do despise the pride of scholarship. Genuine scholarship is good, but the desire to be known as a scholar is evil. The condition of the human heart is what makes scholarship so dangerous in this fallen world.

One of the most serious problems among Bible-believing Fundamentalists today, in my estimation, is the lack of separation from New Evangelicalism (which in turn is yoked together with Romanism and other unscriptural isms because it refuses to practice separation from anything) and Modernism at the seminary level of Bible training. It is extremely common for professors in Fundamentalist and fundamental Baptist seminaries to get much of their education at the feet of New Evangelicals at schools like Dallas Theological Seminary or worse. As the Bible warns, more often than not they become spiritually tainted by this illicit relationship. "Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners" (1 Cor. 15:33). (The exceptions, and they are few, are those who are unusually well grounded in the Word of God, unusually discerning, unusually militant and therefore perpetually resisting much of the instruction they are given, and unusually courageous so that they publicly repudiate the very institution that trained them.) Biblical separation from error is required because of the corrupting power of error (Rom. 16:17,18; 2 Tim. 2: 16-18; etc.). If you don’t believe that Fundamentalists are being influenced by New Evangelicals and worse, simply check out the textbooks used to teach textual criticism and similar disciplines in Fundamentalist seminaries. They are written by New Evangelicals and Modernists like Bruce Metzger, D.A. Carson, and F.F. Bruce. Some have protested against my applying the term "Modernist" to Bruce Metzger, but in my book, at man who says Moses did not write the Pentateuch and the Old Testament miracles are exaggerated myths and Peter did not write 2 Peter is a Modernist.

I want to be known as a simple preacher who believes and defends the infallible, preserved Word of God against all its enemies. You will have to forgive me for thinking that the effectiveness of such an endeavor BEGINS with the confidence that one has such a Bible! I want to encourage my readers that they can trust the King James Bible and its Received Text (and any good translation of the Received Text in other languages). God’s people today do not have to be dependent upon textual critics to tell them which parts of the Bible are preserved. The critics themselves don’t know, so why waste the time with them. Believe God, and reject the critics. You won’t be able to believe both. The textual critics are the true heretics in this issue. They are also the true idolaters, because they worship scholarship and look upon the holy Bible (at least in a practical sense) as a human device.

I will gladly be called an idolater, a heretic, and a Ruckmanite before I will take the position of skepticism represented by the men who have recently written to me on this subject.

"Therefore I esteem all thy precepts concerning all things to be right; and I hate every false way" (Psalm 119:128).