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1 Corinthians 11:23-24 "For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, That the same night in which he was betrayed took bread: And when he had given thanks, he brake it, and said, TAKE, EAT: this is my body, which IS BROKEN for you: this do in remembrance of me."


In most modern bible versions that are based on the Westcott-Hort, Nestle-Aland, UBS Greek critcal texts, the words "Take, eat" and "broken" are omitted. Those who defend these modern versions tell us that the words "take, eat" and "broken" are not in the best manuscripts (meaning primarily Sinaiticus and Vaticanus), and some go so far as to suggest that the King James Bible reading is not only "corrupt" but also teaches false doctrine.


One such KJB critic writes: "A serious error is found in the KJV where it says: And when he had given thanks, he brake it, and said, Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of me. - 1 Corinthians 11:24


This is in direct contradiction to the prophecy of His crucifixion: I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint: my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels. - Psalm 22:14 (Note the bones are out of joint - not broken) and in direct contradiction of what actually took place:


The Jews therefore, because it was the preparation, that the bodies should not remain upon the cross on the sabbath day, (for that sabbath day was an high day,) besought Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. Then came the soldiers, and brake the legs of the first, and of the other which was crucified with him. But when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake not his legs - John 19:31-33


And in fact if we go back to the orginal Greek we do not find the word 'broken'. It is actually much closer in the NASB which says this: 11:24 - and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, "This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me."


In response to this allegation of "serious error" in the King James Bible, it should be pointed out that this Bible critic has never seen "the original Greek" a day in his life, and what he (or she) would refer to as the best manuscripts are in fact only two - Sinaiticus and Vaticanus -, and these are not only in constant disagreement with the vast majority of all remaining Greek texts, but also with each other.


For an article which presents FACTS showing that these "oldest and best" are actually among the very worst corruptions to which the New Testament has been subjected, see:


http://www.geocities.com/brandplucked/oldbest.html


The words "TAKE, EAT: this is my body WHICH IS BROKEN for you" are found in the vast Majority of all remaining Greek texts, including the corrections of Sinaiticus, C and D. It is also the reading found in several Old Latin copies b, d, e, f, g, (not to be confused with the later Vulgate, and the subsequent Catholic versions which also omit these precious words). They are also found in the Syraic Peshitta and Harkelian, the Gothic, Armenian, Georgian, Slavonic and Ethiopic ancient versions. It is also found in the Clementine Vulgate, Wycliffe 1395, Tyndale 1525, Coverdale 1535, Bishops' Bible 1568, the Geneva Bible 1599, the Italian Diodati 1649, Spanish Reina Valera's from 1569 (Sagradas Escrituras), 1602, 1909 - 1995, the French Martin 1744, French Ostervald 1996, Luther's German 1545, the Hebrew Names Bible, the Amplified Bible 1987, New Life Bible 1979, Young's, the NKJV 1982, the Third Millenium Bible 1998, and the Modern Greek N.T. used in the Greek Orthodox churches today. Even the wild and wacky Message 2002, which usually follows the WH texts, reads "body broken for you". These are only a few of the many Bible versions in many languages that contain all these inspired words.


The words "Take, eat" "which is broken" are omitted in such versions as the ASV, RSV, NRSV, NASB, NIV, TNIV, ESV and Holman Standard, primarily because of the confusing witnesses of Vaticanus and Alexandrinus, yet these two manuscripts differ from each other hundreds of times in very significant ways, with many whole verses found in the one but omitted by the other.


The textual evidence is overwhelmingly in support of the reading found in the King James Bible. As for the charge that the KJB reading contradicts other Scriptures, this again, is not true at all. The problem lies in the faulty understanding of the Bible critic. By the way, this Bible critic does not believe that ANY Bible in any language is now the complete, inerrant and 100% true words of God.


At our Which Version internet club, after one of the members posted this alleged error in the King James Bible, brother Teno Groppi, a straight shooting King James Bible believer, replied in the following manner:


"Right. His BONES were not broken. But 1 Cor 11:24 says His BODY was broken. It certainly was. He was ripped to shreds by 39 lashes, His beard plucked from His face, thorns pressed into His head, nails driven through His hands and feet, a spear thrust into His side, His wounds continually ripped open while pulling Himself up to breathe while on the cross. His BODY was certainly broken. His BONES weren't. All it takes to reconcile that alleged error is to actually READ what the KJV SAYS. All it takes is the ability to tell the difference between the words 'BONE' and 'BODY', which most second graders are probably capable of.


Here is what some Bible commentators have had to say regarding this section of Scripture.


John Gill comments: he brake it;as a symbol of his body being wounded, bruised, and broken, through buffetings, scourgings, platting of a crown of thorns, which was put upon his head, and piercing his hands and feet with nails, and his side with a spear; for which reason the right of breaking the bread in this ordinance ought literally and strictly to be observed...broken for you; for though a bone of him was not broken, but inasmuch as his skin and flesh were torn and broken by blows with rods and fists, by whippings and scourgings, by thorns, nails, and spear; and body and soul were torn asunder, or divided from each other by death; and death in Scripture is expressed by "breaking"; see (Jeremiah 19:11) his body might be truly said to be broken, and that for his people."


David Guzik's Commentaries on the Bible notes: "This is My body: In taking the bread, we are called to remember Jesus' body broken for you. The Passover meal would feature unleavened bread... The unleavened bread used at a Passover meal would have the scortch-mark "stripes" and holes from baking that would look like "pierce" marks. In the same way, the body of Jesus was broken for us. He was without sin (as the bread had no leaven), and His body bore stripes and was pierced (as the bread)."


John Wesley tersely comments: "This is my body, which is broken for you - That is, this broken bread is the sign of my body, which is even now to be pierced and wounded for your iniquities."


John Calvin comments: "Which is broken for you. Some explain this as referring to the distribution of the bread, because it was necessary that Christ's body should remain entire, as it had been predicted, (Exodus 12:46,) A bone of him shall not be broken. As for myself -- while I acknowledge that Paul makes an allusion to the breaking of bread, yet I understand the word broken as used here for sacrificed -- not, indeed, with strict propriety, but at the same time without any absurdity. For although no bone was broken, yet the body itself having been subjected, first of all, to so many tortures and inflictions, and afterwards to the punishment of death in the most cruel form, cannot be said to have been uninjured. This is what Paul means by its being broken."


One commentary I found to be of interest is the one by Coffman, who himself is a promoter of the Westcott-Hort text which he refers to as "the best manuscripts". Even though he is completely wrong about these so called "best manuscripts", even he agreed with the meaning found in the King James Bible and the reading of the vast Majority of all Greek texts. Here is what he says:


Coffman Commentaries -"Some have supposed that breaking the bread contradicts (by symbolism) the fact that not a bone of Jesus was broken (John 19:36)! but the breaking of a bone is not the same as the breaking of the body. The spear that pierced Jesus' side certainly broke his "body," but did not break any bone. The KJV, of course, has "This is my body which is broken"; and the meaning is certainly in the passage, deriving from "he brake it." Thus the meaning is true, despite the fact of the word "broken" not being in the best manuscripts."


In summary, the Bible critic with no inerrant Bible of his own to recommend to anyone else is completely mistaken both in his facts as to the legitimacy of the reading and what it means. The King James Bible is right - as always.


Will Kinney

 




1 Timothy 1:4 "godly edifying"


The Bible Critics -


In his article, Translation Problems in the KJV New Testament, Copyrighted 2000 by Theodore H. Mann, he writes:1 Tim. 1:4: The 1611 "..which minister questions, rather then edifying.." Modern KJV: "..which minister questions, rather than godly edifying.." The modern KJV is more accurate than the 1611, but even that is not the best translation. A better version is: "These promote mere speculation [or "controversy"] rather than God's work [or "the administration of God"], which is by faith." (Gk. ejkzhthvsei: useless speculation; oikonomivan qeou': a stewardship of God)."


Using a different tactic, James White also takes a shot at the reading found in the King James Bible. In his book, The King James Only Controversy, on page 68, under the title of Textus Receptus Versus Textus Receptus, Mr. White writes: "godly edifying" Erasmus, Beza, KJV, D, Vulgate. "dispensation of God" Stephanus, M, Sinaiticus, A and G."


It should first of all be emphasized in bold letters that neither one of these Bible critics believes that there is any Bible in any language, including "the originals", that they think is now the complete, inerrant and 100% true words of God. This is the fundamental difference between today's multiple choice, multi-version promoters and the King James Bible believer.


Secondly, I still have no idea where Mr. Mann gets his Greek from, since throughout his article, most of his Greek matches nothing in any text I have ever seen. In this instance Mr. Mann not only seems to make up a Greek word out of thin air, but misapplies the one he gives us to the actual textual difference he is addressing.


The word in dispute as to the actual Greek Text has nothing to do with "useless speculation", but rather with "godly edifying" versus any number of different renderings recommended by Mr. Mann, including "administration of God" or "work of God", "stewardship of God", or "dispensation of God".


Apparently Mr. Mann is trying to kill two birds with one stone, and he ends up badly missing them both. The first word Mr. Mann takes on is the word rendered as "questions" in the King James Bible. This Greek word is 2214, zeeteesis rather than the "ejkzhthnsei" Mr. Mann lists. Mr. Mann gets himself into a bind from the get-go. Most Greek texts have the word zeeteesis (questions), but Sinaiticus and Alexandrinus have a slight variation (ek-zeeteesis), but even if we use this word, it ends up meaning the same thing.


Not only does the King James Bible render this word as "questions" but so do the Revised Version, the American Standard Version, and the Douay-Rheims, all three of which are Westcott-Hort texts. It is also rendered as "questions" in the Bishops' Bible, the Geneva Bible, Young's 'literal', Darby, the Amplified bible, and the Third Millenium Bible. Even the NASB itself renders this same Greek word as "questions" right here in 1 Timothy 6:4!


Most modern versions give a wide variety of translations for this one word rendered as "questions" in the King James Bible and in many others as well. The NKJV has "disputes", the Holman "empty speculations", NASB "mere speculation", and the NIV has "controversies".


You see, once a Bible critic like Mr. Mann abandons faith in an inerrant Bible, he then becomes his own Final Authority, and his peculiar opinions and personal preferences will differ from everybody else's.


The one point where Mr. Mann is correct is that the first printing of the 1611 King James Bible did contain a minor printing error in that the word "godly" was accidently omitted, but was soon caught and corrected. How do I know it was a printing error? Easy. All Greek texts contain the word rendered as "godly" and so too did all previous English Bibles like Wycliffe, Tyndale, Coverdale, Bishops', and the Geneva Bible.


Since most Whateverist, No Bible is Inerrant, Multiple-Choice Approximations, Bible of the Month Club promoters eventually end up in retreat at this last shallow fox-hole called "printing errors", I have written an article about this which you can see here:


http://www.geocities.com/brandplucked/PrintErr.html


Now to address the specific points brought up by James White and Mr. Mann regarding the reading of "godly edification". James White refers to the Greek text of Stephanus which reads "dispensation of God". However it should be noted that NO English Bible adopted the reading found in Stephens Greek text. Instead, all of them followed the reading of "godly EDIFYING".


The reading of "godly edifying" is found in codex D, the Old Latin copies of d, f, g and m; the Syriac Peshitta, and the Gothic ancient versions. Both the Old Latin and the Syriac versions preceeded the Sinaiticus copy, and the Gothic Bible was written around the same time. It is also so quoted by Iraeneus who lived between 130 to 200 A.D. "godly edifying" is the reading found in the Greek texts of Erasmus, Beza, Elzevir, and Scrivenir's Trinitarian Bible Society Textus Receptus. It is also the reading found in the online English Majority Text Version found here: http://www.emtvonline.com/


"godly edifying" is the reading in the following Bible versions: Wycliffe 1395, Tyndale 1525, Coverdale 1535, Bishops' Bible 1568, the Geneva Bible 1599, Wesley's N.T. 1755, Webster's 1833, the NKJV 1982, Young's, the Spanish Reina Valera (edificación de Dios), Italian Diodati, the KJV 21st Century, the Third Millenium Bible, and the Modern Greek N.T. used throughout the Greek Orthodox churches today.


The reading found in the Westcott-Hort text, which both James White and Mr. Mann endorse, has a different Greek word. Their text reads "oikonomian theou" and is variously rendered as "God's plan" (Holman 2003), "God's ordered way of life" (Bible in Basic English 1963), "God's work" (NIV), "dispensation of God" (RV, ASV), "stewardship for God" (Weymouth 1902), "design of God" (Jerusalem Bible 1968), "training which God requires" (St. Joseph New American Bible 1970), "divine training" (RSV, NRSV), while the NASB of 1963 had "God's provision", but later changed this to "administration of God" (NASB 1995). Daniel Wallace, of Dallas Theological Seminary, has now rendered this as "God's redemptive plan" which doesn't follow any Greek text at all!


This is an example of the confused mess you get yourself into when you believe and follow the "scholarly" opinions of men like James White and Theodore Mann. You end up with no sure words of God and no faith in an inerrant Bible. "In those days there was no king in Israel; Every man did that which was right in his own eyes." Judges 21:25.


Will Kinney



== External Link ==

* [http://brandplucked.webs.com/1cor11241tim14.htm 1 Corinthians 11:24 My Body which is Broken for You; 1 Timothy 1:4 Godly Edifying] by [[Will Kinney]]

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