KING JAMES and BAPTIST TOO!

Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and HOLD THE TRADITIONS which YE HAVE BEEN TAUGHT, whether by WORD, or OUR EPISTLE. --2 Thess. 2:15

CONTINUE thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast BEEN ASSURED OF, KNOWING of whom thou hast learned them . . . --2 Tim. 2:14

Baptists are the shock troops of history. They can be found in the front lines of the battle before anyone ever heard of a reformation. They are the indomitable fighters of the past, the present, and we are persuaded of the future. Their church polity, their Biblical fidelity, their faith, their freedom, and their independent spirit have made them, in the Lord, the leaders in the fight for Christ, His salvation, His Church, and His Bible.

Baptists have made the greater of the contributions to evangelism, missionary endeavor, and church planting. They are at the forefront of religious literary works, apologetics, and reference material compilation. Moreover, they have put to rout the Campbellites, the baby sprinklers, lose your salvationists, and other heretics. Baptists, indeed, have left their mark on history in a trail of blood!

Baptists have enjoyed hundreds of years of spiritual prosperity and growth. However, it was not until the advent of the bible revisions of 1881 and 1901 that Baptists have experienced a severe deterioration and apostasy in their ranks. Many Baptist scholars and writers have since been influenced by these revisions and their underlying Wescott/Hort text.* unwittingly, they were hoodwinked into participating in the biggest bamboozle ever perpetrated on Christendom.The practice of tampering with the Scriptures and overzealous appeals to the Greek (often the wrong Greek) has become commonplace among Baptists, although it is not in line with the traditions of the Apostle Paul, John Bunyan, the Albigenses, the Donatists, the Waldensians, the Anabaptists, nor any other spiritual ancestor. Bible correcting is far from a "landmark" principle among Baptists.

Comfort cannot be found in the fact that Baptists have confined most of their Bible Correcting to one or two doctrines, while others (cults, interdenominational, and nondenominational outfits) engage in this practice indiscriminately. Baptists must return to the traditional scriptural practice of allowing the Bible to judge them rather than trying to judge the Bible.

The Myth

Many Baptist Bible Correctors ultimately resort to the old myth that King James conspired against the Baptists by not allowing the Greek words for "baptism" and "church" to be translated. Strange that the same perpetrators of this old wive tale do not bat an eyelash at the failure of the "New Scofield Bible" to translate "HELL." Now, admittedly, James was no angel (neither was Solomon and David); and, yes, he was anti-Puritan; and, yes, he did instruct the translators to keep the older ecclesiastical words. However, this only proves that he did not invent the use of these older ecclesiastical words (church and baptism) and that he should be absolved of such false accusations. King James’ false accusers can hardly be credited with the scholarship that they desire, for the older ecclesiastical words (church and baptism) may be found in Tyndale's Bible (1525); The Great Bible (1539); The Geneva Bible (1560); and the Bishop's Bible (1568). All of these predate the Authorized or King James Bible.

Church

The word "church" is an English word that distinguishes between a nonreligious assembly or congregation and a religious one. One objector to the word tells us that this word (church) comes from the Greek word "KURIAKON" which mean's the Lord’s and that it was used by the early Christians in reference to the "Lord's house." Such usage, if not referring to a building, would satisfy the strictest of the "Landmark Baptists" in that a local assembly of baptized believers is held to be the "HOUSE of God." Furthermore, it demonstrates that the term (HOUSE of God) can also be loosely applied to a building that houses God’s people (as can also the word "church" and “synagogue”). Who would complain about the ambiguity of this term (HOUSE of God)?

Counterparts of "KURIAKON,” we are further told and are also found in the German "KIRCHE"; the Scotch "KIRK"; and the Old Scandinavian "KYRKA." This plus the fact that some of the English Bibles that predate the Authorized Bible of 1611 use the words "congregation" and "church" synonymously more than demonstrates that not only could it not be a conspiracy contrived by James but that it could not even be an English conspiracy.

BAPTISM

The word "baptism" is a legitimate English word with roots in antiquity that distinguishes a religious immersion from other immersions. Because infant sprinklers have abused the word, is no reason to blame King James or the A.V. 1611 Bible any more than to blame them for the present abuse of the term "born again." Moreover, the Baptist Bible Correctors, who complain the most about the "Old ecclesiastical words,” while seeking to change the Bible in this matter, make no effort to change the names on their fellowships or their church signs! (i.e., Calvary Immersionist Church, Mount Zion Immerser Assembly, Immerser Bible Fellowship East, or Congregation Beth Immersionist, and so forth. Sheer doubleminded hypocrisy!

As strict, old fashioned, traditional, Independent, Fundamental Baptists; we would like to challenge our brethren to prove local church doctrine, storehouse tithing, restricted communion, baptism by immersion, and other kindred doctrines by the plain English of the King James Bible as opposed to the Greek. If you can't do it without correcting it or without playing with Greek prepositions like a Jehovah’s witness, you're not worth your salt nor your ancestry!

This article is more of a challenge to Independent Fundamental Baptists than it is a rebuke. We have no desire to alienate Baptists from the Bible, who in our estimation, can as churches, lead the way responsibly in the defense and propagation of the A.V. 1611 Bible. If Baptists do not rally to this cause, then it will ultimately fall to kooks and isms, then, Lord help us. Be King James and Baptist too! The two do not contradict each other.

*Note: Wescott and Hort took a few of the most corrupt manuscripts and compiled from them an entirely new Greek text according to their own vain imaginations.

-- by Herb Evans