The G.O.A.T., the Greatest Of All Time. That is quite a claim to make. For a few years now, we have been hearing this about Tom Brady. He is the winningest quarterback in NFL history with 251 regular-season and 35 postseason victories. He has more than twice the number of playoff victories as any other player. He has been the starting quarterback on ten Super Bowl teams, winning seven of them. Holding nearly every major quarterback record. Brady is the NFL leader in career passing yards, attempts, completions, and touchdown passes in both the regular season and playoffs. He has set the record with five Super Bowl MVPs, along with having three NFL MVPs and two NFL Offensive Player of the Year.
The man is truly the G.O.A.T., but football isn’t the subject of this article. I want to talk about the G.O.A.T. of English Bible translations. That’s right, there is one English translation that is the greatest of all time: The King James Version!
I do have some things to say about this wonderful translation, but rather than me going into great depths about it, I want to recommend two books that have done a much better job covering the issues than I could. The first is In The Beginning: The Story of the King James Bible and How It Changed a Nation, a Language, and a Culture by Alister McGrath. The second is The King James Only Controversy: Can You Trust Modern Translations? by James R. White. While dealing especially with the KJV-only issue—does a great job with the KJV overall and has great material on issues with texts..
The KJV was first published in 1611, and by the mid-17th century, it was the main English translation in existence surpassing its main rival, the Geneva Bible. The KJV remained the top selling translation until unseated in the mid-1980’s by the NIV. In 2021 it was the number two top-selling translation. It is estimated between 5 to 7 Billion Bibles have been made in the last 1,500 years; the vast majority of them have been the KJV (no estimate is available for total KJVs printed).
As with all the early translations, the KJV is a formal equivalent translation. What some would incorrectly call a word-for-word translation (see Which Way to Go? for a discussion of translation theory). From about 1650 to the end of the 20th century, the KJV was the undisputed Bible of the English-speaking world. Not just the English-speaking church but of the entire world, Christian and otherwise. When one spoke of the Bible, that was all that needed to be said. It was universally understood to be the King James Bible. Just to put this in perspective, “Don Quixote” is the bestselling novel of all time; it has sold more than 500 million copies, that is “m” as in million as opposed to “B” in Billion.
There are many reasons for the greatness of the KJV, but the truest reason is its clarity and beauty. The KJV is the greatest work of literature in the English language—Shakespeare being the only possible rival to that claim. The style and phrasing are unsurpassed. Beyond the impact on Christians, the language of the KJV, along with Shakespeare, lifted the English language from being considered a crude language unsuited for higher endeavors, especially theological use, to being a language worthy of use in translating the Word of God and other endeavors.
It may be hard to imagine in this day with what seems like hundreds of translations that there was a time, only forty to fifty years ago, when everyone in your church and Sunday school class was using the same Bible. When read aloud, everyone would follow along in the same translation: the KJV. The power of having a common book to work from was immense but is now lost to modern English-Speaking Christians. It is unfathomable that we could ever unify around one translation again. There isn’t even a local church now where all members use the same translation. (Well, outside the KJV-only groups, but that is a different post; see James White’s book.)
But like all the greatest, there is a time for a career to come to an end. Even Tom Brady, the G.O.A.T., has retired. Well, retired again, most likely for good. It is past time for the KJV to be retired from regular use. While still retaining its beauty, its language is antiquated. This is more than just the “thees” and the “thous,” but its very vocabulary in many places is archaic. This is not to speak ill of the greatness of the KJV. It is and will always be the greatest English translation, if not simply the greatest translation of God’s word ever produced. Yet, we need to deal with the reality of its lack of current usefulness for the vast majority of people. A translation so difficult to read it requires its own translation is an issue. For those who love the King James and want to stay with its familiar style, the New King James is a great alternative.
Until the next time we see you here at CultivatingFaith.org, God Bless! #CultivatingFaithOrg