The Highway Forums General Discussion Theology Discussion Forum Reformed Confessions of Faith and the Traditional Text

One of the main problems I have with the author's quote, " the confession proceeds to make clear that “immediate inspiration” is not referring merely to the autographs, but the text that came down to us through history..." is that anyone who has studied this subject knows that the manuscripts, parchments, uncials, etc. which came down through history are many, i.e., these sources of texts aren't like a bound book. No, they are various objects which have been found in myriad locations. And, there are many discrepancies to be found between them. It is an arduous task to try and determine which is correct and which is not. What I believe is the "immediate inspiration" can only belong to the original writings written by the original authors and only those which belong to the canon; the 66 books of what we call The Bible. The Spirit of God did NOT "inspire" any copy of those original autographs, i.e., preserved them without contradiction or error. However, It seems to me to be more than satisfactory to believe that the Spirit guided those who sorted through all those various manuscripts, parchments, uncials, etc. to choose the correct ones from which translations were based. Translations are certainly not "inspired", i.e., guaranteed to be inerrant and infallible for minor errors and discrepancies can be found in every one of them. Just one example of errors which one can find in the KJV is that the translators in many places translated "uios" as child/children and "tekna" as son(s), when in fact, "uios" without question (except in KJV only circles) is the Greek word for "son(s)" and "tekna" is without question the Greek word for child/children. And it is not a minor thing that this error appears for the understanding of the texts where this is done is dependent upon the correct meaning of the words. Having said that, with confidence every Christian can be assured that no major or critical doctrine in the more traditional translations is negatively effected. I can say without wavering that my KJV and ASV both are the Word of God and trust my very soul to their content. :BigThumUp: