Beza Vindicated

James White said in his book The King James Only Controversy:

“Beza did introduce... “conjectural emendations,” that is, changes made to the text without any evidence from the manuscripts. A few of these changes made it into the KJV, the most famous being Revelation 16:5, “O Lord, which art, and wast, and shalt be” rather than the actual reading, “who art and who wast, O Holy one.”

Well Mr James White, it looks like Theodore Beza wasn't the first to have “and shalt be” (G. ἐσόμενος; L. eris) at Revelation 16:5!

Revelation 16:5 in the 1549 Ethiopic (Geez) Bible

Brian Walton (1600 – 1661) was an English priest, divine and scholar. He published a massive polyglot between 1654 and 1657 in nine languages: Hebrew, Chaldee, Samaritan, Syriac, Arabic, Persian, Ethiopic, Greek and Latin. Among his collaborators were James Ussher, John Lightfoot and Edward Pococke, Edmund Castell, Abraham Wheelocke and Patrick Young, Thomas Hyde and Thomas Greaves. It has been considered as the last and most scholarly ever printed.

Walton's Polyglot

In Revelation 16:5 his 1549 Ethiopian (Known today as Amharic, and formerly as Ge'ez) version has a Latin translation with the words:

Justus es Domine, et rectus qui fuisti et eris,..

Eris is a Latin Verb that is the second-person singular future active indicative of sum "you will be"

The Latin translation in the Polyglot says et eris - shalt be!

Herman Hoskier also noted this. So in addition to the early commentaries on the book of Revelation in Latin, the reading found in Revelation 16:5 "and shalt be" is also that of the Ethiopian Version. The early 20th century textual critic Herman Hoskier cited the Ethiopic version as containing the phrase "and shalt be" in Revelation 16:5. This information is found in Hoskier's 'Concerning the Text of the Apocalypse: Collation of All Existing Available Greek Documents with the Standard Text of Stephen's Third Edition Together with the Testimony of the Versions, Commentaries and Fathers', 2 volumes, London: Bernard Quaritch, 1929.

Hoskier mentions Justus es, Domine, et Rectus qui fuisti et eris

The Ethiopic version as cited by Herman Hoskier in Latin:

• "...Justus es, Domine, et Rectus qui fuisti et eris".

Translation of Ethiopic from Latin =

• "Just thou art, and Righteous that was and will be".:

King James Version

• "Thou art righteous, O Lord, which art, and wast, and shalt be..."

For more information see the Textus Receptus website on Revelation 16:5.

Donate here

The Modern English Version

The Modern English Version (MEV) is a great disappointment. They claim on their website that it has been translated by 47 men "produced in the King James tradition". I will show you how this is a fabrication. The 47 number is used because some old figures thrown about concerning the King James Version's history has 47 as the official number of translators; more recent figures are somewhere between 57 - 60. The '47 translators' sales pitch is merely to create a nostalgic association with the KJV so that people would assume that it went through the same cross checking filtration processes the 1611 did, which was at least 14 times according to Bancroft's translation rules. I doubt it even went through two cross checks in this verse below...

In Isaiah 58:8 they change the KJV's "rereward (pronounced rear-ward)," which is often modernized as "rear guard," into "reward," revealing that the MEV's 47 translators totally misunderstood the correct meaning of the archaic rereward, and also that they really didn't do real checks and balances like the men in 1611.

It is clearly an error and reveals their incompetence. It appears that they just saw the KJV's rereward and assumed it was reward not even checking the NKJV. It also reveals that they didn't go into the Hebrew at all.

Think about it. Did all 47 get it wrong here? Did they even read the final draft?

With all the glowing endorsements by religious leaders across the globe, this version demonstrates the lack of decent scholarship within popular Christianity. It is far worse than the NKJV in many places.

There are many hundreds of errors in the MEV of which I will continue to document here, but lets look at just one more verse:

Hebrews 3:16

For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit not all that came out of Egypt by Moses. KJV

for who were they who heard and rebelled? Was it not all of those who came out of Egypt, led by MEV Moses?

The MEV changes the wording of the KJV from a statement to a question. They changed the KJV and made an untruth, because we know from the Old Testament that Joshua and Caleb didn't rebel and came out with Moses. The KJV clearly says that "some" i.e. most of the older generation of Israel, "howbeit not all" meaning Joshua and Caleb, "did provoke." The MEV says that everyone who came out of Egypt rebelled. This is clearly mistranslated and ruins the basic Old Testament historical narrative. This error is also in the NKJV.

These two examples alone reveal the MEV is just another modern trash version designed to fill the shelves of bookshops and the pockets of publishers. But what do we expect? The ecumenical Committee on Bible Translation (Committee) is composed of 47 American and English scholars from the three major branches of Christendom: Orthodox, Protestant, and Roman Catholic. hmmm

Compare the King James Version 2016 Edition at Hebrews 3:16 below (also here)

For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit not all that came out of Egypt by Moses.(KJV)
Because some, having heard, did provoke. However not all who came out of Egypt by Moses. (KJV 2016)

Donate here