Most readers of this article will agree that the Christian gospel is up-to-date, relevant and powerful, and that understanding and acting upon it is just about the most important thing any of us can do.
So why does so much of our worship give precisely the opposite impression, by being couched in language that’s more than 400 years out of date? In far too many of our Bible readings, hymns, prayers, and even Bible talks, the language of the 16th century — the ‘thees’ and ‘thous’ — still persists.
Using the language of the past damages the cause of Christianity in several ways. First, it suggests the Gospel is quaint and outdated. It breaks the connection with the contemporary world, as though Christianity has little in common with the hopes, worries and concerns of people today. Second, it exposes Christianity to ridicule; have you ever noticed how, when comedians try to mock religious belief, they use the antiquated language as part of the mockery? Third, and crucially, it hinders the understanding of the Bible and its message for people who aren’t familiar with it — and often for those who are, too. The phrasing and vocabulary are difficult, and numerous words have changed their meaning over the years; how many hours have been wasted explaining what ‘soul’ or ‘ghost’ don’t mean, or that ‘let’ and ‘prevent’ mean the opposite of what the unfortunate listener might think?
Why is the language of the past so persistent?
The main reason, of course, is the King James version (KJV) of the Bible, no longer in regular use among many Christians but unfortunately still popular in a lot of Christadelphian meetings. A mainstay of Christian worship and discipleship for so long, the KJV is now a real handicap — which is ironic, since in large measure the roots of the KJV are in the work of William Tyndale, the brilliant Bible translator driven by the belief that the Word of God should be available in the everyday language of ordinary people. Tyndale’s 1525 New Testament, and his partial translation of the Old, underlie several English Bibles, including the KJV in 1611. In fact, King James’ men consciously kept to the language of the earlier work of Tyndale and his followers, even though English had changed a lot in almost 100 years since 1525: the ‘thou’ form, for example, was growing obsolete.
Not that King James’ translators were entirely faithful to Tyndale, however: the political and ecclesiastical ‘fix’ that James was seeking with his translation involved compromises. Ecclesiastical terms that Tyndale had rightly avoided were restored to suit the Church establishment. For instance, Tyndale translated ‘ecclesia’ as ‘congregation’, stressing the people and not the building, but the KJV put back ‘church’.
There are at least three reasons why some believers make the mistake of holding on to 16th century language. The beauty of Tyndale’s translation is certainly one of the reasons that it has been so persistent. The phrasing and tone of the ‘Authorized Version’, as it’s often (though inaccurately) called, does have an almost musical quality about it. It’s memorable, a little like the language of Shakespeare perhaps. And I like my Shakespeare in the original, not put into modern English. But there’s a big difference between the Bible and Shakespeare. Shakespeare is entertainment, art: it doesn’t have to change you, and it can’t help you save your life forever by understanding it. The Bible does, and can. The clarity of the message is all-important, and if some much-loved beauty of phrasing has to be sacrificed in the interests of clarity, so be it.
A second reason is the claim that 16th century language carries with it a sense of reverence absent from modern speech. The bizarre idea that we show reverence for God by speaking to or of Him in the language of nearly 500 years ago relies on a mistaken conception of both the English and the original language involved. In English, to suggest that to address the Almighty as ‘Thou’ somehow carries more reverence is absurd; the ‘Thou’ form was the more familiar form of address in earlier English, not the respectful form used to superiors or strangers. Archaic word forms have nothing to do with respect, and reverence is something much deeper than the language one uses. As to the original language, the New Testament was written in the everyday “koine” Greek, the Greek of the streets, not the literary Greek of the classics. That King James’ translators did not understand the difference is not their fault — though it meant that the translation was somewhat more ‘literary’ in tone than the original warranted.
A final reason for archaic language is the claim that the KJV itself is a more accurate translation than any later versions. This too is wrong, but it does deserve considering in more detail. There are two aspects:
- the quality of the manuscript evidence underlying the translation, and
- the approach to the job of translation itself.
The manuscript evidence
On the issue of manuscript evidence, the major deficiency of the KJV is an inevitable consequence of its time. The text available to King James’ men was inferior to what’s available today, when we have literally thousands of ancient texts to work from. Perhaps the most glaring example of a deficient text is the notorious interpolation in 1 John 5:7 (in the KJV, “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.”). That passage was known to be spurious long before 1611. Many have wanted to retain it, and leave it in translations, valuing it as clear Biblical evidence for the doctrine of the Trinity — thinking, correctly, that there’s no such evidence anywhere else in the Bible! This puts adherents of the KJV today in an unseemly and unbiblical alliance with the Trinitarian Bible Society.
Apart from that, there are fortunately no major doctrinal issues at stake in those passages where the KJV is deficient on account of an inferior text. That doesn’t mean we should be satisfied with an inferior text. Continuing to use the New King James Version, which just updates the language using the poorer text, is a bad idea.
The approach to translation
The issue of approach to translation is essentially about balance between conveying the sense and meaning of the original, and translating each word of the original text as literally as possible within the constraints of English grammar. The KJV translators adopted an approach closer to word-for-word equivalence than their modern counterparts, but they were quite capable of departing from literal translation when they felt it appropriate. As the 20th century translator J.B. Phillips points out, “Since I know that there are many who imagine that the Authorized Version is a particularly literal and accurate translation of the Greek, it is refreshing to turn to Matthew 27:44 and see that not one single word of the expression ‘cast the same in his teeth’ is in fact in the Greek.’ Incidentally, if you do want the closest thing in English to a ‘literal’ word-for-word translation, the New American Standard Bible is the one to use. The KJV is the wrong choice, and an unnecessary choice.
Tyndale today
We’ve seen that the persistence of 16th-century language has a lot to do with William Tyndale. Among all the faithful men and women of the past 2,000 years, Tyndale is one of those to whom we owe most. We acknowledge that not by using his language, but by sharing and working for the same ideals for which he gave his life — ideals he shared with his predecessor Erasmus, the scholar who published the first printed Greek New Testament on which Tyndale’s English version was based. Erasmus wrote:
“I totally disagree with those who are unwilling that the Holy Scriptures, translated into the common tongue, should be read by the unlearned… I wish that the farm worker might sing parts of them at the plow, that the weaver might hum them at the shuttle, and that the traveler might beguile the weariness of the way by reciting them.’
A well-known story relates how Tyndale was disputing with a learned cleric who asserted: “We were better to be without God’s law than the Pope’s.’ Echoing Erasmus, Tyndale’s answer was “I defy the Pope and all his laws. If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plow shall know more of Scripture than thou dost.’
Tyndale believed passionately that the Bible should be available to the common people in the language of everyday — ordinary, simple street English; the English that would change lives. We should share that passion. Not, perhaps, with the awesome courage and dedication of a Tyndale, but enough to care that the Word of God should speak as clearly and eloquently to today’s equivalent of the plowboy or the weaver, as Tyndale’s New Testament did to their 16th century counterparts. That means the Bibles we read; the talks we give; the prayers we lead; the hymns and songs we sing… all should be in clear, contemporary English.
So when you lead or take part in a service, don’t use the language of ‘thee’ and ‘thou’. Let’s make less use of hymns and songs that still use that language, or revise the wording; and let’s make more use of the wealth of contemporary Christian music. Let’s watch our choice of words and phrases in talks and prayers to make sure we don’t lapse into outdated speech or into clichés based upon it. Let’s put the King James Bible back on the reference shelf, not on the reading stand in our meetings.
And that way, we’ll let the Word of God speak as powerfully and clearly today as it ever has.
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One