Ex-Church of Christ Support Board

Was this a problem where you attended? We had a KJV-only elder who resigned because the KJV was what the apostles used and we needed to follow first century Christians.

Not a problem, exactly. The KJV was indeed the only authoritative version (I wonder if that is because the title page says 'authorized version'?) but some people did have other versions - but if you showed up with, say, the NASV, or worse, the Living Bible, you certainly garnered a lot of ATTENTION!

But nobody ever stood up in the pulpit and said 'you must use the KJV or else' - I mean, that did get SAID, but never made official.

NKJV was preferred. NASB and KJV was acceptable but leave those perverted hippie versions like NIV and ESV at the door!

Also this sort of depended on the he preacher/elder dynamic. A gentle shift to RSV, but when the NIV came out a big push for that. I don't know much after that.

One deacon preferred the NRSV, but no one said anything to him. I use the ESV and ASV. ASV is acceptable because that's what Wayne Jackson uses. My ESV wasn't and I was told not to use it when reading in public.

I attended only one church where they told you what you could and couldn't read in front of the congregation.

I do recall an article about the NKJV in which the author questioned its soundness, saying it had the word "commits" instead of "commiteth," as the KJV read. His argument was that they meant two entirely different things.

We had and used lots of different versions, and no one seemed to care. Of course, there were the usual arguments about which version was translated best if it made a difference to COC doctrine. I remember arguments about the critical difference in meaning between the English words "as" and "for" in one particular verse. People who knew little or nothing about Greek would go on and on about which was the better translation for a particular word.

Uber conservative CoC'sters generally look with disdain at anyone reading/relying on translations other than the authorized KJV. Other versions are hesitantly accepted as long as they conform - or at least don't contradict - their traditional viewpoints.

The NIV and ESV translations work fine for me - I need simple stuff - and I don't have to wade through all the quaint and archaic word useage of the King James era.

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Moogy wrote:People who knew little or nothing about Greek would go on and on about which was the better translation for a particular word.

Since the COC eschews seminaries and other kinds of theological education, this could really be generalized to say: People who knew little or nothing about __________ would go on and on about __________.

Lev