Not merging this question, but:
A disproportionately Indian list, no matter what your criteria (and Laura Hale goes through several). Her criteria do not factor in being passed over several times running; Laura?
Day: November 25, 2016
What does the oldest translation say: was the Son Of God a Carpenter or a Stonemason?
I’ll register some confusion at Robert Semple’s answer that it’s a day labourer; I’ve read Crossan too, and I don’t remember that.
I’m not disputing it; Crossan is pretty dense.
What’s stuck in my head is what the Jesus Seminar decided (and Crossan was a prime move behind it, but not the only one): they were inclined towards interpreting it as “builder”, because of the number of building references in Jesus’ parables and sayings (capstone, not a stone upon a stone, etc).
Note that the Greek word used in the Gospels, tektōn, shows up in English: archi-tect (literally chief tektōn), tectonics.
If the King James Bible is the only valid version, where does that leave non English translations?
I’ve tried to reword the question to what OP Sam Rizzardi intended (“what do King James Only proponents think…”); but QCR knows what he intended out of the question better than OP does, clearly. *sigh*
There are different flavours of King James Only, as explained at King James Only movement – Wikipedia. Not all versions hold that KJV is divinely inspired, and most are opposed to modern textual scholarship (moving away from the Textus Receptus for the Greek); they would find allies in the Greek Orthodox church. In most versions, KJO says nothing about languages outside of English.
Going through the flavours.
- “I Like the KJV Best”. Likes it for style, doesn’t actually make any big theological claims. Indifferent to other languages.
- “The Textual Argument”. Prefers the older redactions of the Greek and Hebrew texts that the KJV used. Would be fine with e.g. the Vulgate for the same reason.
- “Received Text Only”. Thinks the older redactions of the Greek and Hebrew texts are providentially selected. Again, would be fine with e.g. the Vulgate for the same reason.
- “The Inspired KJV Group”. Holds that the KJV translation itself was divinely inspired. Does not necessarily say that translations into other languages might not be divinely inspired; though I assume they don’t expend a lot of energy exploring that possibility.
- “The KJV As New Revelation”. Holds that the KJV translation supersedes the original Greek and Hebrew themselves, because it is literally a new revelation from God. Would therefore reject all other translations, unless they are translations from the KJV direct. Called Ruckmanism after Peter Ruckman.
Where does it leave non-English translations? #1 doesn’t care. #2–#3 wants them to be textually conservative. #4 is agnostic about them (though it would at minimum expect them to be textually conservative as well). #5 rejects them.