This is an archived copy of a post written by Conflict Of Justice (conflictofjustice.com). Used with permission: Conflict Of Justice may not agree with any alterations made.
“What are 1769 King James Version edition errors doing in the Book of Mormon? An ancient text? Errors which are unique to the 1769 edition that Joseph Smith owned?”
(CES Letter)
No Translation Errors
No, the Book of Mormon does not contain unique errors from the King James Version bible. This argument is a lie, and CES Letter does not give any examples.
KJV does not take the word for “rock” and accidentally translate it is “lamp post.” Now, some words would be translated a little differently if I were translating it, but this is all subjective. It is a matter of opinion which word is a better translation. I would not have used the word “dragon” as the KJV bible does, but this is not actually a translation error. The original Hebrew tannin means “serpent” and the Greek drakon means “serpent.” The word “satyr” in the KJV bible is also not incorrect, as the original Hebrew described a goat-like demon, and the closest thing in our language is the mythical satyr.
In the context which they are used, it is pretty obvious that they are metaphors: “Dragons in their pleasant palaces…” Look at the context. I think Joseph Smith was aware that the mythical creatures “dragon” and “satyr” are not real. I don’t think Joseph Smith thought there were dragons and satyrs flying around. So why would he keep these words if that wasn’t what the gold plates meant? Indeed, it turns out these words were translated correctly.
Does Not Use KJV Language
Why Change The Universal Bible Translation? – Later in life, Joseph Smith started going through the bible and making inspired corrections and commentary. But for the purpose of the Book of Mormon, why would he radically change text that everybody was already familiar with for the bible quote translations? Everybody used the KJV bible. Why not just stick with what’s there, for now?
Not 18th Century Language – There were no errors, but we can still ask the question: was it appropriate for Joseph Smith to use the 1769 language from his KJV bible when translating quotes that appeared in the Book of Mormon, considering how different his language was in his day. Shouldn’t he have used 1800’s language? Well, I don’t see a problem with it. Again, it was already a universal and well understood text. But the point is actually moot, as scholars have recently found that Joseph Smith did not even uses KJV language in his overall translation. That’s right. He used 16th-17th century language similar to what appeared in earlier bibles, such as John Wycliffe’s 1382 version–bibles that Joseph Smith couldn’t have had access to–version which were the basis for the KJV bible. “For example, To require, meaning “to request.” Enos 1:18 reads “and the Lord said unto me: thy fathers have also required of me this thing.” It may seem unusual that Enos’s ancestral fathers (Lehi, Nephi, and Jacob) required the Lord to preserve their records. Notice that the word also in verse 18 implies that Enos too is “requiring” the Lord to preserve these records, yet previously (in verses 15—17) Enos simply asks the Lord to do so. But the passage makes perfectly good sense when we observe that earlier in English the verb require had the meaning “to ask, request, or desire someone to do something.” Another example is To cast arrows, meaning “to shoot arrows.” Alma 49:4 reads “the Lamanites could not cast their stones and their arrows at them.” Similarly, verse 19 reads “and thus were the Nephites prepared to destroy all such as should attempt to climb up to enter the fort by any other way by casting over stones and arrows at them.” For us today, it seems strange to cast arrows. Yet the Oxford English Dictionary gives the following comment for definition 2 under the verb cast: “Formerly said also of military engines, bows, and the like, which throw or shoot projectiles.” Oxford English Dictionary citations date from about 1300 to 1609, including the following biblical one in John Wycliffe’s 1382 translation of 2 Kings 13:17: “Helise seyde, kast an arowe; and he kest.” The King James Bible uses the verb shoot in translating this same passage: “Then Elisha said, Shoot. And he shot.” But there is one place in the King James Bible where the verb cast does occur with arrows: “As a mad man who casteth firebrands, arrows, and death” (Proverbs 26:18). In 2 Nephi 20:29 all the printed editions as well as the printer’s manuscript read Ramath instead of the Ramah found in Isaiah 10:29 (the original manuscript is not extant for this passage). A number of scholars have noted that Ramath would have been the earlier Hebrew form for Ramah and have therefore claimed that the Book of Mormon text here maintains the earlier Hebrew name for this place, thus supporting that the Book of Mormon text may have been translated from a more ancient version of Isaiah.” The CES Letter: A Closer Look
He used early archaic words and phrases that sometimes got passed on to the KJV–and sometimes didn’t. Joseph Smith did not have access to these other versions, so how did he end up using their language? Coincidence?
Makes Translating Easier – I once sat down to translate a 15th century German book into English. Despite my fluency in German, I found this extremely challenging, and I was relieved when I realized parts of the book were quoting a book that had already been translated into English. With great relief, I grabbed that book and used it as a close reference for those parts.
Is this what Joseph Smith did with the KJV parts in the Book of Mormon? Probably. But it is very telling that he includes more archaic English than we find in the KJV bible. Maybe the spirit of John Wycliffe had a role in it, who knows? In any case, anyone who is bilingual will tell you there is no reason why Joseph Smith should mire through difficult bible quotes when he could just grab a bible off the shelf for help.
KJV Is Not An “Edition” – This question suggests a multitude of falsehoods. One interesting lie is that the KJV is an “edition” of the bible, rather than a “version.” KJV stands for King James Version not King James Edition. This is a significant difference because edition means “one of a series of printings or of the same book… each issued at a different time and differing from another by alternations, additions.” This does not describe the KJV bible. There were no alterations or additions, just different translations from the same sources as other versions. By calling it an “edition”, CES Letter falsely implies that the content that appears in the Book of Mormon is different or unique from earlier bibles, and that the KJV is appropriate for 1769 and not today, which is false.
CES Letter Logical Fallacies
| Falsehood | The King James Version is a version, not edition, of the bible. |
| Burden Of Proof | CES Letter provides zero examples or evidence to back up their false claim that KJV translation errors appear in the Book of Mormon. |
| Argument From Ignorance | Early texts of the bible are in existence, and we have the Dead Sea Scrolls, but we do not have the original documents that the bible came from, so we can’t know for sure what is an “error” and what isn’t. |
| Anachronism | In Joseph Smith’s time, the KJV was the only bible in English available to most people, so obviously there is no other “edition” to compare his translations to. |
| Subjectivist Fallacy | The existence of modern translations lead some people to believe that things could have been better translated, but that is just a subjective opinion, not an “error.” |
| Argument From Repetition | CES Letter repeats this same argument on p. 81 |
| Guilt by Association | This arguments incorrectly claims that the KJV “edition” of the bible has translation “errors,” and the Book of Mormon is in error for copying them. |
Current Year – Socialists are obsessed with he “current year.” Their recycled ideas and philosophies that have been tried under Marxism, Paganism, and ancient philosophies going back before that, these same old ideas are repeatedly repackaged in a flashy new frame to replace our “outdated” gospel. “It’s 2018, why is this still a thing??”
Socialists find this appeal to modernity a convenient way to pervert religious doctrine, as we can see with modern translations of the bible that erase important truths and spin important pure doctrine. The KJV is the oldest universal English translation, and even if a couple words are a little hokey, so what? It is still the best version we have. Socialists exploit these few hokey instances as an excuse to revise a new “edition” of the bible that erases important doctrine.
The atheists use it as a hammer to ridicule us for not being modern. This opening attack on the Book of Mormon sets a narrative that scripture needs to be framed in a modern package with modern language, or it is in “error.”
Innuendo Rather Than Logic – CES Letter drops a few (incorrect) bits of leading evidence, and the reader connects to dots in their mind to the inevitable conclusion. If errors which were introduced in 1769 appear in the Book of Mormon, obviously the Book of Mormon wasn’t produced before then. CES Letter does not give us this logic, but allows the reader’s mind to string it together. They do this because people are much more likely to believe a deduction if they figured it out on their own, subconsciously. They are also more likely to believe the evidences for that deduction, which in this case are falsehoods.
It is easy for armchair scholars to sit back and lecture us about how Joseph Smith should have translated. But what has CES Letter ever translated? What do they know about translating? Let’s see them try it, learn a language and translate a very ancient text. Don’t criticize something you know nothing about. Joseph Smith’s translation is truly marvelous and miraculous, and there is no way a person could have done it without divine guidance. Complete answers to CES Letter questions about Mormons: