Why do Bible versions differ?

By tiaan gildenhuys

I have been wondering for quite a while why Bible versions differ? Especially since we know that our God NEVER changes. So if He never changes, surely His word must also always stay the same?

In this book the Authorized King James Version Holy Bible (KJV) is compared with the New International Version (NIV) and other modern translations to enable the reader to decide for him/herself whether the message in the modern "Bibles" are still the same or not. And if not, why not?

It is all about the Received Text which has always been used in Bible translation, versus some corrupt manuscripts which are used by the enemy to let God's children doubt His Word.

• Language: English
• Publisher: tiaan gildenhuys
• Release date: Jan 3, 2018
• ISBN: 9781370071326

tiaan gildenhuys

Tiaan Gildenhuys has been in full-time ministry as an evangelist since 2003. He has ministered across church-denominational borders in South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Swaziland, Malawi and Scotland, and wherever else the Lord Jesus Christ may send him. He and his wife also lead regular spiritual tour groups to Israel. In 2014 he received an Honorary Doctor of Divinity Degree from Team Impact Christian University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, USA, as a result of the work he has done in the Kingdom. He has published 43 books, and a large number of CD's and DVD's both in Afrikaans and English, which can be viewed at www.oicb.co.za under: "eshop/tiaan gildenhuys". He also has an active YouTube channel which can be viewed at:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBtAiDFZJm09SFs3N6b0IAAll honour and glory for all this goes only to our Lord Jesus Christ of Nazareth!

Book preview

WHY DO BIBLE VERSIONS DIFFER?

tiaan gildenhuys

Copyright © 2018

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All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means without written permission by the author.

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

1. My personal experience

2. My experience with the NIV

3. A short history of the original texts from which Bibles are translated

4. What has been changed and what is gone?

5. Why are some verses left out completely?

6. Where has Jesus’ Name gone?

7. Are all the new Bibles still The Bible?

8. The Bible which I can read and understand

9. What is the problem with the Apocryphal Books?

Index/Bibliography

1.

MY PERSONAL EXPERIENCE

On August 28th, 1999 during a Christian men’s retreat, I had a personal Damascus-experience with the living God, Jesus Christ. The next day I received the baptism in the Holy Spirit and I immediately knew that I wanted to work for the Lord on a full-time basis. As soon as the Holy Spirit started bubbling in me, I immediately knew that there was a fiery zeal within me that I NEVER had before, even though I had been a (somewhat) loyal church-goer at that time in my life. I also knew immediately that it came from Jesus Christ Himself as I just could not stop worshiping and praising Him. I just wanted to tell everybody about that which now LIVED in me! It was something that had never happened before in my life.

At that stage I was thirty six years old and had already served on different church-councils for thirteen years of my life. But never before in my life had I encountered such a wonderful, sometimes even physical, spiritual experience. The following Scripture found new meaning in my life: O TASTE AND SEE that the LORD is good: blessed is the man that trusteth in him. (Psalm 34:8) Yes, I could even TASTE, SEE and FEEL the Lord and His Holy Spirit within me! It felt as if my skin wanted to burst open with that which suddenly burned within me. I just wanted to know more about my Lord Jesus Christ, and about what the Bible taught and I just wanted to read more of the Bible. I wanted to be more and more like Jesus! But when I REALLY started studying the Bible, I realized that I had erred for most of my life because I did not know the Scriptures.

"Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, NOT KNOWING THE SCRIPTURES, nor the power of God." (Matthew 22:29)

The past fifteen years of my life – of which nearly twelve years in full-time ministry – and after lots of research and Bible reading, I received an absolute peace in my heart that the best and most complete version of the Bible to be read in English, especially regarding certain spiritual truths contained therein, is the Auhorised King James Version Holy Bible. (Hereinafter I will just refer to it as the KJV).

Without trying to rewrite other authors’ books, which said authors made a much more detailed study over the years, and after having checked a number of modern English Bibles for myself I started experiencing lots of problems, but more specifically with the New International Version Bible (hereinafter called the NIV), which Bible every newly converted English speaking Christian buys and starts reading because of the easy English it contains. I will endeavour in this book to just show the differences between the KJV and the NIV (and the reason for the differences) and you as reader must make up your own mind whether the NIV can still be deemed to be called a Bible.

Some of my personal objections are that I found certain SPIRITUAL truths to have been written out of the NIV, while the name of Jesus Christ also disappeared in many places. This is not even taking into consideration that many complete Bible verse also disappeared from the NIV with the theological argument that: it never was part of the original text in the first place. I will give some very clear examples of this later in this study.

Since I personally started to ASK and TRUST the Holy Spirit to reveal the Scriptures to me, I started to understand more and more of the KJV, just as it is written, notwithstanding the old English used therein. And this says a lot, seeing as how my native tongue is Afrikaans. Most people use the argument: The old KJV is difficult to read, I can’t understand it. There are two reasons for this. Firstly it is because we don’t ASK the Author of this awesome Book to reveal it to us Himself. And secondly it’s because the devil does everything in his power to ensure that we don’t or don’t want to, or won’t understand the truths contained in the KJV. Since I started to ask the Lord to help me to read the KJV through the eyes of the Holy Spirit, I started to understand more and more thereof. The same can happen with you, if you are just willing to ask.

"Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened." (Matthew 7:7,8)

Unfortunately most modern day Christians all have the attitude of rather taking the road of least resistance. The moment something does not read easily enough to MY taste then I don’t want to read it and I push it to one side. But meantime the Bible is clear that the Holy Spirit will lead and teach us, as long as we are willing to ask, as we saw in the verse above. The words of the following verse are very clear:

"But the anointing (Holy Spirit) which ye have received of him abideth IN YOU, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him." (1 John 2:27)

I don’t necessarily even have to go so far as to check the original Hebrew or Greek, although it is awesome with the help of modern computer programs such as e-sword to also be able to look at those two rich languages to see what the more intimate meanings of a specific word or sentence is. And I mustn’t make the mistake to just put my trust in my reverend, pastor or priest to explain the Bible to me, just because he is a so-called learned man. The Bible contains a very specific warning regarding that in Jeremiah 17:5:

"Thus saith the LORD; Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the LORD."

Therefore I