Choosing an English Bible involves more than finding a version that reads smoothly. I need to know whether I can trust it when I study a passage or teach it to someone else, as well as when I read it each day. That means considering the Hebrew and Greek text behind the translation and how faithfully the translators carried those words into English. Scripture’s teaching about preservation gives us a place to begin.
Confidence Begins With God’s Promise to Preserve His Words
The Bible is the foundation of our faith, and Jesus said that man lives by “every word that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4). That makes the words in our Bibles a question of faith as well as scholarship. Versions differ in the manuscripts they follow and in how they translate them, and some of those differences affect the clarity of important doctrinal passages.
God describes His words as pure and promises to preserve them. I take encouragement from how specific that promise is: the psalmist speaks of the words themselves, rather than only a general message surviving. God has not left His people to believe that His Word vanished somewhere in history.
“The words of the LORD are pure words, like silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. You shall keep them, O LORD, You shall preserve them from this generation forever.”
“Forever, O LORD, Your word is settled in heaven.”
Jesus spoke with the same precision. He referred to the smallest marks of Hebrew writing, then promised that His own words would not pass away.
“Till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled.”
“Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.”
These promises give us confidence that God has kept a faithful record of His words for every generation. But to choose a translation, we still need to ask which manuscript line reflects that preservation and which English Bible faithfully carries those words into our language.
God’s preservation does not mean that every copyist or translator worked without mistakes. Surviving witnesses let us see where copies differ, while Scripture itself remains the standard. My confidence rests in God keeping His words available among His people in a received textual stream. I do not believe He allowed them to disappear and left us to guess them back into existence. Through faithful translation, readers who do not know Hebrew or Greek can receive those words too.
I need to consider the manuscript base and the English wording together. Natural English does not resolve the problem of a translation that begins with a text removing received words. Yet the right manuscript line will not help a modern reader understand language that is unclear to him. We need a sound original-language base translated accurately into clear English. The Bible in our hands should invite careful reading without making confidence depend on constant scholarly revision.
Ancient copies do not always agree word for word. For the Old Testament, I receive the Hebrew Masoretic Text as the preserved base entrusted to Israel. The Septuagint and Dead Sea Scrolls remain historically useful, as does the Samaritan Pentateuch. None of these witnesses stands as the final authority over the Hebrew text. In the New Testament, the main question is whether a translation follows the received Byzantine and Textus Receptus stream or the modern Alexandrian critical text.
My disagreement concerns the textual foundation and how translators work from it, including the confidence their Bible gives readers about which words belong. It does not give me grounds for pride or careless accusations. Many critical-text translators are sincere, and their translations contain much true Scripture. We should describe the ancient manuscripts accurately even when we disagree about the authority given to them.
The Old Testament Text Entrusted to Israel
The Masoretic Text is the Hebrew Bible preserved by the Jewish people. Paul wrote that to the Jews “were committed the oracles of God” (Romans 3:2). Most of the Old Testament was written in Hebrew, with a small portion in Aramaic, and Jewish scribes copied those Scriptures from one generation to the next. When Jesus spoke about “the Law and the Prophets” and the Psalms in Luke 24:44, He treated those writings as a fixed and authoritative body.
The Masoretes were Jewish scribes active especially from the sixth through the tenth centuries AD. They carefully transmitted the text, adding vowel points and accents to guide its reading and marginal notes to guard its copying. Their work did not create the Hebrew Scriptures. They preserved and marked the text Israel had already received and passed down.
“Till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled”
Jesus affirmed the lasting authority of the Hebrew Scriptures that the Masoretic tradition later safeguarded. Reformation Bibles such as the Geneva Bible and the King James Version used the Masoretic Text for the Old Testament. The New King James Version follows that same base.
The Septuagint, often shortened to LXX, is a Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures. Work on it began in Alexandria several centuries before Christ, first with the Torah and later with other books. Greek-speaking Jews used it widely, especially outside Israel, and many early Christians also read it. At times, a New Testament quotation follows wording closer to the Septuagint than to the Masoretic Hebrew.
The Septuagint’s history makes it valuable, but I would not confuse an ancient translation with the original text. Its translators made wording choices, as all translators do, and some parts contain paraphrase or expansion. Its collections also include books commonly called the Apocrypha that Israel did not recognize as Scripture. Jesus and the apostles did not affirm those books as part of the Hebrew canon.
The Septuagint differs from the Masoretic Text in wording and sometimes in order. Its form of Jeremiah is about one-eighth shorter, and its numbering of the Psalms differs. Isaiah 7:14 gives us a useful example of how the Greek wording can help us understand a passage. It uses parthenos, meaning “virgin,” where the Hebrew almah can refer to a young woman and, in this setting, an unmarried woman. Matthew 1:23 uses the Greek word for virgin when applying Isaiah’s prophecy to Christ.
The Septuagint helps me see how ancient Jewish translators understood Isaiah 7:14 without replacing the Hebrew as my authority. Long before Christ’s birth, they understood the passage to speak of a virgin, and Matthew’s inspired use confirms that Isaiah foretold the virgin birth. Here the Greek translation helps us understand the Hebrew expression while remaining a witness to the original rather than an authority over it.
Other ancient witnesses help us trace how Scripture was preserved and translated. The Samaritan Pentateuch contains only Genesis through Deuteronomy, while the Syriac Peshitta and Latin Vulgate show its transmission into other languages. The Dead Sea Scrolls contain fragments from nearly every Old Testament book, dating roughly from the third century BC through the first century AD.
Discovered near Qumran in 1947, the Dead Sea Scrolls gave us Hebrew witnesses more than a thousand years older than the complete Masoretic manuscripts then known. In the great majority of cases, their readings align most closely with the Masoretic Text. Some readings resemble the Septuagint and show that textual variation existed in the ancient world. Even so, their main witness confirms that the Hebrew Scriptures were transmitted with remarkable faithfulness and that the Masoretic line carries forward the same Old Testament known before Christ.
I have to distinguish the age of a surviving manuscript from the age of the text it carries. Codex Leningradensis is a complete Masoretic manuscript from about the eleventh century AD, but the Hebrew tradition it preserves reaches much further back. The Septuagint is an ancient Greek translation surviving from an earlier period. The Samaritan Pentateuch and Qumran scrolls are also early witnesses, yet neither became the received base of the Hebrew Bible entrusted to Israel.
That is why I would not settle the question simply by choosing the oldest surviving complete copy. Israel carried the Masoretic line long before the medieval codices now in museums. The Septuagint came from Hebrew sources translated into Greek in Alexandria, while the Dead Sea Scrolls survived in caves rather than being copied forward as a worshiping community’s standard text. Those witnesses each help us understand history, but the Masoretic line served as the continuing Hebrew base.
Most modern English versions begin with the Masoretic Text, but their practice differs. The KJV, NKJV, and MEV retain it as their Old Testament base. Versions such as the ESV, NIV, and NASB sometimes prefer readings from the Septuagint or Dead Sea Scrolls where their editors judge those readings stronger. Catholic Bibles give more weight to Septuagint tradition and include the Apocrypha. In my view, ancient witnesses can clarify history, but the Masoretic Text should remain the base rather than being overruled whenever modern critical judgment prefers a variant.
When an inspired New Testament writer used a familiar Greek expression to communicate Hebrew truth, that did not make every reading in later Septuagint collections Scripture. Nor did it place the translation above the original-language writings entrusted to Israel. I therefore receive the Greek version as valuable evidence of ancient interpretation while retaining the Hebrew canon and received text as the standard.
The Received New Testament and the Alexandrian Critical Text
Thousands of Greek manuscripts bear witness to the New Testament text, along with early translations and quotations in the writings of church fathers. They do not always agree. The main distinction here is between the Byzantine tradition, often called the Majority Text, and the Alexandrian tradition that shaped the modern critical text.
The Byzantine text dominated the Greek-speaking church for more than a thousand years. Its name reflects its copying throughout the Byzantine Empire, while the name Majority Text reflects the general pattern followed by most surviving Greek manuscripts. These copies belonged to the church’s worship and teaching. Repeated reading and copying often wore them out.
When printed Greek New Testaments appeared during the Reformation, editors such as Erasmus, Stephanus, and Beza worked from manuscripts in this Byzantine stream. Their editions became known as the Textus Receptus, or Received Text. The Textus Receptus is not identical to every individual Byzantine manuscript, but it belongs to the same received family. Tyndale, the King James translators, and other Reformation translators used it. The NKJV continues with this Greek base and provides notes where the Majority or modern critical texts differ.
The modern critical text gives substantial weight to a smaller group of ancient witnesses associated with Egypt. Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus are especially influential. Modern printed editions such as Nestle-Aland and the United Bible Societies’ Greek New Testament rely heavily on critical evaluation that includes these Alexandrian witnesses. The ESV, NASB, NIV, CSB, NRSV, and most other recent English versions use this critical text.
Supporters of the critical text argue that a manuscript closer in time to the original may preserve a better reading. I understand why its age enters the discussion, but physical age alone cannot tell me how faithfully it represents the text the churches received. A favorable climate or little use can help a manuscript survive. Byzantine copies may be later because the churches continually handled and replaced them, so an earlier surviving copy does not necessarily represent the most broadly received text.
Codex Vaticanus dates to the fourth century and has long been kept in the Vatican Library. Limited access delayed its public influence until fuller publication in the nineteenth century. The manuscript is incomplete, with portions of Genesis and Psalms missing as well as large parts of the New Testament. It lacks the Pastoral Epistles, which are 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, and Titus, along with Philemon and Revelation. Later corrections also appear in it. Those features are reasons I would study Vaticanus as an important ancient witness without making its age a guarantee that it can judge the received text flawlessly.
Codex Sinaiticus also dates to the fourth century. Constantine Tischendorf brought it to wider attention after finding leaves at St. Catherine’s Monastery near Mount Sinai in the nineteenth century. His account included leaves he believed were in danger of being discarded or burned, though details of the discovery and later transfer remain debated. The manuscript contains many corrections by different hands, including spelling repairs and changes to readings. Its quality varies from one section to another. I would treat it as an ancient witness that deserves careful study, not as a final standard that can overrule the church’s received text.
The dry Egyptian climate helps explain the survival of these codices, whose condition also reflects copying and correction. Modern editions often follow their readings by leaving out words or passages found in the Textus Receptus, or by placing them in brackets or footnotes. A reader may then find a note referring to the “earliest and best manuscripts” as grounds for omitting a verse. I would not treat that wording as though it settled the decision. These witnesses are few and incomplete, contain corrections, and differ from the line copied throughout the churches.
Other New Testament traditions include the Syriac Peshitta, ancient Ethiopic versions, and Latin translations. They show how quickly Scripture spread among different peoples and can provide evidence for particular readings. Still, they are translations rather than the Greek base from which an English New Testament should be made. My confidence rests on the received Byzantine stream and its printed Textus Receptus form.
Surviving Byzantine witnesses begin in the early centuries and grow into the vast majority of later Greek manuscripts. The Textus Receptus editions date from 1516 through the seventeenth century, but the text did not originate at the printing press. Those editions gathered readings from the Byzantine tradition already used by the Greek church. They became the Greek base for the KJV, NKJV, MEV, Luther’s Bible, and other Reformation translations.
Vaticanus and Sinaiticus are especially prominent fourth-century Alexandrian witnesses, but their manuscript line is much smaller. Nineteenth-century critical scholarship gave their readings new influence, and those readings now stand behind most modern versions. I would not describe the debate as “old manuscripts versus new manuscripts.” I am asking which ancient stream God preserved through regular church use and which editorial method should govern the printed New Testament.
Receiving the Byzantine tradition does not require me to pretend that all its manuscripts are identical or that textual variants do not exist. I also have no grounds to turn every disagreement into an accusation of malice. We need to describe the manuscripts honestly and acknowledge where their history remains debated. I understand the text read and copied in the churches to be the central line of preservation. Vaticanus and Sinaiticus can be studied as witnesses without becoming judges over that text.
The numerical majority helps us recognize a text that was repeatedly copied, but preservation cannot be reduced to counting manuscripts without examining them. The printed Textus Receptus also involved editorial decisions. I receive that printed tradition as the form through which the Reformation church inherited the Byzantine text, without claiming that every copyist was incapable of error. My conviction is that God preserved a stable, recognizable text through the ordinary life of His churches. They did not need to reconstruct their Bible from witnesses that had not governed their reading.
Translation Method Shapes What the Reader Receives
A sound manuscript base is only part of the question. Translators must also decide how to carry Hebrew and Greek into English. Even when two teams begin with the same text, their translation philosophy can produce noticeably different results.
Formal equivalence is often called word-for-word or essentially literal translation. It seeks to represent the wording and structure of the source as closely as English allows. No translation can replace every original word with one English word in a rigid pattern because languages do not work that way. Still, formal-equivalence translators try to preserve vocabulary and grammatical relationships rather than restating what they think the author meant. The KJV, NKJV, ESV, and NASB generally follow this approach.
For study and teaching, including the doctrine we draw from Scripture, I believe this is the safest method. Keeping close to the inspired words leaves more room for Scripture to control my interpretation. Since God promised to preserve His words rather than merely a collection of ideas, I want a translation that carries those words with as little interpretive filtering as possible.
Formal equivalence still requires judgment because Hebrew and Greek word order cannot always be copied directly into readable English. The same source word may also need different English words in different settings. Translators need the discipline to make those adjustments in service of the source text, without producing wooden English or giving themselves freedom to rewrite a passage’s theology.
Dynamic equivalence, also called functional equivalence, gives greater attention to expressing the thought in natural modern language. The NIV, NLT, and CSB use this method to varying degrees. The result may be easier to read, but the translator must decide what the thought means before restating it. That gives human interpretation a larger place in the finished wording. Readability is valuable, yet it should not be purchased by weakening precision or closing off a meaning present in the source.
Paraphrases go further. The Message and The Living Bible restate biblical ideas in loose contemporary language rather than translating the original wording closely. They can be read as devotional commentary, but they should not serve as the basis for doctrine or serious study. Their wording reflects one person’s interpretation and can add shades of meaning not found in the text.
The need for precision appears inside Scripture itself. In Galatians 3:16, Paul’s argument turns on the singular word “seed” rather than the plural “seeds.” In Matthew 22:32, Jesus reasons from God’s statement “I am the God of Abraham,” not “I was.” Those arguments depend on exact wording and grammar. A method that offers only the general idea can hide the very detail on which an inspired argument rests.
Paul’s argument about seed and Jesus’ attention to God’s exact words help me see why translation method has doctrinal weight. Formal equivalence respects verbal inspiration by trying to give us the words themselves rather than an expanded explanation. That does not make the translation a newly inspired original, and no English Bible stands above the preserved Hebrew and Greek.
Why Textual Differences Cannot Simply Be Dismissed
Core Christian doctrine can be taught from critical-text translations, so I am not claiming that every doctrine disappears when a Bible follows that text. My concern is what happens as omissions and brackets accumulate. They affect individual words as well as verses and longer passages, and can weaken clarity while leaving readers uncertain about what belongs in the Bible.
Proverbs 30:6 warns, “Do not add to His words, lest He rebuke you, and you be found a liar.” Revelation 22:19 warns against taking away from the words of that book. Since God treats His words seriously, the church should not dismiss variants merely because a doctrine can still be supported somewhere else.
Mark 16:9-20 is present in the Byzantine tradition and was received in the churches. The last two verses describe Christ’s ascension and the apostles’ ministry:
“So then, after the Lord had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God. And they went out and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word through the accompanying signs. Amen.”
Many modern versions place the longer ending in brackets or note that early manuscripts omit it. That can leave a reader doubting a passage the churches read and received for centuries. I accept the ending as part of Mark rather than as a late addition.
The account of the woman taken in adultery, John 7:53-8:11, receives similar treatment. Modern versions often bracket it, while the received tradition includes Jesus’ words of mercy and repentance.
“When Jesus had raised Himself up and saw no one but the woman, He said to her, ‘Woman, where are those accusers of yours? Has no one condemned you?’
She said, ‘No one, Lord.’ And Jesus said to her, ‘Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more.’”
Jesus showed mercy to the woman while commanding her to leave her sin, so His words do not offer cheap acceptance. I receive this account as inspired Scripture and do not regard it as optional material that may be removed from John.
Some shorter variants also carry clear doctrinal force. The Received Text states the incarnation directly in 1 Timothy 3:16:
“And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifested in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen by angels, preached among the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up in glory.”
Critical texts commonly read “He who was manifested in the flesh” instead of “God was manifested in the flesh.” Christ’s deity can be proved elsewhere, but the received wording declares it plainly. Colossians 1:14 likewise makes the blood of Christ explicit:
“In whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.”
Critical editions omit “through His blood” in this verse, although they affirm that truth elsewhere. Since Christ’s blood is central to redemption, I want to know whether these words belong here. Pointing to another passage that teaches the same truth does not answer that question.
Acts 8:37 records the Ethiopian eunuch’s confession before baptism:
“Then Philip said, ‘If you believe with all your heart, you may.’ And he answered and said, ‘I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.’”
Most modern versions omit the verse. The received reading clearly places personal faith in Christ before baptism, so its omission weakens the clarity of the passage’s order.
John 6:47 identifies the object of saving faith:
“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me has everlasting life.”
The critical text often drops “in Me,” leaving only “he who believes.” The wider context still points to Christ, but the received wording states the object of faith directly.
Luke 2:33 provides another example:
“And Joseph and His mother marveled at those things which were spoken of Him.”
The Received Text says “Joseph and His mother,” while critical texts commonly read “His father and mother.” The received reading guards the truth that Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit and that Joseph was not His biological father.
Mark 1:2 combines a quotation from Malachi with one from Isaiah:
“As it is written in the Prophets: ‘Behold, I send My messenger before Your face, who will prepare Your way before You.’”
The Received Text says “in the Prophets,” while the critical text says “in Isaiah the prophet.” Since the opening line comes from Malachi, the received wording avoids creating an apparent error.
Matthew 18:11 states Christ’s saving purpose:
“For the Son of Man has come to save that which was lost.”
Critical editions omit this verse. Christ’s mission to save the lost is taught elsewhere, but I see no reason to remove this received testimony from Matthew.
One of the best-known differences is 1 John 5:7, sometimes called the Johannine Comma:
“For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one.”
This verse is present in the Textus Receptus and absent from modern critical texts. I receive its wording without making it the sole foundation of the Trinity, since the whole Bible teaches one God in three co-equal and co-eternal Persons. That wider testimony does not give us freedom to discard what this verse says.
Other differences appear in Matthew 9:13, Matthew 19:17, Luke 4:4, Luke 9:56, Luke 23:42, and Romans 8:1. Some omit words, while others change the sense or introduce a difficulty. No one example carries the whole case, but together they show why the differences reach beyond typography and style.
I remain with the Byzantine and Textus Receptus stream because it preserves these received passages with clarity and stability. Mark’s ending and the account in John 8 remain in the text, as do the confession before baptism and the direct wording about Christ’s deity and blood. Continual brackets and omission notes leave readers uncertain about whether to regard those passages as Scripture. That uncertainty is part of what concerns me about departing from the stream received in the churches.
From the First English Bibles to the NKJV
The history of the English Bible shows both a hunger to place Scripture in the hands of ordinary people and a later change in the Greek text behind many translations. Each version reflects decisions about its manuscript base and how closely it will represent the source wording.
John Wycliffe and his followers translated the Bible into English in the fourteenth century. Their work came from the Latin Vulgate rather than directly from Hebrew and Greek, but it gave English readers access to Scripture in their own tongue. The Lollards risked their lives to spread it. Though the translation had limits, it helped prepare the way for the Reformation by insisting that common people should hear God’s Word.
William Tyndale translated the New Testament from Greek in the early sixteenth century, using Erasmus’s printed Textus Receptus. His English was clear and forceful, and many of his phrases remain in later Bibles. Tyndale was executed for his work, yet his desire that even the plowboy know Scripture helped shape the English-speaking church.
The Geneva Bible appeared in 1560 through English exiles in Geneva, using the Received Text for the New Testament and Masoretic Hebrew for the Old. Widely read in Shakespeare’s England, it also became the Bible of the Pilgrims. Ordinary readers valued its clarity, though its Reformation study notes sometimes challenged royal power and made it controversial with rulers.
The King James Version was published in 1611 after King James I commissioned a team of scholars. It followed the Received Greek text and the Hebrew Masoretic Text. Its reverent style and accuracy made it the standard English Bible for centuries, shaping worship and even the English language. For generations it was the common Bible in both pulpit and home.
A major change came during the nineteenth century. Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus gained influence, and Westcott and Hort published a Greek New Testament in 1881 that relied heavily on Alexandrian witnesses. The Revised Version in England and the American Standard Version in the United States followed this critical-text direction. English translation began moving away from the text received in the churches.
The NASB and NIV became prominent critical-text Bibles during the twentieth century, followed by the ESV in the twenty-first. The NASB aims at a more literal rendering than the NIV’s more dynamic method, with the ESV between them. Those differences in English style do not change their shared use of a Greek base that omits or brackets readings long received by the church. Notes about missing verses can leave readers wondering whether anyone knows what belongs in the Bible.
Earlier English Bibles presented received passages as the text. Modern readers frequently find those passages bracketed or meet notes questioning whether they are original, sometimes alongside divided verse numbering. I recognize that textual notes can be honest and useful. My concern is the effect of repeatedly removing readings preserved in the church’s Bible: readers learn to suspend judgment about the words before them until experts decide what belongs. That changes the way Christians talk about Scripture and can make uncertainty habitual.
I do not believe God made preservation depend on a manuscript hidden for centuries until modern scholarship restored it to authority. I see His providence in the text His people openly carried and copied for worship, then translated during the Reformation. Its wide use alone is not the proof. That history fits the biblical pattern of God entrusting His words to a covenant people who received and used them.
Published in 1982, the New King James Version updated the KJV’s language while retaining its textual foundation in the Masoretic Text and Textus Receptus. Removing archaic expressions helps readers unfamiliar with older English, including children and new believers. Its textual notes show where the Majority or critical texts differ while leaving the received reading in the body.
The NKJV gives me the combination I am looking for: a faithful textual foundation and English that people can understand. It keeps the same basic manuscript foundation as the KJV while using clear modern language, making it a practical Bible for serious study as well as public teaching and regular family reading.
The KJV remains faithful, and recommending the NKJV does not mean that Christians need to stop reading it. The difficulty arises when older English conceals meaning from someone who no longer uses those words. The NKJV retains the received passages and familiar structure while removing much of that barrier, helping a child or new believer understand a verse without first having to translate its archaic English.
I appreciate being able to consult the NKJV’s textual notes without finding the received wording moved out of the main text. The notes identify where the Majority Text or critical text differs from the Textus Receptus, allowing readers to examine the evidence further while continuing to read a complete Bible with confidence.
I do not recommend the NIV, ESV, NASB, NLT, CSB, or similar critical-text versions as the main Bible for study and teaching. That judgment concerns their Alexandrian base, which omits or questions received passages, and the greater interpretive freedom allowed by some of their translation methods. It does not mean that their translators intended to attack Scripture or that every sentence is unreliable. These versions still contain much true Scripture.
My recommendation does not make every NKJV translation choice beyond discussion. No English translation is a new act of inspiration or an authority above God’s preserved Hebrew and Greek Word. I recommend the NKJV because I believe it begins from the right texts and handles them with a largely formal-equivalence method.
The recommendation also needs to work in ordinary Christian life. A believer needs a Bible he can read steadily and bring to church with confidence that a footnote will not remove the verse before him. Continued use lets him become familiar with passages he marks and memorizes. The NKJV also gives teachers wording close enough to the source to explain grammar and doctrine responsibly, while families can understand its language when it is read aloud. It serves those needs while keeping continuity with the received English Bible tradition.
This conviction gives me no reason to treat Christians who use another version as enemies or to assume bad motives when scholars disagree. We should hear the evidence carefully and acknowledge disputed historical claims as disputed. At the same time, humility does not require us to dismiss variants that change what is read publicly. Removing the confession before baptism affects the passage’s clarity, just as other changes affect how directly a passage speaks about Christ. Together, those differences influence readers’ confidence in received passages.
We need a faithful translation so that we can hear God clearly and know the Christ Scripture reveals, rather than merely win an argument about manuscripts. Jesus is the eternal Son, fully God and fully man, who was born of a virgin and remained completely sinless. Wicked men physically tortured and punished Him before killing Him. He willingly bore that real punishment for our sins in His innocent body, shedding His blood and dying for us. He was buried and rose bodily.
The Father did not abandon or curse the Son. He did not punish, strike, or bruise Him, nor did He pour wrath on Him. Christ died for the whole world, and whoever repents and believes in Him is forgiven and born again. The Holy Spirit indwells and seals that believer, who is eternally secure in Christ. Confidence in the text serves this gospel by helping us open Scripture reverently and follow the Savior it reveals.
Several related studies examine individual parts of this subject in greater depth. The Majority Text and Textus Receptus addresses the received New Testament stream, while The Septuagint and The Dead Sea Scrolls examine important Old Testament witnesses.
The studies on Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus discuss those manuscripts individually. The Johannine Comma considers 1 John 5:7, How to Study the Bible Properly develops a sound reading posture, and The Trinity places that doctrine in the witness of the whole Bible.
My Final Thoughts
I trust and recommend the NKJV because it carries the Masoretic Old Testament and the received New Testament into clear English for modern readers. That confidence does not turn an English translation into a newly inspired original, and I need to remain humble toward Christians who reach a different conclusion. I want us to open Scripture ready to hear God’s preserved Word. Winning a textual argument would accomplish little if we failed to believe the gospel it proclaims and obey the Lord Jesus Christ whom it reveals.