Someone recently ask me about Bible versions and the never ending new versions that are marketed. One good reason to stay with the King James Version, (also known as the Authorized Version), is the very fact that these new versions keep cropping up. There is one English version which has clearly stood the test of time for over 400 years, the KJV. Some other reasons:
1. The level of excellence of the scholarship. Fifty-four of the most imminently qualified Bible Scholars in the world of that day worked on the translation for about seven years.
2. These men had a high view of the Scriptures as the Word of God.
3. They did not attempt to interpret the Scriptures but to faithfully translate them as exactly faithful to the manuscripts as possible. They relied heavily on the majority line of manuscripts rather than the widely variant readings found in the minority texts such as the Vaticanus and Sinaiticus manuscripts, upon which virtually all the modern English translations lean.
4. The attitude and approach of those KJV translators was marked by humility, much in contrast to that of modern translators. Though all fifty-four were thoroughly familiar with the Biblical languages, Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic, they had command of, on average, five languages including Latin and English. Some were conversant in seven languages. Yet they referred to themselves in their Epistle Dedicatory as, “…poor instruments to make God’s Holy Truth to be yet more and more known unto the people…”
5. God has obviously added His special blessing to the Authorized Version for these many generations, and has given it all the hallmarks of His work of preserving His Word to all generations.