A light unto my path

The 400th anniversary celebrations for the King James Bible have been a great success so far. That is very gratifying, but how many people actually read it? The sad truth behind all the celebrations is that Bible-reading is at an all-time low and there is little sign of any improvement in the foreseeable future.

Non-churchgoers cannot be expected to peruse it regularly, but Christians should do better. Yet even among regular churchgoers, Bible knowledge is not what it used to be. This is ironic, because there has never been a time when more translations and aids to reading it have been readily available. As an academic discipline, Biblical Studies is very productive and new commentaries are constantly appearing. So how is it that general knowledge of the Bible has declined so dramatically in the past generation?

One reason may be overkill. The KJV was designed to eliminate the different translations that were then circulating and confusing churchgoers. Go to a small-group Bible study today and you will soon appreciate the problem. Everyone brings a different version and much of the time is spent trying to figure out which one is “correct”. The original Hebrew and Greek texts are fairly uniform, but you would never guess that from the variety of English translations. Keep reading