In a recent video, Josh Lavesque of the King James Bible Research Council (KJBRC) proudly announced a massive project their organization has been working on secretly for quite some time. He admitted it was hard to keep from the public, but now was the appointed time for the big reveal.
āIn the 16th century, Bible-correcting heretic William Tyndale challenged the perfect word of God as that the Church as a whole had bore witness to for centuries,ā the video explained. āThis confused āscholar” suffered from a spiritual delusion that the English people should have the word of God in their language, the way they spoke it. It is clear for anyone with common sense to see right through these misguided intentions to the true solution: a Latin-English pocket dictionary for every English speaker!ā
The video went on to explain that a Church approved Latin-English dictionary one could keep by one’s side at all times would have been the obvious solution for the masses to experience the Bible for themselves. Any layperson who could read anything in English could simply look up the words they didn’t understand in this dictionary and instantly understand the Bible without changing a single word of the sacred text!
āPeople can’t be trusted to update the Bible,ā other leading members of the KJBRC affirmed. āWhen they do that they always end up getting heretical ideas and asking awkward questions about the accepted meaning of the text. Failure to cling to the one authoritative version leads to divisions in the Church! Thatās why we’re happy to celebrate the 500th anniversary of William Tyndale’s misguided work with our brand new documentary titled āSearching for A Dictionaryā!ā
You may object that not everyone would have access to such dictionaries. Sure, Latin-English dictionaries were as hard to come by as Early Modern English dictionaries are today, but you can get the gist of the Bible and go to your local priestā¦I mean pastor, in case he has one and you can’t understand some archaic words or phrases. By and by you’ll understand that no words have changed meaning ever since the perfectly preserved Bible came to us all those centuries ago.
Sadly, Tyndale didn’t realise that the Bible should never be revised, updated, or changed in any way. If only Tyndale would have understood this biblical truth, could have been martyrdom.
The KJBRC hopes viewers enjoy this documentary, and that they get the message that the lessons of history teaches us, not to question what we are told by our spiritual leaders, and how the Bible can be dangerous if it falls into the wrong hands.
Cave Creek, Arizona ā Today, Prophet Gary Roverino, the charismatic leader behind the Above Godās Name YouTube channel and co-founder of the KJV Museum, has released exciting news about a new edition of the original KJV 1611 printing. This new edition will be unlike the previous thirty special editions he has produced over the last two years. Prophet Roverino predicts this upcoming edition is sure to astound his followers and silence his skeptics once and for all!
Each edition of the 1611 produced by prophet Roverino has been intended to highlight the supernatural patterns and miraculous coincidences it contains. What sets the new edition apart? It includes literal highlights! Prophet Roverino has received special insight from God to circle every letter of his own name in red when it is found in the KJV text and the results are mind-blowing!
Prophet Roverino’s GRoundbreaking discovery that his initials āGRā are the first two letters in āGReatā and āGReatā is the first word in the 1611ās dedication to King James is how God revealed to him that he is a prophet sent to demonstrate the infallibility of the 1611 KJV to the world in the last days with signs and wonders. Ever since, Prophet Roverino has been praying that God would reveal his prophethood in an even more striking way. Not only has God answered his prayer, but he has revealed a GRand network of miracles that spans the entire Bible and it literally spells out āGARY ROVERINOā!
āYou common Christian people may be wondering why the world needs yet another reprint of the 1611,ā said Prophet Roverino in a recent interview with the Bible of the Week Society. āThe answer is simple. The riches God has concealed from Christians in the inspired 1611 printing are so vast we could publish a new edition of the 1611 every dayāwhich is one of our goalsāand still never run out of miracles. Besides, there is no copyright on the 1611 KJV and we need you suckers to keep giving us money! ā¦Did I say that outloud?ā
One of the striking miracles youāll notice is that these nine letters occur on almost EVERY PAGE of the 1611 KJV! This isnāt the case in any of the modern perversions like the NIV, NKJV, or ESV or any other book on Earth! Amazing! Even the words āEVERY PAGEā is made of nine letters! Another miracle that will blow your mind is that āGā, āAā, āRā, and āYā are the first letter of words in the same verse in 53 books of the 1611 Bible and in EXACTLY 473 verses! Another miracle that is removed from every modern translation. Whatās the big deal about 473, you may ask? Do the math!
Equation 1: 5+3=8 (8 is half of 16, and 16 HALF of 1611! There are also 16 letters in āProphet Roverinoā if you count the space! Wow!)
Equation 2: 4+7=11 (There are four R’s in āProphet Gary Roverino”, four letters in “Gary” and “math”, and āGā is the seventh letter of the alphabet and seven letters in “Prophet”!)
Result: 16+11=1611! The exact year the KJVās inspired edition was published!
What about the ā3ā in 473? Clearly this refers to the 1611 with Old and New Testaments and the Apocrypha which “Prophet Gary Roverino”āthree wordsāhas been defending as inspired for exactly three years! These three parts are meant to be read, read, READ, the three R’s in āGary Roverinoā! Prophet Roverino explained, āThe revelation of these miracles are guaranteed by God to bear fruit because, as you can see, there are nine different letters in my name just like there are nine fruits of the Spirit! The miracles are undeniable but they are hidden from those who do not wish to see!ā
You might be wondering, āWhy doesnāt āGRā stand for Gail Riplinger, another leading voice in KJV-only circles who has rejected Prophet Roverino as a false prophet?ā Or it may have crossed your mind to ask, āHas Prophet Roverino tried this with any other names which arenāt significant to him to test his process of deducing miracles?ā After careful consideration and prayer, God supplied Prophet Roverino with this majestic answer: āHey, shut up! What do you know about miracles? What do you even know about math!ā
Prophet Roverino has guaranteed that the first ten to purchase this new edition will receive a custom edition with the letters of their names circled in red so they too may behold the miracles God has planned for them. These customers will be charged $16.11 an hour for the many weeks it takes Prophet Roverino’s secretary to circle them all, with an additional surcharge in case she has to go to the hospital for hand surgeryāplus shipping and handling. If you order a case, you will receive an autoGRaphed 16Ć11 photo of Prophet Roverino himself! Order yours today!
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We hope you enjoied our first-ever satirical article! šš
Twenty Years Unmasking āNew Age Bible Versionsā: One Believerās Stand for Honesty
By Angela Benko
He that is first in his own cause seemeth just; but his neighbour cometh and searcheth him. ā Proverbs 18:17
I never expected a single VHS tape to shake my churchāor change the next twenty years of my life, but everything shifted the moment the claims on what seemed to be a simple Bibleāstudy interview didnāt match the Scriptures in my hands. Christians are called to love the truth, yet what happens when a popular book practices something very different?
In 2005, my husband and I had been attending a small Independent Baptist, āKing James Version onlyā church for about a year when a church brother handed us a VHS tape. He said it was being passed around the congregation and that the information on it was āreally important.ā Curious and eager to learn, we took it home.
The video was an interview that Gail Riplinger had on the Christian television program Nite Line in 1993. Having never seen her before, we thought that āG.A. Riplingerā, the name on the video cover, was a man. You can imagine our surprise when we saw the woman behind the initials for the first time.
We sat and listened closely to what she said. Not far into the interview, something she said didnāt sound quite right. Then another statement felt off. I grabbed my Bible to check her claim and see for myself.
The Big Fact-Check Begins
At that time, I had been using the New King James Version alongside my King James for fifteen years. I grew up with the KJV. It was the version used in the Baptist high school I attended, and all my memory verses came from it. I knew it well.
As I reviewed more of Gailās claims, I took notes. I became uncomfortable as I realized that several of her statements were inaccurate, misrepresentativeāor, in many cases, simply untrue. These were things anyone could check for themselves. I was surprised that people in my church had not verified her claims against her sources or even the basics of Bible history. They had simply checked their brains at the door, or in that case, the book cover.
I found a copy of Gail’s book New Age Bible Versions (NABV) on eBay for $4 and went through it carefully. Page after page, I found serious errors. This troubled me deeply because Christians are called to be truthful with one another.
Ephesians 4:25 KJV ā Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour: for we are members one of another.
Do Modern Versions Omit āOn Theeā to Promote New Age Meditation?
During the interview, Gail criticized the difference between the KJV and the New American Standard Bible in Isaiah 26:3. Pay close attention to what she said and take a look at the passage for yourself. Gail said,
In the NASB they had omitted “in Me.” So it just said, “Whose mind is steadfast.” Well, before I was saved, I studied New Age philosophy and Eastern mysticism, and all that sort of thing. And I knew that was exactly what the Eastern mystics were teaching people: “Keep your mind steadfast on the mantra, meditate on this.”
This accusation against the NASB in Isaiah 26:3 was one of two foundational āchangesā that led Gail to write her books. It was also one of the first misrepresentations I checked. Below is how it appears in the 1971 NASB compared alongside the KJV. Pay close attention to the words in the KJV.
Isaiah 26:3 KJV ā āThou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.ā
Isaiah 26:3 NASB 1971 ā “The steadfast of mind Thou wilt keep in perfect peace, Because he trusts in Thee.”
Is this a New Age conspiracy to use the Bible to promote Eastern mysticism? Of course not. From the very beginning, Gail greatly misunderstood this difference between these two translations. It’s not that the modern versions took āon theeā out as she pretended. The difference is that the NASB did not add to their translation what the King James Bible did. Neither were wrong or misleading, they were just stylistically different; saying exactly the same thing in two different ways.
Did you notice how āon theeā is in italics? In the KJV, āhisā, āwhomā and “is” are in italics for the same reason: they are not in the underlying Hebrew. It’s wrong to criticize Bible translations that do not add āon theeāāsuch as the Wycliffe Bible (1384), Lutherās German Bible (1534), Coverdale Bible (1535), Great Bible (1539), Geneva Bible (1560), Bishopās Bible (1568), and almost all English translations available today except the ERV, ASV, ESV and NKJV which are translations intentionally patterned after the KJV. Since many faithful translations before and after the KJV do not insert āon theeā, it is clear that āon theeā is not required to adequately express the Hebrew nor did the KJV translators add āon theeā because it was demanded by the theological sense of the passage as Gail implies in NABV (chapter āSilenced Scribes Summon Psychologyā, p. 503) and her book Blind Guides (pp. 40-41). Since āon theeā is not in the underlying Hebrew text, it’s disturbing that Gail seems to believe failing to add āon theeā to the Bible is theologically wrong and is leading to Christian psychological problems.
Over and over again Gail accuses the wording in modern Bibles is a product of New Age and even satanic influence. She bases this on flimsy and misleading evidence and often on outright falsehoods. If left unchecked, simple rumors like these can quickly breed paranoia and contempt for anyone who challenges the accusations, a reality I didnāt fully grasp until we saw their impact on our own church firsthand.
Questioning the Narrative
Concerned for friends in our church, we began gently but firmly encouraging others to check Riplingerās claims for themselves. For several months, I continued verifying her statements and documenting what I found. By the time I finished, I had uncovered hundreds of misquotations, fallacies, distortions, and outright falsehoods. It tasted more and more like poison for the saints with every source I checked. I could not understand why someone who presented herself as a sweet, soft-spoken woman who loved the Lord would publish a book filled with so much error.
I shared some of my findings with a āfriendā at church. Sadly, she was more concerned about what the pastor would think of me checking NABV than about the serious issues I had uncovered. Another friend proudly told me she and her husband had given copies of NABV to each of their eight children. A man in the church frequently praised āMrs. Riplingerā as an āamazing scholarā and handed out copies of NABV as if it were a gospel tractābuying them by the case.
A few months into my research, someone went to the pastor and accused my husband and me of āsowing discordā because we did not share the churchās KJVO convictions nor did we accept the claims of NABV. The atmosphere toward us shifted overnight from warm to ice-cold. No one wanted to check anything for themselves. Some seemed afraid to. Everyone simply wanted to accept whatever the pastor said. No one wanted to hear what we had found. We were shunned, gossiped aboutāespecially by those we thought were our friendsāand quietly pushed away. After six months of this, we knew it was time to leave.
Eight years later, a woman who had attended the church during that time met with me. She told me that the pastor had instructed everyone not to ask questions about why we left. He told them we were āsnaredā and āworldlyā because we dared to examine things for ourselves. It was as if no one there was allowed to think, to use the mind God gave them. The church’s unspoken rule was: āStay under the thumb. Do what you are told. The pastor said it, so thatās how it is.ā Sadly, this is the same unspoken rule in many other churches where people are made to feel ashamed or afraid to ask questions, do their own research, and reach their own conclusions. To this day, I can’t find anywhere in the KJV where God forbids checking sources and verifying claims. In fact, Scripture warns us not to be simpleminded, to ātry the spirits,ā and to be like the Bereans.
Proverbs 14:15 KJV ā The simple believeth every word: but the prudent man looketh well to his going.
1 John 4:1 KJV ā Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.
Acts 17:10-11 KJV ā And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea: who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews. These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
During this time, I felt the Lord pressing heavily on my heart the need to put my findings into a bookāsomething others could read so they could judge the claims of New Age Bible Versions for themselves.
In the spring of 2006, I began typing my research notes and the earliest rough draft. Some days the Enemy whispered that no one would care, that I was wasting my time, that no one would think it mattered. But the Lord kept encouraging me to continue.
Bundle of Joy
In late summer 2008, after years of infertility, we learned we were expecting our first childāa little boy. By six months old, it was clear he was different in ways that resembled autism. Doctors said he was too young to diagnose, so we waited.
At age three, specialists diagnosed him with high-functioning autism. Even that comes with many challenges. His early years were filled with physical, occupational, sensory, and speech therapies, followed by special-education preschool and eventually full-time homeschooling with me. During his first twelve years, I could only work on the book part-time.
Nearing Completion
In 2021, I was finally able to finish the remaining rough draftāabout four hundred pages. In 2024, I began shaping it into a final draft while continuing my research and adding new findings. As of February 2026, the project represents twenty years of researching, compiling, and writing.
Sadly, during this research and writing process I have heard of many churches splitting over Riplingerās claims. Charts filled with misinformation copy and pasted from Gailās books circulate widely on social media to this day. Countless believers are being misled into a mindset of unnecessary paranoia and disdain for fellow Christians and their Bibles.
My upcoming book The Myth of āNew Age Bible Versionsā: How False Warnings Betrayed a Generation of Bible-Believing Christians is a detailed compilation exposing the staggering truth about New Age Bible Versions and portions of Riplingerās other books. It compares hundreds of her claims and quotations with what her sources actually say. Readers deserve to know that everything is not as it appears in NABV. The footnotes include links to her sources so readers can examine them firsthand. It is important that people have access to this information so they can develop their own well-informed opinions and avoid the consequences of believing Riplinger’s falsehoods.
There is no need to shoot the messenger. Approach The Myth of āNew Age Bible Versionsā with an open heart and mindāthe best posture for learning. Examine the evidence before forming an opinion. You may find yourself surprised.
About Angela Benko
Angela Benko has more than forty years of combined research in Bible, health, and history. She trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ as her Savior in her teens and has served Him in the nursing field as a palliative care and geriatrics nurse for more than 30 years. After much prayer Angela met her wonderful husband Robert at church. They have been happily married for more than 20 blessed years and are the proud parents of a special needs child.
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This article was written for the Bible Version Conspiracy by our Co-conspirator and friend Angela Benko. To discover more about the Bible Version Conspiracy, visit our website at bibleversionconspiracy.com and check out our YouTube channel. Join the Co-conspiracy and support what we do at https://buymeacoffee.com/josepharmstrong/membership. Donāt hesitate to reach out to us with questions or suggestions via email at bibleversionconspiracy@gmail.com. We look forward to hearing from you soon!
My journey into KJV-onlyism began when I returned to Christ, like the prodigal son, after wondering from him in my childhood. I had left the Church not long after my confirmation and baptism, and spent many years āin the worldā in every sense of the phrase. But in Godās providence and grace, my heart was stirred, and for the first time in my life I picked up a Bible and began to read.
I was so disconnected from Christianity as we entered into the digital age that I was not aware Bibles could be read for free on mobile apps. So, doing what any book lover does when a book is needed immediately, I opened my Kindle and purchased a New King James Versionāhaving absolutely no idea what that meant. In my childlike understanding of Scripture, there was simply āthe Bibleā and I knew nothing of translation and variations within the biblical manuscripts that have survived history, a testament of the past and our ancient faith.
About halfway through Genesis, I realized the digital format was just not going to do. I wanted a physical Bible. The weight of Godās Word demanded a corresponding feeling in my hand. So I drove to a nearby store and bought the first physical copy I would ever read. Though I had been gifted Bibles growing up, they had long since disappearedāhaving never understood their value, something I would later come to regret. I picked one off the shelf that looked good: hand-sized, brown and tan cover. It happened to be an NIV.
Not long after, having read significant portions of the Pentateuch and the Gospels, the Spirit convicted me of my sin, drove me to my knees, and brought me to Christ. As I continued in Scripture and grew in my faith, I began attending a congregationāone where Textus Receptus preferences and KJVO leanings were present in some circles, though not officially held by the church.
One well-meaning lady pointed out that my Bible was missing verses. I had noticed the footnotes about manuscript variation all along, but it had never occurred to me that this was supposed to be concerning. I showed her the footnote containing the verse she said was missing and explained that my Bible wasnāt hiding anything.
I had no context for these new ideas I was being introduced to, and this issue came up again and again. Once, an elder in the church pulled a few Bibles off his shelf for me to compare verses in a passage in order to demonstrate some issue. I read them and considered what each said. I responded to him, confusedly, āThey are saying the same thing.ā I was perplexed. I couldnāt see what they saw and didnāt understand their fear and concern. I certainly hadnāt learned such anxieties from reading Godās Word.
I felt the need to defend my Bible. This was the Bible that introduced me to Jesus, the one I was reading when He became my friend, the one that brought me to tears at the Last Supper, the one in which He became my Lord and Saviour, and finally my King. But the idea that something was wrong with the text had been planted, and as these interactions continued, their suspicion would eventually become my own.
From my perspective, these ideas were coming from church leaders who had been walking with the Lord much longer than I had; perhaps they understood something I didnāt. Before long, I switched back to the NKJV. Still, for my own conscience, I needed to dig deeper. I had been pressed to adopt their concerns without, in my opinion, a satisfactory justification. Over the next year, as I neared the end of my first full read-through of Scripture, I began devouring textual debates and lectures on textual criticism and related topics. I must have watched hundreds of hours. I started leaning toward the Critical Text (The base text underlying most contemporary translations of the New Testament). The reasoning used to weigh manuscripts and decide between variant readings struck me as thoughtful and well grounded. This is when I started reading from the English Standard Version, influenced by Christian teachers I was watching online. I saw these men exposit the text with deep conviction, and I could see their love for Godās Word, something I shared, and I was drawn to it.
As it turned out, this leaning would only be temporary. Circumstances had placed me in a new church where their particular flavor of onlyism was even more pronounced. They used the KJV exclusively in preaching and teachingāsomething I had not yet experienced. To their credit, exclusive use of the KJV wasnāt treated as a condition of fellowship, nor was anyone required to use the KJV for personal devotion or study. Yet, that openness was never explicitly communicated to the congregation; it remained more of an unspoken liberty. Unfortunately, that silence created space for onlyism to take root and fester. This setting naturally inclined me to explore the KJVO position more seriouslyānot just the Textus Receptus or the traditional text and Majority/Critical Text positions, but the distinct claims of KJV-onlyism itself.
In conversations with my peers, I quickly realized we were approaching the issue from very different starting points. Whenever I brought these issues up, my closest friend in the church seemed disinterested. He told me God had told him the KJV was the correct Bible to use. From his perspective, there was no need to understand the nuances of textual issues or to weigh the arguments for one text over anotherāeven when my presentation was in support of the King James. I have no doubt my brother genuinely believed God had told him the King James Bible was the correct one to use. In his mind, he was simply exercising obedience to Christ, and therefore any further examination was unnecessary.
God never gave me such a revelation, so for the sake of my own conscience I had to investigate these matters, assess all the positions for their strengths and weaknesses, and know the truth for myself. In the end, I became convinced of KJV-onlyismāor, more accurately, I became convinced that absolute certainty about the entirety of the text was necessary, and King Jamesāonlyism was the only position that seemed to allow for it.
As providence would have it, a move to a new city, closer to family, brought me to yet another churchāone where no one held to any kind of āonlyā position. The sermons were preached from the NIV, which unsettled me a little at first, but I still carried my King James to the pews each week. It gave me a sense of security, as though I could quietly measure everything I heard against what I believed was the true text and, as the saying goes, āeat the meat and spit out the bones.ā
Around this time, my mother experienced her own return to Christ, and we were attending that church together. She asked me to help her find a Bible. By then I had become a collector of sorts and very knowledgeable about the offerings from all the major publishers, and though I had settled firmly into KJV-onlyism, I accumulated many editions across many translations along the way.
My mom had just one requirement: anything but the King James. We had discussed my preference before, but I felt strongly that I shouldnāt pressure her. In some ways, I felt I was better off before I started down this path to onlyism. And as I watched the Lord revealing her newly kindled faith, a question pressed on me more and more: What good had my onlyist position actually done for me? In the end, I simply helped her choose what suited her needsāa large-print thinline with a purple cover. I slipped a NKJV into the list of options, secretly hoping she might pick it, but she chose the NIV.
This is the Bible my mother chose and ever since the Lord has been working in her life in unmistakable ways.
During that first year in the new church, we read through the Bible together and met weekly to discuss the readings. Over the course of that year, I saw the Lord working in my motherās life in unmistakable ways, which only further softened my heart and kept that same question before me.
That church would only be a momentary stop on my way to what would become my church home. While going through this textual journey during the preceding six years, I was simultaneously going through a theological one.
When I began attending the church I now call home, I asked the pastor for recommended theological readings. He pointed me to Christian Doctrine by Shirley Guthrie. Guthrieās Neo-Orthodox approach was completely foreign to meāespecially his view of Scripture. While I wouldnāt embrace all his conclusions, his book did open my eyes to something that had been staring me in the face the whole time: there is a spiritual nature to Scripture that cannot be understood in physical terms. I had heard echoes of this idea before, ironically from those defending the King James Version as a kind of sacred textual standard for the English-speaking Church.
The Word of God is āliving and active, sharper than any two-edged sword.ā I had witnessed its living power in my own motherās life and experienced it myself from those very first days of picking up Godās Word. And slowly, I began to grasp a deeper understanding of what I already knew: what transforms hearts is the Spirit of God speaking through His Word, and that work of grace is not hindered by some personal uncertainties in the text. For the ink that pools and spreads across the vellum, the strokes that draw the droplets into letters, the words that slowly take shape, are but a visible sign of the thing signified. They point to the greater reality than themselves that has no container we can see or fully understand.
When I look back on my journey into only-ism, I began to see parallels between my own heart on this matter and the very things Jesus so often rebuked in the Pharisees. Imagine driving up a mountain near dusk when a valley suddenly opens before you and a breathtaking sunset fills the horizon. You pull over and start fiddling with your camera and adjusting its settings, trying desperately to capture the perfect shot. But you spend so long seeking perfection in the image, that you miss the sunset entirely and the opportunity to enjoy the perfection of the reality that image was meant to point to, and the beauty God placed before you in that special moment.
I now understand that I cannot ultimately figure out the entirety of the text in its hundreds of thousands of words down to the single letter with absolute certainty. No one can. By God’s grace itās clear to me we were never meant to. God, in His providence, did not give us a completed text of Scripture free from variation in any ageāincluding the King James. This is something the informed onlyist must reckon with, and some do so with more or less consistency. Nor did He give us instructions for identifying a single copy as the standard, or for constructing one.
And maybe thatās the point. Maybe the human element so evident in the transmission of the text is intentional on Godās partābringing His Word down to us in a form meet for us. A well preserved text with minor variation that points to the perfect Word. Perhaps the absolute perfection we long for in a text is really a misplaced longing for the absolute perfection found only in Christ, the living Word. And even if such flawless perfection could be captured in physical form in all its glory, would we be capable of beholding it unveiled? Or would we, like the Israelites, shrink backāpleading for God to speak through Moses insteadāafraid of the radiance reflected in his shining face?
And with that realizationāI began to see how Christ was the one feeding us, even when I thought I was the one sorting the meat from the bones. And after a seven-year journey that took me into KJV-onlyism along the way, and then out of itāmy conscience came to rest. Today I have the freedom to read and be nourished by Godās Word in a variety of translations with textual variation between them, free from the anxieties of onlyism which can never deliver what it promises, utterly certain of Christās ability to spiritually feed my soul through His Wordāwhich despite my ignorance is always meat, never bones.
To God be the glory!
Stepping away from a King James Versionāonly perspective was never just about favoring one translation over another. It was about recognizing that I had once put myself alone in the driverās seat of discernment and had failed to see Godās care in feeding His children through His Word in all of Church history. In that independent frame of mind, I adopted a narrow view of Scripture and inspiration that made it difficult to see beyond a single text. But as I became exposed toāand began to embraceāthe broader landscape of Christian theology and the rich tradition of the Church, I found my way out of that mindset.
It was this shiftāfrom a solitary approach to a communal, historically grounded understandingāthat allowed me to appreciate Scripture more fully and to recognize that we all need the wisdom of the Church, now and in history to guide us. And I believe this is the key to freeing the conscience of many bound to King Jamesāonlyism: helping them understand a robust doctrine of the Word. Entangled within the KJVO mindset is a particularly narrow view of Scripture and inspiration that is incompatible with Church history, the extant manuscript evidence, and the way the Church has understood these matters for millennia. This wisdom must reach the onlyist, because apart from a miraculous work of God, Iām not sure anything else could release them.
From this I conclude that it is both good and right to desire the best possible text of Scripture and to labor faithfully to render it in every language under Heaven. Yet this workāand our understanding of itāmust be kept in its proper proportion. Our certainty does not rest upon the absolute perfection of our labors, nor upon the possession of a flawless physical copy of Godās Word. Our certainty rests in Christ Himself. It is His work, not ours, to ensure that His Church hears the words it needs for faith and life.
And so this is my hope and my charge to the Church at large: that she would rediscover her roots, embrace the inheritance of the past, and receive with gratitude the blessings God has bestowed through the ministry of His Church in every age. And may the faithfulness of our Lord Jesus Christ sustain you until His appearingāand keep you unto everlasting life.
Did Helena Petrovna Blavatsky (1831-1891), the OG New Ager who founded the Theosophical Society and Lucifer Magazine, actually worship Satan as is so often accused? Does Isaiah 14 describe the fall of Satan from heaven? Are KJV-only apologists spreading falsehoods about Blavatsky, modern Bible translators and their translations, and even the word āLuciferā itself? š¤ Short answer: no, she didn’t, no, it doesn’t, and yes, they are! š³
According to John Algeo (1930ā2019), National President of the Theosophical Society in America, the first article that Blavatsky wrote for Lucifer Magazine confirms our own research into the āLuciferā translation controversy from our formerly KJV-only perspective. Not only that, but Blavatsky taught the same thing about the name āLucifer” in Isaiah 14:12 as the many faithful and learned Christian commentators and translators, which we’ve been exploring. In fact, it appears the one major difference between the insights of men like John Rogers, Matthew Poole, King James, the KJV translators themselves (!), Noah Webster, John Calvin, Adam Clarke, etc, and Blavatsky is that Blavatsky’s conclusion dismisses the existence of Satan altogether.
We are not endorsing Helena Blavatsky, John Algeo, or the Theosophical Society, nor are we defending their beliefs or teachings. I’ve read quite a bit of her book Isis Unveiled, Volume 2: The ‘Infallibility’ of Religion. We are well aware of what she thought of religion, especially Christianity, and history, and we have been clear on multiple occasions that she got a lot of things wrong and that, although her wisdom is extensive, it is not infinite and is dangerous if taken uncritically. We simply want to show that she has been wrongly accused of Satan worship, and did not teach that he is an impersonal force as some claim. Disingenuous authors have read her article “What’s in a Name?” and continue to lie about her beliefs to protect their anti-modern version rhetoric. This dishonesty is an unfruitful work that we are reproving. It also adds to our own exposure of the meaning and history of the word “lucifer”.
We also do not seek to prove an error in the KJV since, properly understood, it is saying the same thing as any other modern version in this case since āday-starā, āmorning starā, āplanet Venusā, and āLuciferā are synonymous and accurate translations in the context of Isaiah 14:12. āLuciferā is, however, the easiest translation to be misunderstood by modern readers because its classic sense has fallen almost completely out of use. As a result, “Luciferian” has been acquainted with “Satan worshipper” which simply isn’t the case.
Several KJV-only books, some of them written by friends of ours, have claimed Blavatsky was a worshipper of Satan because she was “Luciferian” and strongly imply that the translations of modern Bibles which read “Day-Star”, “Morning star”, etc., may be as well. This is not typical of KJV-only literature, but his standard fare in those written from a conspiratorial perspective. As conspiracy theories often go, these accusations are founded on half truths and misunderstandings. We hope this helps to set the record straight.
Mr Algeo’s article is reproduced below in bold. My comments are in [[ double brackets ]].
John Algeo writes:
“How Lucifer got to be used as a name for a devil is a complicated story. In the Book of the Prophet Isaiah (chapter 14), there is a passage talking about the King of Babylon, who was not a favorite of Isaiah’s. Verse 12 of that chapter runs (in the oldest known version of the Bible): “How you are [sic] fallen from heaven, O day-star, son of the morning! How you have been cut down to the ground-you who laid low the nation” (Dead Sea Scrolls Bible 292).
āThe King of Babylon had apparently been given (or perhaps himself assumed) the title “Day-Star,” which is a name for the planet Venus, the first planet or star seen in the morning just before the sun rises, hence the King was also called “son of the morning.” The identification of important monarchs with heavenly bodies has always been common, as for example King Louis XIV of France was called the “Sun King.” Now, the word Lucifer “light bearer” was the Latin term for the “day-star” or Morning Star because it brought in (or bore) the light of the day.
āSo when the Hebrew scriptures were translated into Latin, the word lucifer was used in this verse, rendered into Latin as Quomodo cecidistide cƦlo, lucifer, qui mane oriebaris? That is literally, “How have you fallen from heaven, light bearer, who are born in the morning?” The reference to falling from heaven was doubtless Isaiah’s way of putting the Babylonian king in his place by sarcastically observing in effect: “OK, you call yourself the Day Star of Heaven, you who think you’re so high and mighty, but look at you now–you, the so-called Day Star, have fallen from your place in the heavens and have yourself been cut down to the ground.
[[ Please note this is exactly the same interpretation offered by many godly and learned Christians who have put aside Roman Catholic traditions when they conflict with or obscure the plain meaning of Scripture. This can be clearly seen, for example, in the notes of both Matthew’s Bible and Geneva BibleĀ³, as we have discussed elsewhere.
Unfortunately, some fundamentalist researchers pretend that the fall of Satan scenario is the only interpretation acknowledged by genuine Christians who have not fallen into blasphemous error. One young KJV-only blogger (speaking from a place of pure innocence and good intention), goes so far as to say that no one questioned the Isaiah 14:12 fall of Satan narrative until Westcott and Hort! Elsewhere we have discussed why they see any translation other than āLuciferā as blasphemous, so we won’t get into that now. These authors have set up a scenario or a modern translators are following occult beliefs in their translations. This is not the case, and it’s easy to show when the facts are considered. The false accusations need to be exposed, and showing whay Blavatsky actually believed and taught is a great way to do it.
The fall of Satan is indeed an ancient tradition, but this in this tradition Satan is being compared with the planet Venus, as Algeo goes on to discuss. ]]
āHowever, the early Christian interpreters misunderstood the expression “fallen from heaven” and, instead of recognizing it as a figure of speech playing on the destruction of the wicked King of Babylon, who called himself the Day Star, they thought it was a literal statement about a fall from heaven and identified the event with the legendary fall of Satan. So they thought that the term “Day Star,” or “Lucifer” in Latin, referred to Satan. And thus a term for the planet Venus became one of the names of a devil. It was a mistake caused by misunderstanding figurative language as a literal statement, a common problem among fundamentalists.
[[ The āfigurative languageā being confused for literal is the taunt from the dead kings that the king of Babylon had āfallen from heavenā. They compare his death to the planet/star Venus falling from the sky. Here āheavenā refers to the sky, not the abode of God and the angels. Reading the KJV, we assume we know the meaning of these āfalse friendsā (āheavenā and āLucifer”) which are used in an unusual, more archaic sense than we typically understand them. This is made especially clear regarding āLuciferā in the KJV’s own marginal note which reads āOr, O Day-starreā. Since we commonly refer to the big blue thing above us as the sky, rather than heaven, it is easy to see how confused interpretations of this passage have been reinforced by the passage of time. KJV-only fundamentalists fight against modern translations, complaining that modern versions omit āheavenā many times when they, in fact, simply make a distinction by using āskyā and āheavenā according to the context.Ā¹
Unfortunately, the same KJV-only people (and even some commentators) see the fall of Satan as essential to the understanding of Isaiah 14 because the king of Babylon didn’t fall from heaven. To them, Satan is the only being that fits the bill. Some pretend that only New Agers and occultists take the view Mr. Algeo expresses while carefully avoiding the fact that many sound Christian commentators and translators through the ages taught the same truths as presented by Mr. Algeo. Thanks to the suspicions and panic spread by these careless authors, insinuations and accusations of closeted satanism fly freely against, not only Blavatsky, but anyone and anything not in accordance with narrow KJV-only views. ]]
āThe story does not end there, however, at least not for Theosophists. When Helena Blavatsky moved to London in 1887, she decided to start a new magazine, and she chose to name it Lucifer, against the advice of some of her friends.Ā² The choice of that name was surely due, at least in part, to Blavatsky’s wicked sense of humor. She knew very well that the literal-minded and unimaginative of her day would associate the name with the devil. She was saying in effect: Very well, you think I’m a devil well, here’s another little tidbit for you to chew on. That is, she used the name to tweak the noses of the literalists.
[[ We don’t quite agree with Mr. Algeo that the fall of Satan (the traditional interpretation of Isaiah 14:12) is the literal interpretation of the passage. However, we do see how he could think itās literalistic since it’s how it is taken by most Christians who only consider the passage at face value and only in the light of strong cultural traditions.
Although Blavatsky was involved in occultism and the New Age, continuing to pretend Blavatsky worshiped Satan is not only irresponsible, but it is also downright dishonest and false accusations do not come from the heart of Christ. We all remember who the Father of Lies is, don’t we? ]]
āThe very first article in the first issue of the magazine was ‘What’s in a Name?’ and was by Blavatsky herself. In it, she explained what the name really means and how it came to be misunderstood and misapplied. She also explained why it was the right name for her magazine, which was intended (as St. Paul says in 1 Cor. 4.5) to bring “to light the hidden things of darkness.” She wrote that the purpose of her new magazine was “to fight prejudice, hypocrisy and shams in every nation, in every class of Society [sic], as in every department of life.” To top it off, the illustration on the cover of the magazine depicted a brilliant youth holding aloft a blazing star that he is bringing to earth.
āBlavatsky furthermore pointed out that in the Book of Revelation, Christ referred to himself as “the bright and morning star,” that is, Lucifer. And the Gospel of St. John (1.4) says, “In him . . . was the light of men.” Blavatsky identified Christ with Prometheus, who brought fire and thus light to humanity and who was thus etymologically a Lucifer or Light-bearer. Christ, Prometheus,and Lucifer were all symbolic bringers of light to the world and consequently savior figures.
[[ Close followers of the Bible Version Conspiracy know who we’re talking about when we say certain authors and their followers criticize the Latin Vulgate for saying ālucifer risingā in 2 Peter 1:19 refering to Jesus Christ. Not only do these researchers not understand ā or at least are not willing to publicly acknowledge and discuss ā that āluciferā is simply the Latin name for the planet Venus or daystar, but these same individuals loudly praise the Old Latin Bible and cover up the fact that the Old Latin reads exactly the same as the Vulgate! Is this due to a massive conspiracy? No. It’s simply because they are both written in Latin.
The Google AI summary informs us of other passages where the word āluciferā is used in the Latin Vulgate:
āJob 11:17: Referring to a man arising like the morning star.
Job 38:32: Asking if one can bring forth the morning star.
Isaiah 14:12: Addressing the King of Babylon as “Lucifer,” who rose in the morning and fell from heaven.
2 Peter 1:19: Referring to the “day star” (lucifer) arising in hearts, which in this contextt refers to Jesus Christ.ā ]]
“Blavatsky certainly did not believe in the existence of any literal devil, under whatever name. And she doubtless thought that ideas about the devil were a mixture of legends and misunderstandings of metaphorical and symbolic language, of which the name Lucifer is a prime example. For that reason also, it was a good name for her magazine.ā ā Viewpoint: Lucifer: What’s in a Name by John Algeo (2001).
Translation differences between modern Bible versions and the KJV have been blown far out of proportion by KJV-only fundamentalists in recent decades. Thankfully, most Christians are willing to absorb information that does not contradict clear scriptural teaching, whereas the fundamentalist mentality all too often keeps itself from asking serious questions and protects itself from the truth out of fear. The Isaiah 14:12 controversy illustrates how, when mixed together, tradition, ignorance, presumption, superstition, and paranoia can form an especially corrosive compound. Sadly, drinking this conspiratorial cocktail often brings out the worst in the āOnlyistsā and accusations and suspicions of satanism fly freely against any man or woman who dares to question the voices of their movement. Men or women in our own century or in the 19th century.
As we wrap up 2025, a new year dawns with plans to explore the “Lucifer” controversy more deeply, finally finish and publish our official Lucifer page, the article Blavatsky wrote about āLuciferā for the first edition of her magazine, write an article exposing the usage of “lucifer” in Latin manuscripts, finish our page about Gail Riplinger’s nutty and dishonest Shepherd of Hermas and Epistle of Barnabas claims, and lots of other fascinating topics. We will also begin work on the chapter we’re contributing to the upcoming book, The Myth of “New Age Bible Versions”. Stay tuned and subscribe so you don’t miss anything!
Question of the day: Have you ever been accused of something that was exactly the opposite of the truth? How did it make you feel? Has that experience made you more careful to hear both sides of the story before passing judgment?
Ā¹ The KJV only uses āskyā seven times and āskiesā 5 times compared to the NKJV’s āskyā nine / āskiesā seven, and NIV’s āskyā in eighty-four verses / āskiesā 16 verses. The NKJV retains both āheavenā and āLuciferā in Isaiah 14:12, whereas most translations replace āLuciferā with āmorning starā, āday-starā, “shining one”, etc. Several versions use āheavensā in this context as Algeo did in his paraphrase to refer to the sky/outer space, but it seems only the NET replaces āheavenā with āskyā in Isaiah 14:12.
Ā² The friends won out eventually as the Magazine was renamed the Theosophical Review ten years later.
Ā³Matthew’s Bible (1537) āHow art thou fallen from heaven O Lucifer thou faire morning childe? hast thou gotten a fall eve to the grounde / thou and (not witstanding) didest subddue the people? Marginal note, āHe compareth the death of Nebuchadnezzar to the falling of Lucifer the morning star which he calleth the child of the morning because it appeareth only in the morning. The meaning is: no such thing ought to have happened unto thee, that in earth was like the morning star, which no man can take out of heaven: And thou that wast so mighty that thou destroyedst what people thou wouldest and unto whom it was a pastime to overthrow nations, hast received such measure as thou broughtest. Such a like thing is there in Ezek. 28. Against king Cyrus.ā
Geneva Bible margin note (1560) āHow art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning? and cut down to the ground, which didst cast lots upon the nations?ā Marginal note: āThou that thought thyself most glorious, and as it were, placed in the heaven for the morning star, that goes before the sun, is called lucifer to whom Nebuchadnezzar is compared.ā
Did a famous occult philosopher say the quiet part of the Bible version conspiracy out loud? As some KJV-only authors claim, is KJV-onlyism the greatest hindrance to the New World Order? Is there an important lesson KJV-onlyists can learn from the writings of one of the greatest occult philosophers of the last century?
At the Bible Version Conspiracy, we are on a mission to expose the conspiracy we believe manipulates and controls the modern Bible version controversy. Many KJV-only and some modern Bible version proponents also believe in this controversial conspiracy, both sides offering evidence to justify their suspicions. Responsibility demands that we explore these claims and verify their accuracy before accepting them and promoting them as proof of the conspiracy we seek to expose on our YouTube channel and website. After the hundreds of “facts” from KJV-only authors that we have been able to verify as falsehoods, we were anticipating finally having a claim that checks out.
Please note, our friend Joey Faust is the first to offer a fascinating and mysterious quotation as proof of an occult conspiracy against the King James Bible. Brother Joey and us have discussed it briefly before this article was completed, and we have barely scratched the surface. Brother Joey and us have been friends for years, and we appreciate the wisdom he has to share. We occasionally disagree, often strongly, but we want to be clear that we have no ill will toward him or his books, even if they contain serious errors. This article is designed to document our fact-check, findings, and opinions as transparently as possible.
Hall and Faust in the Balance of the Scales
Manly Palmer Hall (above) was a famous esoteric philosopher, astrologer, globalist, founder of the Philosophical Research Society, and author of The Secret Teachings of All Ages. Several KJV-only authors accuse Hall of being an accomplice in a conspiracy to supplant the KJV and possibly even a mastermind behind modern versions of the Bible. Joey Faust, author of The Word: God Will Keep It, quotes Hall from 1944, when he wrote:
āThe way of…conditioning would be the one used in Central Europe to condition Nazi minds…[It there] began in the public schools…[and] with the small child; which is where we will have to begin…To make things right we will have to undo much that is cherished error. The problem of revising the Bible shows how difficult it is to do this. For the last hundred years, we have been trying to get out an edition of the Bible that is reasonably correct; but nobody wants it. What’s wanted [by the majority of people] is the good old King James version, every jot and tittle of it, because most people are convinced that God dictated the Bible to King James in English…The solution to this whole problem…is…psychology…it should be an absolute requisite of education from the grammar school up…We must begin in the home with small children…[and] with the churches teaching the integrity of the religions of other peoples…We have to be conditioned…ā
(Manly P. Hall, Horizon, āAsia in the Balance of the Scales,ā Volume 4, No. 1, 1944)
The Word: God Will Keep It by Joey Faust. Note, all those “…” are Joey’s. Page numbers are excluded since we reference his searchable PDF.
Although Faust wrote a fascinating book on the 400-year “History of the KJV-only Movement” (specifically intended to dispel the claims that KJV-onlyism is a “new sect”), this quotation does not do the context justice and grossly misrepresents Hall’s statement. Sadly, we have found such misrepresentations among KJV-only works far more often than can be accounted for by simple human error.
Did Manly P. Hall hate KJV-onlyism, seeing the movement and the KJV as obstacles to the New World Order? Or is this a delusion of grandeur conceived in a Riplinger-level overactive imagination? A few vocal KJV-only advocates have taken up Faust’s quote and used it for their purposes.
Hall also admitted that he (and his āassociatesā) had been laboring to change the world through a mass indoctrination program that includes promoting revised versions of the Bible! They worked to change and replace the King James Bible.
…
It is probable that these men, with such diverse backgrounds, were connected and organizedmore than is often realized, through various secret societies, etc. However, it is certain that the prince of the power of the air (the god of this world) is organized, as he labors to unite men philosophically toaccomplish his goals.Things are āprogressingā quickly according to such occult plans. Evil men and seducers arewaxing worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived (2 Timothy 3:13). Yet, in the early 1940’s, Hall was complaining that KJV Onlyism was a major roadblock to the devilish goals of ushering in a one world religion, etc. (see Daniel 8:25, Revelation 13, 17, etc.). The great awakening of so many people to the King James Only viewpoint in recent decades continues to be a hindrance to their agenda.
…
Many [sic] P. Hall was one of the most influential occult writers. He was also a 33Āŗ Mason. In theabove quote, this occultist is complaining that their āplansā were being hindered by KJVOnlyists! It is clear from such testimonies that there were enough KJV Onlyists around to trouble men like Hall:
…
The occult plan is plainly confessed above.
Joey Faust, The Word: God Will Keep It
Okay, never mind that he totally made up a false teaching to slam the King James Bible-believers.
…
I asked the question, āWho is āweā?ā Letās take that apart right now. And while weāre at it, weāll see what the Sinaiticus might have to do with it. By āwe,ā it seems that Hall is referring to some very high-up people in the occultic and political world. These people were the intelligent leaders who were to create a New World Order.
…
Six: The evidence suggests that this Bible found by Tischendorf in 1844 is what occultist Manly P. Hall was referring to, when he said, in 1944:
“For the last hundred years we have been trying to get out an edition of the Bible that is reasonably correct; but nobody wants it. Whatās wanted is the good old King James version, every jot and tittle of it.”
David W. Daniels, Is the “World’s Oldest Bible” a Fake? p. 48, etc. He quotes Hall four times throughout the book and serves a central role in thus book’s thesis.
He is clearly insisting that it was the KJV believers who slowed down the works of the modern Bible. Those Christians who force other Christians to have a firm belief in modern versions of the Bible will surely be accountable for their sin.
…
He believed that the verses in the KJV taught these [erroneous] doctrines that he didnāt agree with, that is why he put out another bible to correct those āwrong theological notions.ā
Now for the most important occult quote of them all:
…Did you catch that? Hall says that “they” had spent 100 years trying to replace the King James Bible with a different version. This quote comes from 1944 ā exactly 100 years from the time Codex Siniaticus was discovered ā the same codex which Hall claims corrects the errors of the King James Bible.
The ālast hundred yearsā from the date of publication of Hallās article would have been 1844. It is interesting that around that time there were reported activities by the Jesuits, a Roman Catholic order that was created to fight the Protestant Reformation, to pursue an objective to take control of the Bible.
In the spring of 1944, exactly 100 years since the Jesuitsā created the Textus Vaticanus [sic] and Textus Sinaiticus [sic] forgeries, he made a following statement:
…
Who are āweā? Letās take that apart right now. And while weāre at it, weāll see what the Sinaiticus might have to do with it.
…
By āwe,ā it seems that Hall is referring to some very high-up powerful individuals in the Occult and Political world. That was the focus of his 1944 article,
…
But to accomplish this enslavement, Hall and his masters needed to muddy the understanding of anyone reading a Bible in the common tongue. Once again, they cloaked the Word of God in an ancient language and offered a counterfeit in the common tongue to the unwary masses.
…
In other words, presenting modern Bibles with Jesuit-edited errors as an alternative to confusing, antiquated translations.
…
Hall cunningly pitted himself on the side of āreasonā by contrasting the need for modern translations against the minority of misguided Christians who consider the King James translation, itself, āinerrantā.
If the KJV is the only infallible Bible in history, why wouldn’t Satan hate it with all his being? If it is truly “the only real Bible”, how could it be anything but a hindrance to his plans for world domination? Seeing your movement as Satan’s most formidable foe seems to afford a degree of comfort. Every KJV-only advocate who references Hall’s statement seems to agree. We think the scenario put forward by the above authors is logical. Whether or not these claims are based in reality is another question entirely.
The clearest evidence that the passage is being misunderstood by the authors above is the simple fact that Hall is not speaking about KJV-onlyism as we know it today, since it did not even exist in 1944, and certainly did not constitute “the majority of people” (Faust) in 1944 which will be important later. The “totally made up” claim about “the King James Bible-believers” (Daniels) was not describing the convictions of a narrow cross-section of fundamentalist Christians, but, almost sarcastically, to represent Western society’s view of what constitutes “the Bible” after 300 years of exposure to only one. Hall’s quote encompasses Western believers and non-believers in every walk of life, not simply “the King James Only Movement”. This becomes clear when we read Hall’s article for what it says rather than for what we want it to say or wish it said. (Much of the pre-Ruckman KJV-only history presented throughout Faust’s book may likewise be unrelated to the KJV-only movement we all know and love. A distinguishing belief seems to separate pre-Ruckman and post-Ruckman KJV exclusives, that there was no perfect Bible before 1611.)
Unfortunately, examining the context further reveals that our authors reached the same conclusion because they shared biases, not because they carefully, fairly, and independently read the article to see what Hall said. Modern KJV-onlyism has serious questions to answer in an age where references can be fact-checked online. Since the entire volume containing āAsia in the Balance of the Scalesā is available for free on the Internet Archive, how many readers will test the accuracy of KJV-only authors for themselves? And if they are inaccurate, how much longer can the truth be avoided?
Context is King
Who are the “we” people mentioned by Hall who have been trying to bring out a reasonably accurate Bible? Check out the immediate context below.
Manly Hall died in 1990, so we can’t email him to ask what he meant. However, from reading the context, it is clear that Hall’s “we” is not a secret society, “some very high-up people in the occultic and political world”, or a shadowy Bible translation cabal. The Faustian reading of Hall’s article makes some parts of it very confusing (i.e., the “totally made up false teaching” described by Daniels above), but careful reading of the article in question brings many of the statements Hall made to a place where they can be easily understood.
Taking the entire context of the article into consideration, Hall is clearly speaking of occidental Bible translators in the West who were struggling to overcome the widespread ignorance of Bible history in their society. He wrote this before most modern Bible versions were published and became popular, but the American Standard Version of 1901 was highly regarded as one of the most formally accurate to the original Bible languages. Unfortunately, the uninformed position regarding the KJV that Hall describes could be held by anyone, Christian or non-Christian. The translator’s plight, mentioned in passing, is but one example of how “cherished error” can get in the way of progress in any field. Despite the movement’s high concentration of cherished error, Hall is not discussing KJV-onlyism as we know it today, not even close.
Closely held opinions, preferences, and traditions can cause unnecessary strife and division, making us unable to consider things from any other perspective. This is the entire point of Hall’s statements, not some secret plot against the KJV. Hall’s love of psychology as a solution to these problems is because it is “the first systematic effort to analyze human thinking” and a great step toward bringing formal training in seeing things from others’ point of view to public education. Admittedly, globalism has done a lot of harm in its battle for utopia, but maybe Hall had a little wisdom to share after all. The call for cooperation and understanding among men of different persuasions is overlooked by Faust and company in favor of a failed attempt to give KJV-onlyism way more credit than it deserves.
As showcased by Faust, the passage leads the reader to the conclusion that Hall and the “we” see KJV-onlyism as a major obstacle that must be ripped down so the NWO can march forward and conquer the globe. We believed Faust’s view was the case for years and actively promoted his book, but we have unfortunately discovered the flaws in his treatment of the passage over the last several weeks. Perhaps the overuse of “…” should have alerted me sooner since it seems to be the trademark of Riplinger-level documentation among KJV-only authors. And, yes, Joey says he read Hall’s entire article and many others by him before he wrote The Word, and he stands by the statements he made above. As always, we highly encourage you to read Hall’s article for yourself and draw your own conclusions.
Other vocal KJV-only authors and bloggers have borrowed this segment from Faust to demonstrate a conspiracy behind modern translations (above). Unfortunately, their insights add nothing to our understanding of what the passage originally said, serving only to confuse their readers further. It makes one wonder whether any of them (other than Faust and Daniels) have even seen the article before. Trust for KJV-only authors ā whom some KJV-only adherents feel are the only authors you can truly trust ā, proof of a deeply held conviction about a conspiracy behind modern Bible versions, and a chance to justify authors they trust (such as Gail Riplinger) prove too delicious to resist.
Despite our disagreement with Joey’s reading of āAsia in the Balance of the Scales”, we do agree that what is meant by reasonably accurate translations in the last hundred years refers especially to the efforts of the English Revised Version and the American Standard Version. The rest of The Word: God Will Keep It pretends that modern translations are only viewed as more accurate than the KJV because Christianity is being secretly influenced by liberals, Jesuits and occultists. Perhaps it is, but probably not. We’ll have to look into this later. (I have a hunch that Joey’s suspicions hinge on the claims of a certain woman focusing on the translation of a certain word in Isaiah that starts with “L”.)
Sadly, as seen in another work of his, brother Joey tends to ignore heaps of information that don’t fit his thesis and pretend the opposing viewpoint is only held by “cultists”. Sound familiar? It’s not a perfect parallel, but this error in Joey’s book reminds me of Gail Riplinger’s quotation of Vera Alder to prove there is a plan to create a New World Order Bible. (New Age Bible Versions (2021), p. 613) There is always just enough information that can be trimmed away from such quotations so they can be squeezed into the KJV-only conspiracy narrative. It is easy to prove that Faust’s artificial occultists-hate-KJV-onlyism scenario is not the case in Hall’s article.
How many other statements in The Word: God Will Keep It have been skewed to fit the Faustian narrative? We trust there will not be any more serious misunderstandings or misrepresentations in the book, as Joey is a good friend of mine, but only time and fact-checking will tell. We will discuss other clear problems in Joey’s work in the future. All this being said, we deeply appreciate that so far, Joey has received our criticisms in the spirit they have been intended, and we are encouraged that he has been willing to listen to and discuss at length our observations and arguments in the background.
We were hoping the evidence behind these claims would pan out. Why? Because we are on the hunt for 100 rock-solid pieces of evidence that there is a conspiracy behind the modern Bible translation controversy. Have you found something you think we should consider? Feel free to drop us a note!
Modern English Bible translations change “Lucifer” to “day star” in Isaiah 14:12. Is this part of a satanic conspiracy to exalt Satan as KJV-only authors demand? Or is the truth much more simple than we suspected? š¤
It is true that most modern translations do not include “Lucifer” in Isaiah 14:12, the only verse with the word in the entire Bible. This controversial translation choice has given rise to KJV-only accusations of satanic practices being performed secretly by modern Bible translators. Certainly, whoever made this change must worship Satan, right?
Granted, there may be satanic practices being performed by professing Christians which have infiltrated Bible translation committees. Such infiltration, however, did not influence the change from “Lucifer” to “day star”. This is plain to see and easy to prove from history and the Scriptures themselves.
The name Lucifer has been traditionally applied to Satan for most of Christian history. It comes as a shock to most, but the learned men at the time the KJV was translated didn’t think “Lucifer” was a true name of Satan! Were the scholars of the 17th century alive today, they would battle the same KJV-only conspiracy theories as intellectually misleading and detrimentally divisive to Christianity.
Abundant proof of this conclusion is readily available spanning every century that demonstrates KJV-only advocates are dead wrong about Lucifer. The latest discovery we’ve made is Matthew Poole’s Commentary on Isaiah 14:12 from the year 1685. For his noble contribution to the demise of scriptural ignorance and needless discord among brethren, Poole wins our “Devil’s Advocate” of the week award! šš„³ …Posthumously of course. š
The section from his commentary reads thusly:
“O Lucifer; which properly is a bright and eminent star, which ushers in the sun and the morning; but is here metaphorically taken for the high and mighty king of Babylon. And it is a very usual thing, both in prophetical and in profane writers, to describe the princes and potentates of the world under the title of the sun or stars of heaven. Some understand this place of the devil; to whom indeed it may be mystically applied; but as he is never called by this name in Scripture, so it cannot be literally meant of him, but of the king of Babylon, as is undeniably evident from the whole context, which certainly speaks of one and the same person, and describes him as plainly as words can do it.”
Were Pool alive today, would he join KJV-only advocates in their objections to “day star” replacing “Lucifer” in modern English Bibles? Simply, NO! In fact, he taught that Satan holds no natural place in the passage, something KJV-only authors can’t abide.
Perhaps Satan has in some sense a secondary spiritual or “mystical” place in this passage, however this is not enough to sustain the wilting flower of KJV-only falsehoods and objections to “day star”. KJV-only objections to this sort of information stem from the inability of their arguments to withstand exposure to plain facts of history in linguistics: facts of which old and modern translators are only too aware.
Stay tuned for a full treatment of the falsehoods and facts surrounding the “Lucifer” vs “day star” controversy on our upcoming page bibleversionconspiracy.com/lucifer
Have a blessed week! ā¤ļø
Joseph Armstrong
bibleversionconspiracy.com
Proverbs 6:16-19 KJV ā These six things doth the LORD hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him: A proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, An heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, A false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren.
Revelation 12:10 KJV ā And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night.
The Shepherd of Hermas says to 1. Take the mark of the beast, 2. Give up to the beast, 3. Kill anyone not receiving the mark of the beast, 4. Form a one-world government, etc. …Or does it? š¤ Are Gail Riplinger’s “explosive” claims verifiable? Short answer: No, because she lied.
A friend asked me, “What’s wrong with what she wrote about the Shepherd of Hermas? She backs it up with summarized portions of the work. Is she misrepresenting the actual words? Is she making stuff up?”
I replied, “šÆ She misrepresents and makes stuff up about the Shepherd of Hermas many times!
A friend asked me if her claims about Hermas from her Prophecy Club speech were accurate and I started looking into it. Soon I was sickened and horrified by the gross ignorance and lies I found. To be clear, I’ve checked all of the statements about the Shepherd of Hermas as well as almost everything in New Age Bible Versions Chapter 40, “The Final Bible!” (which is about the Shepherd of Hermas and Epistle of Barnabas), and out of over 100 claims, almost nothing checked out. Her 12 Mandates of the Antichrist (claiming Hermas teaches to take āthe nameā of the beast, give āup to the beastā, form a one world government, kill those not receiving his ānameā, etc. etc.) were all completely false.
To save time, I’ve copied and pasted the following response to another of my friends to answer your question with more details about selected points.
“On page 623 the Antichrist’s disregard for “the desire of women” (Daniel 11:37) is related to Hermas’s statement that, “These men should repent and put away their desire for women (22) and return unto these virgins and walk in their power…”. In actuality, it says, “[T]hese men, being such as they are, should repent and put away their desire for THESE women, and return unto the virgins, and walk in their power… “. (Hermas 13[90]:1) These women in the passage are directly stated to represent vices such as Unbelief, Intemperance, Disobedience, and Deceit (Hermas 15[92]:3) and the virgins represent the virtues of Faith, Continence, Power, Long-suffering, “Simplicity, Guilelessness, Purity, Cheerfulness, Truth, Understanding, Concord, Love”. (Hermas 15[92]:2) From reading the passage, I would say no good Christian should desire “these women” and Daniel 11’s description of the Antichrist is not even remotely related. Gail currently justifies reading Hermas as an occult document written to appear Christin by misrepresenting Blavatsky’s statements regarding Hermas earlier in āThe Final Bible!ā.
“On page 630 where Hermas is quoted as saying “I took courage and gave myself up to the beast (22)…” presenting this as proof that Hermas wants Christians not to have victory over the Antichrist, but rather To accept him and take his mark. In context, the passage of Vision 4 says “And I began to weep, and to entreat the Lord that He would rescue me from it [the beast]. And I remembered the word which I had heard, “Be not of doubtful mind, Hermas.” Having therefore, brethren, put on the faith of the Lord and called to mind the mighty works that He had taught me, I took courage and gave myself up to the beast. Now the beast was coming on with such a rush, that it might have ruined a city. I come near it, and, huge monster as it was, it stretcheth itself on the ground, and merely put forth its tongue, and stirred not at all until I had passed by it.” (Hermas 1[22]:7-9) As I listened to the audiobook, I understood “I took courage and gave myself up to the beast” to mean “I took courage and fully accepted that the beast was coming and prepared for battle.” However I have since learned from looking up a translation that came just before Lightfoot’s that what was meant is that Hermas made himself clearly visible to the beast and boldly faced it prepared for conflict. I also took time to look up a modern English translation and the passage in Greek and found the Roberts-Donaldson translation says, “I boldly faced the beast.” A friend of mine translated the greek phrase “ĪøĪ±ĻĻį½µĻĪ±Ļ Īµį¼°Ļ Ļį½ø ĪøĪ·Ļį½·ĪæĪ½ į¼Ī¼Ī±Ļ Ļį½øĪ½ į¼Ī“ĻĪŗĪ±” as “I courageously faced the beast.” In fact, Hermas does have victory over the beast in the passage by the power of Christ. Furthermore, the old lady which typifies “the Church” (2[23]:2) says to him, “[T]ell them [the elect] that this beast is a type of the great tribulation which is to come. If therefore ye prepare yourselves beforehand, and repent (and turn) unto the Lord with your whole heart, ye shall be able to escape it, if your heart be made pure and without blemish, and if for the remaining days of your life ye serve the Lord blamelessly. Cast your cares upon the Lord and He will set them straight.”. (Hermas 2[23]:5) This is so far from a command to “Give āup to the beastā” (NABV, 615) that I doubt even the Antichrist himself could employ this passage to get Christians to surrender to him much less use a translation from 1893. Somehow, Gail has been able to flip the passage on its head and sell the idea that the Shepherd of Hermas teaches people to āgive up to the beastā to thousands of unsuspecting Christians.
“Gail and Bryn are well aware of these last two criticisms and have published 2 documents in an attempt to respond. However they manage to avoid addressing these problems directly, opting rather for the copout at the quotations of Hermas are not intended to be accurate since it was called āan abstractā on page 617, misrepresenting my statements, attacking my character, and questioning my motives. I’m sad to say that after supporting her for over a decade, I have recently been on the receiving end of some of her harshest statements and gas lighting. I have responded to both documents on my YouTube channel the Bible Version Conspiracy (see live streamed episodes 18, 21, 22, 31, 32 and 33 in particular) and will continue to do so on our website as opportunity allows.
“I could list many more if called upon to do so, but this should meet your request. I hope this answers your question and helps to bring the closure you’re desire. Feel free to reach out to Gail about these matters. Please let me know if you have any questions. God bless!ā
BTW, she also lied about “āIf you think you have everything you need in your Bibleā¦we donāt think thatās true.āā š¤¦āāļø More on this later.
Did Saint Patrick win back a biblical symbol from the druids that modern KJV-onlyism is now telling Christians to avoid?? š®
A three-pronged enigma has puzzled researchers of ancient symbolism and myth for centuries. The history of one of Ireland’s timeless symbols, the triquetra, is shrouded in dark mystery. Wiccans and Pagans claim it as their own while Christians use it to represent the Holy Trinity of Father, Son (Jesus), and Holy Ghost! In some King James-only circles, the wildest claims imaginable ā though of highly questionable accuracy ā have surfaced in the last 30 years. But there are many important truths about the triquetra that have remained unexplored until now.
You may find this surprising, but its most ancient use of the triquetra was to symbolize Noah and his three sons and how all men are brothers and should be kind one to another. I hope the article will help clear up some of the divisive falsehoods KJV-only gatekeepers have spread about it over the last 30 years.
It’s true! The word “God” is in the New King James Version 51 FEWER times than in the KJV! šµ This is proof of a conspiracy to eventually remove the Judeo-Christian God from the Bible and replace Him with a New Age “God of forces”! …or is it?
Sounds a little crazy, I know, but that seemingly off-the-wall belief is nothing new. It’s exactly what I used to believe and what thousands of others for the last 30 years have continued to believe thanks to one person. In her track called the NKJV Death Certificate, Gail Riplinger (author of the unhinged 1993 book New Age Bible Versions) presents the following chart.
Modern versions are constantly leaving out words relating to God and Satan, aren’t they? That’s what Gail says. In her many presentations, Gail compared this series of “omissions” to removing the main characters of a novel. But is this actually a fair comparison? Are these indications of an Antichrist conspiracy, or is there more going on here that we are not being told? š¤ Let’s take the second “ommission” in her list, “God”, as an example.
Rick Norris, author of The Unbound Scriptures, Discerning the Truth about the KJV, and a top contributor to our Facebook group Rebooting Gail Riplinger made a facinating comment on one of our group’s posts. The post was a video which responded to Gail’s oft-repeated claim of “God” being omitted from the NKJV 51 times as well as others on the chart. Rick writes:
“Gail Riplinger claimed in her tract [NKJV Death Certificate] that the “NKJV omits the word āGodā 51 timesā (Church Bus News, April-June, 1996, p. 26). This inaccurate claim seems to be based on a simple comparison of the NKJV to the KJV and not on a comparison to the preserved Scriptures in the original languages. This count likely does not even take into consideration the places where the KJV has the word āGodā added in italics. In the 2021 updated edition of New Age Bible Versions, Gail Riplinger continued to repeat her misleading, incorrect claim that the NKJV omits āGod 51 timesā (p. 4).
“In response to this misleading charge, James D. Price noted: “The truth is that the KJV added the word “God” in fifty one or more places where the Hebrew or Greek text did not contain it–and that without using italics in most cases. This was because the KJV used dynamic equivalence paraphrases such as “God forbid,” “God save the king,” or “God speed” instead of a more literal expression in good English. In all these places the NKJV made the KJV more literal and more faithful to the Hebrew and Greek texts without undermining the place of God in the Bible” (False Witness of G. A. Riplinger’s Death Certificate for the New King James Version, p. 4).
“James D. Price then discussed these times and demonstrated the faithfulness of the NKJV to the Hebrew and Greek texts underlying the KJV.
“Jack Lewis maintained that āthe phrases āGod forbidā (1 Sam. 14:45; etc.) and āwould Godā (Num. 11:29) add the word āGodā to the textā (English Bible, p. 44). Harold Rawlings claimed that āthe KJV is replete with dynamic idioms like āGod forbidā and āGod save the kingā that have no exact verbal equivalent in the originalā (Trial by Fire, p. 192). In the introduction to his 1833 revision of the KJV, Noah Webster noted that the phrase God forbid was used several times in the KJV “without any authority from the original languages for the name of God” (p. ix). The KJV has āGod forbidā eight times in the Old Testament and fifteen times in the New Testament. Michael Sproul maintained that āāGod forbidā is a dynamic equivalent of a Greek idiom in the English languageā (Godās Word Preserved, p. 346). D. A. Waite acknowledged that the Greek for the KJV’s “God forbid” would be literally translated as “may it not be” (Foes, p. 96). KJV-only author David Cloud described this example as āāa little something likeā that which is called dynamic equivalency todayā (Bible Version Question/Answer, p. 157). KJV-only author William Grady asserted that āoccasionallyā the KJV translators āeven had the āaudacityā to insert an English idiom, with no manuscript authority whatsoever, such as the phrase āGod forbidāā (Given by Inspiration, p. 44). David Daniell indicated that Lutherās German Bible has ādas sey ferne (be that far away)ā instead of āGod forbidā (William Tyndale, p. 142).
“At Acts 10:14, Tyndale’s and Matthew’s Bibles have “God forbid” while the KJV has “Not so.” At Acts 11:8, Tyndale’s, Matthew’s, Whittingham’s, and Geneva Bibles have “God forbid” while the KJV again has “Not so.” At 2 Samuel 20:20, the Geneva and Bishopsā Bibles have āGod forbidā twice while the KJV has āFar be itā twice. This verse has the same Hebrew word twice that the KJV rendered āGod forbidā several other times. At 1 Samuel 20:9, the 1560 Genevaās rendering [āGod keep it from theeā] and the Bishopsā rendering [āGod keep that from theeā] were revised in the KJV [āFar be it from theeā]. Would Riplinger and other KJV-only advocates claim that the KJV omitted the name of God from the English Bible at these verses as they inconsistently allege against the NKJV concerning other verses?
“Were the KJV translators always completely faithful to their underlying original-language texts and always consistent in following the renderings of the earlier English Bibles? Instead of keeping the rendering of the earlier English Bibles, the KJV translators corrected the addition of the word “God” in several of them at 1 Kings 1:31. At Nehemiah 2:3, Coverdaleās and Matthewās Bibles have a rendering with the name of God [āGod save the kingās life for everā] and the Geneva and Bishopsā Bibles have a similar rendering [āGod save the king for everā]. The KJV does not add the name of God at this verse [ālet the king live for everā]. At Daniel 2:4, Coverdaleās, Matthewās, and Bishopsā Bibles have the name of āGodā [āO king, God save thy life for everā] where the Geneva and KJV does not. Coverdaleās and Matthewās also have a similar rendering at the following verses (Dan. 3:9, 5:10, 6:6, 6:21).”
Pastor Scott Ingram also has an excellent video breaking down the details behind Gail’s chart.
Gail Riplinger claimed that the NKJV removes the word “God” 51 times. The truth is the King James Bible “added” the word “God” to the text 54 times and there is nothing wrong with that. I hope it is clearer that this article has in no way been critical of the King James Bible. We can still say with confidence that there is not one error in the KJV’s translation of God’s word.
Sadly, we have come to grips with the fact that Gail’s so-called “explosive” exposes rely on shock value rather than documentation and understanding. Presenting only enough of the facts to be shocking but nowhere near enough to inform the reader about what is actually going on seems to be her standard mode of operation. We hope that more of her followers will take the challenge to evaluate Gail’s “documentation” and see the truth for themselves.
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