I was driving behind a car the other day that was covered in bumper stickers proclaiming the superiority of the King James Version of the Bible.  This seemed an odd thing to make bumper stickers about, let alone deciding to wall paper your car with them.

One particularly caught my eye because it seemed to be in code.

KJV 1611
Psalm 12:6-7

Because I’m nosy I immediately googled the verse in King James of course. (Yes, while driving, for shame.)  Then my head exploded.

6 The words of the Lord are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.

7 Thou shalt keep them, O Lord, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.

Those words combined with the date of 1611…. They couldn’t possibly be trying to imply that the Bible says that the King James Version is the only true version because it wasn’t this generation’s doing?

Turns out that this is a real thing.  It has been going on since 1930 so I’m quite late to the party.  There are lots of websites parsing the pronouns in the verses to show that it doesn’t mean that.  Seriously, you need to go back to the original language to prove this is a load of BS?  How about applying a bit of logic?

  1. The Psalms were written waaaaaaaaaaay earlier than 1611.  The people in the 1600s were a new uppity generation messing with the words when they translated them into English.
  2. Does that mean that people in that generation couldn’t use that version because it was of their time?
  3. You think the Psalms predicted the translation of the Bible (a book that didn’t exist) to English (a language that didn’t exist) and felt strongly enough about it to only want it translated in the one version?

What is wrong with people?  You ought not be putting stupid bumper stickers on your car to bother me like this.