Skip to main content

Search LearnTheBible

Early King James Only Believers

Is it correct to say that the London Baptist Confession of 1677 and 1689 state that the Bible is preserved in only the Hebrew and the Greek?

There are numerous Baptist confessions of faith. I have a book of 368 pages called "Baptist Confessions of Faith" that is full of them. Most of the confessions seem to say something about the scriptures being made of the Old and New Testaments and being the sole rule for faith and practice. Some say a bit about the scriptures in translation, mostly that they are a good and profitable thing. But they usually do not say much or anything of a particular translation. The following one makes some interesting statements.

Article 27 of the London Baptist Confession the General Baptists of 1679 makes this statement concerning the scriptures: "And we do believe, that all people ought to have them in their mother tongue, and diligently, and constantly to read them in their particular places and families, for their edification, and comfort; and endeavour to frame their lives, according to the direction of God's word, both in faith and practice, the holy scriptures being of no private interpretation, but ought to be interpreted according to the analogy of faith, and is the best interpreter of itself, and is sole judge in controversy. And no decrees of popes, or councils, or writings of any person whatsoever, are of equal authority with the sacred scriptures. And by the holy scriptures we understand, the canonical books of the old and new testament, as they are now translated into our English mother-tongue, of which there hath never been any doubt of their verity, and authority, in the protestant church of Christ to this day."

If you consider the last sentence, you will find that it does come close to an absolute recommendation of the King James Bible of 1611, since that would be the one referred to in 1679.

It was also thought of by others at a later date. In the "Articles of Faith of the Barren River Association," a Baptist association of churches in Kentucky, written in 1830, we read this article: "We believe that the scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, as translated by the authority of King James, to be the words of God, and is the only true rule of faith and practice." --taken from "Pioneer Baptist Church Records" by C. P. Cawthorn and N. L. Warnell (p.23).