Strictly Personal
February 2008, Bible Believers’ Bulletin
from How to Teach the “Original” Greek.
The following letter was mailed to Dr. Zane Hodges of Dallas Theological Seminary more than fifteen years ago (August 19, 1977). He was THE champion of the Textus Receptus (or “Majority” Text”) at Dallas. The letter was written in answer to a letter that Zane Hodges wrote to a certain Mr. Gregg in Chattanooga, Tennessee—a born-again, saved, soul-winning, once-married, Bible believer. The letter speaks for itself and for Zane Hodges.
He never answered: not one peep in fourteen years. The reason will be seen immediately when one checks paragraphs 6, 7, and 8. Zane Hodges had assumed, from the start, that he was dealing with a red-neck “jack-leg” with no background in Manuscript Evidence, the Greek Critical Texts, the History of Textual Transmission, or “the textual problems” (see pp. 70–72 of this work) involved in getting rid of a King James Bible. When he saw his “buddies” (“collaborators” is the Alexandrian cliché) NAMED in paragraphs 6, 7, and 8, Zane Hodges decided that “discretion was the better part of valor.” He did not answer my letter, and he never wrote to Mr. Gregg again about ANYTHING.
You see (by my letter), I have dealt with the “celebrities” in the same language you find in this book. And there is not ONE of them alive today who doesn’t know that my BITE IS AS BAD AS MY BARK.
August 19, 1977
Dear Brother Hodges:
I received a copy of a letter which you sent to a certain Mr. Gregg in Chattanooga. And although it represents the standard “party line” taught by all the “recognized scholars” in the Scholars’ Union, I thought I might answer briefly and send a copy to your friend.
- You seem oblivious of the FACT that you have asked Mr. Gregg to accept YOUR OPINION about errors in the AV text without presenting one single verse or word. Aren’t you a little foolish to write things like: “Why should anyone take Dr. Ruckman’s word for it that the King James Version is inerrant?” when you are rascal enough to try to convince a young man that it has errors on the basis of YOUR OWN OPINION—undocumented with any facts whatsoever?
- My assertion that the AV does not contain errors does not make that true; however, if it contains no errors then my assertion is true. Since you listed none, mentioned none, or sent none to Mr. Gregg, I am to presume you haven’t found any either and are simply trying to bluff your way through. Robertson, Vincent, Thayer, Souter, Trench, Aland, and Metzger OFTEN DO THAT; and if you would like documentation, I would be glad to send it.
- Don’t be too surprised if some of us are “persuaded” to accept the AV text against your scholarship and the scholarship of other “good, godly,” etc. men like yourself. In every age since 1611, there have been several million saved sinners who had more confidence in the Authorized Version than the egotistical dunces who thought they could correct it.
- Ruckman does not “defend errors of the AV” (see your letter), so don’t go around lying to young men about such a thing. You do say “IF” Dr. Ruckman does, but of course, that carries the implication with it—based on your word only—that there ARE errors in it. What does your opinion matter, my good brother, alongside the authoritative God-honored text? NOTHING.
- Please don’t worry about getting Gregg to help anyone who is “confused.” You birds who think you are smart enough to correct the greatest book on this earth have been confused for so long it is pitiful.
- I will await some “reasonable discussion” from you or Mr. Gregg; this is what you both seem to think is missing in the philosophy of those of us who think that the AV is able to correct the bungling of Nestle, Kittel, Delitzsch, Keil, Robertson, Rendall, Mauro, Wuest, Metzger, and other members of the “Union.”
- We both know, Brother Hodges, that no translator translates all the words the same way every time; we both know that Anacaluthon would be found in the “originals.” We both know that errors in grammar are relative to the grammarian; we both know that gender does not always follow gender; we both know that neither you nor your friends would translate every article in ANY text; we both know that articles are often added to ANY text; we both know you have no Scriptures given to the Apostolic church with which to CHECK anything (see your letter); we both know that what you and your friends call “mistakes” in translating from ANY text (Beza, Stephanus, Colineaus, Elzevir, Tregelles, Scholtz, Griesbach, Tischendorf, et al.) COULD NOT BE PROVED IN COURT WITH A BATTERY OF LAWYERS. So don’t put on airs to young men who don’t know what you and I know.
- I would not have stated that I believed the AV was able to correct YOUR scholarship (anytime, anyplace, anywhere) unless I had not thoroughly checked the men who taught you what you know. My “Expositor’s Greek New Testament,” ISBE, and Greek and Hebrew lexicons are no different from yours. I don’t give any opinion without checking Nestle’s and Aland’s apparatus with the works of Burgon, Miller, Scrivener, Philpotts, and one of your own men—Pickering.
- Since you were kind enough to warn the young man about people being “confused” by a man who claimed an “advanced revelation” (see your letter), I take the liberty, with your permission, of warning Mr. Gregg to beware of any conceited ass who thinks because he has had 30 years of formal education he is equipped to judge the word of God and correct it. Conceited asses like that are a dime a dozen these Laodicean days.
Sincerely in Jesus Christ,
Dr. Peter S. Ruckman
PSR/slr
P.S. Don’t ever bother your little ole’ head about “Ruckman” being troubled by the “uncertainty engendered by textual and translational differences” (see letter). Having checked every word of Aland’s and Nestle’s text with every reference in the apparatus, I am no more “uncertain” about “texts” and “translations” than I am about Darwin’s theory of evolution. Go kid the kiddies who don’t know the score.