Freqently Assaulted Quotations
(or "...things have been calumniated")
vs. Fully Accurate Quotations
In recent years, there has been an outbreak of false information about Westcott and Hort. Many things have been written (especially by extremist KJV-only authors) that paint a completely false and slanderous picture of Westcott and Hort - the thinking being that if they can discredit Westcott and Hort personally, that would thus discredit the Greek New Testament of 1881 and in turn most of the English Bibles since then. Some claim Westcott and Hort are guilty of "heresy", "occultism", etc., and may are being led to believe completely wrong things about Westcott and Hort. Others are less easily convinced, and are looking for verification and more detail about such quotes, as well as information on what they actually believed. That's why this section exists.
On the left are misquotes (constructed, misunderstood, and/or out of context) and false claims produced and repeated by those intent on discrediting Westcott and Hort, along with some discussion explaining the misuse of the quote. On the right are accurate, verifiable quotes to demonstrate what Westcott and Hort really believed, in their own words.
Most attempts at defamation take the form of misquotes: quotes taken out of context, quotes altered, even quotes constructed by piecing together words and phrases from entirely different chapters or even books. Initially, such misquotes were largely ignored because very few people actually took seriously the ones putting forth the quotes, and of those that did, nobody bothered to verify the references. However, during the last few decades, a snowball effect has taken place where KJV-only authors have fed off each other, using each other's "information" in their own writings. As the KJV-only movement has gained a foothold in some evangelical circles, the number of authors, preachers and laymen who are believing and repeating such misinformation has grown at an alarming rate. A simple search on the internet will reveal website after website where Westcott and Hort are unjustly attacked and falsehoods are repeated.
(It is worth noting here that people like Charles Spurgeon and Dean Burgon, who were comtemporaries with Westcott and Hort and knew them personally, never made such claims against their character and beliefs, even when vocally disagreeing with some of their approaches to textual criticism. Burgon and Spurgeon never called them heretics, never questioned or challenged their Christian faith, never challenged or questioned their doctrinal statements, never accused them of involvement or of condoning of occultic or New Age practices or beliefs, etc.)
This rise in the spread of falsehoods is due largely to the fact that extremely few people are taking the time to verify the information for themselves: the books the "quotes" come from are quite rare in the first place, and sometimes cumbersome to read through if obtained. The authors spreading the falsehoods are either guilty of not verifying their sources (at best), or deliberate misrepresentation and lying (at worst). I give the benefit of the doubt to most, simply because the books are so hard to come by to do real verification. However, there are three or four authors who: 1. pride themselves on their research abilities, 2. have written extensively on Westcott and Hort, 3. claim to own several books by Westcott and Hort, and 4. have their KJV-onlyist agenda to push - and it is these authors that, I can only conclude, provide the misquotes with the full knowledge that they are deliberately slandering and spreading falsehoods. Various replies by various people have been given to these authors, and they have had years to apologize and/or correct the false information they are spreading - yet no apologies or corrections have been made. This is completely unacceptable in Christian literature. It is these authors that inspired me to create this section of the Westcott and Hort Resource Centre.
This section of the Westcott and Hort Resource Centre is my attempt to fight back against the lies. It is my hope that by making available electronic copies of the books (see the Bookshelf) that contain the quotes in question, people can both more easily verify the sources for themselves, as well as learn what Westcott and Hort really believed on various issues. As well, I will be responding below to specific misquotes that are more "popular" in KJV-only circles, and I will provide the necessary context, additional references on the same subject, links directly into the Bookshelf, my own commentary, and even scans of the quotes from the original books so that when you encounter such misquotes (and you will, if you spend any time in discussion with those that support KJV-onlyism), you can verify for yourself whether or not the "quotes" genuine and the implications are valid - and maybe even respond back to the person making the claims, to minimize the spread of misinformation about Westcott and Hort.
No comments:
Post a Comment