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Verses in the KJV which do not appear in the NIV & other contemporary translations

The words are in the footnotes, with the note that they occur in later manuscripts. They are entirely absent from the early Greek manuscripts and papyri. So why are these words found in the KJV?

The talented KJV translators worked from 1604 to 1611 and they did a fine job with the very limited resources available to them back then. They had basically twelve ancient manuscripts which the subcommittees shared. Since that time, however, many hundreds of additional manuscripts have been found, and many of them are far older than those available to the KJV team. And of course, more ancient means closer to the originals, closer to the first inspired manuscripts which came from the mind of God to the original authors. Therefore they are also more trustworthy and reliable.

The important fact here is that in these far older manuscripts some of the words and phrases found in later manuscripts are absent. Clearly they were added somewhere along the way. How did this happen?

During the terrible persecution of the Christians under Nero, Decius, and Diocletian, all copies of the Scriptures were ordered to be destroyed. Of course, some did survive and then when Emperor Constantine became a Christian in 312, he ordered that hundreds of copies of the Scriptures should be made. And pious scribes and copyists set to work with great fervor. Occasionally they would add a word or phrase in the margin, and then the next copyist would come along and suppose that these words belonged in the text, and he would insert them. So the later manuscripts got to be a bit longer and contain material not found in the earliest and best manuscripts. And that's why translators today take those words and phrases out of the text, because they are not found in the earliest and most trustworthy manuscripts and codices.

In conclusion, you may be sure that in the NIV you will find all of the inspired text but not the words added by men, however much we might like to have those additional words. Translators must give us the very best and genuine text without any human additions. The highest criterion of the NIV team is accuracy in transmitting the inspired text.

The NIV: The Making of a Contemporary Translation

Portion from Chapter 14: Isn't the King James Version Good Enough? (The KJV and the NIV Compared)

By Edwin H. Palmer

I love the King James Version. I was converted under it, my first memory verses were taken from it, and I have been blessed by it. And God still uses the KJV to bring many people to salvation in Christ. This version was translated by godly men who did an excellent job with the tools they had in the language of four centuries ago. Countless millions have been converted, sanctified, and nurtured through it. Thank God for that marvelously used translation.

The KJV is not, however, the best translation to use today. This is so for two reasons: (1) it adds to the Word of God and (2) it has now-obscure and misleading renderings of God's Word.

Additions to the Word of God

The KJV translators did not intend to add to the Word of God. They did their best, but all they had to work with was a handful of copies of the Greek manuscripts of the New Testament books. These were very late copies dating from a thousand (!) years after the New Testament was written. In a few sections they had no Greek manuscript at all! Instead, they had to rely on the Latin Vulgate's rendering of what they thought must have originally been in the Greek!

Through the providence of God, many more Greek manuscripts had been preserved and were subsequently discovered—in fact, more than five thousand of them. Some were very old indeed, dating back much farther than the relatively few the KJV translators used. Some of the Greek manuscripts date back to the four hundreds and three hundreds—even to about a.d. 200. These ancient manuscripts were more reliable and accurate, not being corrupted by errors made during countless times of copying, such as occurred with the late manuscripts used by the KJV.

As a result we know today, with a high degree of accuracy, what was in the original writings.1 Uncertainty now exists in only an infinitesimally small part of the New Testament (the difference would be comparable to that between "don't" and "do not" or "street" and "way").

Some examples of verses that the KJV added to the Word of God, even though it did so unwittingly and in all innocence, are

In addition many phrases and words were also added.