Is KJVO a Great Danger to Historic Fundamentalism?

I like men to come right out and say what they believe. I would rather have that than the public jello accompanied by the behind-closed-doors concrete gossip. That is something I like about Mike Harding. I'd rather know and he doesn't disappoint when he writes this yesterday:

I am a committed Fundamentalist. At the same time there are some great dangers in our movement. KJV Onlyism is the greatest embarassment to historic Fundamentalism that I know. It shows how intellectually bankrupt and dishonest some aspects of Fundamentalism really are. It is laughable if it were not so serious in its consequences. Also, we have our fair share of Easy Believism and Semi-Pelagianism. Third, certain quarters of Fundamentalism have a pattern of preaching that does grave injustice to the text on a regular basis.

For this essay, I want to park on what Harding says about those who use the King James Version only. I want to enumerate what he says so that it is clear to everyone reading. He writes that using the King James Version only is:
1. A Great Danger
2. The Greatest Embarassment to Historic Fundamentalism
3. Intellectually Bankrupt
4. Dishonest
5. Laughable
6. Serious in Its Consequences

Did you feel like Harding was holding back here? Or did it seem like what he was thinking somehow seeped out? I guess we can put away this urban legend that the KJVO guys are the impolite ones, one of the major arguments that I regularly read by eclectic, criticial text guys like Harding. It's true that many KJVO guys should say things in a nicer way (even me sometimes). I don't think "intellectually bankrupt," "dishonest," and "laughable" are nice, but I'll leave that up to you. Personally, I'd rather know what he is thinking, but since "nice" is important to them, and they use it as a major argument in almost everything that they write, then one would think that he would use a different tone. You see, style never was an issue. Manners always was a red herring to cover for the incredibly faulty exegesis of the multiple version people. They regularly will tell their own people that "errors in the Bible might shake you up a little, but don't let it." They don't want their people hearing a position that says that we don't have errors in the Bible. The vitriol comes out.

I would actually welcome a public debate with Harding on this very issue to check out how dishonest, stupid, and funny we are. If our position really was those three things, he should cream me. I would gladly go and do it on his home turf. He could have home court advantage, so to speak. I should run out of material in about 17 minutes and resort to ad hominem type personal attacks if my side doesn't have the stuff, but then again, maybe liars, dummies, and hilarious are actually ad hominem, aren't they? Well, of course!

Now you may think I'm angry with Mike Harding. I'm not. I've said I like him. I feel sorry for him. He's been blinded on this issue. Satan is working powerfully, I believe. Harding's been compromised in a number of ways through his associations (because of fundamentalism and his commitment to fitting into it), which results in numbers of blind spots. To give it a Scriptural designation, he's been spoiled "through philosophy and vain deceit" (Col. 2:8), so that he staggers "through unbelief" (Rom. 4:20).

I'm going to go one by one through the labels that Harding gives the KJVO position and I'm going to show how that those designations actually and ironically do clearly belong to him. I'll let you judge for yourself. I've searched my soul and I can't defend laughable and unintelligent. Sometimes I'm embarrassing, especially when I spill on my tie or miss a spot shaving. I'm probably those three. Dishonest though, no.

1. A Great Danger?

Is KJVO a great danger? I think that double inspiration is a great danger. That doctrine isn't in Scripture. Harding is saying, however, that the belief in one Bible, the text behind the KJV, that it has been perfectly preserved by God, is a great danger. On the other hand, he is saying that his position, that we don't know what the Words of God are or where they're at is actually the safe, edifying position to the saints. We have certainty. He has doubt. He is saying that doubt is the less dangerous position.

His position is incredibly dangerous. Bart Ehrman was on a track to the Lord's service, but he couldn't square errors with the doctrine of preservation, so he pushed the eject button on Christianity. Now Daniel Wallace professes that inerrancy of Scripture is not a cardinal doctrine and unnecessary to the Gospel. He pragmatically explains that the reason is because if we tie inerrancy to the Bible we currently possess too many people will go off the deep end and depart from the faith. Even Wallace would say that preservation is a logical conclusion to inspiration, so, according to him, if we claim inerrancy, we'll propel people away from the Bible. And here's a comment from a Vinny at Daniel Wallace's Pen and Parchment blog in a recent article Wallace wrote about the impact of textual variations:

Like Bart Ehrman, I came to a belief in evangelical Christianity in my late teens and I know that a significant part of the attraction was the idea of finding a source of certainty in an unsure world. One of the first books I read was “Evidence that Demands a Verdict” and I remember thinking that the arguments and evidence were not nearly as persuasive as I thought they were going to be. Over the course of a couple of years, I found many things to be less certain and knowable than I first thought. Unlike Ehrman, I abandoned the faith before I turned twenty.

Now that is dangerous! What I am finding is that the doctrine of inerrancy is being attacked vehemently by many today and their reasoning often comes from the acceptance of errors in the Bible because of an eclectic and critical text view.

Eclectic and critical text men are often the same men who assail the authoritarian type leadership of certain fundamental Baptist pastors. Do you understand that when one of these men stands before his congregation and tells the people what the Words of God are that he is taking canonicity into his own hands? He is canonizing those Words into the text, making himself the pillar and ground of the truth. Does that seem dangerous to you? Does that seem to supercede his God-ordained authority? And yet these critical text pastors do this regularly.

Do you think that the proponderence of new versions has led to greater or lesser trust in God's Word? That is fairly easy to answer, isn't it? Do you think their attack on the standard Bible for the English speaking people for 400 years could possibly engender more respect for Scripture? Of course not. The multiple version crowd is the dangerous crowd. Danger has become their business.

What isn't dangerous is believing that God fulfilled His promises of preservation and that He supernaturally did it either by providence or a miracle, whatever it took to do what He said He would do. So I absolutely beg to differ on this point that the KJVO position is a dangerous position. Certainty in Scripture would seem to be what we want. We have it. They don't.

2. The Greatest Embarrassment to Historic Fundamentalism

My question on this one is: "Embarrassing to whom?" It is embarrassing to, ta-da, new-evangelicals and liberals! We is embarrassed before these great "scholars." Most people in churches wouldn't know that they were supposed to be so embarrassed for believing in the perfect preservation of Scripture if they weren't told by the so-called scholars and these eclectic, critical-text pastors. I'm glad he told us this one, because if he hadn't, then we would be judging his (and their) motives. They feel lumped in with all the KJVO "hicks."

Another question: "What difference should this make?" It shouldn't make any difference how we look. What makes a difference is that we take the Scriptural position and honor God. By faith we please God. As long as I'm not shameful to God, I don't mind if the world and its scholarship doesn't like me or my positions. They should be embarrassed for their lack of faith. I'm not.

This point was very revealing about fundamentalism and the hold that respect and admiration from men has on it. This is where fundamentalist politics comes in. Men cow-tow to the norms of a fundamentalist sub-culture. Whoever doesn't fit in, doesn't get dealt with an open Bible or with patient discipline, but with a political cold shoulder. Much of the reputation of meanness has been earned by fundamentalism. Harding should be embarrassed about even bringing up embarrassment.

I'm going to continue this series, in the near future, perhaps the next couple of days. When I do, I will also discuss preservation in light of the issue of providence and miracles, that I started a few days ago.