Is the King James Bible the only acceptable translation? Is the KJV really an “Autogragh”. An “autograph” or “the autographa”, is the term for God’s original dictation of the books of the Bible. The church unanimously holds that the “Autographa” alone is authoritative, inerrant, and without blemish. Today’s versions like the KJV, the NIV, the NASB, or the NKJV are all comprised from copies, of copies, of copies of manuscripts, and those manuscripts all have (minor) mistakes. The errors are in punctuation, spelling, unwarranted additions, etc. Despite these errors, the substance of the Bible has not been compromised. God has preserved His word! Still, no translation of the Bible is an “Autograph”. The manuscript errors can easily be corrected; here’s how it’s done. Though each manuscript has errors, each copyist made a different error than other copyists. By comparing manuscript to manuscript, we can get back to what the “Autograph” said. This is done through the science of textual criticism. So how do we classify the KJV?” ALL Bible versions come from the available manuscripts. There are thousands of biblical manuscripts; recorded on papyri, uncials, miniscules, etc. The problem in thinking the KJV is the perfect bible (an Autograph), and others not, stems partly from the fact that the only bible available for years was the KJV. When modern Bibles appeared, people cried “foul”, not knowing that hundreds more manuscripts have been unearthed since the making of the KJV in the 7th century. The discovery of more ancient manuscripts gave scholars a chance to see how acccurate the KJV of the 17th Century was. The Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS) were discovered in 1947, dating back to 4 B.C. The manuscripts (Masoretic text) that were considered for the KJV dated only to 5 A.D. The DSS were more than 1000 years older, therefore closer to the original writings! In this discovery (and others), though the KJV proved to have been copied with concise precision, it was discovered that some minor mistakes had crept in, and in cases scribes and copyists added verses that were not in earlier manuscripts. A good example is the “Comma Johanneum” (1 John 5:7). Though this verse is consistent with what the bible teaches, it is an addition and not part of any earlier manuscript. Mark 16:18, is another that is not in earlier manuscripts and has been added. When newer bible versions came out (NIV, NKJV), they relegated (some of) these verses to the footnotes, noting that they were not in earlier manuscripts. The KJV is a great Bible, yet the newer translations are based on more manuscript evidence. To some, the Elizabethan English of the KJV has devolved slightly out of style with the evolution of language. Words that were once denotative, now are connotative. Personally, I do memorize from the KJV and the NKJV. I study and read from the NKJV.