There, I said it.

When I read a post, pretty much anywhere, and it’s filled with ‘Thee’, ‘Thou’, ‘draweth’, ‘findeth’, ‘doth’, ’shew’, and the like, my brain immediately siezes up and skips to the next article, post, comment, etc.  It takes a force of will, like pulling a cat across shag carpet against its wishes, to get through such writing (unless, of course, it is an article from a time period prior to my parents’ birth).

Why? I can think of a number of reasons, some good and some not-so-good:

1) We’re living in 2006 (soon to be 2007), and the last time people used such language in polite conversation, the phrase ‘French Military History’ was not yet symbolized by a white flag.

2) The KJV is an awful translation, though miles better for the common man than anything else back in 1611.  The OT portions are like the old telephone game – Hebrew (original) translated to Greek (Septuagint) translated to Latin (Vulgate) translated then to English – no chance for loss of context there.   The NT portions also lack a number of manuscripts recovered in the past few centuries.  That said, there are a number of adequate translations today that use modern English, using varying accepted translation techniques.

3) It seems that those who insist on using the KJV sometimes seem to do so to give the words more import (which scripture automatically has), but succeed only in making the words seem archaic, completely out of date, and irrelevant.  Or, just as likely, they make the person using them seem pompous, sanctimonious (as opposed to pious) and out-of-touch.

4) I used to know a few KJVO folks, and I’ve come to believe (not always fairly) that if the KJV is the translation of choice, chances are I’m not going to agree with whatever is being implied, and that, chances are, whatever is being relayed is judgemental, unloving, off-base, or all of the above.

I do recognize that this is a failing of mine, and I’m trying to work on it, but unless you believe the 1611 KJV is the only inspired English translation, please consider your overall audience when you choose your translation – if you need flowery wording to make your point, perhaps adding a little more logic and a few less Thee’s and Thou’s would make your point more clearly. 

I’m fairly certain that I’m not the only anti-Elizabethan-English bigot out there…