Some of you are not going to like what I’m going to talk about; it’s going
to be over some of your heads; some of you are not going to understand
what all the issues and all the roar are about. But I’m going to talk
about something I enjoy talking about, one of my favorite hang-ups. If I
get hung up, I may stay hung up a long time, and I may say some very wild,
offensive things; so get ready to get offended and get hurt and get real
mad because it’s gonna go.
I’m going to talk to you about Why I Believe the King James Bible is the Word of God. If you don’t believe that or don’t know why or wonder why, you’ll be very much upset before I get through, because in order to magnify the word of God, you have to put a lot of things down to their proper level. When you take all these false gods in the body of Christ and put them down to their proper level, you always get into trouble with somebody. So we’ll just go ahead and get into trouble.
The Psalmist says: “Thy word is true from the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgments endureth for ever” (Ps. 119:160). I believe that. I believe the word of God is true from the beginning (Gen. 1), and every one of God’s righteous judgements endures forever.
When you get to Jeremiah 23:36, you read, “For ye have perverted the words of the living God.” That’s a charge brought against somebody who perverted the words of the living God. So, the living God gave some living words; as Christ said, “The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63). Someone took those living words from the living God and perverted those words.
Folks say about this subject, “Well, I believe it is a hobby horse.” No, there’s no “hobby horse” about what I’m going to talk about. The subject of final authority is a crucial subject—absolutely crucial to anything going on in America or the world today. If there’s one issue that’s important anywhere in the world today, it’s the issue of final authority—absolute truth.
The Supreme Court says all truth is relative, and they lie like dogs. When the issue came up about teaching evolution in the schools, they said you can only teach one theory. The only theory that can be taught in the schools is the theory of evolution, and nobody is allowed to teach the theory of Creation. First they say all truth is relative, and then they say only one truth can be taught. If all truth is relative, there’s more than one truth. And if there’s more than one truth, then the kid ought to have access to more than one truth. They’re a bunch of crooked liars.
We’re talking about a timeless subject, a subject that’s more important than almost any other subject in this world. There are only two religions besides Christianity that believe a book is the final authority. The Roman Catholic’s final authority is the Pope and the church and the Bible and anything else he wants to make up to get himself through. But the Jew professes to be in subjection to a book—the Old Testament. A Mohammedan professes to be in subjection to the Koran. So the Christians, the Jews, and the Mohammedans are the only people that profess to be in subjection to a final authority that is a written, printed authority that a man can get his hands on. A child of God professes to be in subjection to the Old Testament AND the New Testament. And Jeremiah said somebody took those words in that book and perverted them.
The first thing I want to say is this: I believe the King James Bible is the word of God because it’s the only book I have in my library that doesn’t have a copyright. You ask, “What about the ‘Crown Copyright’ back in 1611?” I’m not talking about 1611; I’m talking about right now. Folks are always hung-up on the originals, but I never worry about the original King James 1611. I worry about the one I’ve got in my hand. Have you got a Bible in your hand right now? If you have a plain King James Bible, you have a Book with no copyright on it. If you have some notes in your Bible, it may have a copyright. If you have a Scofield Bible, then there is a copyright connected with it, or if you have a Bible that has in it some maps, an index, and references, you may have a copyright on it. But anybody, anywhere in the world, can go down to the dime store and get a plain King James Bible with no notes, no references, no maps, no gazetteer, and no concordance, and there’s no copyright in it. That’s unexplainable.
How do you explain a book sitting here that has no copy-right on it, when there are fifteen million books in the Library of Congress, and every one of them printed in this century has a copyright on it? That’s a mess of books, man! And one of them doesn’t have a copyright. How do you explain that? New “Bibles’’ come out, a printer prints them, and there is a copyright on them. A fellow said, “Oh, well, that thing is just to guarantee that no one misrepresents it.” I don’t believe that. Copyrights are for making money. Copyrights are so that people have to write and ask, “Can I print that?” Yes, you can—for a tidy sum. I believe the King James Bible is the word of God because it has no copyright on it. It may have the Crown Copyright, but you don’t have to ask the Crown for the right to print it. In Ecclesiastes 8:4 it says, “Where the word of a king is, there is power.” If it had a Crown copyright, it was copyrighted under a king. If it was copyrighted under a king, it has the right copyright.
I don’t have any faith at all in these Bibles translated in America (RSVs, ASVs, New ASVs, Weymouth, Moffat, Living Bible, Goodspeed, and all that junk). You ask, “Why not?” They’re not translated under a king. The Bible says, “Where the word of A KING is, there is power.” Somebody asks, “What’s so good about the English? Why do they have a corner on the market?’’ They have a corner on the market because that’s the way God worked it out. What time is it right now? It’s 6:39. Some people’s watches may have 6:40, and some people’s watches may have 6:38. Well, “they’re all reliable; they’re all good,” that’s how people are. But there’s only one correct time on the face of this earth: English time. If you’ve got English time, you’ve got the right time, and if you haven’t got English time, you’ve got the wrong time. All time on this earth is settled by Greenwich, England; the zero line runs right down it.
I received a real nasty letter from a Puerto Rican one time. He said, “What do you mean with all this English stuff? You’re a White Supremist,” you know, a WASP. He said, “What about all us folks down in Puerto Rico here? We had a Bible before the King James came out.” I guess he thought I was an Englishman. I wrote him back and told him, “If it weren’t for England, we wouldn’t know where you’re at. Latitude and longitude are given to every airplane in the air and every ship in the sea by the equator and England.” You can’t even locate Pensacola without finding England. If you put out a distress call and say, “I’m in trouble,” they ask, “What’s the longitude and latitude?” And you give England as the mark. How do you explain that? Absolute location is English location. Absolute time is English time. Why would you think that absolute truth wasn’t English truth?
You ask, “Do you think you’re the only person that believes the Bible is the word of God?’’ I don’t. I think most common, ordinary Christians believe that Book is the word of God. I think you have to get educated out of it. I believe every man who ever got saved in this country believed that was the word of God the first time he ever saw it. I don’t care if you got saved through reading the Living Bible or got saved through hearing Billy Graham preach an ASV; when you picked up a King James Bible, the Holy Spirit told you, “That’s it, right there!’’ If you don’t believe that right now, it’s because somebody has educated you out of it and talked you out of it.
I went off to school, and they tried that. Those professors majored in talking young men out of their belief in the word of God, and they worked at it overtime. They didn’t get anywhere with me. You ask, “Why?” Just bull-headed. There are some advantages to being bull-headed, and that’s one of them. If you get hold of the truth, you don’t let it go just because three hundred thousand saps offer proof it isn’t the word of God. They don’t impress me one way or the other. If I had a room filled with the faculties of Tennessee Temple, Hyles Anderson, Piedmont, Pillsbury, Maranatha, Northeast, Midsouth, Midwestern, Pacific Coast, Baptist Bible College, Moody, Fuller, and Wheaton, they couldn’t dent my fender! You ask, “Why?” I’m fixed; I’m reared! I know what the word of God is—I’ve got it! No jackass is going to talk me out of it! Flaunting education in front of me does not impress me.
I was in a meeting where a guy asked me, “Did you know so and so tried to get a debate going between you and Bob Jones Jr.?” And he told Bob Jones Jr., “If you and Ruckman are having such a problem, why don’t you invite Ruckman up here to face this student body at Bob Jones and let him debate Wisdom and Panosian and Custer so you’ve got him three to one? Why don’t you invite him up there and have him debate up there?” And Jones said, “My goodness, no. You couldn’t win an argument with him; he’s too smart.” Well, that’s some confession to make. If I’m that smart, why don’t they believe what I believe about the Book? If I thought those fellows were smarter than I was, I would believe what they believe.
I believe the King James Bible is the word of God because of the time in which it first appeared on the scene of this world. When the King James Bible first showed up in history, there were a number of things that weren’t around that are around today. When those King James translators sat down to translate that Book, French atheism was not in vogue; German Rationalism was not in vogue; English Deism was not in vogue. All the objections to the word of God came up AFTER the King James Bible came out. The French Revolution hadn’t taken place yet. The German Rationalists hadn’t taken over yet. They were still going by Martin Luther’s Heilige Schrift. The English Deists, Lord Hubert, Holmes, Hobbes, and that bunch, hadn’t showed up yet. The King James was translated at a time in history when God the Holy Spirit could work and get some men to produce a work that they believed in, because all that stuff wasn’t going on.
When these new bibles are printed (ASV, RSV, New ASV), the fellows who are on those committees are literally INFECTED and DISEASED with infidelity!
Jack Hyles preached once up at Jerry Falwell’s school, and when he got through preaching up there, they talked about it back in the classroom. One student said to his teacher, “Brother Hyles implied that the King James Bible was inspired,” and the teacher said, “You know what the Bible says, ‘He knew not whereof he spoke.’” Then he told that young man in the class, “After all, here’s a contradiction: it says here that Jehoiakim was eight years old when he began to reign. There’s a contradiction right there.” There’s a fellow in the classroom in a fundamental school creating an infidel in the classroom. You say, “Where’s that?’’ Liberty University, that advertises the greatest Bible Institute course in the world and says their Bible Institute course is absolutely unequalled when it comes to learning the word of God! To sit there in the classroom and tell the kid that there is a contradiction: that isn’t creating a Bible believer; that’s creating infidels.
You ask, “What’s the trouble?’’ The fellows that sit down on these modern Bible committees are shot through with infidelity. They’ve got bees in the bonnet. They’re droids, wimps.
Here comes a new translation. What’s it about? It’s about $49.95. Have you read this latest book about Zodhiates’s new original Greek? You can hardly wait to get through the introduction before you put it down. Well, here on the Pacific coast, the Living Bible is selling like wildfire: they’re burning them! That’s what they ought to do. I believe the King James Bible is the word of God because of the time in history in which it appeared.
I believe the King James Bible is the word of God because of the promise God made of preserving His word. He said, “The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever” (Psalm 12:6-7). God Almighty said He’d preserve that Book, and He’d preserve that Book forever. I don’t think a bunch of infidels are going to take it away from me. If I want to find it, there must be someplace that I can find it.
The fellows at Bob Jones University say, “God Almighty couldn’t inspire a translation.” I’ve never said that the King James Bible was inspired, although I’ve broadly intimated it sometimes. At Bob Jones they say, “Why, Ruckman teaches the heresy of double inspiration. A translation can’t be inspired.” Why, in the New Testament there are more than forty quotations from the Old Testament. The Old Testament was written in Hebrew; the New Testament was written in Greek. When Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter, James, Jude, and Paul sat down to write and quoted the Old Testament, they had to translate from Hebrew to Greek and write down the translation. When Matthew said, “It might be fulfilled which was spoken” (Matt. 2:15), he’s quoting Hebrew, and he’s writing the Hebrew down in Greek. If no translation is inspired, then the original of Matthew wasn’t inspired because what he wrote down was a translation of Hebrew.
Matthew said, “Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel” (Matt. 1:22-23). He’s quoting Isaiah. What’s Isaiah written in? Hebrew. What’s Matthew written in? Greek. He’s translating. If you can’t inspire a translation, you can’t even count on the New Testament in Greek because it’s a translation from the Old Testament in Hebrew.
You ask, “Where does that stuff come from?” Bob Jones University. My, what a bunch of brains! What a bunch of brilliant people! Oh, they’re smarter than I am? Who do they think they are? I get sick and tired of folks going around, saying, “Ruckman thinks he’s right and everybody else is wrong; Ruckman’s so critical; Ruckman’s always down on this.” Shut your mouth, you hypocrite! Why haven’t I heard you complain about them downing the word of God? They tear up that Book and kick that Book and think they are smart enough to mess with that Book, and then you get upset with me because I correct them? That shows whose side you’re on. You say, “Well, I just don’t believe that Book is that real and that true and that good.” Well, you and the devil agree on that point. You may disagree on some other things, but you’re together there.
I believe the Bible is the word of God because of it’s promise of preservation. The scholars tell me that I can’t get ahold of the word of God. They tell me I can’t get ahold of the words of God. If I can’t get ahold of the word and the words of God, I’m sure in one flat-footed mess, aren’t I? Christ said, “If a man love me, he will keep my words” (John 14:23). Do you love him? How do you keep His words if you don’t have them? Christ said, “If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you” (John 15:7). How do you get a prayer promise if you don’t keep His words? Christ said, “He that is of God heareth God’s words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God” (John 8:47). How do you hear them, if you don’t have them? The Bible says to the preacher, “Preach the word” (2 Tim. 4:2). What? Preach something you don’t have? The Lord said preach the word, and if you’re of God you’ll listen to it. And then He lost it? Rather careless, don’t you think, for God to verbally inspire this Book and then forget the thing and lose it? It’s a good thing He doesn’t treat your salvation like that, isn’t it? Did He give you the new birth? Are you still born again? How do you know? Maybe it got lost somewhere; who knows? If God can preserve you, then He can preserve what He wrote.
I believe the King James Bible is the word of God because of the instruments of its preservation. You ask, “Who’s that? That silly vassal, King James?’’ King James may have been “God’s silly vassal,” but he had better sense than to have somebody bow down and call him “Holy Father;” and that’s more than you can say for some pot-bellied liquor-heads. Maybe he fell off horseback and played tennis on Sunday, but at least he didn’t have somebody call him the Vicar of Christ. You’ve got to admit he had more sense than that.
The translators might have been silly vassals, but at least they used the right manuscripts. When they saw a bunch of manuscripts that had the Apocrypha in the Old Testament, they said, “That’s wrong: put it between the Testaments. They are not supposed to be part of the Old Testament.” They had more sense than the faculty at Bob Jones, who recommend the Westcott and Hort Greek text in their literature. The Westcott and Hort Greek text is Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, and Sinaiticus and Vaticanus have the Apocrypha as part of the Old Testament. Somebody said, “I just don’t like the way they bragged about King James and that Bible.” Why not? Doesn’t that Bible tell you to be in subjection to the powers that be? Doesn’t the Bible say that the powers that be are ordained of God (Rom. 13:1)? Little articles written by Moody magazine, Faith Magazine, and The Fundamentalist Journal say that the King James translators boot-licked King James and made a fuss over him when he was such a sorry character. They say the translators were afraid of him and buttered him up and called him all these high and mighty titles. Well, that Bible says, “Fear God. Honour the king” (1 Pet. 2:17). When Peter said that, he was talking about Nero, a half-mad murderer! There’s nothing wrong when the King James translators honor their king; they’re obeying God because the powers that be are ordained of God.
I have faith in the instruments of preservation because I know their attitude. I’ve read the preface to their Book. You ought to read the preface if you ever have time. A preface is what a fellow says before he begins to write. The translators say, “We are poor instruments to make God’s holy truth to be yet more and more known.” Did you ever read the preface to the ASV or to the Living Bible? I have. Have you ever read the preface to the New King James Bible? I’ve read that preface, where it says, “Buy the New King James Bible. Now, for the first time in 370 years, the word of God is clear.” Those dirty, God-forsaken, lying reprobates! Ask four million converts of Moody how unclear the King James was. Ask four million converts of George Whitefield and John Wesley how unclear it was. Ask a million converts of Bob Jones Sr. and J. Frank Norris how unclear it was until the New King James came along. It has always been perfectly clear. God says, “They are all plain to him that understandeth, and right to them that find knowledge” (Prov. 8:9). There’s no problem in it. Your problem is that you lack understanding. He didn’t say you lack education. He didn’t say you lack intelligence. He said you lack understanding. You can have understanding without intelligence or training, and you can have intelligence, training, and education and not have a lick of understanding. That Bible says, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom” (Prov. 9:10), and the Bible says, “To depart from evil is understanding” (Job 28:28). I’ve studied the instruments of preservation. I’ve compared them to what the other fellows have to say.
I have on my desk a little magazine called The Projector which gives three qualities essential for Christian leadership. Not one of those qualities is believing ANY Bible is the word of God. One of those things is perseverance, and one is loyalty, and another is honesty. When they try to train Christian leaders of men and women, they don’t even give belief in the word of God as an essential for a Christian leader. They will produce Christian leaders that don’t believe the Bible is the word of God.
I believe the King James Bible is the word of God because of the honesty of its preservation. When the King James translators came to a word that wasn’t in Greek or Hebrew and they had to add an English word to make sense, they put it in italics. Somebody says, “What do you think about the italics in the King James Bible?” The italics in the King James Bible are marks that the man who did the translating was an honest man. When he knew he had to add something to make sense, he put it in italics so you could know it wasn’t in the Hebrew or the Greek. That means it’s an honest translation, and the bibles that don’t have italics in them are from fellows who have added to the word of God without letting you know where. The King James Bible is an honest translation.
Sometimes you have to add words—anybody knows that. You can pick up ANY Bible on this earth and look through it, and you’ll find places where if you didn’t add a word it wouldn’t make any sense at all. The idioms change in translation. You ask, “Do you believe God led them and guided them in that?’’ Yes, I sure do. As a matter of fact, I know He did. You ask. “How do you know that?’’ Read 1 John 2:23, “Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father: [but] he that acknowledgeth the Son hath the Father also.” Notice that half the verse is in italics. When the King James translators came to that verse, they couldn’t find half the verse in the Greek manuscripts, but they said, “It seems like it belongs there,” so they wrote it in italics. Do you know what happened two hundred years afterwards? Greek manuscripts were found that had the half of the verse that was put in italics. You had better watch that Book!
That Book speaks about talking in an “unknown” tongue (1 Cor. 14:2), and somebody says, “The word ‘unknown’ isn’t in the original.” You mean you haven’t found a copy that’s got it yet? You had better watch it. I believe the King James Bible because of the honesty of its preservation.
A fellow named Provan wrote a book called The King James Translators Versus Dr. Peter S. Ruckman. He said, “The King James translators refute Dr. Ruckman. Dr. Ruckman says there is no B.C. Septuagint; the King James translators said there IS a B.C. Septuagint. Therefore the King James translators refute Dr. Ruckman.” Well, Dr. Ruckman repudiates them too. I’m not a baby sprinkler; some of them were. Do you believe in baby sprinkling? Some of them did. I’m not Postmillennial; some of them were. These fellows think if you believe the King James Bible is the word of God, then you’ve got to accept everything the King James translators accepted. God used them in spite of their sins.
Was David a man after God’s own heart? Well, he committed adultery and
murder. Are you going to follow the same example? Was Noah a preacher of
righteousness? Are you going to go out and get drunk like he did? The
King James translators believed in baby sprinkling. Are you going to
go out and sprinkle babies? David wrote over half the Psalms. You can
believe what he wrote, but you can’t practice what he did. I’m not
interested in what the King James translators thought about their
product; I’m interested in
the product,
and I’ve got the product.
“Well, the King James translators didn’t say they were inspired.” Neither did Matthew. Why, there’s only one place in the New Testament where it speaks about inspiration, and when it does it isn’t a reference to anything that anyone wrote right then. It says, “All scripture is given by inspiration of God” (2 Tim. 3:16). Where does Matthew say his writing is Scripture? Show it to me. James never once says he’s writing Scripture. Simon Peter never says once he’s writing Scripture. He says, “No prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation” (2 Pet. 1:20), but he doesn’t tell you what the Scripture is. Just because the King James translators didn’t profess to be infallible means nothing. Whoever wrote Leviticus didn’t profess to be infallible.
You ask, “Ruckman, do you profess to have the word and the words of God?” Yes, the word and the words. You ask, “Docs the book contain the word of God?” Yes. “And it IS the word of God, too?” Yes. “Does it have the words of God?” Yes. “Does it have all of them?” Yes, that’s the Book.
I believe that Bible is the word of God because of the dis-honesty of its critics. I’ve made a life-long habit of studying its critics, which has probably soured my preaching a good bit. I would probably be more practical and spiritual in my preaching if I hadn’t spent so much time studying these fellows. When you study them, you get a burr under your saddle that makes the horse buck. One reason I believe the King James Bible is the word of God is the pride and inconsistency of its critics. In studying the Mafia, the Cosa Nostra, and the Syndicate, I have never in my life studied a more crooked bunch of dishonest, unethical people than the people who put out and recommend new translations. They’re the biggest crooks on the face of this earth.
I have a letter from Truman Dollar. “Dear Brother Ruckman, Anytime I can help you, please let me know. I realize you’re off on the wrong track, and I honestly believe you’re doing more harm to the cause of Christ than any other preacher in America today. If you come by sometime here in Kansas City, I’ll be glad to talk with you about these matters. Brother Dollar.”
We wrote him back a letter, and the Board of Trustees signed it. It said, “Dear Brother Dollar, Anytime you want to come by here, we’ll put you in the Holiday Inn, give you an honorarium, and give you fifty minutes in the pulpit Sunday morning to tell why Ruckman is doing more damage to the cause of Christ than any other preacher in America. My people will behave like gentlemen. Nobody will argue back with you; nobody will talk with you. We’ll let you have fifty minutes to state your case.” Do you think he answered?
Not a peep!
If I thought a fellow was doing more damage to the cause of Christ than any man in America and he invited me fifty minutes in his pulpit, do you think I wouldn’t take it? I’d pay my own hotel bill, man! I’d buy my own round-trip ticket and buy my own meals! You say, “What’s the difference between you and those people?” I’m straight forward, over the plate, waist-high. That’s the difference.
I went to Baptist Fundamentalism in 1983, and I was going around shaking hands with Bob Gray, Monroe, Harold Rawlings, and some of my friends, and at an unguarded moment when I was walking by a platform, a guy suddenly stuck his hand out in front of my stomach where I couldn’t avoid it and shook my hand. It was Truman Dollar. He said, “Glad to have you here, Brother Ruckman; good to see you here.” Imagine telling a fellow you’re doing more harm for the cause of Christ than any man in America and then taking his hand and saying, “Very glad to have you here.” Why that wretched, lying, dirty, lowdown, miserable, two-faced, split-tongued, double-tongued, two-headed rascal! Do you know why he did that? A bunch of my buddies were standing around there, and they would think I’m a friend with good ol’ Dollar. What a character! If I lived like that, I couldn’t look myself in the mirror when I got up in the morning. I don’t see how men like that shave without cutting their throats. You ask, “What men are they?” Those are critics of the King James Bible. Truman Dollar was on the New King James committee.
I printed an article in the paper about a fellow one time, and he phoned up the next week. I was totally unprepared for it; I’m not used to people who hate my guts trying to make contact. I try to kick them in the britches hard enough so they don’t come around for eight or nine years. But this one phoned me and said, “Brother Ruckman, I was up all last night, and I was praying about something, and the Lord just dealt with me about it, and I, and I, I wanted to apologize to you.” I said, “It’s OK, don’t worry about it. It’s no skin off my nose.” He said, “Well, I said some very bad things about you.” I said, “It doesn’t make any difference to me; I can take it or leave it.” He said, “But the Lord just dealt with me about it. I wrote you a very nasty letter, and it says some very hard things about you.” I said, “It doesn’t make any difference to me; forget it!” And he said, “Well, the Lord just told me to apologize for writing these things. And I know you’re very strong.” I thought to myself, “Oh, puke!” I couldn’t figure out if I was talking to a woman or what! “I know you’re very strong,” man! I told my wife when that letter came to throw it out. So she did; she threw it out. I asked her, “What in the world do you suppose that guy phoned up about?” She said, “Can’t you guess?” And I said, “No.” I’m a plain fellow. I’ve got friends, and I know who they are. I’ve got enemies, and I know who they are. I’ve got enough friends to be happy, and enough enemies to keep me awake.
I said, “What is all this stuff about a letter?” She said, “Don’t you know?” I said, “What?” And she said, “He didn’t want you to print it.” Well, I should have thought of that, you see. I didn’t think of that. He thought that phone call would get me so I wouldn’t print it. I didn’t print it, and I’m not going to print it. I’m not going to ignore it because I’m worried about him; I’m going to ignore it because I’m so disgusted. My stomach is turning, and I’ve got a strong stomach. If a guy hates my guts, fine. I’ve got an enemy, good. I like to have them marked: friends here, enemies there. But with this, “So glad to meet you,” “I’m sorry,” “The Lord….” Shut your cotton pickin’ mouth! The guy is no friend of that Book, and I’m not a friend of his. When I give a fellow a chance to come down to Pensacola and talk, I mean what I say; I’m not politicking. Come on down.
We gave Custer the same thing. Custer put out a little article saying Ruckman ran off and left his wife and so forth and so on. We wrote him a letter and signed it saying, “Come on down; we’ll give you fifty minutes in the pulpit Sunday morning.” We sent a registered letter with a certificate. They’ve got to sign if they get it, and we get the slip back saying they signed it. They got it! You ask, “Do they show up?” No; they never show. You say, “Why?” Because they’re just as crooked as a two-headed rattlesnake, that’s why. And they’re saved. I didn’t say they were lost; I said they were fine, good, godly, dedicated, crooked thieves and liars.
Oh, the pride, oh, the inconsistency. “Ruckman thinks he’s right. Ruckman criticizes everybody. Ruckman thinks he is so smart. Ruckman is an egomaniac.” I never thought I was smart enough to correct that Book! If they’re smart enough to correct that Book, they think they’re smarter than I am. Somebody said, “Egotism is the hypodermic that God allows a fool to use on himself to deaden the pain.” I believe that.
Do you know what they have at Bob Jones University? They have a little sign behind the pulpit that says, “Please use nothing but a King James Version from this pulpit.” When a speaker comes in, like they do at a Bible conference, he sees this sign; and he may have been using an ASV all his life or recommending a New ASV, but when he gets in that pulpit, he pulls out a King James. When he finishes, four thousand young men and women in that building are deceived into thinking he believes that Book because he was told to use it. That is just as crooked as a dog’s hind leg!
You don’t see any sign at Bible Baptist Church saying “Use a King James.” You say, “Well, you wouldn’t let anybody in the pulpit that doesn’t use a King James.” Sure I would—we’ve done it, accidentally. We’ve had guys use other versions. I don’t run up into the pulpit and say, “Get down; that’s heresy. Get down, you can’t use that.” I sit there. Why, if a guy uses some other version, I don’t have to say anything. The people start laughing. He’ll know he’s in the wrong church real quick, and I won’t have to worry about it.
“Ruckman says that if you don’t believe the King James Bible is the word of God, you’re going to hell.” That’s a saying up and down this country, but I have never thought such a thing a day in my life. I’ve never even told anyone they had to use a King James Bible. If you want to buy the other translations, buy them. It’s a free country; help yourself. If you want to cut your own throat, that’s your problem.
“At Tennessee Temple, we use nothing but the King James Bible.” That’s a good one right there; isn’t that a beauty? That’s from the Sword of the Lord. This is what you miss by not attending Hyles-Anderson College. You miss, “recreation at a six-lane bowling center an indoor miniature golf course, our three thousand seat gymnasium, and attending classes on a beautiful ninety-acre wooded campus,” where you wouldn’t have to go outside from the dormitory to the chapel or dining hall because all the buildings are connected by lighted and heated hallways. Think of what you missed! You would have been “Taught the Bible where only the King James Bible is used in the classroom.” Why, he’s a Ruckmanite; we’re not that fanatical. We use more than a King James Bible in the classroom.
Do you know what’s wrong with that bunch of hypocrites? They USE what they don’t BELIEVE. Down here we USE anything, but we BELIEVE only one. Up there, they use ONE and believe ANYTHING. They’re inconsistent to use a book they don’t believe.
A fellow said, “We believe the King James Bible is good, but the ASV is better.” If it’s better, why don’t you use it? Why give your people second best? If I thought the King James Bible was not as good as some other one, I’d give you the one I thought was best. I wouldn’t lie to you. Do you know what I’ve got against these fellows? They’re liars. I’ve nothing against them except their lying. I know why people lie: they lie because they are afraid. Every time you’ve ever lied in your life, it was because you were scared. Now let me ask you something. A man that is in a pulpit, called to preach, who believes the Book and has a congregation of people who believe the book—what is he scared about?
At Baptist Fundamentalism, the first fellow that spoke was Wendell Zimmerman. They gave to him a subject, the authority of the word of God, and he got up there and flew around the landing strip three hours and never landed. Later Bob Gray got up, and he wasn’t even supposed to speak about that: he was supposed to speak about something else. But that word of God in him was just burning in him until he was just about to explode. He hadn’t opened his mouth five minutes when he said, “You talk about a Baptist heritage, our Baptist heritage in this King James Bible.” He held it up, and when he did, that crowd roared, “Amen!” Well, then Zimmerman had nothing to be afraid about to start with.
Do you know what they advertise themselves as? “Militant Fundamentalists.” Do you know what “militant” is? That means fighting.
After Bob Gray waved that Book around in the air, every other fellow that got up after that would wave his Book around in the air. They had to wait for some little Florida preacher to show them how to behave. What a disgusting performance!
I believe the King James Bible is the word of God, if for no other reason than the pride and inconsistency of its critics. You can tell as much by its enemies as you can by its friends. If I want to find out what a fellow is like, I find out who his friends are; then I find out who his enemies are. When I know the man’s friends and I know his enemies, I know the man. A man that doesn’t have any enemies is not a man. You ought to have friends, and you ought to have enemies. People ought to be able to tell you by your friends, and people ought to be able to tell you by your enemies.
Dr. John R. Rice, when writing to a dear soul in Myrtle, Mississippi, said, “As for Acts 8:37, you may prefer to leave it in, or you may prefer to take it out. It never seemed to me like part of the word of God.” Imagine John R. Rice writing to that saint in the Lord after putting out the Sword of the Lord attacking the Southern Baptist Convention for infidels in the seminaries. What a hypocritical thing. What desperate wickedness. A fellow writes against the Southern Baptists compromising and then tells a dear saint in the Lord, “You may prefer to leave it in, or you may prefer to take it out.” She had written a letter to Rice criticizing him for recommending the ASV, and she pointed out to him the mistakes in the ASV. He wrote her back and said, “You wouldn’t have known there were mistakes in the ASV unless you had been hanging out with bad company. Your trouble is that you listen too much to Peter Ruckman, and if you don’t quit reading his books, then you’ll get talking bad and using bad language like he does, too.” That dear old saint wrote him back and said, “Dear Brother Rice, I’ve never read Peter Ruckman and don’t know who Peter Ruckman is. I wrote to you because my father was a preacher, and you reminded me so much of him.”
There was a fellow up at Tennessee Temple who was called in and told, “You’re a Ruckmanite.” He said, “What’s that?” Faulkner, Jennings, Afman, and Martin said, “You believe the King James Bible is the word of God.” He said, “Yes, I believe that.” Then they said, “So, you’ve been following Ruckman.” He said, “I don’t know who Ruckman is; I’ve never heard of Ruckman.” They hauled out a clipping they took out of the Bible Believers’ Bulletin called “The Creed of the Alexandrian Cult,” and they waved it in his face and said, “You see this? This is about us!” Thank you for that word of testimony. I intended for the dog to yell when he got hit.
There is a bridge that goes to absolute truth. Christ says, “Thy word is truth.” (John 17:17). Not A truth, not TRUTHS; but “Thy word is truth.” But you have to cross the bridge, and if you don’t go over the bridge, you break your neck and fall down in the gully. This bridge is being condemned; people don’t want you walking over this bridge, but that’s the way.
Do you know what Robert Sumner said about the translation of Luke 1? He said the King James translators “made an unpardonable blunder.” Isn’t that a proud, conceited ass?
Here’s Kenneth Wuest saying that the King James translators made all these mistakes in their translation, and their punctuation is in the wrong place. I’ve picked up Kenneth Wuest’s translation of the New Testament, called The Expanded Translation. I found that when he got to John 5, he changed the verse numbering so you would think he had eight verses in the first eight verses, when he had only SIX verses in the first eight verses. The fellow took two verses and knocked them clean out and then renumbered the verses so you’d think he hadn’t left any out. I’ve got more respect for John Dillinger than that bunch. A fellow out there who’s a crook has an alibi, but saved people in charge of teaching and preaching the word of God, what alibi have they got for carrying on like that? What pride! What stuffed shirts!
I have ads piled up from the Sword of the Lord: “Learn the original Greek text… See what the Original Greek text says”! There isn’t a man on this earth that ever saw the original Greek text. And if you saw the original Greek text, you couldn’t tell what it said anyway. If you can’t get it in your own language, how are you going to get it in Greek? Tell me what this means, “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me” (Phil. 4:13). That’s in your language. Do you believe that? Can you explain it? Do you still sin? Why do you sin if you can do all things through Christ? Do you think the Greek can help you out?
There are verses in there you’ll never understand until you live through them, and no amount of education in Greek can tell you anything. Many Christians are out of money and about to declare bankruptcy, “But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus” (Phil. 4:19). You think the Greek will help? I believe the King James Bible is the word of God because of the pride and inconsistency of its critics.
Richard Taylor was the name of a fellow who got saved at Brent Baptist Church and got called to preach. We sent him off to Bob Jones University; in those days, we didn’t have a Bible Institute, and if a young fellow got called to preach, I would just send him off to Bob Jones or Tennessee Temple. When they all came back infidels, the Lord got me in a corner one day and said, “Aren’t you kind of stupid?” I said, “What do you mean?” He said, “Every time I call a young man to preach under you, you send him off to school, and he comes back denying the word of God.” We sent Rick Taylor off to Bob Jones, and he became a professor at Bob Jones. One day he came back to Pensacola, and he went down to the street corner on a Saturday afternoon and saw some of our men preaching down there, and it got him all shook up because he hadn’t been preaching on the street. He’d quit. He wasn’t winning souls; he’d quit. He came alongside one of our young men and said, “You’re a Ruckmanite.” Our young man said, “What’s a Ruckmanite?” He said, “You believe the King James Bible is the word of God.” And he said, “I sure do!” Taylor said, “That isn’t all, you don’t believe it has any mistakes in it.” The kid said, “That’s right, I don’t.” And he said, “Ruckman taught you that. You’re following a man.” This kid said to him, “You believe it does have mistakes?” Rick Taylor said, “Yes, I do.” And he said, “What man are you following? Who taught you that?” I know who taught him that. The faculty at Bob Jones taught him that.
What is the inspired word of God? Faith for the Family magazine: “Neither the Received Text nor the Westcott and Hort text are right or wrong; both are the word of God. The Westcott and Hort text is nearer to the original, and therefore is older and better, but both are the word of God. No version is inspired, except to the degree that it conforms to the original meaning of the words of the original manuscripts. The ASV and the New ASV are efforts by Conservative scholars at faithful translation. They are the result of a continual desire of faithful, textual scholars devoted to the inerrant, infallible, preserved, and divinely transitive word of God to make use of the results of newest manuscript discoveries and the increasing art of the meaning of the Koine Greek.”
World Congress of Fundamentalism, Bob Jones University (advertisement for the suckers): “The theme of the Congress will be the authority of Scripture.” You just said Westcott and Hort was the best one and closest to the originals. You just recommended two versions that deny the deity of Christ in five places. Now you’re going to talk about the authority of Scripture?” The theme of the international gathering of Bible believers….” What? That’s the first time that phrase ever occurred in Bob Jones University literature for thirty-five years! Now they’re calling themselves “Bible believers”?
International Committee for the Propagation and Defense of Biblical Fundamentalism, written to Bob Jones from one of his graduates in California: “Dear Bob, It was shocking to read your letter of December 15th to Mr. Bob Elliot, a deacon in my church. It was even more shocking to learn that you sent copies of your letter to another deacon of our church and to a student at BJU who is a fiancé of another one of our church members. In the opinion of two attorneys who have examined your letter, you are guilty of having published several libellous statements about me. In fact, they are of the opinion that your letter constitutes libel, per se. Attorney John B. Furey, in his March 11, 1983 letter, wrote, ‘It is my opinion that the December 15, 1982 letter from Bob Jones III, president, to Bob Elliot, constitutes actionable and recoverable libel. per se.’ You wrote, ‘Rasmussen has slandered and vilified his Alma Mater.’ This is a falsehood. You wrote, ‘He has said we are approving apostasy.’ That’s the lie of the century. You wrote, ‘He, the pastor, has lost his reason.’ You wrote, ‘His mean streak has erupted.’ You wrote, ‘He has no regard for the truth.’ You wrote, ‘Your pastor has asked the unreasonable and the impossible of Dr. Custer and this institution.’ You wrote to my church members, ‘It was terribly inconsiderate of your pastor to bring up the matter of Westcott and Hort.’ One of the few statements in your letter which I consider to be correct was the statement that Stewart Custer is trying to set the record straight and clear his reputation of being a defendant of heretics. It is my judgment, in view of all this documentation which I have sent to you and Stewart proving Dr. Westcott and Hort were heretics, Custer has a monumental task ahead of him. Bob, I still regret that you refuse to meet with me as I requested when you were in the immediate vicinity of our church for a week last summer. I desire to discuss the whole issue with you and face you in a brotherly way.” There’s Bob Jones cutting down a pastor to his members by sending letters to the members, turning them against the pastor, and libeling him. When he’s in the town where the guy is, he won’t meet and talk with him. And you’re going to have a Congress on the authority of Scripture? You dirty, two-faced, lying, tricky, fork-tongued rascal! And that goes for all your friends and supporters and some of your relatives.
“Dear Brother in Christ: on March 17th, I wrote to Bob Jones III and said, ‘Bob, I still regret that you refuse to meet with me as I requested when you were in the immediate vicinity of our church.’ In his letter of March 23rd, Bob Jones replied, ‘If you will repent, I will forgive you, and then I’ll talk with you.’ It is perfectly clear that Dr. Stewart Custer, who is now widely known as a theological voice at Bob Jones University, refused to admit that Drs. Westcott and Hort were heretics. Dr. Custer, in the opinion of an increasing number of Bible-believing theologians, is mistaken, as is Dr. Bob Jones III in his assertion that Dr. Rasmussen, in insisting that Dr. Custer and Bob Jones University call Westcott and Hort heretics, is asking the unreasonable and the impossible.”
That correspondence goes into many sheets of paper, mailed to thousands of pastors. You say, “What did Bob Jones III do about the charges that pastor brought against him?” Nothing. Do you know why he couldn’t? Because that old boy lied about the pastor from the first letter to the last letter, and when he said, “We believe in the absolute authority of the Bible,” he believed nothing of the kind. I don’t think that Vito Genovese, Al Capone, Pretty-Boy Floyd, Alvin Carpis, Homer Vanmeter, Nick Pacetti, and Valachi were any worse characters. As far as I’m concerned, that’s just immoral, unethical slop. I could get just as much out of a night club at four o’clock in the morning, listening to a rock band play, with the drinks on the table. You can tolerate it only if you don’t know the damage it’s doing.
Many a young man who believes the King James Bible is the word of God has almost been talked out of his belief in it, caused to backslide. What do you want me to do, talk nice about the fellows that did it? Tell you that I’m given to overstatement when I say they’re as bad as the Mafia and the Syndicate? They’re worse. The crooks rob you of your money and your life, but they wouldn’t take your Lord from you or your Book or your testimony. They wouldn’t take your conscience from you or wreck you spiritually for fifty years. If I didn’t have a burden for young men, I wouldn’t care, but I’m concerned about young men. You ask, “Why?” I sent enough to hell before I was saved; so I’m not going to stand around and see someone else do it if I’ve got a claw I can put in. I’m a little fellow, but I’ve got big feet. If I kick, it’ll hurt.
Last but not least, I believe the King James Bible is the word of God because of the preeminent place it gives the Lord Jesus Christ. I’ve had plenty of time to study all kinds of translations, and I never saw a new translation of any kind that didn’t attack the deity of Jesus Christ somewhere. The ASV attacks the deity of Christ in Luke 2:33, 1 Timothy 3:16, and Acts 4:27. So do the New ASV, the RSV, and the New RSV. You ask, ‘“What about the New King James Bible?” The New King James Bible attacks the deity of Christ in Acts 4:27. It says that Jesus Christ was not God’s “child;” He was just God’s “servant.” I don’t believe that. I believe he was God’s child.
The bridge to absolute truth is a condemned bridge. Do you know who condemns it? It’s condemned by atheists and Catholics. Birds of a feather flock together. It’s condemned by Fundamentalists. That’s why they wanted a new translation. It’s condemned by agnostics and Communists. As a matter of fact, it’s condemned by just about everybody, but I find if you open that old Book and pray over that old Book, you get the answer you’re looking for. It’s the bridge to absolute truth!
The thing I have against these fellows is they lie, they lie, they lie, they lie. I don’t like a man who habitually lies. I’ll put up with it occasionally; I know people. You’ll lie about something. But about the word of God?
I invited a professor of one of the strongest Fundamental schools in the country to our January Baptist Blowout, and he phoned me and said he couldn’t come. I said, “Why?” He said, “I don’t want any publicity, but they threatened to fire me if I came.” They called him in and threatened to fire him if he came here to be at the school. What a bunch of dirty, rotten, low-down, cheap, good-for-nothing, wretched, sorry, backslidden, hypocritical bunch of…. If some of you had a chance to go preach at another school or some other church, do you think I’d complain?
Folks, if you’re not going to believe me, will you sit down and consult with your own mind? What’s the difference between this school and other schools? I don’t handle things like those people do. Somebody’s wrong, and I’ll give you one guess.
Herb Evans wrote John R. Rice one time for a debate and said, “Would you debate with Dr. Peter Ruckman about the King James Bible?” Rice wrote back and said, “No, I can have no fellowship with Brother Ruckman because the Bible says you’re not to keep company with an angry and furious man.” Evans wrote him again, “I didn’t ask you to have fellowship with an angry and furious man. I asked you to debate with Brother Ruckman.” You know what I have against these fellows? They won’t tell the truth. Years ago, a man phoned me in the middle of the night, crying, and asked me to come and talk with him. I hadn’t seen this guy for over thirty years; before I was saved I used to know him. When I got to his house, he and his wife had both been drinking. He came up to me crying and said, “Pete, show me Jesus, show me Jesus!” (Wait until you have that put on you without a moment’s notice.) I just happened to have on me one of those color cartoon tracts, Tell It Like It Is. I flipped it open, and there was Christ on the cross, right in front, with the blood running off Him. That old boy broke down. He knelt down there and got saved. After he got saved, he said, “Now, tell my wife! Lead her to Christ!” She was sitting there in a state of shock; she was an Episcopalian. I said, “Are you saved?” She said, “Well, I was confirmed.” I said, “I was confirmed too, before I got saved.” She said, “Well, I have a godfather and a godmother.” And I said, “So did I, before I was saved.” And she said, “Yeah, but we studied Catechism.” I said, “I did, before I was saved.” And she said, “But;” and the guy that just got converted just started laughing, and he said, “See there! I told you Pete Ruckman would tell you the damn truth!” That’s what he said. I didn’t say that; I quoted that fellow saying that.
Some of you thin-skinned folks don’t understand that, do you? I understand it. I consider that a greater compliment than if I had gone to Bob Jones and had been given an honorary doctorate. I know what that old drunk meant. He meant, “I can count on Ruckman. He won’t lie and mess around. He’ll tell you the truth!” Now, I don’t call it “the damn truth”; I call it “the blessed truth,” but I know what he meant. I’d rather have that guy’s commendation than any Ph.D. in the country. You know what the trouble with these fellows is? They’re not man enough to obey; they’re not man enough to speak out; they’re not man enough to speak the truth. That’s their problem.
A.V. Henderson, the president of Bible Baptist College, said to a friend of mine, “I think in the next generation people won’t even use the King James Bible, and it won’t bother me if they don’t.” What a thing for the president of a Baptist college to say to a young bunch of preachers that are studying for the ministry.
General MacArthur said: “Never a night goes by, if I am ever so tired, but I read the word of God before I go to bed.” How does he read it if he doesn’t have it?
General Patton: “Keep your feet clean and read your Bible.”
Hoover: “The Bible is the unfailing guide which points the way for men to a perfect life.”
Billy Graham, in 1949, at the end of his rope, in little old Trinity College down there in south Florida. After the professors tried to talk him out of the word of God, he went out into the bushes, knelt down, and prayed over his Bible and said, “Father, I cannot understand many things about this Book. I cannot come intellectually all the way, but I accept it by FAITH to be the AUTHORITATIVE, INSPIRED WORD of the Living God.” He had a King James Bible open there, kneeling with it. What happened to Billy? Somebody must have talked him out of it.
W.A. Criswell: “The preacher who starts with the word of God in his hands [how do you have it in your hands if it’s the original manuscripts? How do you have it in your hands if it’s the ASV or the New ASV or the Textus Receptus or the Westcott and Hort?] stands upon an invincible and impregnable rock. The Bible is the infallible word of God. God writes it down, and we can open the sacred book and read its holy words.” What happened to Criswell?
Jerry Falwell: “No human being has the right to change what God said. Our faith, our ministry as a New Testament Church, finds its premise on this English Bible. Whenever you are reading something besides this Book, be sure it agrees with this Book, or it isn’t worthy of your reading time.” Amen. What happened to Falwell’s faculty? Somebody backslid off the deep end.
I believe everything I’ve read there. Did these fellows believe it? Well, if they didn’t, they LIED!
Years ago in Panama City, I knew a man named Lee Larson. He was principal of a school that Hugh Pyle had at Central Baptist Church, and he said, “I want to have you put on this school charter and constitution, ‘We believe the King James Bible is the word of God, preserved without error’.” They had a big go-around about it, and they decided not to do it. About that time Jack Hyles and John R. Rice came to Hugh Pyle’s church for a meeting. This was back in the days when Hyles wasn’t as sure of himself as he is now. He had to be kicked around awhile to get on the right track. Hugh Pyle, a very tactful fellow, a gentleman, called Hyles and Rice in and had them talk with Larson. They sat down there and tried to convince him the King James had mistakes in it. Brother Larson said, “Well, it says over there in the book of Revelation….” Rice got mad and said, “It also says you’ve got to keep his commandments, and the King James translators were Episcopalians and Arminians and thought you could lose your salvation, and a man couldn’t be saved and believe that passage as it stands in the King James Bible.” Larson said, “I believe it,” and pointed out some other things. Rice got mad and left the room. After he left the room, Jack Hyles stood there and said, “You shouldn’t have rebuked an elder like that.” Larson said, “I wasn’t rebuking him, I was just showing him mistakes.” Hyles said, “Well, be that as it may, John Rice is our captain, and we’re going to follow him.” And Brother Larson said, “I thought Jesus Christ was the ‘captain of our salvation’.” Hyles said, “That’s the first mean thing you’ve said to me this evening.”
Brethren, I don’t care what Bible you read. I don’t care what Bible you buy. I don’t care what Bible you use. I don’t care what Bible you preach. I’m an American; I believe in freedom. Preach anything you want to. If you want to believe The Living Bible is the word of God, help yourself, brother; it’s your neck, not mine. I’m not going to worry about it. I have just one thing against the brethren: I am sick and tired of them standing in the pulpit, waving a book around they don’t believe, and telling a bunch of Christians, “This is the word of God,” when the dirty, lying scums don’t BELIEVE it! If they don’t believe it, let them SAY they don’t believe it; and if they do believe it, let them SAY they believe it. If they don’t believe it, they should get out of the pulpit or get a book they do believe is the word of God. But don’t lie!
The King James Bible is the word of God, and those are the words of God. You say, “What am I to do with them?” You’re to read them; you’re to believe them; you’re to love them; you’re to put them in practice. Someday, if we have to die for what God said, we won’t be the first ones. There’s a long army ahead of us who died for it. If you have to die by it, die by it.
