 III. Our unity to the cause of Christ’s salvation for the human race will reign
supreme. One simple step to secure this unity is by using only one Bible translation among the company members.
History confirms that the Bible manuscripts used in the translation of the King James Version are the only manuscripts that
can be traced back to the hands of the Apostles themselves. The Protestant scholars under King James, whose lives were in
constant jeopardy from the Jesuit Order of the Roman Catholic Church, chose essentially two Bibles to translate from: the
Greek “Received Text” (preserved by the Greek Orthodox Church), and Old Latin “Received Text.” The
Greek text dates back to the apostolic scholar, Lucian of Antioch (c. 250-312 A.D.), who arranged and edited the Apostle’s
original Greek manuscripts. The Bible of Lucian was restored to western Christianity through the research of the Dutch scholar,
Erasmus (1466?-1536). The second Bible selected to compare and harmonize with the Greek text of Lucian was the original
Latin Bible called the Itala. This noble Bible was the Latin “Received Text,” and was the Bible of Patrick of
Ireland (5th C.), Columba of Scotland (6th C.), Aiden of England (7th C.), Columbanus of Europe, and the Waldenses of the
Piedmont. The Itala was meticulously preserved by the Waldensian Church (120 A.D.). Its origin dates back to the Apostles
themselves to no later than 157 A.D. This Bible was the first used in the early translations of the young Protestant Church
(Wycliffe 1388). The beloved Geneva Bible (1560), which preceded the King James Bible was greatly influenced by the Itala.
To take the necessary steps to secure the union of our hearts gives honor to the Savior’s prayer to our Father: “I have
given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because
they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.
I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou
shouldest keep them from
the evil.
They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.
Sanctify
them through thy truth: thy word is truth.
As thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also
sent them into
the world.
And for their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified
through the truth.
Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on
me through their word;
That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee,
that
they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast
sent me.
And
the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may
be one, even as we are one:
I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and
that the world may know that thou hast sent me,
and hast loved them,
as thou hast loved me.” John 17:14-23.
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