Has the King James changed since 1611?

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Suppose someone were to take you to a museum to see an original copy of the King James Version. You come to the glass case where the Bible is displayed and look down at the open Bible through the glass. Although you are not allowed to flip through its pages, you can readily tell that there are some very different things about this Bible from the one you own. You can hardly read its words, and those you can make out are spelled in odd ways.

Like others before you, you leave with the impression that the King James Version has undergone a multitude of changes since its original printing in 1611. But beware, you are being told a lie. The differences you saw are not what they seem to be. Let's examine the evidence. A kind of change found in the history of the Authorized Version is spelling. Most historians date the beginning of Modern English around the year 1500. Therefore, by 1611, the grammatical structure and basic vocabulary of present-day English had long been established. However, the spelling did not stabilize at the same time. In the 1600's spelling was according to whim.

There was no such thing as correct spelling. No standards had been established. An author often spells the same word several different ways, often in the same book and sometimes on the same page. And these were the educated people. Some of you reading this today would have found the 1600's a spelling paradise. Not until the eighteenth century did the spelling begin to take a stable form. Therefore, in the last half of the eighteenth century, the spelling of the King James Version of 1611 was standardized.

What kind of spelling variations can you expect to find between your present edition of the King James, and the 1611 printing? Although every spelling difference cannot be categorized, several characteristics are very common. Additional e's were often found at the end of the words such as feare, darke, and beare.

Also, double vowels were much more common than they are today. You would find ee, bee, and mooued instead of me, be, and moved. Double consonants were also much more common. What would ranne, euill, and ftarres be according to present-day spelling? See if you can figure them out. The present-day spellings would be ran, evil, and stars.

These typographical and spelling changes account for almost all of the so-called thousands of changes in the King James Bible. None of them alter the text in any way. Therefore, they cannot be honestly compared with thousands of true textual changes that are blatantly made in the modern versions like the NIV and N.W.T.