WESTCOTT and HORT UNMASKED
The following is an excerpt from an excellent sermon by Mike Rios
“. . for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name.” (Psalm 138:2)
This statement that God makes about His Word says volumes about the value He
has placed upon His written Word. Every name that is found in the Bible to
describe the many facets of God's relationship to man and His tender care
toward man must take second place to the priceless importance of His Word.
It is said of men of great character many times that, "His word is his
bond," and so this verse says of God. If His Word be not true, or cannot be
depended upon, then God is nothing more than a ghost and the Christian is
nothing more than a fool. But, if God's Word has the power, authority, and
veracity that it claims to have, then, our God is grander and more
magnificent than human words can describe and the Christian is richer than
all the gold and gems the universe can offer in comparison.
When the translators of the King James Bible began their grand tact, every
translator understood that they were undertaking a project of eternal
consequence. This Book that they were handling was not just any book. It was
a volume whose truths could mean the bliss of damnation of its readers. This
Book would be the epic that revealed to mankind the love no man can
comprehend and the sacrifice that none, but a Saviour can give. It would be
the Door to salvation and the warning to the unbeliever and rebellious. All
that could be truthfully said about our Creator and His Son was enclosed in
this volume. This was their conviction.
The translation of 1611 had an introduction entitled, THE TRANSLATORS TO THE READER. This is where we find the value that the translators placed upon the veracity and importance of the Scripture. This is what they wrote about the reading of the Word of God:
"But now what piety without truth? what truth (what saving truth) without the word of God? what word of God (whereof we may be sure) without the Scripture?
The Scriptures we are commanded to search (John 5:39; Isa.8:20).
They are commended that searched and studied them (Acts 17:11 and 8:28,29).
They are reproved that were unskilful in them, or slow to believe them (Matt.22:29; Luke.24:25).
They can make us wise unto salvation (2Tim.3:15).
If we be ignorant, they will instruct us; if out of the way, they will bring us home; if out of order, they will reform us; if in heaviness, comfort us; if dull, quicken us; if cold, inflame us.
Tolle, lege; tolle, lege: [S.August.confess.lib.8.cap.12.] Take up and read, take up and read the Scriptures..."
The 54 scholars who translated the scriptures were actually in awe at the privilege of putting the Word of God into the English language. Thus, they approached the work as they would approach no other task of translation. It was with this mindset and conviction that the greatest volume in the English language was produced this side of the Holy Spirit's inspiration of the Apostles.
In the 19th Century, two Anglican prelates came on the scene whose views of the Word of God, and, the King James Bible in particular, were quite opposite of the views of the men who translated the King James Bible. They came with all the subtlety of the serpent in the Garden of Eden and with the treachery of Jehudi and his penknife. Doctors Westcott and Hort accomplished the undermining of the Textus Receptus and have forever changed the way that Christian educators handle the issue of the Geek and Hebrew manuscripts.
Fenton John Anthony Hort was born April 23, 1828, in Dublin, Ireland, the
oldest of five children. He was raised by a Christian mother who was a
student of the Bible and a firm believer in the fundamentals of the faith.
Although not much is said about his father, we do know that he was educated
at Westminster School and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he obtained a
scholarship. Dr. Fenton J.A. Hort, as a child, was reared under the tutelage
of the Word of God. In comparison to his mother, Dr. Hort's beliefs were on
the other side of the spectrum in the matters of faith. It prompted his
mother to write," ... we must think often of the many mansions of our
Heavenly Father's House, and, my darling, how happy it will be of we all
meet there; not one missing, of all our household." (Letter to Arthur Josiah
Hort from his mother, September 18th, 1840.)
It is also said in the Life and Letters of Fenton John Anthony Hort about Dr. Hort's opposing Christian views to that of his mother, "She was unable to enter into his theological views.. .thus, pathetically enough, there came to be a barrier between mother and son." (Life and Letters of Fenton John Anthony Hort, Vol. 1, p. 7) Dr. Hort was the main opponent to the Textus Receptus and the leading proponent of the heretical Alexandrian texts1. He was the developer of the method of textual criticism2 that undermines the Majority Text3 and exalts the critical text that is the basis for the Revised Version of the Bible.
Brooke Foss Westcott was born in Birmingham, England on January 12, 1825.
He was the only surviving child of his parents, his father being a
geologist, who excelled in botany. He graduated from Cambridge in 1848. Both
Hort and Westcott taught at Cambridge. Other than their work on the Revised
Version, their professorships at Cambridge are what they are best known for.
In his early days, Hort is known to have had a hatred for the texts from
which the King James Bible was translated. He wrote to a friend in 1851 when
he was only 23 years old, "I had no idea till the last few weeks of the
importance of texts, having read so little Greek Testament, and dragged on
with the villainous Textus Receptus, . . Think of the vile Textus Receptus
leaning entirely on the late MSS4; it is a blessing that there are such
early ones." (Letter to Reverend John Ellerton, December 29th and 30th,
1851, Life and Letters of Fenton John Anthony Hort, Vol. l,p.211)
His open animosity for the manuscripts from which the King James Bible was
written was due to the fact that there were other older manuscripts, which
he believed were closer to the originals. The fact that the older
manuscripts were incomplete, questionable, and unreliable, at best,
apparently made no difference to Dr. Hort. From his relatively young days he
set out devise a theory that would permit the use of these older
manuscripts. Coupled with some very strange religious and philosophical
beliefs, these two Cambridge professors were about to help give the
English-speaking people Bible translations that the devil himself must be
proud of.
Both Westcott and Hort were prolific writers. Along with their biographies,
which their sons wrote, and which consist mainly of letters and
correspondence with those whom Westcott and Hort were acquainted, they also
wrote various commentaries, essays, and analyses on various books of the
Bible and doctrinal subjects. Through these writings we have been able to
establish their heretical beliefs, their disdain for fundamental
Christianity, and their pathetic disrespect for the Words of God.
The following quotes were written over a 43-year period of the adult lives
of Westcott and Hort:
SALVATION
"Can I claim the name of a believer?" (Nov. 1847, Life and Letters of Brooke
Foss Westcott, Vol. 1, p. 92)
". . .but that simple faith and obedience which so many enjoy, I fear will
never be mine." (Jan. 1848, AW.)
"The fact is, I do not see how God's justice can be satisfied without every
man suffering in his own person the full penalty for his sins" (Nov. 1849,
Life and Letters of Fenton John Anthony Hort, Vol. 1, p. 120) This is part
of the Catholic teaching of penance.
"E.g. the facts recorded in the Bible seem to me to show that it is not
unjust (1) that the innocent should suffer, and (2) that the suffering of
the innocent should be the benefit of the guilty . . .1 confess I have no
repugnance to the primitive doctrine of a ransom paid to Satan... But I can
see no other possible form in which the doctrine of a ransom is at all
tenable; anything is better than the notion of a ransom paid to the Father."
(Aug. 1860, Ibid, pp. 427-428)
". . .we maintain 'Baptismal Regeneration' as the most important of
doctrines. . ." (July 1848, Ibid, p. 76)
BIBLE
"Our Bible as well as our Faith is a mere compromise." (Westcott, On the
Canon of the New Testament: A General Survey, p. vii)
"No one now, I suppose, holds that the first three chapters of Genesis, for
example, give a literal history - I could never understand how any one
reading them with open eyes could think they did. . ." (March 1890, Life and
Letters of Brooke Foss Westcott, Vol. 2, p. 69)
"I am inclined to think that no such state as 'Eden' (I mean the popular
notion) ever existed, and that Adam's fall in no degree differed from the
fall of each of his descendants. .." (Life and Letters of Fenton John
Anthony Hort, Vol. 1, p. 78)
"(Hebrews 1:2) in the prophets.. In whatever way God made Himself known to
them, they were His messengers, INSPIRED by His Spirit, not in their words
only but as men..." (Hort, The Epistle to the Hebrews: The Greek Text with
Notes and Essays, p. 6) This heresy teaches that the men were inspired and
not the words. This allows for the authors to become the editors in chief of
God's Word.
Nowhere in their extensive writings do Westcott and Hort defend or teach the
inspiration and preservation of God's Word. This low view of God's Word
opened the door for these two to add and remove verses at a whim. The Bible
becomes just another book that came from some old dusty manuscripts found in
the Middle East. This is exactly how Westcott and Hort handled what they had
of the Bible; no inspiration, no preservation, neither power nor authority.
MARY WORSHIP AND CATHOLICISM
"I have been persuaded of many years that Mary-worship and 'Jesus' worship
have very much in common in their results " (Oct. 1865, Life and Letters of
'Fenton John Anthony Hort, Vol. 2, p. 50) "Still we dare not forsake the
Sacraments, or God will forsake us."
"I am a staunch sacredotalist5, and there is not much profit in arguing
about first principle." (Ibid, p. 86)
"After leaving the monastery we shaped our course to a little oratory6 which
we discovered on the summit of a neighboring hill.. It is very small, with
one kneeling place; and behind a screen was a 'Pieta'7 the size of life I
could not help thinking on the fallen grandeur of the Romish Church, on her
zeal even in error, on her earnestness and self-devotion, which we might,
with nobler views and a purer end, strive to imitate. Had I been alone I
could have knelt there for hours." (1847, Letter to Westcott's fiancé', Life
and Letters of Brooke Foss Westcott, Vol. 1, p. 80)
"The face of the Virgin is unspeakably beautiful. I looked till the lip
seemed to tremble with intensity of feeling," (Ibid., p.183) This is what
Westcott claimed to see when he looked on a portrait of the Sistine Madonna.
It is worthy of note that for many years, and sadly, even to this day,
fundamental Bible colleges in America defended these two Mary worshippers as
being saved, orthodox, conservative Bible scholars! The writings of these
men leave no doubt as to their position and condition in reference to their
salvation.
The King James Bible Defended!
