Replies

Thanks for the candid admission Bill.

I admit that all mature Christians who are able are obligated to be teachers (Heb. 5.12), but all shouldn’t be shepherds, bishops, or elders in the sense of I Tim. 3.1ff, where among their qualifications are being the husband of one wife, having believing children....which would eliminate female shepherds or elders, or single “pastors”.

My opinion is that “pastor” got into the KJV from Roman Catholicism. The 48 men who translated the KJV were ALL prominent men and scholars of the Anglican Church, that portion of the RCC Henry VIII stole from the pope, who wouldn’t let him divorce his wife and marry Anne Boleyn. If they wanted to preserve the use of the latin word “pastor” for elders, bishops, and shepherds in their translation, they had to insert it somewhere, and Eph. 4.11 became the spot.

They weren’t above that sort of thing in other respects. Pascha occurs 29 times in the Greek NT, is translated Passover every time except Ac. 4.12, where it’s translated Easter, of all things. RCC translations routinely translate presbuteros (elder) as priest. All these are examples of denominational bias outweighing scholarship of the translators, to preserve some denominational tradition or practice.

The use of the “divine pronouns” thee, thou, and thine is an example of this. There is no such distinction between you and yours in the text. It’s a human tradition, not scholarship, and those pronouns don’t show respect, as we think. Was God showing respect for Satan when he asked him concerning Job, “Hast thou considered my servant Job?” Was Paul showing respect for the sorcerer Elymas in Ac. 13.11
when he struck him blind saying, “Thou shalt be blind for a season.” Do we address sorcerers that way? Hardly.

Again, thanks for reading and considering.