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Whom should you trust?
The Waites of Bible For Today or Gail
Riplinger? Trust God's word. Mrs. Gail Riplinger's first book, New
Age Bible Versions is, overall, excellent in explaining the critical
differences between modern Bibles and the King James. This book showed me the
truth about modern English versions. Read New Age Bible
Versions!
However, it is necessary to
warn you about a serious problem with a more recent book she authored: In Awe of Thy Word.
In this book she teaches that individual letters
of the alphabet and sounds have actual meanings in and of themselves. (See more below in the In Awe of Thy Word WARNING
section.)
I
strongly
warn against the Waites of The Bible For Today.
The Bible For Today's Defined King James Bible has out of context
"definitions" that serve to teach false doctrine.
See:
DEFINED King James Bible: Definitions For Change --
INDEX Page
Don't depend on man because
man is changeable and corruptible. Depend on God's word which will stand
forever:
The grass withereth, the flower fadeth:
but the word of
our God
shall stand for ever. Isaiah 40:8
In spite of the controversy currently surrounding Mrs. Riplinger,
please note that her book, New Age Bible Versions, contains
startling information that is not found elsewhere. (This book helped me
learn about the false Modern Bible Versions.) Gail Riplinger is, I believe, the
first person to point out that modern versions do promote a "Jesus," a "Father," a "spirit," a "kingdom," etc. that New Agers would approve. Modern 'bible' versions (including the NKJV) do teach New Age doctrine and contain New Age terminology. The John Darby Version is filled with occult/New Age markings.
The New King James Version brazenly marks itself for its master not only with the pagan triquetra symbol (666 mobius) on the cover but also by blaspheming the Lord Jesus Christ by giving him the title of the Maitreya, the World Teacher: "the Coming One." (See: (NKJV and Lucis Trust: Ready For One World Church)
Not surprisingly, the NKJV Transitional Version removes the word, "master" in reference to the Lord Jesus Christ and demotes him to teacher many times.
In Awe of Thy Word
WARNING (See Announcement)
ANNOUNCEMENT:
I appreciate Gail Riplinger's painstaking research on the wonderful history of the KJV1611 and the Bibles that preceded it and her exposure of the beliefs and biases of the men who authored the concordances, lexicons and
interlinears that, in my opinion, have been used by many to undergird the falling away of the church. However,
I am withdrawing my endorsement of
In Awe of Thy Word
because Mrs. Riplinger
encourages the reader to pursue the study of what she claims is the
"science" of discovering the meaning of letters and sounds in words in order to glean more understanding and appreciation of the King James 1611 Bible and as a further proof that the KJV is the real English Bible.
Near the end of her book she cited keywords to encourage readers to search the internet in order to do further study on "letter meanings."
Dozens of current and exhaustive bibliographies can be found by searching the internet for "bibliography sound symbolism"
(e.g. http://www.umich.edu~archive/linguistics/software/dos/monosyl.zip.). (In Awe of Thy Word page 1174)
After reading this passage in In Awe of Thy Word, I typed into the Google search engine the search words Gail Riplinger recommended: bibliography sound symbolism. The first site that came up was
www.trismegistos.com/MagicalLetterPage/. This is the main page of the Margo's Magical Letter Page website! I only needed to read for a few moments to realize Margo's description of letter meanings was similarly expressed in Gail Riplinger's
In Awe of Thy Word!
Quote from Margaret Mangus:
Each consonant and vowel in a language has a meaning, in the sense that every word containing that sound has an element of meaning which words not containing that sound do not have. What underlies this sound-meaning is the form of the sound, i.e. its pronunciation - a sound means what it is. For example, to pronounce a stopped consonant [b, d, g, p, t, k], you completely block the flow of air through the mouth. Consequently all stopped sounds involve a barrier of some kind. The nature of that barrier varies depending on whether the sound is voiced [b, d, g] or unvoiced [p, t, k], whether it is labial [b, p], dental [d, t] or velar [g, k], and so forth.
(Quote source: http://www.trismegistos.com/MagicalLetterPage/)
It is no wonder that Mrs. Riplinger's writing about the alleged meanings of letters is expressed similarly to Margo's. Margo is Margaret Magnus, author of Gods of the Word: Archetypes in the Consonants. Mrs. Riplinger wrote about this Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) linguistics researcher in glowing terms in her book as well as providing the title of her book and making mention of the fact that (sadly) Margaret Magnus' explanations for letter sounds came from the sayings of sages and New Agers.
Margaret Magnus' explanation for the meaning of letters sounds rather mystical to me. Further down on her main page, she wrote:
We scientific types are not the first to discover this. The first ones to notice it were the Mystics. (2) You find references to it in the Upanishads and in Plato and all over The Nag Hammadi Library. The major Arcana of the Tarot are based on the meanings of the Hebrew letters as outlined in the Kabbalah.
(Quote source: http://www.trismegistos.com/MagicalLetterPage/)
[Question: If Margaret Magnus is the "scientific type," why did she name her book about her observations of letter meanings, Gods of the Word: Archetypes in the Consonants? bold emphasis added]
The fourth site down on the same Google page reveals that Margo's Magical Letter Page is one of the (miscellaneous) links on the Kabbalah Links Page! (3) The Kabbalah Links Page's description for Margo's site is as follows:
Sound Symbolism, Phonosemantics, Phonetic Symbolism, Mimologics, Iconism, Cratylus, Ideophones, Synaesthesia, The Alphabet, The Word. Kabbalists have always deconstructed language in curious ways. A site that explores some of the less well-known attributes of language and sound. Recommended. [emphasis mine]
Mrs. Riplinger warned her readers to limit their studies to science and avoid New Age information. Specific information about how to discern between the
occult and science was not included in her seemingly casual warning--other than to communicate that esoterics see letters in gods that are not there and that they ascribe nonsense meanings to letters:
(The internet can be a real "web." Be careful to limit your study to that of verifiable science; avoid mystical New Age information that counterfeits the truth of God (e.g. Kabbalah). They "changed the truth of God into a lie" and even worship God's creation (Rom. 1:25); esoterics have their own nonsense meanings ascribed to letters; these should be avoided. But just because New Age vegans worship 'mother earth' is no reason to quit eating vegetables. Likewise, just because esoterics see in letters 'gods' that are not there, this should not deter true scriptural and scholarly investigation into the word of God.)
(In Awe of Thy Word, page 1116)
The practice and
methodology of ascertaining letter and sound meanings stems directly from
ancient paganism.
The idea that there is a link between letters and
ideas is from ancient occult belief systems that include the Viking Runes,
the Hebrew Kabbalah, the Arab Abjab, etc.
I am deeply concerned that Mrs. Riplinger is delving into and promoting this practice and I do not believe that God shows his approval of the King James 1611 English translation via occult methodologies.
The Russian mathematician, Ivan Panin, falsely "proved" that the Westcott and Hort Greek text is the most accurate manuscript based on his "scientific discovery" that the bible has a "hidden mathematical structure." Do you see where the "hidden meanings" paradigm shift
can lead? (Occult means hidden.)
The Holy Spirit bears witness that we are the children of God:
The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: (Romans 8:16)
The Holy Spirit is also capable of bearing witness to which English translation of the Bible is perfectly acceptable in the sight of God.
It is the Holy Spirit who opens the scriptures to our understanding, andif we obey the light that he has given ushe will give us a deeper understanding of his word. If you cannot understand the meaning of a word in the KJV 1611 based on the context, I suggest that you
find other places in the KJV where this word is used. You can also consult the 1828 Noah Webster Unabridged Dictionary. Noah Webster often demonstrated the meaning of a word by citing that word in a bible verse.
I regret that the important matter of letter and sound meanings escaped me before. I must admit that I skimmed and at times completely swept past the letter and sound meanings sections of In Awe of Thy Word because I was not interested in that part of her book. Rather, I wanted to read the historical sections regarding the background of the KJV 1611 as well as earlier bibles and of course, I wanted to find out as much as I could about how lexicons, concordances, etc. were produced. I realize now that I should not have endorsed her book without having closely examined all of its contents.
Gail Riplinger's stance that the
letters of the English alphabet have meanings (beyond the phonetic)
and such meanings provide further evidence the King James Bible is God's
word is definitely incorrect.
She is causing her readers to believe that God assigned meanings to letters in the English language, thus causing them to function as
runes:
God built the Bible letter by letter. He gave each sound a sense. The meanings of each letter can be found in the Bible, in the book of Genesis. For example, the word, 'place' is the first word to begin with the letter 'p.' 'P' then often carries the meaning 'place' throughout the Bible
(Gen. 19). . . An appendix at the end of this book details some of the central meanings of each letter. (In Awe of Thy Word, pg. 16 bold emphasis added.)
Gail Riplinger actually provided the definition of runes.
It is runes that have word meanings. That is the reason they are suited for divination and other magical purposes.
The primary characteristic which distinguishes a runic alphabet from other alphabets is that each letter, or rune, has a meaning. For example, whereas "ay", "bee", and "cee" are meaningless sounds denoting the first three letters in our alphabet, the names of the first three runes, "fehu", "uruz", and "žurisaz" are actual words in the Germanic language, meaning "cattle", "aurochs", and "giant", respectively.
(Quote source: The Runic Journey http://www.tarahill.com/runes)
Notes:
(1) http://www.trismegistos.com/MagicalLetterPage/Mystics.html
(2) http://www.digital-brilliance.com/kab/link.htm
Liberty To The Captives disagrees with and
warns against the dispensationalist
unconditional eternal security, Pre-Tribulation Rapture doctrines held by individuals such as David Cloud, Peter Ruckman, Gail Riplinger, and Dr. Waite of Bible For Today.
(See:
John Darby Version: Doctrinal Changes to the Bible)
Return to: Barbara Aho, Which Bible is Your Final Authority? Page 2
Also see: Barbara Aho Bids Goodspeed to King James 1611 and
(outside link)
Main index: New King James Version and the One World Church |