Clark's final defense of the Authorized Version (or final assault on the revised translations) arose from his doctrinal concerns. In this defense, President Clark implied that the King James translators had been inspired, while the Revised Standard Version scholars had not: no "clear cut statement of the Revisers is noted that . . . they either sought or enjoyed the help of the Spirit of the Lord. . . . It would seem the whole Revision was approached in the same spirit they would employ in the translation of any classical work." Against this President Clark contrasted the KJV translators' work as described in their preface:
And in what sort did these assemble? In the trust of their own knowledge, or of their sharpness of wit, or deepness of judgment, as it were in an arm of flesh? At no hand. They trusted in him that hath the key of David . . . ; they prayed to the Lord . . . to the effect that St. Augustine did; O let thy Scriptures be my pure delight; let me not be deceived in them, neither let me deceive by them. In this confidence, and with this devotion, did they assemble together.
Thus, Clark implied, the KJV scholars -- and not the Revised scholars -- were "amenable to the promptings of the Holy Spirit."
This position was a bit awkward. First, the newly implied claim that the KJV translators were inspired was directly opposed to the almost unanimous contention of Church leaders from 1830 to President Clark's own time. Second, we might argue that including "non-believing" translators on the Revisers' committee helped minimize sectarian bias in the finished product. Third, whatever the advantages or disadvantages of secularity, the Revised translators did, in fact, invoke the hand of God over their work. In an essay so pious that it would have embarrassed the self-respecting modern translators of any work but holy scripture, the British Revision concluded its preface thus:
We now conclude, humbly commending our labours to Almighty God, and praying that his favour and blessing may be vouchsafed to that which has been done in his name. We recognised from the first the responsibility of the undertaking; and through our manifold experience of its abounding difficulties we have felt more and more, as we went onward, that such a work can never be accomplished by organised efforts of scholarship and criticism, unless assisted by Divine help.
Thus, in the review of the work which we have been permitted to complete, our closing words must be words of mingled thanksgiving, humility, and prayer. Of thanksgiving, for the many blessings vouchsafed to us throughout . . . our corporate labours; of humility, for our failings and imperfections in the fulfillment of our task; and of prayer to Almighty God, that the Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ may be more clearly and more freshly shown forth to all who shall be readers of this Book.
The preface to editions of the later RSV went on to say:
The Bible is more than a historical document to be preserved. And it is more than a classic of English literature to be cherished and admired. It is a record of God's dealing with men, of God's revelation of Himself and His will. It records the life and work of Him in whom the word of God became flesh and dwelt among men. [The] Word must not be disguised in phrases that are no longer clear, or hidden under words that have changed or lost their meaning.
J. Reuben Clark found such professions weak, reserved for the end of the respective prefaces of which they were a part, and more remarkable for what they did not say than for what they did. Their authors, he seemed to feel, damned themselves with faint praise of God.
Now we must readily acknowledge that the Revisers were more restrained in their overt piety than their KJV predecessors, whose eloquent preface continued at great length. But President Clark made no allowance for the difference between modern tastes and those of an age of rhetorical flourish. He seemed to take the worshipful KJV preface at face value, as though it could with little change be transferred to the 19th and 20th centuries. That such a wholesale transfer would have been inapt may be seen by a glance at what modern standards would judge as the obsequious, almost idolatrous 1611 dedication to the increasingly unpopular and autocratic King James.
So distressing was James's behavior to the Puritans that his reign became but a preface to that of Charles I, whose more extreme actions prompted the great Puritan exodus to New England, then British civil war, and finally his own execution. Despite such tensions, the age of literary extravagance induced the Puritans, who were well represented among the Authorized translators, to support "The Epistle Dedicatory" to King James: "Great and manifold were the blessings, most dread Sovereign, which Almighty God, the, Father of all mercies, bestowed upon us the people of England, when first he sent Your Majesty's Royal Person to rule and reign over us." The appearance of "Your Majesty" was "as of the Sun in his strength, instantly [dispelling] mists . . . accompanied with peace and tranquility at home and abroad." "Your very name is precious" and Your subjects look to You "as that sanctified Person, who, under God, is the immediate Author of their true happiness." Similar effusion was not absent from the Authorized "Translators to the Reader"; J. Reuben Clark was expecting too much if he thought its grandiloquence should be duplicated by modern scholars.
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