Acts 8:37 is a verse that comes up often in King James Only discussions. KJV Only advocates charge modern translators with having “removed’ this verse from the Bible, often asserting conspiratorial motives. Many modern translations, of course, have moved this verse from the main text to a footnote with an explanation that it is not in the earliest or even the later majority of manuscripts. King James Onlyists accuse modern translator of “deleting” the verse as if it was originally part of the biblical text and modern translators have willfully taken it out. Modern scholars, however, believe that it was actually added in by later scribes and was not originally part of the Book of Acts. Thus, we must look at the evidence more closely.
The verse in question
The verse under discussion here traditionally reads in the KJV:
“And Philip said, If thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God,” (Acts 8:37, KJV).
Where ever one lands on this verse, it is not really a “King James Only” issue. A number of modern translations contain the verse, such as the MEV, NKJV, and NASB (The latter marks the verse with brackets but still includes it in the main body of the text.) Now, if the verse is not original, then King James Onlyism is false, but even if the verse is original, that doesn’t in any way imply that King James Onlyism is true. Many other versions, both historical and modern, also contain this verse.
The evidence against Acts 8:37
Acts 8:37 is absent in Papyrus 45 (third century), Codex B and Codex א (early fourth-century) Codex A and Codex C (both fifth century), Papyrus 74 (seventh century), Codex L (eighth century) and Codex P, Ψ, Uncial 049, and minuscule 33 (all ninth century), and numerous other later Greek manuscripts from the tenth century on through the middle ages. Indeed, the vast majority of all Greek manuscripts do not have this verse. Some manuscripts of the Latin Vulgate also lack the verse, as do the vast majority of the Syriac tradition (including all the earliest copies) and the vast majority of the Coptic manuscript tradition. It is also lacking in some Ethiopic copies.
The evidence for Acts 8:37
Acts 8:37 is preserved in a number of different forms. The earliest version appears almost exclusively in Latin copies. It is found in some Old Latin manuscripts, itm (fifth century), itr (eighth century), itar (ninth century), and in some later Latin copies from the Middle Ages. It is also found in one eleventh-century Greek Minuscule, some late Syriac copies, and in Armenian and Georgian manuscripts. There are minor variations between these witnesses. A second form of the verse is found in just one copy, the Greek/Latin diglot Codex E (sixth century). Both the Greek and the Latin text of this manuscript contain the second version. A third and much later version (the version found in the KJV) can be seen, with some minor variations, in Minuscule 307 (tenth century), 945 (eleventh century), 323, 610, 630 (twelfth century), and a small number of even later Greek copies. The Old Latin manuscript itt (ninth century) and a small number of later Latin copies from the twelfth century forward also contain this version. Additionally, few Coptic copies read this way, as do some later translations like the Georgian, Slavonic, and many Ethiopic. A fourth version of the verse is present only in Minuscule 629 (14th century), and yet another version was added into Minuscule 88 by a later scribe (Minuscule 88 did not originally contain the verse at all).
Evaluation of the evidence
Acts 8:37 exists only in a small minority of late manuscripts. Few of these copies come before the middle ages, and many of them disagree on the wording of the verse. All of the earliest manuscripts across a wide variety of locations, languages, and streams of transmission all lack the verse. Even the Byzantine “majority text” of the Middle Ages (often favored by KJV Only advocates in other contexts) overwhelmingly favors the omission of this verse. There is simply no explanation for all of this data if the verse was original to the book of Acts. It is a later addition, probably an explanatory marginal note that was mistakenly copied into the text. Luke did not write it, and it is probably best to return it to its role as a marginal or footnote.
