COMPLETENESS
“Become complete” (2 Corinthians 13:11a).
In Parts One and Two, we have highlighted the accuracy and beauty of the NKJV. Now we turn to a third distinctive of the NKJV: Completeness. Since complete is a very inclusive word, we should explain what we mean by the term. In this section, “complete” does not mean “exhaustive.” Instead, it means full, inclusive, not lacking in any essential element.
In French a man’s suit is called un complet, not that it includes shirt and tie, but that it is a full suit of clothes. Likewise, The Complete Concordance to the Bible, New King James Version, is “complete” in that it gives a full account of the words chosen. It does not give an exhaustive list of such words as and, but, from, with, or other very common words that most people would never choose in looking up a verse in a concordance.
With this general definition in mind, the NKJV demonstrates its completeness in the following ways:
9. Complete Old Testament Textual Data. This chapter not only tells about the Hebrew and Aramaic texts, but also a little about the variant readings from the ancient versions and the Dead Sea Scrolls.
10. Complete New Testament Textual Data. Chapter 9 shows how every page of the NKJV New Testament presents, not just one textual viewpoint (as most modern Bibles do), but three: the traditional, the critical, and the majority text views.
11. Complete Equivalence in Translation. This is the interesting account of how a careful and conservative translation can communicate a relatively complete rendering in both meaning and form, aided as well by dynamic-equivalent renderings where needed for good idiomatic English.
Conclusion. The final chapter summarizes the three emphases of the book—Accuracy, Beauty, and Completeness, illustrated with quotations from many sources.