Comments on An Exposition of the Epistle of James

Thanks, but no, I'm afraid you've misunderstood me. More on that in a moment. But more important, I have found confirmation that this is indeed not the original Manton text.

First, about the misunderstanding, you say "We do have works by Manton in our library". Did you realize I was writing this comment on a specific CCEL edition of the book? Perhaps the comments show up in some other way that can make it seem a random comment. And as to your comment on the "alternative rendering", that link (to a book outside of CCEL) was not the one I had a concern with. I was using it for comparison.

I'm referring to the text here in the CCEL, in the book I'm looking at as I comment here. I'm saying that the text in this CCEL edition a) is modernized b) quotes the NIV in its text (not a link to it) and c) seems abridged, compared to the original, at least as shown in the Google Books version (and that "other" one) I mentioned.

I did some more digging and have found the answer. What's here in the CCEL is instead the content of the 1995 Crossway edition of the book which lists Alistair McGrath and JI Packer as editors in addition to Manton.

If you want to see what I mean, compare the first page of this book here with the Google preview of the same first page in that 1995 edition.

They're identical, down to bolding of fonts in the 3rd paragraph.

And this is indeed a modernized and abridged edition, as another site with text from the Crossway Commentary editions says they are "abridged and stylistically adapted for today's readers by series editors J.I. Packer and Mister McGrath, while carefully preserving the meaning and message of the original expositors."

Then compare those to the first page of the google books view of a much older edition which I offered in the first comment.

Or even just compare this CCEL edition (Vol 4 of Manton) to a page from the CCEL edition of Vol 1. You can see that it's the original old English wording (in Manton's words, not just the Bible quotes).

So if this CCEL text of this Vol 4 book is in fact from the 1995 Crossway "update" edition, I suppose that's OK, but shouldn't it be noted as such, lest someone think they're reading Manton's original work?

And also then would copyright permission have been obtained? The copyright page in the PDF of this CCEL edition lists CCEL as the copyright holder, but has no "Print Basis" indication (as does the copyright page in the PDF of the Vol 1 CCEL edition). I just am fearing someone at CCEL may have taken a contributor's word that this was the text of the original (which being from the 1600's would be in the public domain, where this modern edition is not).

Or perhaps it's that you got permission from Crossway to publish the text here.

Not trying to criticize or cause trouble. Just trying to help everyone concerned.