One of the faculty members at my seminary graciously pointed out to me that the translators of the King James Bible were not King James-Only types. He encouraged me to read the preface by the translators to the 1611 KJV Bible.
Two snippets follow for your consideration:
“• 1 Now though the Church were thus furnished with Greek and Latin translations, even before the faith of CHRIST was generally embraced in the Empire: [S.Hieronym. Marcell, Zosim.] (for the learned know that even in S.Hierome's time the Consul of Rome and his wife were both Ethnicks, and about the same time the greatest part of the Senate also) yet for all that the godly-learned were not content to have the Scriptures in the language which themselves understood, Greek and Latin, (as the good lepers [2King.7:9] were not content to fare well themselves, but acquainted their neighbours with the store that God had sent, that they also might provide for themselves) but also for the behoof and edifying of the unlearned which hungered and thirsted after righteousness, and had souls to be saved as well as they, they provided translations into the vulgar for their countrymen, insomuch that most nations under heaven did shortly after their conversion hear CHRIST speaking unto them in their mother tongue, not by the voice of their minister only, but also by the written word translated.”
“• 21 So that to have the Scriptures in the mother tongue is not a quaint conceit lately taken up, either by the Lord Cromwell in England, or by the Lord Radevil [Thuan.] in Polonie, or by the Lord Ungnadius in the Emperor's dominion, but hath been thought upon, and put in practice of old, even from the first times of the conversion of any nation; no doubt because it was esteemed most profitable to cause faith to grow in men's hearts the sooner, and to make them to be able to say with the words of the Psalm, As we have heard, so we have seen. [Ps.48:8]”
(Above from http://www.jesus-is-lord.com/pref1611.htm#s9)
So what we see is that the KJV translators wanted to have a Bible in the common language of the people just as had been done for centuries before them. If THEY wanted the Bible in common English, then we TODAY also ought to have the Bible in COMMON ENGLISH TODAY. It is with this that I recommend to the reader the ENGLISH STANDARD VERSION (ESV).
If that doesn’t convince you, notice that the spelling has changed from Elizabethan English to more Modern English. Even your King James Bible has been changed since 1611 (unless you have a reprint which would be very difficult to read).
More info can be found at www.esv.org (where there is also a complete FREE audio Bible).
