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Title: Introduction to the textual criticism of the Greek New Testament
Author: Eberhard Nestle
Editor: Allan Menzies
Translator: William Edie
Release date: June 4, 2025 [eBook #76224]
Language: English
Original publication: London: Williams and Norgate, 1901
Credits: deaurider, David King, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://pgdp.net. (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive.)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK INTRODUCTION TO THE TEXTUAL CRITICISM OF THE GREEK NEW TESTAMENT ***
Introduction to the textual criticism of the Greek New Testament
THEOLOGICAL TRANSLATION LIBRARY
VOL. XIII.
NESTLE’S INTRODUCTION TO THE TEXTUAL
CRITICISM OF THE GREEK NEW TESTAMENT
INTRODUCTION TO THE TEXTUAL CRITICISM OF THE GREEK NEW TESTAMENT
BY
EBERHARD NESTLE, PH. AND TH.D.
MAULBRONN
_TRANSLATED FROM THE SECOND EDITION_
(_With Corrections and Additions by the Author_)
BY
WILLIAM EDIE, B.D.
KING EDWARD
AND EDITED WITH A PREFACE BY
ALLAN MENZIES, D.D.
PROFESSOR OF DIVINITY AND BIBLICAL CRITICISM IN THE
UNIVERSITY OF ST. ANDREWS
WILLIAMS AND NORGATE
14 HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN, LONDON
20 SOUTH FREDERICK STREET, EDINBURGH
AND 7 BROAD STREET, OXFORD
NEW YORK: G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
1901
PRINTED BY
NEILL AND COMPANY LIMITED
BELLEVUE, EDINBURGH
EDITOR’S PREFACE.
Professor Eberhard Nestle of Maulbronn is one of the distinguished
company of philologists who have in recent years directed their
attention to the study of the New Testament. He is by no means a
stranger in this country. Readers of the _Expositor_ and the _Expository
Times_ are familiar with his name, and are accustomed to receive from
him original and independent discussions of New Testament textual
problems. He is consulted by scholars both in this country and on the
Continent on questions of Aramaic and Syriac scholarship, and has
contributed, in the way of criticism and careful proof reading, to many
important publications of English scholars, such as Professor Swete’s
edition of the Septuagint,[1] the publications of Mrs. Lewis and Mrs.
Gibson (_The Sinaitic Palimpsest_, etc.), and the _Gospel of the Twelve
Apostles_ recently published by Professor Rendel Harris.
The readers of this volume may be glad to know a little more of its
author. A native of Württemberg, he was educated at the Gymnasium of
Stuttgart and then at the Theological Seminary of Blaubeuren, the latter
being one of the four old cloister schools of Württemberg, in which, far
from the distractions of large towns, a thorough philological training
is provided for the future clergy of that kingdom. It was as
“Praeceptor” of one of these schools that Albrecht Bengel, that great
textual critic and unaffectedly pious man, spent the best part of his
life, and in his _Marginalien und Materialien_ Dr. Nestle gives an
interesting account of Bengel as a scholar, and describes the studies of
the school over which he presided. Our author studied divinity and
oriental languages at the Universities of Tübingen and Leipzig, and
considers it one of the happy dispensations of his life that he was
permitted to live in England for two years, working in the British
Museum and preaching to German congregations in London. He was then
Repetent or Tutor at the Theological Seminary of Tübingen, and, after a
short period of work as a preacher, was called to the Gymnasium of Ulm
to teach Greek, German, Hebrew, and Religion. For two years he filled
the vacant professorship of Semitic languages at the University of
Tübingen, but, not being appointed to the chair, he returned to Ulm.
From there he moved to the Seminary at Maulbronn, which offered better
opportunities for combined philological and theological studies.
Dr. Nestle’s principal works are:—_Die israelitischen Eigennamen nach
ihrer religionsgeschichtlichen Bedeutung_ (Proper Names in Israel: their
significance for the history of religion), the Prize Essay of the Leiden
Tyler Society, 1876. An earlier Prize Essay at Tübingen on the
Septuagint and Massorah of Ezekiel was also successful, but was not
published.
_Psalterium Tetraglottum_ (_Graece_, _Syriace_, _Chaldaice_, _Latine_),
1879. Sixth and Seventh Editions of Tischendorf’s _Septuagint_ (with new
collation of Codices Vaticanus, Sinaiticus, and Alexandrinus) 1880,
1887.
_Septuagintastudien_, i.-iii., 1886, 1896, 1898.
_Syriac Grammar_ (Latin, 1881; German, 1888; English, 1889).
_Novi Testamenti Graeci Supplementum_, 1896 (Collation of Codex Bezae:
Apocryphal Gospels).
_Philologica Sacra_, 1896.
Minor publications collected in _Marginalien und Materialien_, 1893.
Edition of the _Greek New Testament_ for the Stuttgart Bible Society,
1898, of which a third edition is now in preparation.
Numerous contributions to theological and literary Journals (_Jahrbücher
für deutsche Theologie_, _Studien und Kritiken_, _Theologische
Literaturzeitung_, _Literarisches Centralblatt_) and to Herzog-Hauck,
_Encyklopädie für Protestantische Theologie_.
The _Introduction_ now brought before the English public in Mr. Edie’s
translation is thus the work of one who is, and has long been, actively
engaged in the studies belonging to several parts of the great subject
of the text of the New Testament, and who possesses an exact and
practised knowledge of the words of the sacred books of Christianity.
The present manual accordingly shows the instruments of criticism in
actual operation in the hands of a master. It was meant originally for
the _Göschen-Sammlung_, a collection of small manuals for the general
public, and arose out of the wish of the author to tell his pupils with
whom he read the Greek Testament, as well as others, more about the
history of the New Testament text than was at the time generally
accessible. The handbook was brought out by the theological publishers
Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, literary references being then added to fit it
for use by students of theology. It met with a warm welcome from such
readers, and the second edition was largely recast so as to meet still
further the purposes of students. The long experience of Professor
Nestle as a teacher of younger pupils has no doubt enabled him to
present the subject so clearly that his book may find favour in the eyes
of the general reader, and commend itself to all who care for the New
Testament.
The absence of theological bias will not be thought by any wise judge a
disadvantage in a work of this character. It will be observed that
Professor Nestle does not regard the texts recently formed by great
scholars as constituting, either singly or jointly, a _Textus Receptus_
in view of which textual enquiry may now desist from its labours, but
that he believes that much is still to be learned about the text both of
the Gospels and of the other books of the New Testament.
This translation, as the title-page indicates, has been made from the
second, enlarged, edition, and the author has kindly furnished various
corrections and additions, bringing the book in its English form up to
date. Some additional references to English books and periodicals have
been inserted by the translator.
A. M.
Footnote 1:
See the Dedication to Dr. Nestle of Professor Swete’s _Introduction to
the Old Testament in Greek_, just published.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
=History of the Printed Text since 1514=, ...... 1-27
Complutensian Polyglot—Aldus—Erasmus—Collections of
editions—Literature—First critical edition: Colinaeus—Stephen—Verse
division—Beza—Polyglots: Antwerp: Paris: London—Elzevir—_Textus
Receptus_—Critical attempts: Caryophilus: Courcelles: Saubert:
Simon—Mill—Toinard—Bentley—Gerhard von
Maestricht—Bengel—Wettstein—Griesbach—
Matthaei—Birch—Moldenhauer—Adler—Scholz—Lachmann—
Tischendorf—Tregelles—Westcott and Hort: their types of
text—Weymouth—B. Weiss—von Gebhardt—Stuttgart New
Testament—Schjøtt—Baljon—Catholic editions: Gratz—van
Ess—Gehringer—Patricius—Jaumann—Reithmayer—Hetzenauer—Brandscheid—Apocrypha
and Pseudepigrapha.
CHAPTER II.
=Materials of the Textual Criticism of the New Testament=, ...... 28-155
Autographs—Manuscripts—Versions—Quotations—Number of Manuscripts—Uncial
and Cursive Script—Age—Material—_Scriptio continua_—
Accentuation—Stichometry—Palimpsests—Punctuation—Size—
Contents—Lectionaries—Parchment—Ink—Papyrus—Paper—Pen—Manuscripts de
luxe—Illustration—Uncials: of the whole New Testament: of the Gospels:
of the Acts and Catholic Epistles: of the Pauline Epistles: of the
Apocalypse—Minuscules—Ferrar Group—Lectionaries—Versions: Syriac:
Peshitto: Curetonian: Lewis: Tatian: Philoxenian: Harklean: Gwynn:
Jerusalem: Literature of Syriac Versions—Latin Versions: Old Latin
manuscripts: Fathers: The Vulgate: Jerome: Alcuin: Theodulf: Harding:
Correctoria Bibliorum: Mazarin Bible: Sixtine and Clementine
Vulgate—Egyptian Versions: Bohairic: Sahidic: Middle
Egyptian—Gothic—Ethiopic—Armenian—Georgian—Arabic—Patristic Quotations.
CHAPTER III.
=Theory and Praxis of the Textual Criticism of the New Testament=,
...... 156-246
Task and method—Internal criticism—Conjecture—Eclectic
method—Genealogical method—External testimony—Lucian: his relation to
the Peshitto—Hesychius: Codex B—Eusebius: Pamphilus: Origen: Euthalius:
Evagrius: Athos manuscript—Later revisers—Pre-Origenic texts—Heretics:
Artemonites, Marcosians, Basilides, Noetus, Valentinians, Gnostics,
Marcionites, Arians—Marcion: his relation to the Western text—Tatian:
question as to a Greek Harmony: his relation to the Western text—The
Western text: theory of Blass: the Lucan writings in Codex Bezae:
conclusion of Luke’s Gospel: the Apostolic Decree—Rules of Textual
criticism: sources of error: illegibility: homoioteleuton: transposition
of letters and words: itacism: substitution of synonymous terms:
additions: conscious alterations: stylistic, liturgic, and dogmatic
changes: critical canons: proper names: textus brevior—Conclusion.
=Critical Notes on Various Passages of the New Testament=, ......
247-335
=Appendix I. List of Greek and Latin Writers=, ...... 336
=Appendix II. List of Passages referring to= ἀντιγραφα, ...... 340
=Index of Subjects=, ...... 343
=Index of New Testament Passages referred to=, ...... 350
ABBREVIATIONS.
The symbols used to indicate the various manuscripts and versions will
be found in the chapter on Materials. The student will compare the Notes
in Tischendorf’s _Edito octava minor_ and the Index in the _Octava
maior_, vol. iii. The following contractions are employed in the course
of this work:—
_GGA._ = Göttinger gelehrte Anzeigen.
_GK._ = Zahn’s _Geschichte des neutestamentlichen Kanons_. See p.
196 n. 2.
_LCbl._ = Literarisches Centralblatt.
PRE. = Protestantische Real-Encyklopädie. See p. 7.
_ThLbl._ = Theologisches Literaturblatt.
_ThLz._ = Theologische Literaturzeitung.
_ThStKr._ = Theologische Studien und Kritiken.
_TiGr._ = Tischendorf’s _N.T. Graece_, _editio octava maior_, vol.
iii. See p. 6.
_TU._ = Texte und Untersuchungen.
_Urt._ = Urtext und Uebersetzungen der Bibel. See p. 6.
W-H. = Westcott and Hort. See p. 21.
W-W. = Wordsworth and White. See pp. 123, 131.
_ZdmG._ = Zeitschrift der morgenländischen Gesellschaft.
_ZfdPhil._ = Zeitschrift für deutsche Philologie.
_ZfwTh._ = Zeitschrift für wissenschaftliche Theologie.
ADDENDA.
_Page 6._ To the Literature add: Rüegg, _Die neutestamentliche
Textkritik seit Lachmann_, Zurich, 1892.
_Page 74._ Two fragments of N.T. text have been published by Grenfell
and Hunt in _The Amherst Papyri, Part I.: The Ascension of Isaiah and
other theological fragments_ (London, 1900). The first consists of
Hebrews i. 1, written, along with Genesis i. 1, in a small uncial hand
of the late third, or more probably early fourth, century at the top of
a _papyrus_ leaf containing a letter from Rome. The verse from the N.T.
exhibits the reading τοῖς πατράσιν ἡμῶν, which is not found in any of
the manuscripts. The other fragment consists of Acts ii. 11-22 with
lacunae, written on vellum and dating apparently from about the fifth or
sixth century. It contains a few singular readings such as: (verse 12)
πρὸς τὸν ἄλλον; (13) ἐχλεύαζον λέγοντες, which is practically the
reading of D, the only difference being that D has the compound verb
διεχλεύαζον; (14) γνωστὸν ὑμῖν, apparently; (17) μετὰ ταῦτα with B
instead of ἐν ταῖς ἐσχάταις ἡμέραις, and also, apparently, ἐνύπνια with
the _textus receptus_; (20) πρὶν ἢ with the _textus receptus_; (21) ὃς
ἂν with the _textus receptus_.
_Page 91._ Add: J. R. Harris, _Further Researches into the History of
the Ferrar Group_, 1900.
_Page 106 (5)._ Add: Hilgenfeld, _Thomas von Heraklea und die
Apostelgeschichte_, in the _ZfwTh._, 1900, 3.
_Page 137._ Add: Forbes Robinson, _Coptic Apocryphal Gospels_, in _Texts
and Studies_, iv. 2, 1896.
_Page 139._ To Kauffmann’s _Beiträge_ must now be added: v. _Der codex
Brixianus_ (_ZfdPhil._ xxxii. pp. 305-335). In this important
contribution Kauffmann corroborates the view expressed by Burkitt in the
_Journal of Theological Studies_, i. pp. 129-134, that Wordsworth and
White were mistaken in regarding the text of codex Brixianus (f) as a
recension of the Old Latin closely allied to Jerome’s revision. Burkitt
holds that the text of Brixianus was corrected from the Vulgate, and
afterwards altered in conformity with the Gothic. The only difference
between Burkitt and Kauffmann is that the latter believes that the text
of Brixianus was derived from an earlier Latin manuscript which had been
altered in conformity with the Gothic, and that it was _afterwards_
assimilated to the Vulgate. This view must also be noted in connection
with the Old Latin codex gue (see p. 118). For an example of the
connection between Brixianus and the Gothic see the note to p. 289,
below.
_Page 162._ Add: (9) John, Luke, Matthew, Mark, in cod. min. 90. _Page
289._ John vii. 15. For Ἰουδαῖοι f here reads _turbae_, which is
interesting as agreeing with the Gothic, which has _manageius_. Compare
the view of Burkitt and Kauffmann in the note to p. 139 above. The
variant is not mentioned in Tischendorf.
CHAPTER I.
HISTORY OF THE PRINTED TEXT SINCE 1514.
[Transcriber’s Note: Throughout this book, superscripts and subscripts
are used for various purposes. Superscripts after the titles of books
indicate edition numbers. Superscripts after the symbols for manuscript
groups are used to name members of the group. Subscripts are also used
for distinguishing documents.
In this text version, superscripts are indicated with the caret symbol:
^. A single-character superscript will be shown as text^1; a
multiple-character superscript will be wrapped in brackets: text^{1, 2},
text^{abc}. Subscripts are indicated with the underscore, followed by
the subscript text wrapped in brackets: text_{1}.
The asterisk, *, is often used as part of the name of a manuscript.
There are also some instances of characters printed, one on top of the
other. In this e-book they are rendered A/B, with A on top and B on the
bottom.]
It is not quite creditable to Christian scholarship at the close of the
Middle Ages that not a single printed edition of the Greek New Testament
appeared during the course of the fifteenth century. The Jews printed
their Hebrew Psalter as early as 1477, and the entire Hebrew Bible in
1488.
[Sidenote: Editio princeps.
Complutensian Polyglot.]
1. The honour of producing the first edition belongs to the Spanish
Cardinal Francis XIMENES de Cisneros (1437-1517). It was included in the
so-called _Complutensian Polyglot_, which takes its name from Complutum
(now Alcalà de Henares), where it was printed. The plan of the work was
conceived as early as 1502, in celebration of the birth of the future
Emperor Charles V. The scholar who had the principal part in it was
James Lopez de Stunica. The printing of the New Testament was completed
on the 10th January 1514, and of the remaining five volumes, comprising
the Old Testament with Grammar and Lexicon, on the 10th July 1517. On
the 8th November of the same year the Cardinal died. It was not,
however, till the 22nd March 1520 that Pope Leo X. sanctioned the
publication of the work, the two Vatican manuscripts of the Greek Old
Testament, which had been borrowed in the first year of Leo’s papacy,
having been returned on the 9th July 1519.[2] On the 5th December 1521,
the presentation copy designed for the Pope, printed on parchment and
bound in red velvet, was placed in the Vatican Library. No copies seem
to have reached Germany through the trade till the year 1522. Only 600
copies were printed, which were sold at 6-½ ducats per copy—about £3 of
our present English money. The Cardinal, who enjoyed the income of a
king but was content to live like a monk, expended over 50,000 ducats on
the undertaking. At the present time, copies of the Complutensian
Polyglot, especially those printed on parchment, are counted among the
rarest treasures of libraries. The Old Testament is printed in three
columns, the Latin text of the Bible used in the Church of the Middle
Ages standing between the original Hebrew text of the Synagogue and the
Alexandrian Greek version, “like Jesus between the two thieves.” The New
Testament has only two columns, that on the left containing the Greek
text, that on the right the Latin version. For the sake of those
learning Greek the corresponding words in each are indicated. The type
is modelled on the characters found in good manuscripts. Of accents, the
acute alone is used to mark the tone syllable.
LITERATURE.—Scrivener, _Introduction_, ii. c. 7; Hoskier (see below,
p. 5); Frz. Delitzsch, _Studien zur Entstehungsgeschichte der
Polyglottenbibel des Cardinals Ximenes_, Leipzig, 1871;
_Fortgesetzte Studien_, 1886; _Urtext und Uebersetzungen der Bibel_,
p. 64. A facsimile of the title-page and colophon will be found in
Schaff’s _Companion to the Greek Testament and the English Version_.
The decree of Pope Leo X. is printed in the Greek and Latin
Testament of Van Ess, Tübingen, 1827.
Previous to Ximenes, however, the famous Venetian printer Aldus Manutius
had conceived the idea of such a Polyglot. In the Preface to his undated
Greek Psalter (_circa_ 1497), a triglot Bible was promised. Of this he
was reminded from London by Grocyn on the 6th October 1499. On the 9th
July 1501 he wrote about it to the German humanist Conrad Celtes, to
whom he sent the first specimen page on the 3rd September of the same
year. (Facsimile in Renouard, _L’Imprimerie des Aldes_^{2, 3}.)
Still earlier, the Magnificat and the Benedictus[3] had been printed
among the hymns at the end of the Greek Psalter (Milan, 1481; Venice,
1486). These were the first portions of the Greek New Testament to be
printed, while the first printed in Germany appeared at Erfurt in
1501-2. The first edition of the Greek New Testament for sale was
Erasmus’s edition of 1516.
LITERATURE.—On Aldus, see Nestle, _Septuagintastudien_, i. 2; ii.
11. On Aldus’s well-known device, the anchor and dolphin, see Léon
Dorez, _Études Aldines_, Revue des bibliothèques, vi. (1896), part
5-6, p. 143 ff.; part 7-9; also J. R. Harris, _The Homeric
Centones_, London, 1898, p. 24. The device is emblematic of the
favourite motto of Augustus and Titus, ἀεὶ σπεῦδε βραδέως, Semper
festina lente.
[Sidenote: Erasmus, 1516.]
2. Froben, the printer of Basel, was anxious to forestall the costly
edition of the Spanish Cardinal, and with this object appealed on the
15th March 1515 to the famous humanist Desiderius ERASMUS (1467-1536),
then in England. His edition appeared as early as the 1st March 1516,
and was dedicated on the 1st February to Pope Leo. The printing was
begun in the previous September, and was partly superintended by
Zwingli’s friend, John Oecolampadius of Weinsberg. Erasmus himself
confessed afterwards that his New Testament was “præcipitatum verius
quam editum,” though he boasted that he had employed in its preparation
not any sort of manuscripts, but the oldest and most correct copies.[4]
As early as 1734, J. A. Bengel recognised that in the Apocalypse Erasmus
must have used only one manuscript, and that partly mutilated, so that
he was unable to read it correctly and was obliged to supply its lacunæ
by means of a retranslation from the Latin into Greek. And this
conclusion was confirmed in 1861 by the rediscovery of that very
manuscript by Franz Delitzsch in the Oettingen-Wallerstein Library at
Mayhingen.[5]
In a parallel column Erasmus gave a translation of the Greek into
elegant Latin. The Emperor protected the edition for four years by
copyright, but as early as February 1518 it was reprinted by Aldus
Manutius in his Greek Bible. It was sanctioned by the Pope on the 10th
September 1518. Four successive editions were afterwards prepared by
Erasmus: the second in 1519, the third in 1522, the fourth (improved) in
1527, and the fifth in 1535.
In his third edition, Erasmus for the first time incorporated the
well-known “comma Johanneum,” the passage about the Three Witnesses (1
John v. 7). He did so on the evidence of a manuscript now in Dublin
(Montfortianus, 61), in which the passage had probably been inserted
from the Vulgate by the English Franciscan monk Roy. From the Vulgate it
had already been received, in a slightly different form, into the
Complutensian Polyglot. Luther himself purposely omitted it from his
version. The first edition of his translation to contain it was that
printed at Frankfurt by Feyerabend in 1576. It was not inserted in the
Wittenberg editions till 1596. After 1534 no Greek edition appeared
without it for the space of 200 years.
LITERATURE.—Scrivener, vol. ii. p. 182 ff.; Frz. Delitzsch,
_Handschriftliche Funde_, i., Leipzig, 1861; H. C. Hoskier, _A full
Account and Collation of the Greek Cursive Codex Evangelium 604 ...
together with ten Appendices containing ..._ (B) _... the various
readings by the five editions of Erasmus_, 1516, 1519, 1522, 1527,
1535.... (F) _Report of a Visit to the Public Library at Bâle, with
facsimile of Erasmus’s second MS. Evan. 2_, ... London, 1890. On
Erasmus’s supplementary matter, the New Version, Annotationes,
Paraclesis ad lectorem, Methodus and Apologia, as also on the entire
practical and reforming aim of his N.T., see R. Stähelin in the
_Protestantische Real-Encyklopädie_, third edition, v. 438. Froude,
_Life and Letters of Erasmus_, p. 126 ff.
[Sidenote: Collections of editions.]
3. The number of editions of the Greek New Testament which have been
brought out since the time of Ximenes is about 1000. No library in the
world contains them all. In the last century the Danish Pastor Lorck
possessed perhaps the largest private collection of Bibles. This was
purchased by Duke Charles of Württemberg, and has found a place in the
Royal Public Library at Stuttgart. Unfortunately, it is not possible to
supplement or enlarge it in the way that it deserves. The largest
collection of the present century is that of the late Prof. Ed. Reuss of
Strassburg. In his descriptive catalogue he established the genealogy of
the separate editions by a collation of the readings in 1000 selected
passages. Several editions he was unable to obtain: some he was obliged
to regard as of doubtful existence: others, again, mistakenly quoted by
previous collectors, he was able to discard once for all. His labours
form the basis of those further researches prosecuted with much ardour
chiefly in England and America: in the latter by the German-Swiss
scholar Philip Schaff (d. 20th Oct. 1893), and his American friend I. H.
Hall (d. 1896), in England by F. H. A. Scrivener (d. 26th Oct. 1891),
and in Germany by the American C. R. Gregory. Mention can be made of
only a few of these printed editions.
LITERATURE.—Ed. Reuss, _Bibliotheca Novi Testamenti Graeci, cuius
editiones ab initio typographiae ad nostram aetatem impressas
quotquot reperiri potuerunt collegit digessit illustravit E. R.
Argentoratensis_, Brunsvigae, 1872. Tischendorf, _Novum Testamentum
Graece ad antiquissimos testes denuo recensuit apparatum criticum
apposuit Constantinus de Tischendorf_, Lipsiae (Hinrichs), vol. i.
1869; vol. ii. 1872; vol. iii., _Prolegomena scripsit Caspar Renatus
Gregory additis curis Ezrae Abbot_, 1894, 8vo. (vol. iii. cited in
the following part of this work under the symbol _TiGr._). F. H. A.
Scrivener, _A Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New
Testament_. Fourth edition, edited by Ed. Miller, 2 vols., London,
1894. P. Schaff, _Companion to the Greek Testament and the English
Version_. Fourth edition revised, New York, Harper, 1892. Schaff’s
_Companion_ gives, in an Appendix, Reuss’s list of printed editions
of the Greek N.T., with additions bringing it down to 1887, by I. H.
Hall. It also contains an interesting set of facsimile illustrations
of twenty-one standard editions of the Greek N.T., showing in each
case the title-page and a page of the print. I. H. Hall, _A Critical
Bibliography of the Greek New Testament, as published in America_,
Philadelphia, 1883. Also, by the same author, _Some Remarkable Greek
New Testaments_, in the Journal of the Society of Biblical
Literature and Exegesis, Dec. 1886, 40-63. S. P. Tregelles, _Account
of the Printed Text of the Greek New Testament with remarks on its
revision and a collation of the critical texts with that in common
use_, 1854. Copinger, _The Bible and its Transmission, being an
historical and bibliographical view of the Hebrew and Greek Texts,
and the Greek, Latin, and other Versions of the Bible (both
manuscript and printed) prior to the Reformation. With 28
facsimiles._ London, Sotheran, 1897, large 8vo. H. J. Holtzmann,
_Einleitung in das Neue Testament_ (_Allgemeiner Teil_, _Geschichte
des Textes_), Freiburg, 1886. _Urtext und Uebersetzungen der Bibel
in übersichtlicher Darstellung_, a reprint of the article “Bibeltext
und Bibelübersetzungen,” in the third edition of the
Real-Encyklopädie für protestantische Theologie und Kirche, Leipzig,
Hinrichs, 1897, pp. 15-61 (Tischendorf), O. v. Gebhardt, “_Bibeltext
des Neuen Testamentes_,” PRE, ii. 728-773 (cited hereafter as
_Urt._). C. R. Gregory, _Textkritik des Neuen Testamentes_, vol. i.
Leipzig, 1900. Vol. ii. in the press.
[Sidenote: First critical edition.]
4. The first to prepare a really critical edition of the Greek New
Testament, _i.e._ one based on a collation of manuscripts, was Simon de
Colines (COLINAEUS), the father-in-law of the Parisian printer Robert
Stephen (Estienne). In his edition^1, which appeared in 1534, he adopted
for the first time a number of readings that are now generally accepted,
though naturally he did not succeed in gaining credit for them. Up till
the time of Mill and Bengel the publishers and their more or less
uncritical coadjutors simply reprinted the text of Ximenes and Erasmus,
mostly the latter, with trifling variations.
Among the innovations introduced by these editors was the choice of a
more convenient form. The first editions were all in folio. But in 1521,
Anselm, then in Hagenau but previously in Tübingen, reduced the size to
quarto; in 1524 Cephaleus in Strassburg still further to octavo; while
Valder printed the first miniature edition in Basel in 1536. The
smallest edition printed previous to this century is that of Jannon,
1628 (Sedan); the smallest of this century is that of Pickering, 1828
(London).
But a much more important feature was the collation of fresh
manuscripts. The credit of being pioneer in this respect rests with the
Parisian Typographer-Royal, Robert STEPHEN (1503-1559). [Sidenote:
Stephen.] He was assisted by his son Henry Stephen (1528-1598),
particularly in the preparation of his third edition of 1550, the
_Editio Regia_, which takes its name from the inscription on its
title-page in honour of Henry II., Βασιλεῖ τ’ ἀγαθῷ, κρατερῷ τ’
αἰχμητῇ.[6] The first edition, called _O mirificam_, from the opening
words of its preface, appeared in 1546. The Editio Regia was the first
to contain a critical apparatus in which fifteen manuscripts indicated
by the Greek letters β—ιϛ were collated with the text of the
Complutensian which was designated α. All the manuscripts employed were
of late date, with two exceptions, viz., the Codex Bezae, of which we
shall have a good deal to say in the sequel, and a Parisian MS. of the
eighth century, now known as L.
[Sidenote: Verse division.]
An important innovation of another sort is due to the same Robert
Stephen, who printed at Geneva in the following year (1551) a fourth
edition containing the Greek text with the Latin version of Erasmus on
the outer side and the Vulgate on the inner.[7] With a view to carrying
out this arrangement conveniently, he divided the text into separate
verses or very small sections, which he numbered on the margin. In this
way he introduced into the New Testament not only a convenient
verse-enumeration—there are 7959 verses in all—but also the unfortunate
practice of printing the text in separate verses. Mill in 1707, and
notably Bengel in 1734, were the first to revert to the practice of
printing the text in paragraphs divided according to the sense while
retaining the enumeration of the verses in the margin. [Sidenote:
Chapters.] The customary division of the New Testament books into
chapters is much earlier, having been first invented in Paris for the
Latin Bible by Stephen Langton (died Archbishop of Canterbury in 1228),
and at once adopted in the earliest printed editions of the Vulgate. It
was employed in the Complutensian Polyglot with a subdivision of the
various chapters into A B C etc.
LITERATURE.—_Nov. Test. textus Stephanici_ A.D. 1550, _ed._
Scrivener, Camb., 1859, 1871 etc. Hoskier (as above) ... (B) _A
Reprint with corrections of Scrivener’s list of differences between
the editions of Stephen 1550 and Elzevir 1624, Beza 1565 and the
Complutensian, together with fresh evidence ... by the other
editions of Stephen of 1546, 1549, 1551...._ Ezra Abbot, _De
Versibus_, in _TiGr._ 167-182. I. H. Hall, _Modern Chapters and
Verses_, in Schaff’s _Religious Encyclopædia_, i. 433. _Journal of
the Soc. of Bib. Lit. and Exeg._, 1883, 60; 1891, 65.
It is frequently stated that copies exist of Stephen’s edition of 1551
(the first to contain the verse enumeration) bearing on the title-page
the date MDXLI. In the two I examined belonging to the collections of
Lorck and Reuss, the two halves of the number MD and LI are far apart.
In the case of the Lorck copy it is possible to suppose that a letter
has been erased from the middle, but not in the Reuss copy. In his
Preface, Stephen says: “Quod autem per quosdam ut vocant versiculos opus
distinximus, id, vetustissima Graeca Latinaque ipsius Novi Testamenti
exemplaria secuti, fecimus: eo autem libentius ea sumus imitati, quod
hac ratione utraque translatio posset omnino eregione Graeco contextui
respondere.” As Ezra Abbot pointed out, Stephen gave a double number
19/20 to the verse Τινὲς δὲ ... πρὸς μέ in Acts xxiv. A similar double
enumeration occurs in the previous chapter, where the verse Γράψας ...
χαίρειν is numbered 25/26. Accordingly, Abbot’s supposition becomes
pretty certain, that the verse division was originally made for a Latin
copy which, at the passage in Acts xxiv., contained the additional
sentence: Et apprehenderunt me clamantes et dicentes, Tolle inimicum
nostrum. And in chapter xxiii. several Latin editions show an extra
sentence at the place marked with the double number: et ipse postea
calumniam sustineret tanquam accepturus pecuniam. But what edition it
was from which Stephen took the enumeration into his Greek copy is not
yet known. Unfortunately, as Abbot shows (_l.c._ 173-182), later
editions frequently deviated from Stephen’s enumeration. Even Oscar v.
Gebhardt, in his editions of Tischendorf’s text, followed in eight
instances a different verse division from that recommended by Gregory in
his Emendanda (p. 1251 ff.).
Several mistakes in numbering crept into the Stuttgart edition of the
N.T., but the division and enumeration have been carefully compared with
that of the Reuss copy for the second edition. There are differences in
verse-division even in the reprint of Westcott and Hort’s Greek
Testament (Macmillan fount, 1895), Heb. xii. 22, 23: in Swete’s _Gospel
of St. Mark_ (Mk. ii. 18, 19), and in Cronin’s edition of _Codex
Purpureus Petropolitanus_ (Lk. iii. 23, 24, ix. 7, 8.)
The Textus Receptus is usually indicated by the Greek letter ϛ, the
initial of Stephen’s name.
[Sidenote: Beza.]
Following Stephen, the French theologian Theodore de Bèze (BEZA
1519-1605), the friend and successor of Calvin in Geneva, prepared,
between 1565 and 1611, four folio and six octavo editions,[8] which are
noteworthy as forming, with the last two editions of Stephen, the basis
of the English Authorised Version. Beza was the owner of two valuable
Greek-Latin manuscripts of the Gospels with the Acts and Pauline
Epistles, one of which, the now so famous Codex Bezae, he presented to
the University of Cambridge in 1581. He himself, however, made little
use of these in his editions, as they deviated too far from the printed
texts of the time. Beza seems also, in the preparation of his Geneva
edition, to have been the first to collate the oriental versions. For
this purpose he employed the Syriac edition of Emmanuel Tremellius
(1569), and for Acts and 1 and 2 Corinthians the Arabic version put at
his disposal by Franciscus Junius.
LITERATURE.—Scrivener, ii. 188 ff.; Hoskier (as above): _the various
readings ... by the remaining three Bezan editions in folio of 1582,
1588-9, 1598, and the 8vo. editions of 1565, 1567, 1580, 1590,
1604_.
[Sidenote: Polyglots.
1. Antwerp.]
5. The credit of presenting these oriental versions in a convenient
combination for the interpretation of the Bible belongs to the so-called
_Antwerp Polyglot_, the Biblia Regia, printed in eight folio volumes
between 1569 and 1572 by Christopher Plantin, a French printer residing
in Antwerp. In this work the Greek New Testament is printed twice, first
in vol. v., alongside the Vulgate and the Syriac text with its Latin
translation, and again in vol. vi. with the interlinear version of Arias
Montanus. Plantin was aided in this enterprise by a grant of 12,000
ducats from King Philip II. It was carried out under the supervision of
the Spanish theologian Benedict Arias, called Montanus from his
birth-place Frexenal de la Sierra.
“Labore et Constantia” was the motto of this celebrated family of
printers, who continued to carry on their trade on the same premises
till August 1867. Nine years later the house was sold to the city
and converted into the “Musée Plantin.”
Of the Antwerp Polyglot 960 ordinary copies were printed, 200 of a
better quality, 30 fine, 10 superfine, and 13 on parchment, for which
last 16,263 skins were used. One of these Montaigne saw and admired in
the Vatican Library; another, the copy dedicated to the Archduke Alba,
is in the possession of the British Museum. The undertaking was the
glory of Plantin’s life, but it was also the beginning of his financial
difficulties. Copies were sold to book-sellers at 60 gulden each, and to
the public at 70 gulden (about £6 and £7). Ordinary copies now fetch
from £6 to £7 or £8. At the sale of the Ashburnham Collection in 1897 a
parchment copy realised £79. The supplements, including lexical and
other matter, are still valuable to a certain extent. But here the
collector must note that certain parts have been reprinted.
On the Polyglots, see: _Discours historique sur les principales éditions
des Bibles Polyglottes. Par l’Auteur de la Bibliothèque Sacrée_, Paris,
1713; especially pp. 301-554, “Pièces justificatives du discours
précédent.” Also, Ed. Reuss, _Polyglottenbibeln_, PRE^2, xii. 95-103
(1883). Max Rooses, _Christophe Plantin, Imprimeur Anversois_, Antwerp,
1884. Fol. 100 plates. Also _Correspondance de Plantin_, edited by
Rooses. 2 vols. 1886. L. Degeorge, _La Maison Plantin à Anvers_. 3rd ed.
Paris, 1886. R. Lorck, _Das Plantin-Haus in Antwerpen_. Vom Fels zum
Meer, 1888-9, ix. 328-346. On the double imprint see Rooses, p. 123; A.
Rahlfs in Lagarde’s Bibliotheca Syriaca, p. 19. On Plantin’s connection
with the Familists see PRE^3, v. 751-755.
[Sidenote: 2. Parisian.]
A still more extensive undertaking than the Antwerp Polyglot is that
brought out in Paris by the advocate Guy Michel LE JAY. This _Parisian
Polyglot_ extends to ten folio volumes of the largest size, furnished
externally in the most sumptuous manner. Le Jay expended his whole
fortune on the edition, and was obliged at last to sell it as waste
paper, being too proud to accept the offer of Cardinal Richelieu, who
wished to purchase the patronage of the enterprise for a large sum and
thereby acquire the credit of it. The scholars who gave most assistance
in the preparation of the oriental texts were Jean Morin and the
Maronite Gabriel Sionita, the latter of whom superintended the Syriac
portion. The two volumes of the New Testament, viz. vol. v. 1,
comprising the Gospels, and vol. v. 2, the Acts, Epistles, and
Apocalypse, appeared in 1630 and 1633. In addition to the texts printed
in the Antwerp Polyglot, the Parisian contained a Syriac version of the
so-called Antilegomena, _i.e._ those parts of the New Testament at one
time disputed (2 Peter, 2 and 3 John, Jude, and Apocalypse), and it had
also an Arabic version, each one being accompanied with a Latin
translation.[9]
[Sidenote: 3. London.]
Less sumptuous, but more copious, convenient, and critically valuable,
is the last, and at the present day still most used of the four great
Polyglots—the _London Polyglot_ of Brian WALTON (1600-1661). It contains
in all nine languages. In the New Testament (vol. v.) there is the Greek
text of Stephen with slight alterations, the version of Arias, the
Vulgate, Syriac, Ethiopic, Arabic, and (for the Gospels only) Persic
versions, each with a literal translation into Latin. The sixth volume
also contains Walton’s Apparatus, which was re-issued at Leipzig in
1777, and again at Cambridge by F. Wrangham in two volumes in 1828. It
is really a kind of Introduction to Biblical Criticism. Finally, in two
supplementary parts, there is Edmund Castle’s _Lexicon Heptaglotton_, a
thesaurus linguae semiticae such as no one since has ventured to
undertake.
The London Polyglot first appeared in 1657, under the patronage of
Cromwell, but after the Restoration it received a new Preface from
the editor, who was raised to the See of Chester by Charles II. In
this Preface Cromwell is styled “Magnus Draco ille.” Accordingly,
bibliophiles draw a sharp line of distinction between republican and
loyalist copies. One of the former costs considerably more than the
latter, the most recent prices running from £22 to £31. This is said
to have been the first work brought out in England by subscription.
See Schaff’s “_Companion_” for facsimiles of title-page and page of
text. Todd: _Life of Brian Walton with the Bishop’s Vindication of
the London Polyglot Bible_. London, 1821. 2 vols.
For this Polyglot, in addition to the critical works of previous
scholars, the Codex Alexandrinus of the Greek Bible, sent by Cyril Lucar
to Charles I. in 1628, was also employed for the first time. Its
readings are set at the foot of the Greek text and indicated by the
letter A. This was the origin of the modern custom of indicating
manuscripts with Roman letters in the apparatus of critical editions not
only of the New Testament but of other books as well, a custom which has
generally prevailed since the time of Wettstein. That gift of Cyril
Lucar seems really to have awakened for the first time a general desire
for critical editions. At the same time it was Walton’s edition that
made Stephen’s text of 1550 the “textus receptus” in England.
[Sidenote: Elzevir.]
6. On the Continent a similar result was attained by the enterprising
Dutch printers Bonaventura and Abraham ELZEVIR of Leyden. What scholars
had a hand in their edition, if we may speak of scholars at all in this
connection, is not known. In 1624 the Elzevirs published, in a handy
form and beautifully printed, an edition the text of which was taken
mainly from Beza’s octavo edition of 1565. In their Preface to a new
issue in 1633 they said “textum ergo habes nunc ab omnibus receptum, in
quo nihil immutatum aut corruptum damus,” while they professed that even
the smallest errors—“vel minutissimae mendae”—had been eliminated with
judgment and care. By means of this catchword they actually succeeded in
making their text the most widely disseminated of all during 200 years.
The English Bible Society alone have issued not fewer than 351,495
copies of it in the 90 years of their existence, and at the present time
are still printing this text alone. They issued 12,200 copies of it in
the year 1894. For several centuries, therefore, thousands of Christian
scholars have contented themselves with a text based ultimately on two
or three late manuscripts lying at the command of the first
editors—Stephen, Erasmus, and Ximenes—a text, moreover, in which the
erroneous readings of Erasmus, already referred to, are retained to this
day.
LITERATURE.—Scrivener, ii. 193. Hoskier ... (C) _a full and exact
comparison of the Elzevir editions of 1624 and 1633, doubling the
number of the real variants hitherto known, and exhibiting the
support given in the one case and in the other by the subsequent
editions of 1641, 1656, 1662, 1670, and 1678_. On the Elzevirs see
G. Berghman, _Nouvelles Études sur la Bibliographie Elzevirienne.
Supplément à l’ouvrage sur les Elzevier de M. Alphonse Willems_,
Stockholm, 1897. Also, A. de Reume, _Recherches historiques,
généalogiques et bibliographiques sur les Elzevier_, Brussels.
Facsimile of the edition of 1633 in Schaff’s _Companion_.
[Sidenote: Critical attempts.]
7. Even those who were impelled by a greater spirit of research did not
yet get back to the oldest attainable sources. In Rome, CARYOPHILUS set
about preparing a new edition. With this view, about the year 1625 he
collated twenty-two manuscripts with the Antwerp Polyglot—ten for the
Gospels, eight for the Acts and Epistles, and four for the Apocalypse.
Among these were the most celebrated manuscript of the Vatican Library,
the “Codex Vaticanus” _par excellence_, and another of the same
collection, dating from the year 949 (Tischendorf’s S), one of the
oldest manuscripts of the Greek New Testament whose date is known with
certainty. The results of this collator’s labours were printed at Rome
in 1673. But such collations were not then made with that exactitude
which is the primary condition of works of this nature at the present
day, though even now it is not always observed. In 1658 Stefan de
COURCELLES (Curcellaeus, 1586-1659), a native of Geneva, brought out an
edition which was printed by the Elzevirs, and which is valuable for its
scholarly Introduction, its careful collection of parallel passages, and
its fresh collation of manuscripts. In this edition the “Comma
Johanneum” was included in brackets. The editor also expressed the
opinion that even conjectural readings deserve consideration. Courcelles
had further projects in view, but these were interrupted by his death.
In 1672, in Germany, John SAUBERT published a collection of various
readings in St. Matthew’s Gospel which he had compiled from printed
editions, manuscripts, ancient versions, and quotations in the Greek and
Latin Fathers.
In 1675 John FELL, afterwards Bishop of Oxford, published anonymously at
the Sheldonian Theatre, _i.e._ the Oxford University Press, an edition
in the preparation of which more than 100 Greek manuscripts were
employed. Among the ancient versions the Gothic of Ulfilas and the
Coptic were also made use of.
About the same time (1689) there appeared anonymously at Rotterdam a
_Histoire Critique du Texte du Nouveau Testament_, by Richard SIMON, a
member of the French Congregation of the Oratory. Simon is the father of
the historical method of critical introduction to the New Testament.
With his work, what might be called the infancy of New Testament
criticism comes to a close. With Mill’s New Testament begins the period
of its maturity, especially if Simon’s works are taken as belonging to
it. Such, at least, was the judgment expressed in 1777 by the Göttingen
scholar J. D. Michaelis. But we would say rather the period of its
youth, for otherwise we should now have reached the time of its old age,
and much work still remains to be done.
[Sidenote: Mill, 1707.]
8. Encouraged by Bishop Fell, John MILL (1645-1707), about 1677, set to
work upon an edition which appeared in the year of his death.[10] The
value of Mill’s New Testament lies in its extended critical apparatus,
and particularly in its Prolegomena. An enlarged edition was brought out
in 1710 by Ludolf Küster of Westphalia (1670-1716), which, however, had
such a small sale that it had to be reissued with a new title-page at
Leipzig in 1723, and again at Amsterdam in 1746. In Mill’s time the
number of various readings in the New Testament was estimated at 30,000:
a competent estimate will now make them more than four or five times as
many. That is to say, there are almost more variants than words.
Mention must also be made of Nicolaus TOINARD’S Latin-Greek Harmony of
the Gospels, which appeared at Orleans in the same year as Mill’s New
Testament, and which was the fruit of nearly as many years’ labour.
Toinard was the first Catholic after Erasmus, and the last previous to
Scholz, to undertake a critical edition of the New Testament. He was
also the first editor after Beza to estimate properly the critical value
of the Vulgate.
[Sidenote: Bentley.]
It was Edward Wells who set the example of greater freedom in the
adoption into the text of new readings from the manuscripts. His famous
countryman, the great philologist Richard BENTLEY (1662-1742), projected
a great critical edition of the New Testament, but unfortunately got no
further than the preparation of materials and the publication of his
“Proposals” in 1720. He undertook to remove two thousand errors from the
Pope’s Vulgate, and as many from that of the Protestant Pope (Stephen),
without using any manuscript under 900 years old. But as his edition
never appeared, his nephew had to refund the 2000 guineas prepaid by the
subscribers.
In 1729 MACE published an edition anonymously, in which, perhaps, most
courage was shown in departing from the ordinary text. Thereafter,
English work in this department was suspended for nearly a century. It
was transferred to Germany and the Netherlands by the Swabian scholar
Bengel and by Wettstein of Basel.
LITERATURE.—A. A. Ellis, _Bentleii Critica Sacra_, Camb., 1862. R.
C. Jebb, _Bentley_, London, 1882. _TiGr._, 229-240.
Wordsworth-White, I. pp. xv-xxviii (see below, p. 123).
[Sidenote: Bengel.]
9. As early as 1711, G.D.T.M.D., _i.e._ Gerhard de Trajectu Mosae
(Maestricht) Doctor, a Syndic of Bremen, published at Amsterdam an
edition prefaced by 43 canons or rules of criticism. Thereafter, in
1725, J. A. BENGEL (1687-1752) issued his _Prodromus Novi Testamenti
Graeci recte cauteque adornandi_, in which he unfolded a most carefully
thought-out scheme for a new edition, undertaking to reduce all Gerhard
von Maestricht’s 43 canons to one comprehensive rule of four words. That
was the principle now commonly expressed in the shorter but less
satisfactory form—_lectio difficilior placet_. Bengel himself chose a
more careful mode of expression—_proclivi scriptioni praestat ardua_.
Six years later he was able to issue his _Notitia Novi Testamenti Graeci
recte cauteque adornati_. It was published in 1734 at Tübingen by Cotta
in a handsome quarto.[11] In the same year a small octavo edition
appeared at Stuttgart in which he urged the duty expressed in the motto,
Te totum applica ad textum,
Rem totam applica ad te.
Of the latter, four editions were afterwards brought out. Of the large
edition, the Apparatus, pronounced by Haussleiter to be a “memorable
work of most solid and productive learning,” was reprinted separately
after his death. Bengel was too timid. He was unwilling to admit into
the text any reading which had not already appeared in some printed
edition. But he inserted new readings in the margin and classified them.
Out of 149 readings pronounced by Bengel to be genuine, only 20 are not
now generally approved. Out of 118 whose genuineness appeared to him
probable but not quite certain, 83 are now accepted.
But Bengel’s most important contribution to the textual criticism of the
Greek New Testament consists in the sound critical principles which he
laid down. He recognised that the witnesses must not be counted but
weighed, _i.e._ classified, and he was accordingly the first to
distinguish two great groups or families of manuscripts. His principles
were reaffirmed by the celebrated philologist Lachmann, the first great
textual critic of our time, and the advance which the latest English
critics have made on Tischendorf is really due to the fact that they
have gone back to Bengel.
LITERATURE.—Eb. Nestle, _Bengel als Gelehrter, ein Bild für unsere
Tage_. (In Marginalien und Materialien; also printed separately,
Tübingen, 1893.) Scrivener, ii. 204.
[Sidenote: Wettstein.]
For the time, however, Bengel’s rival, John WETTSTEIN (1693-1754),
outdid him. His treatise on the Various Readings of the New Testament
was published as early as 1713, to be followed by his Prolegomena, which
appeared anonymously in 1730, and later by his New Testament,[12] which
was issued in two folio volumes in 1751 and 1752. His Apparatus is
fuller than that of any previous editor, while he also gives a detailed
account of the various manuscripts, versions, and Patristic writers. It
was he who introduced the practice, already referred to, of indicating
the ancient MSS. by Roman letters and the later MSS. by Arabic numerals.
He too, however, still printed the Elzevir text, following Maestricht’s
edition of 1735. At the foot of the text he placed those readings which
he himself held to be correct.
LITERATURE.—Scrivener, _Introduction_, ii. 213; Carl Bertheau,
PRE^2, xvii. 18-24, 1886.
[Sidenote: Griesbach.]
10. J. J. GRIESBACH (1745-1812) was the first in Germany who ventured to
print the text of the New Testament in the form to which his criticism
led him. He was the pupil of Salomo Semler, who had combined the
principles of Bengel and Wettstein. These principles were adopted and
carried out by Griesbach. He enlarged the Apparatus by a more exact use
of citations from the Fathers, particularly from Origen, and of various
versions, such as the Gothic, the Armenian, and the Philoxenian. In his
classification of the witnesses, Griesbach distinguished a Western, an
Alexandrian, and a Byzantine Recension. The edition, in four folio
volumes, printed by Göschen at Leipzig (1803-1807), is rightly described
by Reuss as “editio omnium quae extant speciosissima.”[13] His text was
more or less faithfully followed by many later editors like Schott,
Knapp, Tittmann, and also by Theile.
[Sidenote: Matthaei.]
Griesbach’s opponent, Christian Friedrich MATTHAEI, a Thüringian
(1744-1811), was misled into attributing a too great value to a large
number of manuscripts in Moscow of the third, the Byzantine, class.
A considerable amount of critical material was collected at the expense
of the King of Denmark by Andreas Birch (afterwards Bishop of Lolland,
Falster, and Aarhuus), by D. G. Moldenhauer, and by Adler.
A similar service was rendered, though not with sufficient care, by J.
M. Augustin SCHOLZ, Professor of Catholic Theology in Bonn.
LITERATURE.—On Matthaei see O. v. Gebhardt, _Christian Friedrich
Matthæi und seine Sammlung griechischer Handschriften_, Leipzig,
1898.
[Sidenote: Lachmann.]
It was Carl LACHMANN (1793-1851) who first broke with the Textus
Receptus altogether. He was a master in the domain of textual criticism.
He distinguished himself first in the department of classical and
Teutonic philology, but came afterwards to render equal service to the
textual criticism of the New Testament. His object was to restore the
text to the form in which it had been read in the ancient Church about
the year 380, going on the ground of the oldest known Greek and Latin
manuscripts, _i.e._ the oldest Eastern and Western authorities.[14] He
did not claim to go further back than that date with any certainty. But
it was still open to question whether that were not possible, and
whether the grounds on which Lachmann’s work was based might not be
still further extended and confirmed.
[Sidenote: Tischendorf.]
11. The task which Lachmann set before him was prosecuted with the most
brilliant success in and from Germany by Gottlob (Aenotheus) Friedrich
Constantin von TISCHENDORF (b. 18th January 1815, d. 7th December 1874).
In the course of several tours, first in Europe and afterwards in the
East, from the year 1841 onwards, he discovered and collated a number of
the most important and ancient manuscripts of the Bible. Among these the
most notable was the Codex Sinaiticus, found by him on Mount Sinai in
1859, and now in St. Petersburg, the oldest known manuscript of the
present day which contains the entire Greek New Testament. On the basis
of the material collected by himself and others, Tischendorf prepared
eight different editions between 1841 and 1872.[15] His seventh edition,
consisting of 3500 copies, appeared in 1859, previous to the discovery
of the Sinaiticus. The text of this edition differed from that of 1849
in 1296 instances, of which no fewer than 595 were reversions to the
Textus Receptus. The text of the last edition, the octava critica maior,
which was issued complete in eleven parts between 1864 and 1872,
differed from that of the seventh in 3572 places. The third volume of
the editio octava maior, containing the Prolegomena, was completed in
three parts, extending to 1428 pages, by Caspar René Gregory between
1884 and 1894, a work which affords the most complete survey of what has
been done on the Greek New Testament up to the present time.
LITERATURE.—Scrivener, ii. 235; _TiGr._, 1-22; _Urt._, 49-52. Apart
from the Editio Octava Maior, the most useful editions will be found
to be those of O. v. Gebhardt (see below, p. 23), or the Editio
Academica ad editionem oct. maior. conformata, Leipzig, Mendelssohn,
16mo, 1855, twentieth edition, 1899.
[Sidenote: Tregelles.]
While the editions of Tischendorf were appearing on the Continent, an
edition began to be issued in England, which was completed in the course
of twenty years. It was the work of a Quaker, Samuel Prideaux TREGELLES
(b. 1813, d. 1875), who, while reaping no profit from his undertaking,
has left in it a monument to his fidelity. In this edition
(1857-1879)[16] those passages in which the editor was unable to
pronounce a final judgment from the accessible material are indicated by
the form of the type.
[Sidenote: Westcott and Hort.]
A still more important advance was made by Brooke Foss WESTCOTT (b.
1825), now Bishop of Durham, and Fenton John Anthony HORT (b. 23rd April
1828, d. 30th November 1892). In 1881, these Cambridge scholars, after
nearly thirty years of joint labour, published two volumes, the first
containing the Text with a brief survey of its history and resulting
criticism, the second giving a detailed exposition of their critical
principles by Hort himself. They were led by their investigation to
distinguish four main types of text:—
(1) A late type, originating in Syria about the year 300, which, issuing
from Constantinople, became the prevailing text in later manuscripts,
and corresponds essentially with the textus receptus of early printed
editions:
(2) A type originating in Alexandria, characterized by linguistic
emendations:
(3) A type originating in Syria but reaching the West previous to the
year 200, represented essentially by the Old Latin versions on the one
hand and by the Syriac on the other, and displaying all sorts of
remarkable additions:
(4) The Neutral text, which displays no sort of corruptions.
Westcott and Hort’s work is the latest and most thorough attempt yet
made at a complete edition of the New Testament.
LITERATURE.—_The New Testament in the original Greek. The text
revised by Brooke Foss Westcott, D.D., and Fenton John Anthony Hort,
D.D._, Cambridge and London. Vol. i. Text (Fourth Edition, 1898).
Vol. ii., Introduction and Appendix (Third Edition, 1896). A smaller
edition of the text, 1885. Text, from new type, in larger form,
1895. For “Some trifling Corrections to W.-H.’s New Testament,” see
Nestle in the _Expository Times_, viii. 479; ix. 95, 333, 424. See
_Life and Letters of F. J. A. Hort, by his son, A. F. Hort, 2 vols.,
London, 1896; also article on Hort_, by Gregory in the PRE^3, viii.
368. Facsimile of the American Edition with Introduction by Schaff,
in Schaff’s _Companion_.
[Sidenote: Weymouth.]
The “Resultant Greek Testament” of R. F. WEYMOUTH affords a convenient
comparison of the text of the most important editions.
LITERATURE.—_The Resultant Greek Testament, exhibiting the text in
which the majority of modern editors are agreed, and containing the
readings of Stephen (1550), Lachmann, Tregelles, Tischendorf,
Lightfoot, Ellicott, Alford, Weiss, the Bâle edition (1880),
Westcott and Hort, and the Revision Committee._ By Richard Francis
Weymouth. With an Introduction by the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of
Worcester. London, 1886.... Cheap Edition, 1892, pp. xix. 644.
Besides the editions mentioned in the title, the Complutensian,
Elzevir (1633), Scrivener and others are compared in several places.
[Sidenote: Weiss.]
Quite recently, Bernhard WEISS, of Berlin, began a new and independent
revision of the text, which has been published in three large volumes
with introduction and explanatory notes.
LITERATURE.—_Das Neue Testament. Textkritische Untersuchungen und
Textherstellung von D. Bernhard Weiss. Erster Theil,
Apostelgeschichte: Katholische Briefe: Apocalypse._ Leipzig, 1894.
_Zweiter Theil, Die paulinischen Briefe einschliesslich des
Hebräerbriefs_, 1896. _Dritter Theil, Die vier Evangelien_ 1900.
Vol. i. is compiled from _Texte und Untersuchungen_, ix. 3, 4; viii.
3; vii. 1. The section in vol. ii. entitled _Textkritik der
paulinischen Briefe_, is taken from _TU._ xiv. 3, and the
corresponding section in vol. iii. from _TU._ xix. 2 (New Series,
iv. 2). See “B. Weiss and the New Testament,” by C. R. Gregory in
the _American Journal of Theology_, 1897, i. 16-37.
[Sidenote: Von Gebhardt.]
In Germany, O. von GEBHARDT has done good service by issuing the text of
Tischendorf’s last edition, with the necessary corrections, and giving
in the margin the readings adopted by Tregelles and Westcott-Hort, when
these differ from the text. In the “editio stereotypa minor,” the
differences of Westcott-Hort alone are shown. In his Greek-German New
Testament, he also exhibits at the foot of Luther’s German text those
readings wherein the text of Erasmus’s second edition of 1519, used by
Luther, differs from that of the last edition of Tischendorf. In this
diglot of v. Gebhardt, therefore, one can see at a glance not only how
far the Greek text of the present day differs from that printed at the
beginning of the sixteenth century, but also the amount of agreement
between present-day editors working on such different principles as
Tischendorf and Westcott and Hort. In the Adnotatio Critica found in the
Appendix to the larger edition, there is a brief digest of the critical
Apparatus, but it extends only to those passages where Tischendorf and
Westcott-Hort disagree. The editio minor contains 600 pages. One of
these, p. 501, shows not a single disagreement between these great
editors, while 18 pages exhibit only one variation each, and these, for
the most part, mere grammatical trifles.
LITERATURE.—_Novum Testamentum Graece recensionis Tischendorfianae
ultimae textum cum Tregellesiano et Westcottio-Hortiano contulit et
brevi adnotatione critica additisque locis parallelis illustravit
Oscar de Gebhardt._ Editio stereotypa. Lipsiae (Tauchnitz), 1881.
Seventh edition, 1896.
_N. T. Graece et Germanice._ Leipzig, 1881. Fourth edition, 1896. In
this edition the Greek is that of Tischendorf’s last edition, and
the German is the Revised text of Luther (1870). The various
readings are shown for both texts, and a selection of parallel
passages is also given.
_N. T. Graece ex ultima Tischendorfii recensione edidit Oscar de
Gebhardt._ Editio stereotypa minor. Lipsiae, 16mo., 1887. Fourth
edition, 1898.
[Sidenote: Stuttgart New Testament.]
The text of the Greek and Greek-German New Testaments prepared by me,
and issued by the Württemberg Bible Institute, is based on a comparison
of the three editions of Tischendorf, Westcott-Hort, and Weymouth. The
variations of these editions are shown at the foot of the page, where
are given also the readings inserted by Westcott and Hort in their
Appendix and omitted by O. v. Gebhardt. From Acts onwards, the readings
adopted by Weiss are indicated as well. In a lower margin, a number of
important manuscript readings are given. In the Gospels and Acts, these
are taken mainly, though not exclusively, from Codex Bezae. In the
Greek-German edition, the text (German) is that of the Revised Version
of 1892. Below it are given the readings of Luther’s last edition
(1546), with several of his marginal glosses and earlier renderings.
LITERATURE.—_Novum Testamentum Graece cum apparatu critico ex
editionibus et libris manu scriptis collecto._ Stuttgart, 1898.
Second corrected edition, 1899. Also issued in two and in ten parts,
and interleaved. Third edition in preparation.
[Sidenote: Schjøtt.]
Fr. SCHJØTT published an edition at Copenhagen in 1897 the text of which
was determined by the agreement between the Codex Vaticanus
(Claromontanus, from Heb. ix. 14 onwards) and the Sinaiticus. Where they
disagreed he called in the next oldest manuscript as umpire. For this
purpose he employed for the Gospels the manuscripts A C D E F H I^b K L
P Q T U V X Z Γ Δ, for the Acts and Catholic Epistles A C D E H K L P,
for the Pauline Epistles A C D E F G H L P, and for the Apocalypse A C P
1, 18, 38, 49, 92, 95. At the foot of the text his edition gives, in two
divisions, a comparison with the Elzevir text and with that of
Tischendorf-Gebhardt (1894). From what source Schjøtt derived his
knowledge of the Vaticanus and the Sinaiticus is not mentioned. The
photograph of the former seems not to have been employed.
LITERATURE.—_Novum Testamentum Graece ad fidem testium
vetustissimorum recognovit necnon variantes lectiones ex editionibus
Elzeviriana et Tischendorfiana subjunxit Fr. Schjøtt._ Hauniae,
1897, pp. xi. 562.
[Sidenote: Baljon.]
The edition of J. M. S. BALJON is in the main an abridgment of
Tischendorf’s octava maior. He avails himself, however, of later
discoveries, such as the Sinai-Syriac Palimpsest for the Gospels, and
the Syriac version published by Gwynn for the Apocalypse. In Acts,
Blass’s restoration of the so-called Forma Romana is regularly
indicated. No other edition, for one thing, shows more conveniently
where recent scholars recognise glosses or other interpolations, or
propose transpositions or conjectural emendations and such like. So far,
therefore, it may be commended to those who do not possess an edition
with a more copious critical apparatus. But even Baljon’s New Testament
fails to realise the ideal of a practical edition.
LITERATURE.—_Novum Testamentum Graece praesertim in usum studiosorum
recognovit J. M. S. Baljon_, Groningae, 1898, pp. xxiii. 731. The
first 320 pages are also issued separately as Volumen primum
continens Evangelia Matthaei, Marci, Lucae et Ioannis. _Vide_
Bousset in the _Theologische Rundschau_ for July 1898.
[Sidenote: Catholic editions.]
From the Catholic side little has been done in Germany in this
department of scholarship for a long time. In 1821 Aloys GRATZ reprinted
the Complutensian at Tübingen; while Leander van ESS issued an edition
which combined the Complutensian and Erasmus’s fifth edition.[17] This
also appeared at Tübingen in 1827. Both of these contained the Vulgate,
and showed where recent editions gave a different text.
Reuss mentions two Synopses, one by Joseph GEHRINGER (Tübingen, 1842,
4^o), the other by Fr. X. PATRICIUS (Freiburg, 1853, 4^o), and two small
editions, one of which, by A. JAUMANN (Munich, 1832), was the first to
be printed in Bavaria. The other is by Fr. X. REITHMAYER (Munich, 1847),
and closely follows the text of Lachmann.
There has also appeared recently at Innsbruck a Greek-Latin edition in
two volumes by Michael HETZENAUER, a Capuchin. The first volume contains
the Evangelium and the second the Apostolicum. But as the strict
Catholic is bound by the decision of the Holy Office, Hetzenauer’s
edition hardly falls to be considered here. A resolution of the Holy
Office of 13th January 1897 pronounced even the Comma Johanneum (1 John
v. 7) to be an integral part of the New Testament. This was confirmed by
the Pope on the 15th January, and published in the _Monitore
Ecclesiastico_ of the 28th February of the same year. An edition in
Greek and Latin was issued by BRANDSCHEID at Freiburg in 1893.
It is impossible to enumerate here editions of separate books of the New
Testament. Many of these are in the form of Commentaries. In addition to
the works of Blass, to which reference will be made later, mention may
be made here of a recent and most thorough piece of work—viz., _The
Gospel according to St. Mark: The Greek Text, with Introduction and
Notes_, by Henry Barclay SWETE, D.D., pp. cx. 412 (London, Macmillan,
1898); also of _The Gospel according to St. Luke after the Westcott-Hort
text, edited with parallels, illustrations, various readings, and
notes_, by the Rev. Arthur Wright: London, Macmillan, 1900; and of
Hilgenfeld’s edition of the Acts in Greek and Latin. Berlin, 1899.
[Sidenote: Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha.]
Nor can we enter particularly the field of early Christian Apocrypha and
Pseudepigrapha. Those who cannot obtain Hilgenfeld’s _Novum Testamentum
extra Canonem Receptum_, or Resch’s _Agrapha_, or the editions of
Tischendorf, Lipsius, and Bonnet, will find a handy and inexpensive
selection in my _Supplement_ to Gebhardt’s editions of Tischendorf.
LITERATURE.—_Novi Testamenti Graeci Supplementum editionibus de
Gebhardt-Tischendorfianis adcommodavit Eb. Nestle. Insunt Codicis
Cantabrigiensis Collatio, Evangeliorum deperditorum Fragmenta, Dicta
Salvatoris Agrapha, Alia._ Lipsiae (Tauchnitz), 1896, pp. 96.
There can be no question that in these last mentioned editions which
have been brought out at the end of the nineteenth century, we have a
text corresponding far more closely to the original than that contained
in the first editions of the Greek New Testament issued at the beginning
of the sixteenth century, on which are based the translations into
modern languages used in the Christian churches of Europe at the present
time. It would be a vast mistake, however, to conclude from the textual
agreement displayed in these latest editions, that research in this
department of New Testament study has reached its goal. Just as
explorers, in excavating the ruined temples of Olympia or Delphi, are
able from the fragments they discover to reconstruct the temple, to
their mind’s eye at least, in its ancient glory—albeit it is actually in
ruins—so too, much work remains to be done ere even all the materials
are re-collected, and the plan determined which shall permit us to
restore the Temple of the New Testament Scriptures to its original form.
Footnote 2:
They were reinserted in the library on the 23rd August.
Footnote 3:
Mary’s Hymn, Luke i. 46-55; and Hymn of Zacharias, Luke i. 68-79.
Footnote 4:
“Nec eis sane quibuslibet, sed vetustissimis simul et emendatissimis.”
Footnote 5:
At the present time this text of Erasmus is still disseminated by tens
and even hundreds of thousands by the British and Foreign Bible
Society of London. To this day the word ἀκαθάρτητος is printed in
their editions at Apoc. xvii. 4, though there is no such word in the
Greek language as ἀκαθάρτης, meaning uncleanness. In the concluding
verses of the New Testament, which were retranslated by Erasmus from
his Latin Bible, there stands the lovely future ἀφαιρήσει for ἀφελεῖ.
We find also constructions like οὐκ ἔστι, καίπερ ἐστίν, in c. xvii. 8,
where, however, the accentuation ἐστίν makes Erasmus responsible for
an additional error he did not commit, seeing that he at least printed
ἔστιν. Every college lad knows that καίπερ is construed with the
participle, though it is not perhaps every one that will see just at
once that καὶ πάρεστι is the correct reading. [_Cf._ Mark xv. 6, where
the MSS. fluctuate in like manner between ὃν παρῃτοῦντο and ὅνπερ
ᾒτοῦντο (ΟΝΠΑΡΗΤΟΥΝΤΟ.)] Other instances where the Textus Receptus has
adopted the reading of Erasmus in spite of the fact that it is
unsupported by any known MS. are to be found, _e.g._ in 1 Pet. ii. 6
(καὶ περιέχει) and in 2 Cor. i. 6. Luther, who used Erasmus’s second
edition of 1519, followed him in saying of the Beast, “that is not
although it is.” This, however, is not so remarkable as that in the
year 1883 such things were still allowed to stand in the first
impression of the Revised Version of Luther’s Bible issued by the
Conference of German Evangelical Churches, and only removed in their
last Revision of 1892. The error in Apoc. xvii. 8 was copied into the
English Authorised Version of 1611 (“is not and yet is”) but was
corrected by the Revisers of 1884 (“is not and shall come”).
Footnote 6:
Facsimile in Schaff’s _Companion_.
Footnote 7:
Facsimile in Schaff’s _Companion_.
Footnote 8:
Facsimiles of Folio 1598 and Octavo 1604 in Schaff’s _Companion_.
Footnote 9:
Copies of the Parisian Polyglot now cost about £6.
Footnote 10:
Facsimile in Schaffs’s _Companion_.
Footnote 11:
Facsimile in Schaff’s _Companion_.
Footnote 12:
Facsimile in Schaff’s _Companion_.
Footnote 13:
Facsimile of the second edition, Halle and London, 1796, in Schaff’s
_Companion_.
Footnote 14:
Facsimile in Schaff’s _Companion_.
Footnote 15:
Facsimiles of the edition of 1841, and the octava maior 1872, in
Schaff’s _Companion_.
Footnote 16:
Facsimile in Schaff’s _Companion_.
Footnote 17:
Van Ess’s edition was issued with two different title-pages. One of
these gives the names of the Protestant editors, Matthaei and
Griesbach. But the other omits the names together with the Notanda on
the back of the title-page, so that the reader is left in the dark as
to the meaning of the symbols Gb, M, etc., in the margin. Most copies
omit the Introduction, which contains the Pope’s sanction of the
editions of Erasmus and Ximenes.
CHAPTER II.
MATERIALS OF THE TEXTUAL CRITICISM OF THE NEW TESTAMENT.
Even in the age of printing, and with all the security afforded by that
invention, it is not always easy or even possible to exhibit or restore
the literary productions of a great mind in their original form. One has
but to think of the obscurity in which the works of Shakespeare and
their early editions are enveloped, or the questions raised over the
Weimar edition of Luther’s works. And even when the author’s original
manuscript is still preserved, but the proof-sheets, as is usual,
destroyed, we cannot always be certain whether occasional discrepancies
between the print and the manuscript are intentional or not. Nay, even
when the two agree, there is still the possibility that what the author
wrote and allowed to be printed was not what he thought or intended to
be read. Did Lessing, _e.g._, mean us to read in _Nathan_ ii. 5, 493,
“the great _man_ requires always plenty of room,” or “the great _tree_”
does so? Various writers, in speaking of this or that artist’s talents
or dexterity, have used the words “haud impigre.” To take them at their
word, the object of their praise had no such endowment beyond the
common. We may be certain that what they meant to convey was the very
opposite of what they actually wrote, viz. “haud pigre” or “impigre.” As
a rule, however, the purchaser of a modern classic may rely upon reading
it in the form in which the author intended it to be circulated. It is
quite different in the case of those works which were composed at a time
when their multiplication was only possible by means of copying, and
specially so in the case of those that are older by a thousand years
than the invention of printing. For then every fresh copy was a fresh
source of errors, even when the copyist was as painfully exact as it was
possible for him to be. It is simply astonishing, in view of all the
perils to which literary works have been exposed, to find how much has
been preserved, and, on the whole, how faithfully.
[Sidenote: Autographs.]
The matter is, of course, quite a simple one, when by good fortune the
author’s own manuscript, his =autograph=, is extant. The abstract
possibility of this being so in the case of the New Testament writings
cannot be denied. Thanks to the dryness of the climate of Egypt and the
excellence of ancient writing material, we have documents more than
twice the age that the New Testament autographs would be to-day did we
possess them. Now and again we find a report circulated in the
newspapers that such an original document has been found,—of Peter,
_e.g._, or some other Apostle. About the year 489 it was asserted that
the original copy of Matthew had been discovered in the grave of
Barnabas in Cyprus. And to the eyes of the devout there are still
exhibited not only the Inscription from the Cross, but works from the
artist hand of Luke. In reality, however, we have no longer the
autograph of a single New Testament book. Their disappearance is readily
understood when we consider that the greater portion of the New
Testament, viz. the Epistles, are occasional writings never intended for
publication, while others were meant to have only a limited circulation.
Even in the early ages of the Christian Church, when there must have
been frequent occasion to appeal to them, the autographs were no longer
in existence.
Tertullian (_De Praescriptione Haereticorum_, 36) mentions
Thessalonica among the cities in which he believed the letters of
the Apostles that were addressed there were still read from
autograph copies.[18] “Percurre ecclesias apostolicas, apud quas
ipsae adhuc cathedrae apostolorum suis locis praesident, apud quas
ipsae authenticae literae eorum recitantur, sonantes vocem et
repraesentantes faciem uniuscuiusque.” But when the same author, in
his _De Monogamia_, speaks of “Graecum authenticum,” he refers not
to the autograph, but to the original text as distinguished from a
version.
On the copy of Matthew’s Gospel found in the grave of Barnabas in
Cyprus, _vide_ Theodorus Lector (Migne, 86, 189); Severus of Antioch
in Assemani, _Bibliotheca Orientalis_, ii. 81; _Vitae omnium 13
Apostolorum_: Βαρνάβας ὁ καὶ Ἰωσῆς ... οὗτος τὸ κατὰ Ματθαῖον
εὐαγγέλιον οἰκειοχείρως γράψας ἐν τῇ τῆς Κύπρου νήσῳ τελειοῦται.[19]
In the Imperial Court Chapel the lessons were read from this copy on
Holy Thursday of every year. _Vide_ Fabricius, _Evv. Apocr._, 341.
On the supposed autograph of Mark in Venice see Jos. Dobrowsky,
_Fragmentum Pragense Ev. S. Marci, vulgo autographi_, Prague, 1778.
It is really a fragment of a Latin manuscript of the Vulgate, dating
from the seventh century, of which other fragments exist in Prague.
In the _Chronicon Paschale_ there is a note on the reading τρίτη for
ἕκτη in John xix. 14, to the following effect:—καθὼς τὰ ἀκριβῆ
βιβλία περιέχει _αὐτό τε τὸ ἰδιόχειρον τοῦ εὐαγγελιστοῦ_, ὅπερ μέχρι
τοῦ νῦν πεφύλακται χάριτι θεοῦ ἐν τῇ Ἐφεσίων ἁγιωτάτῃ ἐκκλησίᾳ καὶ
ὑπὸ τῶν πιστῶν ἐκεῖσε προσκυνεῖται. Bengel himself said on 1 John v.
7:—“Et tamen etiam atque etiam sperare licet, si non autographum
Johanneum, at alios vetustissimos codices graecos, qui hanc
periocham habeant, in occultis providentiae divinae forulis adhuc
latentes, suo tempore productum iri.” (N.T. 420, 602, 770.)
In disproof of an alleged autograph of Peter, see Lagarde, _Aus dem
deutschen Gelehrtenleben_, Göttingen, 1880, p. 117 f. On legends of
this sort among the Polish Jews, on the autograph copy of the
Proverbs that Solomon sent to the Queen of Sheba, and now in the
possession of the Queen of England, etc., _vide_ S. Schechter, _Die
Hebraica in der Bibliothek des Britischen Museums_, in the
_Jüdisches Literatur-Blatt_ for 1888, No. 46.
At the Sixth Ecumenical Council of 680-1, which Harnack (_DG._ ii.
408) says might be called the “Council of Antiquaries and
Palaeographers”, investigations were instituted in this department
with some success.
J. G. Berger, _De Autographis Veterum_, Vitenb., 1723. 4^o.
J. R. Harris, _New Testament Autographs_ (Supplement to the
_American Journal of Philology_, No. 12), Baltimore, 1882. With
three plates.
In this connection reference might be made to the falsifications of
Constantine Simonides: _Facsimiles of certain portions of the Gospel
of St. Matthew, and of the Epistles of St. James and St. Jude,
written on papyrus of the first century_. London, 1862. Fol.
[Sidenote: Manuscripts.]
Seeing, then, that the autographs of the New Testament books have all
perished, we have to do as in the case of the Greek and Latin classics,
viz. apply to later copies of them, the so-called =manuscripts= of which
frequent mention has already been made. But while in the case of most
literary products of antiquity these manuscript copies are the _only_
sources whence we may derive our knowledge of them, we are happily more
fortunate in regard to the New Testament.
[Sidenote: Versions.]
The new faith very early and very rapidly spread to distant peoples
speaking other languages than that in which the Gospel was first
preached. Indeed, even in its native land of Palestine, several
languages were in use at the same time. Accordingly, at a very early
date, as early as the second, and perhaps, in the case of fragments,
even in the first century, there arose in the East, and in the South,
and in the West, =versions= of the Christian books very soon after their
composition. At first only separate portions would be translated, but as
time went on versions of the entire New Testament made their appearance.
Manifestly, the value for our purpose of these versions depends on their
age and accuracy. It is impossible, without further knowledge, to be
certain whether a Greek copyist of later centuries followed his original
quite faithfully or not. But a Latin version of the New Testament which
dates from the second century, _e.g._, will represent with tolerable
certainty the second century Greek manuscript from which it is derived,
even supposing that our present copy of that version is not earlier than
the sixth century or even later. But these versions confer yet another
advantage. In the case of most, and certainly of the oldest Greek
manuscripts, we do not know in what country they originated. But it is
quite certain that a Latin version could not have originated in Egypt,
or a Coptic version in Gaul. In this way we may learn from the versions
how the text of the Bible read at a particular time and in a particular
region. Lastly, if it should happen that several versions originating in
quite isolated regions, in the Latin West, and in the Syrian East, and
in the Egyptian South, agree, then we may be certain that what is common
to them all must go back to the earliest times and to their common
original.
[Sidenote: Quotations.]
In addition to the Greek manuscripts and the versions, we have still a
third and by no means unimportant class of material that we can employ
in reconstructing our text of the New Testament. We possess an
uncommonly rich Christian literature, which gathers volume from the
second half, or, at all events, from the last quarter of the first
century onwards. Now, what an early Church teacher, or, for that matter,
what any early writer quotes from the New Testament will have for us its
own very peculiar importance, under certain conditions. Because, as a
rule, we know precisely where and when he lived. So that by means of
these =patristic quotations= we are enabled to locate our ancient
manuscripts of the Bible even more exactly, and trace their history
further than we are able to do with the help of the versions. Here, of
course, we must make sure that our author has quoted accurately and not
loosely from memory, and also that the quotations in his book have been
accurately preserved and not accommodated to the current text of their
time by later copyists or even by editors of printed editions, as has
actually been done even in the nineteenth century. We shall now proceed
to describe these three classes of auxiliaries.
LITERATURE.—W. Wattenbach, _Anleitung zur griechischen
Palaeographie_, 2nd ed., Leipzig, 1877; V. Gardthausen, _Griechische
Palaeographie_, Leipzig, 1879; Fr. Blass, _Palaeographie,
Bücherwesen, und Handschriftenkunde_, in I. v. Müller’s Handbuch der
klassischen Alterthumswissenschaft, 2nd ed., vol. i., Munich, 1892;
E. M. Thompson, _Handbook of Greek and Latin Palaeography_, London,
1891; T. Birt, _Das antike Buchwesen_, Berlin, 1882; W. A. Copinger,
_The Bible and its Transmission_; F. G. Kenyon, _Our Bible and the
ancient Manuscripts_, London, third edition, 1897; F. H. A.
Scrivener, _Six Lectures on the Text of the N.T. and the ancient
Manuscripts which contain it_, Cambridge and London, 1875; _A
Collation of about 20 Manuscripts of the Holy Gospels_, London,
1853; _Adversaria critica sacra_, Cambridge, 1893; Hoskier; _Urt._,
pp. 16, 54; O. Weise, _Schrift- und Buchwesen in alter und neuer
Zeit_, Leipzig (Teubner), 1899 (with Facsimiles: a popular work); F.
G. Kenyon, _The Palaeography of Greek Papyri_, Oxford, 1899 (with 20
Facsimiles and a Table of Alphabets, pp. viii., 160); Ulr. Wilcken,
_Tafeln zur älteren griechischen Palaeographie, Nach Originalen des
Berliner K. Museums_, Berlin and Leipzig, 1891 (with 20
photographs); G. Vitelli e C. Paoli, _Collezione Fiorentina di
facsimili paleografici greci e latini_, Firenze, 1884-1897 (with 50
Greek Plates and 50 Latin, Folio); Charles F. Sitterly, _Praxis in
Manuscripts of the Greek Testament; the mechanical and literary
processes involved in their writing and preservation_ (with table of
Manuscripts and 13 Facsimile Plates), New York and Cincinnati, 1898,
second enlarged edition, 1900; F. Carta, C. Cipolla e C. Frati,
_Monumenta Palaeographica sacra: Atlante paleografico-artistico
composto sui manuscritti_, Turin, 1899; Karl Dziatzko,
_Untersuchungen über ausgewählte Kapitel des antiken Buchwesens. Mit
Text, Uebersetzung und Erklärung von Plinii Histor. Nat._, lib.
xiii. § 68, 69, Leipzig, Teubner, 1900.
1. MANUSCRIPTS.
[Sidenote: Number of manuscripts.]
For no literary production of antiquity is there such a wealth of
manuscripts as for the New Testament. Our classical scholars would
rejoice were they as fortunate with Homer or Sophocles, Plato or
Aristotle, Cicero or Tacitus, as Bible students are with their New
Testament. The oldest complete manuscript of Homer that we have dates
from the thirteenth century, and only separate papyrus fragments go back
to the Alexandrian age. All that is extant of Sophocles we owe to a
single manuscript dating from the eighth or ninth century in the
Laurentian Library at Florence. But of the New Testament, 3829
manuscripts have been catalogued up till the present. A systematic
search in the libraries of Europe might add still more to the list; a
search in those of Asia and Egypt would certainly do so. Gregory
believes that there are probably some two or three thousand manuscripts
which have not yet been collated, and every year additional manuscripts
are brought to light. Most of these are, of course, late, and contain
only separate portions, some of them mere fragments, of the New
Testament.[20] Not a few, however, go much further back than our
manuscripts of the Hebrew Old Testament and most of the Greek and Latin
Classics. Only in the case of the Mohammedan sacred books is the
condition of things more favourable. These came into existence in the
seventh century, and the variations between separate manuscripts are a
vanishing quantity, because the text of the Koran was officially fixed
at a very early date and regarded as inviolably sacred. Fortunately, one
might almost say, it is quite different with the New Testament, which
was put together in a totally different way. In its case the very
greatest freedom prevailed for at least a century and a half.
The manuscripts of the New Testament being so numerous, it becomes
necessary to arrange them. One of the most important considerations
hitherto has been that of age, and therefore manuscripts have been
divided into =Uncials= (or Majuscules) and =Cursives= (or Minuscules),
according to the style of writing in use at earlier or later times.
[Sidenote: Uncial, and Cursive script.]
In early times, as at the present day, inscriptions on monuments and
public buildings were engraved in capital letters. This form of writing
was also employed for books, especially those containing valuable or
sacred writing. The letters were not joined together, but set down side
by side.[21] They were called _litterae majusculae_, _capitales_,
_unciales_, _i.e._ “inch-high,” as Jerome says with ridicule—_uncialibus
ut vulgo aiunt litteris onera magis exarata quam codices_. Alongside of
this there arose, even previous to the Christian era, a smaller Cursive
form (_Minusculae_), for use in common life, in which the letters were
joined.[22] This running hand found its way into manuscripts of the
Bible in the course of the ninth century. In some cases, in Codex Λ
_e.g._, both styles are found alongside or following each other.[23]
The oldest Cursive manuscript of the New Testament, the exact date of
which is known, is 481^{evv.}; it bears the date 835. The great majority
of New Testament manuscripts belong to this later date, seeing that out
of the 3829 manuscripts there are only 127 Uncials to 3702 Minuscules.
Greek copyists not being accustomed to date their manuscripts exactly,
it becomes the task of palæography to settle the criteria by which the
date and place of a manuscript’s origin may be determined. These are the
style of writing—whether angular or round, upright or sloping, the
punctuation—whether simple or elaborate, and the different material and
form of the book. These distinctions, however, are often very
misleading. The following table will show the distribution of the
manuscripts according to the centuries in which they were written, as
given by Vollert, Scrivener, and von Gebhardt[24]:—
Vollert. Scrivener. v. Gebhardt.
IVth Century, 5 ... 2
Vth “ 4 10 15
VIth ” 18 22 24
VIIth “ 6 9 17
VIIIth ” 8 8 19
IXth “ 23 ... 31
Xth ” 4 ... 6
[Sidenote: Papyrus and parchment.]
Manuscripts are distinguished according to the =material= on which they
are written, which may be either parchment or paper.
=Parchment= derives its name from Pergamum, where it was introduced in
the reign of King Eumenes (197-159 B.C.). But prior to the use of
parchment, and to a certain extent alongside of it, =papyrus= was used,
especially in Egypt, down to the time of the Mohammedan Conquest.
Papyrus books were originally in the form of rolls (_volumina_). Only a
few fragments of the New Testament on papyrus remain. The use of
parchment gave rise to the book or Codex form. In the case of parchment
codices, a further distinction is drawn between those made of vellum
manufactured from the skins of very young calves, and those made of
common parchment from the skins of sheep, goats, and antelopes.
[Sidenote: Paper.]
As early as the eighth century (not the ninth), the so-called =cotton
paper= (_charta bombycina_) was introduced from the East. This, however,
never consisted of pure cotton, but rather of flax and hemp. It had been
in use for a long time in China and the centre of Eastern Asia, but
seems to have been unknown in Syria and Egypt till after the fall of
Samarcand in 704. From the thirteenth century onwards, paper made of
linen was employed.
In the New Testament, both papyrus and parchment are referred to. In 2
Tim. iv. 13, Paul asks that the φελόνης he had left at Troas might be
brought to him, and τὰ βιβλία, but specially τὰς μεμβράνας. Here,
φελόνης means cloak rather than satchel; τὰ βιβλία are the papyrus
books, possibly his Old Testament, while τὰς μεμβράνας are clean sheets
of parchment. In 2 John 12 the word χάρτης is used of papyrus. There,
and in 3 John 13, τὸ μέλαν is the ink, and the κάλαμος (_lat._ canna) is
the reed pen, still used for writing in the East. The quill pen, strange
to say, is not mentioned prior to the time of Theodoric the Ostrogoth in
the sixth century. The size of a sheet of writing paper may be inferred
from the passages in 2nd and 3rd John alluded to above.
[Sidenote: Scriptio continua.]
In order to economize space, the writing was continuous, with no break
between the words (=scriptio continua=), breathings and accents being
also omitted. This is a frequent source of ambiguity and
misunderstanding. In Matt. ix. 18, _e.g._, ΕΙΣΕΛΘΩΝ may be either εἷς
ἐλθὼν or εἰσελθὼν. In Mark x. 40, ΑΛΛΟΙΣΗΤΟΙΜΑΣΤΑΙ was rendered “aliis
praeparatum,” ἄλλοις being read instead of ἀλλ’ οἷς. In Matt. xvi. 23,
ΑΛΛΑ may be taken either as ἀλλὰ or ἀλλ’ ἃ. In 1 Cor. xii. 28, again,
the Ethiopic translator read οὖς instead of οὓς. The Palestinian-Syriac
Lectionary translates 1 Tim. iii. 16 as though it were ὁμολογοῦμεν ὡς
μέγα ἐστίν. There is something to be said for this, but Naber’s proposed
reading of Gal. ii. 11, ὅτι κατέγνωμεν ὃς ἦν, cannot be accepted.
[Sidenote: Columns, Lines.]
Most manuscripts show two =columns= to the page. The Sinaitic, however,
has four, while the Vatican has three. Columns vary considerably in
width. They may be the width of a few letters only, or of an average
hexameter line of sixteen to eighteen syllables or about thirty-six
letters. Such a line is called a στίχος, and as the scribe was paid
according to the number of στίχοι, we find at the end of several books a
note giving the total number of στίχοι contained in them. In carefully
written manuscripts, every hundredth, sometimes every fiftieth στίχος is
indicated in the margin. These stichometric additions were afterwards
adopted for the entire Bible. Their value in many respects will be
obvious.
As the church increased in wealth and prestige, New Testament
manuscripts acquired a more sumptuous form, either from the luxury of
the rich or the pious devotion of kings and churches.
[Sidenote: Palimpsests.]
Parchment, however, grew more and more expensive, and so the practice
arose of using an old manuscript a second time. The original writing was
erased by means of a sponge or pumice stone or a knife, and the sheets
were then employed to receive other matter, or it might even be the same
matter over again. And so we have =Codices Rescripti= or =Palimpsesti=
as they were called, a term known to Cicero, who says, though of a wax
tablet, “quod in palimpsesto, laudo parsimoniam” (_ad Diversos_ vii.
18). Some manuscripts were used as often as three times for distinct
works in three different languages _e.g._ Greek, Syriac, and Iberian.
Codex I^b is one of these thrice used manuscripts, being written first
in Greek and then twice in Syriac.
[Sidenote: Punctuation.]
Marks of =punctuation= are hardly to be found in the earliest times. It
was frequently, therefore, a question with church teachers whether a
sentence was to be taken interrogatively or indicatively, or how the
sentences were to be divided, as in the case of John i. 3 and 4. In the
general absence of punctuation, the appearance of quotation marks in
some of the oldest manuscripts, like Codex Vaticanus _e.g._, to indicate
citations from the Old Testament, is remarkable.
[Sidenote: Size.]
The =size= of a manuscript varies from a large folio, which in the case
of a parchment codex must have been very expensive, to a small octavo.
In regions inhabited by a mixed population we find =bilingual=
manuscripts, Greek-Latin, Greek-Coptic, Greek-Armenian, and such like.
If the manuscript was designed for use in church, the two languages were
written in parallel columns, the Greek frequently occupying the left
column or reverse side of the sheet, being the place of honour. In
manuscripts intended for use in schools, the translation was written
between the lines. Codex Δ is an example of a manuscript with an
interlinear version of this sort.
[Sidenote: Contents.]
Of more importance is the distinction of manuscripts according to their
=contents=. Of all our recorded Uncials, only one contains the whole of
the New Testament complete. That is the Codex Sinaiticus discovered by
Tischendorf in 1859. A few others, like Codices Vaticanus, Alexandrinus,
Ephraemi, were once complete, but are no longer so. Of the later
Minuscules, some twenty-five alone contain the entire New Testament. Of
the English Minuscules, five are complete. The fragmentary nature of our
manuscripts is intelligible on two grounds. One is that a New Testament
codex written in uncial characters is a very bulky and ponderous volume
running to about 150 sheets. Comparatively few would be in a position to
procure such a costly work all at once. The other reason is that the New
Testament itself is not a single book, but a series of different
collections, which at first, and even afterwards, were circulated
separately. To the same reason is due the great variety in the order of
the several parts of the New Testament found in the manuscripts, and
still, to a certain extent, in our printed editions. It is not exactly
known who it was that first collected and inscribed in one volume the
books and the parts that now make up the New Testament. Such a single
volume of the entire New Testament was afterwards known as a πανδέκτης,
and in Latin, _bibliotheca_. The parts into which the New Testament is
divided are—
1. The four Gospels.
2. (_a_) The Acts of the Apostles. (_b_) The so-called Catholic
Epistles, _i.e._ those not addressed to any particular church or
individual, viz., James, 1 and 2 Peter, 1, 2, and 3 John, Jude.
3. The thirteen Pauline Epistles, or, including Hebrews, fourteen.
4. The Apocalypse.
[Sidenote: Lectionaries.]
Among these incomplete manuscripts of the New Testament may be classed
the so-called =lectionaries=—_i.e._ manuscripts containing only those
portions read at church services. Following the custom of the Synagogue,
in which portions of the Law and the Prophets were read at divine
service each Sabbath day, the practice was early adopted in the
Christian Church of reading passages from the New Testament books at
services. A definite selection of such extracts was formed at an early
date from the Gospels and Epistles, and the custom arose of arranging
these according to the order of Sundays and Holy days, for greater
convenience in use. A collection of selected passages from the Gospels
was called a Εὐαγγέλιον, and in Latin _Evangeliarium_,[25] in
distinction to the books containing the continuous text, which were
called Τετραευαγγέλιον, while the selections from the Epistles were
known as Ἀπόστολος or Πραξαπόστολος. These lectionaries, though mostly
of later origin, are nevertheless important as indicating the official
text of the various provinces of the Church. They show, moreover, how
sundry slight alterations found their way into the text of the New
Testament.
We can easily understand why it is that manuscripts of the Gospels are
by far the most numerous, while those of the last book of the New
Testament are the fewest. Among the Uncials, 73 contain the Gospels, and
only 7 have the Apocalypse. Of these 73 Uncials, again, only 6, viz. א B
K M S U, or, if we include Ω, only 7 are quite complete; 9 are almost
so; 11 exhibit the greater part of the Gospels, while the remainder
contain only fragments. Of the 20 Uncials of the Pauline Epistles, only
1 is entirely complete—viz., א; 2 are nearly complete, D G; 8 have the
greater part. It is plain that our resources are not so great, after
all, as the number of manuscripts given above would lead us to expect.
Here also there are πολλοὶ κλητοί, ὀλίγοι ἐκλεκτοί.
Parchment.
The manufacture of parchment is perhaps older than that of papyrus. It
is said to owe both its name and wide circulation as writing material to
the encouragement given to its manufacture by Eumenes II. of Pergamum
(197-159 B.C.). Pliny’s story,[26] which he gives on the authority of
Varro, is that Eumenes wished to found a library which should, as far as
possible, excel that of Alexandria. To frustrate this intention Ptolemy
Epiphanes prohibited the exportation of papyrus to Asia Minor. (In the
list of principal exports of Alexandria, Lumbroso[27] mentions βίβλος
and χάρτη in the second place after ὑέλια, and βιβλία in the seventh.)
Eumenes was accordingly obliged to prepare parchment at Pergamum, and
hence its name, περγαμηνή. The name first occurs in Diocletian’s
Price-list,[28] and in Jerome. The word used in earlier times was
διφθέραι,[29] or δέρρεις,[30] or μεμβράναι as in 2 Tim. iv. 13, which
last was taken from the Latin. At first parchment was less valuable than
papyrus, and was used more for domestic and school purposes than for the
making of books, as the writing was easier erased from the skin. But it
gradually supplanted papyrus, and with its employment came also the
change from the roll to the “codex” form of book. If papyrus was the
vehicle of Pagan Greek literature, parchment was the means whereby the
literature of the new faith became known to mankind, and the remnant of
the ancient culture at the same time preserved. Origen’s library, which
still consisted for the most part of papyrus rolls, was re-written in
parchment volumes (σωμάτιον, _corpus_) by two priests shortly before the
time of Jerome. Our principal manuscripts of Philo are derived from one
of these codices.[31] When Constantine ordered Eusebius to provide a
certain number of Bibles for presentation to the churches of his Empire,
he sent him, not rolls, but codices, πεντήκοντα σωμάτια ἐν διφθέραις.
Parchment was prepared from the skins of goats, sheep, calves, asses,
swine, and antelopes. Our oldest manuscripts of the Bible exhibit the
finest and whitest parchment. The Codex Sinaiticus, _e.g._, displays the
very finest prepared antelope skin, and is of such a size that only two
sheets could be obtained from one skin. As a rule, four sheets were
folded into a quire (quaternio), the separate sheets having been
previously ruled on the grain side. They were laid with the flesh side
to the flesh side, and the grain side to the grain side, beginning with
the flesh side outermost, so that in each quaternio, pages 1, 4, 5, 8,
9, 12, 13, 16 were white and smooth with the lines showing in relief,
while the others, 2, 3, 6, 7, 10, 11, 14, 15 were darker and rough, with
indented lines.[32]
[Sidenote: Ink.]
For writing on papyrus, ink made of soot was employed. Three parts of
lamp-black were mixed with one part of gum and diluted with water. This
ink, however, was easily washed off, and did not stick well to
parchment, and therefore recourse was had to ink made of gall nuts.
Sulphate of iron was afterwards added to it, with the result that the
writing material is frequently corroded with the ink. From its having
been boiled the mixture was also called ἔγκαυστον, hence our word “ink”
(encre). Many old recipes for making ink are still preserved.[33] Even
in early Egyptian writing, coloured inks, especially red, were used. One
of the most beautiful manuscripts extant is a Syriac Codex in the
British Museum, of date 411, in which the red, blue, green, and yellow
inks are still quite fresh. Eusebius used cinnabar for numbering the
paragraphs, and Jerome makes mention of minium or vermilion. In times of
great wealth parchments were dyed purple and inscribed with gold and
silver letters.
Papyrus.
Among ancient writers, Pliny gives the fullest description of the
preparation of papyrus, in his _Historia Naturalis_, xiii. 11.[34] The
sheets were prepared, not from the bark, but from the pith of the plant.
This was cut into strips (σχίδας) as thin and broad, and, according to
some, as long as possible. These were laid side by side as firmly as
might be, to form the first layer (σχέδα). On this a second layer was
laid crosswise and fastened to the lower with moisture or gum. The two
layers were then compressed to form the writing sheet (σελίς), which was
carefully dried and polished with ivory or a smooth shell. The roll
(τόμος, κύλινδρος) consisted of a number of σελίδες joined together to
make one long strip—sometimes as much as 20 or 40 feet long, or even
longer. The upper side, the side used for writing on, was the one in
which the fibres ran in a horizontal direction parallel to the edge of
the roll.[35] The under or outer side was only used in cases of
necessity.[36] The first sheet (πρωτόκολλον) was made stronger than the
rest, and its inner edge was glued to a wooden roller (ὄμφαλος), with a
knob at the end (κέρας). The margin of the roll, what corresponds to the
edge of our books, was frequently glazed and coloured, while the back
was protected against worms and moths by being rubbed with cedar oil.
The title was inscribed on a separate label of parchment (σίττυβος or
σίλλυβος). The separate rolls were enclosed in a leather case (διφθέρα
or φαινόλης, see 2 Tim. iv. 13), and a number of them kept in a chest
(κιβωτός or κίστη).
On the literature cf. also Paul Krüger, _Ueber die Verwendung von
Papyrus und Pergament für die juristische Litteratur der Römer_,
Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte. Roman section,
viii. pp. 76-85 (1887). Wilcken, _Archiv für Papyrus-Forschung und
verwandte Gebiete_, Leipzig, Teubner. F. G. Kenyon, _Palaeography of
Greek Papyri_. C. Haeberlin, _Griechische Papyri_, Leipzig, 1897:
“Nearly 150 years have fled since 432 complete Rolls and 1806 Papyrus
Fragments were discovered in the year 1752 at Herculaneum, in the Villa
of L. Calpurnius Piso Caesoninus, the pupil and friend of the Epicurean
philosopher Philodemus. Then twenty-five years later the soil of Egypt,
that home and nursery of literature, opened for the first time to
vouchsafe to us a Greek Papyrus Roll, destined to be the forerunner of a
series of discoveries often interrupted but never ceasing altogether. It
was, perchance, not the only one of its kind; but out of the fifty rolls
accidentally discovered in the year 1778 by Arabian peasants in the
neighbourhood of Memphis, it alone had the fortune to come into the
possession of Cardinal Stefano Borgia. The rest were burned by their
unsuspecting discoverers, who found a peculiar pleasure in the resinous
odour that arose from their smoking pyre.”
Paper.
The collection of manuscripts brought from the East by the Archduke
Rainer gave a stimulus to the study of the early history of
paper-making, and at the same time supplied the materials for a more
exact investigation of the subject than had previously been possible.
Earlier works, therefore, like that of G. Meerman, _De Chartae vulgaris
seu lineae Origine_, ed. J. v. Vaassen, Hagae Comitum, 1767, have been
superseded. The manufacture of paper seems to have been introduced into
Europe by the Moors in Spain, where it went by the name of _pergameno de
panno_ to distinguish it from the _pergameno de cuero_. In the Byzantine
Empire it was called ξυλοχάρτιον or ξυλότευκτον, as being a vegetable
product. It came afterwards to be known as χάρτης Δαμασκηνός, from its
chief place of manufacture. The Arabs introduced it into Sicily, whence
it passed into Italy. After 1235, we find paper mentioned as one of the
exports of Genoa. European paper is distinguished from that of Eastern
manufacture chiefly by the use of water marks, such as ox-heads, _e.g._,
which were unknown in the East. Older sorts of paper bear a great
resemblance to parchment. The Benedictine monks, who owned the fragments
of Mark’s Gospel preserved in Venice, asserted that they were written on
bark. Montfaucon declared the material to be papyrus. Massei said it was
cotton paper. But the microscope shows it to be parchment. In many
manuscripts a mixture of parchment and paper is found. This is so in the
Leicester Codex, in which the leaves are regularly arranged in such a
way that the outer and inner sheets of a quire are of parchment, while
the three intermediate sheets are of paper. See J. R. Harris, _The
origin of the Leicester Codex of the New Testament_, 1887, p. 14 ff.
[Sidenote: Lead.]
Lead was also employed in early times for writing on. Budde sees a
reference to this practice in the well-known passage, Job xix. 24. He
holds that the lead there mentioned is not to be supposed as run into
letters cut out in the rock, which would be a very unlikely thing to do,
and a practice for which there is no evidence. He would therefore
correct the text so as to read “with an iron pen on lead.” Hesiod’s
Ἔργα, _e.g._, was preserved on lead in the temple of the Muses on
Helicon.[37] A leaden tablet from Hadrumet contains an incantation
showing strong traces of O.T. influence.[38] At Rhodes there was
recently discovered a roll of lead inscribed with the 80th Psalm, which
was used as a charm to protect a vineyard.[39]
[Sidenote: Clay.]
Clay and brick were also used as writing material, a fact which Strack
has omitted to mention in his article on Writing in the
_Realencyklopädie_ (see Ezek. iv. 1). So far, however, no traces of N.T.
writing have been discovered in the Ostraca literature of which we have
now a considerable quantity. We have tiles of this sort dating from a
period of over a thousand years from the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus
onwards, inscribed with ink and a reed pen. Several of these contain
portions of literary works such as those of Euripides.[40]
[Sidenote: Linen.]
Linen was also written on.[41] It was used, _e.g._, for the Sibylline
Oracles (lintea texta, carbasus: _Orac. Sib._ ed. Alexandre, ii., 159,
178, 189). But up to the present no N.T. writing has been found on
linen.
Paul’s “books.”
On Paul’s “books and parchments,” see Zahn, _Kanon_ ii., 938 ff. I am
not aware if J. Joseph takes up this point or not in his La Bibliothèque
de l’Apôtre Paul (Chrétien Évang., 1897, v. 224-227). In the _Theol.
Tijdschrift_, 1898, p. 217, the view that the μεμβράναι Paul sent for
were blank sheets of parchment is called in question. The most natural
explanation, certainly, is that they were.
Pen.
The N.T. makes no mention of the metal, wood, or bone stilus. By “the
wild beast of the reeds” (Ps. lxviii. 31) the Rabbis understood the
reed pen, which in Syriac also is commonly denoted by קנה, and they
took it as referring to Rome and the Emperor, who decided the fate of
nations with a single stroke of his pen.[42] Luther, moreover, was not
without precedent in speaking of “governors with the pen” in Jud. v.
14, as the Syriac version renders it in the same way. In Ps. xlv. 2,
the Hebrew עֵט is rendered κάλαμος (LXX), σχοῖνος (Aquila), and
γραφεῖον (Symmachus). It is also rendered σχοῖνος by the translator of
Jeremiah viii. 8, where Aquila has γραφεῖον. Σχοῖνος must therefore be
added to the Bible names for pen. Γραφίς for γραφεῖον, mentioned
alongside of ὄνυξ ἀδαμάντινος in Jer. xvii. 1, seems to belong to the
Spanish-Greek of the Complutensian, but is really classic, as also its
diminutive γραφίδιον. According to the Rabbis, pens were among the
things God made in the evening of the last day of the creation. They
were also venerated by the Egyptians and the Greeks as an invention of
the Deity.[43] According to Antisthenes[44] or Democritus,[45] a young
man, in order to enter the school of wisdom, requires to have a
βιβλιαρίου καινου (= καὶ νοῦ) καὶ γραφείου καινου καὶ πινακιδίου
καινου. In Cyprus, the stilus is called ἀλειπτήριον, and the
γραμματοδιδάσκαλος in like manner διφθεράλοιφος.[46] In the recently
discovered fragments of Diocletian’s _List of Wares_, the section περὶ
πλούμου (goose, swan, and peacock feathers) is followed by that περὶ
καλάμων καὶ μελανίου, and then by that περὶ ἐσθῆτος. Ink costs 12
drachmae the quart; Paphian and Alexandrian κάλαμοι[47] cost 4
drachmae; and κάλαμοι δευτ[έρας] φώρ[μης] the same. Baruch, the
ἀναγνωστής, purchased ink and a pen in the market of the Gentiles, in
order to write his letter to Jeremiah (ἀποστείλας εἰς τὴν ἀγορὰν [v.
l. διασπορᾶς] τῶν ἐθνῶν ἤνεγκε χάρτην καὶ μέλανα [v. l. μελαν]).[48]
Demosthenes was not the only possessor of a silver stilus. Boniface,
_e.g._, had one of that sort sent him from England.
[Sidenote: Reading and writing.]
The following is a list of expressions relating to reading and writing
taken from the Greek Versions of the O.T. It makes no claim to be
complete. The passages will be found in Hatch and Redpath’s _Concordance
to the Septuagint_.
ἀκριβόω, ἀναγιγνώσκω, ἀνάγνωσις, ἀναγνωστής, ἀντίγραφον, ἀποκαλύπτειν;
βιβλιαφόρος (βιβλιο-), βίβλινος, βιβλιογράφος (Est. iii. 13, Complut.),
βιβλιοθήκη, βιβλίον (βυ-), βιβλιοφυλάκιον, βίβλος (βυ-); γαζά, γράμμα,
γραμματεία, γραμματεύειν, γραμματεύς, γραμματικός, γραμματοεισαγωγεύς,
γραπτόν, γράφειν (ἀνα-, ἀπο-, ἐπι-, κατα-, συν-), γραφεῖον (σιδηροῦν),
γραφεὺς (ταχινός), γραφή (ἀνα-, ἀπο-, συν-), γραφικός, γραφίς;
διφθέρωμα, διώκειν; εἴλημα, εἰς- or ἐγχαράττειν, ἐπιστολή, ἑρμηνεύω,
ἐπιστάμενος γράμματα; θησαυροφύλαξ; κάλαμος (καλαμάριον, _vide_ Field’s
_Hexapla_ on Ezek. ix. 2) κάστυ, κεφαλίς; μαχθάμ, μέλαν, μελανοδοχεῖον,
μίλτος, μνημόσυνον, μολίβος, μολίβδινος; ξυρός; ὄνυξ ἀδαμάντινος,
ὀξυγράφος; πινακίς, πινακίδιον, πτύξ, πτυχή, πυξίον; σελίς, σμίλη,
στηλογραφία, σφραγίζειν, σφραγίς, σχοῖνος; τόμος (χαρτοῦ καινοῦ μεγάλου,
Isa. viii. 1; also 1 Esdras vi. 23 for τόπος), τεῦχος, τύπος; χάρτης,
χαρτίον, χαρτηρία.
Diastole and hyphen.
Ancient Homeric grammarians used to debate whether contiguous letters
were to be read as one word or not. To obviate misunderstanding, they
employed the ὑποδιαστολή as the mark of division (ὅ, τι, _e.g._), and
the ὑφ’ ἕν as the mark of combination (Διό[σκ]ουροι, not Διὸς κοῦροι).
Such marks are also found in manuscripts of the Bible, in the
Septuagint, _e.g._, in the case of proper names. It goes without saying
that the scriptio continua made the reading as well as the copying of
manuscripts a matter of some difficulty. Hermas (Visio ii. 1) says of
the book given him to copy μετεγραψάμην πάντα πρὸς γράμμα· οὐχ ηὕρισκον
γὰρ τὰς συλλαβάς.[49] For two instructive mistakes in the Latin
interlinear version of Codex Boernerianus see p. 77.
Breathings and accents.
Breathings and accents were found in various manuscripts of the Bible as
early as the time of Epiphanius and Augustine. In our oldest manuscripts
they seldom occur before the seventh century. They were inserted by the
first hand of the Ambrosian Hexateuch (Swete’s F), which is ascribed to
the first half of the fifth century by Ceriani. They seem to have been
added to the Codex Vaticanus by the third hand, probably in the twelfth
century, and do not always conform to our rules. Augustine, commenting
on the rival readings _filiis_ and _porcina_, in Psalm xvi. 14, says:
“quod (porcina) alii codices habent et verius habere perhibentur, quia
diligentiora exemplaria per accentus notam eiusdem verbi graeci
ambiguitatem graeco scribendi more dissolvunt, obscurius est” (ii.
504-5, in Lagarde’s _Probe einer neuen Ausgabe_, p. 40). Similarly,
speaking of the difference between ῥάβδου αὐτοῦ and ῥάβδου αὑτοῦ, Gen.
xlvii. 31, he says:—“fallit enim eos verbum graecum, quod eisdem literis
scribitur sive _eius_ sive _suae_; sed accentus [= spiritus] dispares
sunt et ab eis qui ista noverunt, in codicibus non contemnuntur” (iv. 53
ed. Lugd. 1586, cited by Scrivener, i. p. 47).
[Sidenote: Abbreviation.]
The practice of abbreviating words of frequent occurrence like Θ̅Σ̅,
Χ̅Σ̅, Χ̅Σ̅, Α̅Ν̅Ο̅Σ̅ goes back to very early times. So, too, does the
use of letters as numerals, Ι for 10, etc.
[Sidenote: Divisions.]
In dividing syllables the Greek copyists in general observed the rule of
beginning each new line with a consonant. A good many exceptions occur
however, especially in the Vaticanus, most of which have been corrected
by a later hand. These are indicated in the third volume of Swete’s
edition of the LXX. A good instance of this is seen in Jer. xiv. 12,
where the Vaticanus and Marchalianus both originally had προσ ενεγκωσιν,
which in the former is corrected to προ σενεγκωσιν, and in the latter to
προσε νεγκωσιν. For examples from the O.T. portion of the Codex
Vaticanus see Nestle’s _Septuagintastudien_, ii. 20.
Stichometry.
Carefully written manuscripts of the Old and New Testaments are provided
with a system of stichometry just as occurs in the better manuscripts of
the classics, as _e.g._ Herodotus and Demosthenes. In the N.T. it is
found specially in those Pauline Epistles that go back to the recension
of Euthalius. One of the writers of the Codex Vaticanus has copied, in
several of the books of the O.T., the stichometric enumeration which he
found in his original, and the numbers show that the manuscript he
copied contained almost twice as much matter in a line as the one he
himself wrote. See Nestle, _Septuagintastudien_, ii. 20 f.; Lagarde,
_Die Stichometrie der syrisch-hexaplarischen Uebersetzung des alten
Testaments_ (_Mitteilungen_, iv. 205-208). On the stichometric list in
the Codex Claromontanus of the Pauline Epistles (D_{2}), see p. 76.
American scholars have counted the number of words in the Greek N.T. In
Matthew the number is 18,222, in Mark 11,158, in Luke 19,209.
Unfortunately, I am unable to give the total number in the N.T. See
Schaff’s _Companion_, pp. 57, 176.
Graux (_Revue de Philologie_, ii.) has counted not only the words but
the letters in the various books. The numbers are given in Zahn’s
_Geschichte des N.T. Kanons_, i. 76. They are as follows:—
Letters. Stichoi.
Matthew, 89,295 2480
Mark, 55,550 1543
Luke, 97,714 2714
John, 70,210 1950
Acts, 94,000 2610
3 John, 1,100 31
Apocalypse, 46,500 1292
For Philemon, Zahn 1,567 44
gives
In this last epistle I find that my edition has 1538 letters, or
including the title 1550. The lines in my edition happen to coincide as
near as may be with the ancient stichoi. 41 stichoi at 36 letters to the
stichos would give a total of 1476. Now in the 41 complete lines which
my edition gives to Philemon I find 1469 letters, that is, only 7 fewer.
In Jude, again, Graux enumerates 71 stichoi, while my edition shows
exactly 70 lines or 71 with the title. For stichometric calculations,
therefore, this edition will prove very convenient.
For a “Table of Ancient and Modern Divisions of the New Testament,” see
Scrivener, i. 68; also Westcott, _Canon_, Appendix D, xix., xx.; _Bible
in the Church_, Appendix B, 4.
[Sidenote: Cola and commata.]
The Cola and Commata were quite different from the stichoi. The length
of the latter was regulated according to the space (space-lines), that
of the former by the sense and structure of the sentence (sense-lines).
On cola and commata see Wordsworth and White, _De colis et commatibus
codicis Amiatini et editionis nostrae_, in the _Epilogus_ to their
edition of the Vulgate, i. pp. 733-736. On the stichometry proper see
_Ibid._, p. 736, _De stichorum numeris in euangeliis_.
Manuscripts de luxe.
Solomon perfumed with musk the letter he sent to Bilqis, Queen of Sheba,
who herself could both read and write.[50] Mani inscribed characters on
white satin in such a way that if a single thread was drawn out the
writing became invisible.[51] On gold and silver writing among the
Syrians see Zahn, _Tatian, Forschungen_, 108, n. 1; also R. Wessely,
_Iconographie_ (_Wiener Studien_, xii. 2, 259-279). The earliest mention
of this kind of writing that I know is in the Epistle of Aristeas,[52]
σὺν ... ταῖς διαφόροις διφθέραις, ἐν αἷς [ἦν] ἡ νομοθεσία γεγραμμένη
χρυσογραφίᾳ τοῖς Ἰουδαϊκοῖς γράμμασι, θαυμασίως εἰργασμένου τοῦ ὑμένος
καὶ τῆς πρὸς ἄλληλα συμβολῆς ἀνεπαισθήτου κατεσκευασμένης. In
Alexander’s copy of the Pentateuch the name of God was written in gold
letters.[53]
On the fineness of the parchment and the beauty of the writing see
Chrysostom, _Hom. 32 in Joannem_: σπουδῆς περὶ τὴν τῶν ὑμένων λεπτότητα
καὶ τὸ τῶν γραμμάτων κάλλος. Ephraem Syrus commended this Christian
munificence, as is pointed out in the _Histor. Polit. Blätter_, 84, 2,
104. Gold writing is also mentioned in the Targum on Ps. xlv. 10.
The passage in the Epistle of Theonas to Lucian referring to the use of
purple-dyed parchment is thought by Batiffol to be derived from that in
Jerome’s Commentary on Job, and he founds on this an argument against
the genuineness of the Epistle.[54] In the Martyrium of Qardagh the
Persian, particular mention is made of the remarkable beauty and
whiteness of the parchment (σωμάτιον) on which he wrote his
epistles.[55]
For the preparation of his Bible, Origen procured the services not only
of rapid writers (ταχυγράφοι) but also of girls who could write
beautifully (καλλιγράφοι). Cassiodorus pleads—qui emendare praesumitis,
ut superadjectas literas ita pulcherrimas facere studeatis, ut potius ab
_Antiquariis_ scriptae fuisse judicentur.[56] We also find him making
proposals for expensive bindings in the _De Inst._, c. 30, a passage
which, according to Springer,[57] has been overlooked in the literature
on illustrated bindings in modern histories of art.
On various decorated manuscripts see W. Wattenbach, _Ueber die mit Gold
auf Purpur geschriebene Evangelien-handschrift der Hamiltonschen
Bibliothek_, in the _Berliner Sitz.-Ber._, 7th March 1889, xiii.
143-156. Cf. _Berl. Phil. Wochenschrift_, 1889, 33, 34. This manuscript
purported to be a gift to Henry VIII. from Pope Leo X., but was rather
from Wolsey. Bishop Wilfrid of Ripon (670-688) had the four Gospels
written with the finest gold. Boniface requested his English friends to
send him the Epistles of Paul written with gold in order therewith to
impress the simple-minded Germans (Ep. 32, p. 99), a fact of which
Gustav Freitag makes use in his _Ingo und Ingraban_, p. 476. (See _Die
Christliche Welt_, 1888, 22.) _Cf._ also the manuscripts of Theodulf in
Paris and Puy (see below, p. 125). The Cistercians forbade the use of
gold and silver bindings or clasps (firmacula) and also of different
colours.
[Sidenote: Illustration.]
Illustrations must have made their appearance in Greek manuscripts a
whole century earlier than has hitherto been supposed if H. Kothe is
right in his interpretation of the passage in Diogenes Laertius, ii. 3,
8 (= Clem., _Strom._, i. 78, p. 364, Potter): πρῶτος δὲ Ἀναξαγόρας καὶ
βιβλίον ἐξέδωκε σὺν γραφῇ (“with a picture”: formerly read as
συγγραφῆς). In addition to the works of Aristotle and the obscene poems
of Philainis, illustrated manuscripts were known to exist of the works
of the astronomers Eudoxus and Aratus, of the botanist Dioscorides, of
the tactician Euangelos, and of the geographer Ptolemy. A description of
the earliest illustrated Bibles is given by Victor Schultze in the
_Daheim_, 1898, No. 28, 449 ff., with good facsimiles. On the horses in
the chariot of Elijah in a Greek manuscript of the ninth century in the
Vatican Library, and on the pictures of the horsemen in the codex of
Joshua also contained there, see F. aus’m Weerth in the _Jahrbuch des
Vereins von Altertums-Freunden im Rheinland_, Heft 78 (1884), Plate VI.
Cassiodorus had a Pandectes Latinus—_i.e._ a manuscript of the Old Latin
Bible of large size—which contained pictures of the Tabernacle and the
Temple. There is an old work on this subject by P. Zornius entitled
_Historia Bibliorum pictorum ex antiquitatibus Ebraeorum et
Christianorum illustrata cum figuris_, Lipsiae, 1743, 4to; and by the
same author, _Von den Handbibeln der ersten Christen_, Lips. 1738, also
_Historia Bibliorum ex Ebraeorum diebus festis et jejuneis illustrata_,
Lips., 1741. See also Georg Thiele, _De antiquorum libris pictis capita
quattuor_, _Marburg_, 1897.
Palimpsests.
Palimpsests of Bible manuscripts came to be prohibited by the Church.
The Sixth Ecumenical Council (Trullan, Concilium quinisextum, 680-681),
in its 68th canon, Περὶ τοῦ μὴ ἐξεῖναί τινι τῶν ἁπάντων βιβλία τῆς
παλαιᾶς καὶ νέας διαθήκης διαφθείρειν, forbids the sale of old
manuscripts of the Bible to the βιβλιοκάπηλοι or the μυρεψοί, or to any
persons whatever.[58] There was naturally a special aversion to letting
such manuscripts fall into the hands of Jews; but yet there were
discovered, in the lumber room of the Synagogue of Old Cairo, fragments
of a Greek MS. of the Gospels, which had been afterwards employed to
receive Jewish writing. Parchments of this sort were at first used only
for rough drafts and such like, instead of wax tablets from which the
writing could be erased again.
Punctuation.
A good example of the importance of punctuation will be found in Lk. i.
35, on which see p. 201. Compare also Lk. xxi. 8, 1 Tim. ii. 5, where
Lachmann punctuates καὶ ἀνθρώπων ἄνθρωπος. By a different punctuation in
Heb. i. 9, Tischendorf and Westcott-Hort make ὁ Θεός vocative and
nominative respectively. In the former case the Messiah is God, in the
other God is the one who anoints him. This difference was not observed
at first by O. v. Gebhardt. Similarly there is a difference between the
text and the margin of Westcott and Hort in verse 8, where by the
insertion or omission of the two commas before and after ὁ Θεός the
meaning is either that Messiah is God or that God is Messiah’s throne.
Considering the importance of such marks of division, the rule laid down
by Ephraem Syrus in the year 350, and again emphasized by Bengel and
Lagarde, should be carefully attended to in the New Testament: εἰ
κέκτησαι βιβλίον, εὐστιχὲς κτῆσαι αὐτό· μήποτε εὑρεθῇ ἐν αὐτῷ πρόσκομμα
τῷ ἀναγινώσκοντι ἢ μεταγράφοντι (see Nestle, _Bengel als Gelehrter_, p.
24). Compare also what Chrysostom says regarding punctuation on Mt.
viii. 9: τινὲς δὲ καὶ οὕτως ἀναγινώσκουσι τουτὶ τὸ χωρίον· εἰ γὰρ ἐγὼ
ἄνθρωπος ὤν, καὶ μεταξὺ στίξαντες ἐπάγουσιν· ὑπὸ ἐξουσίαν ἔχων ὑπ’
ἐμαυτοῦ στρατιώτας. See also Victor (or whoever it is) on Mk. xvi. 9. On
the change of the sense by means of false emphasis or punctuation see
below, pp. 204(7), 276. J. A. Robinson thinks it probable that ὁ
Ἀγαπητός is a separate title of the Messiah, and would point ὁ υἱός μου,
ὁ Ἀγαπητός in Mk. i. 11, ix. 7 on the authority of the _Ascensio Esaiae_
and the Old Syriac (see Hastings’ _Bible Dictionary_, ii. 501).
Contents.
On the contents of Bible manuscripts see Zahn, _GK._ i. 62 f. According
to him Jerome’s Old Testament was in 14 volumes. In addition to some
entire Bibles Cassiodorus had the Scriptures written out in 9 codices.
Of these vol. VII. comprised the Gospels, VIII. the Epistles, and IX.
the Acts and Apocalypse. Leontius speaks of 6 books of the New
Testament, of which probably I. was Mt. and Mk., II. Lk. and Jn., III.
Acts, IV. Catholic Epistles, V. Pauline Epistles, VI. Apocalypse. As a
rule the Gospels and the Pauline Epistles made two codices.
In cod. א we find that the different parts of the New Testament display
a different type of text, from which we may conclude that the codex was
copied, not from a single manuscript but from several. Similarly, the
singular type of text exhibited by cod. Δ in Mark would show that this
codex, or that from which it was copied, was transcribed from different
rolls or codices, each containing one Gospel. See Zahn, _GK._ i. 63.
Bibliotheca.
On the designation _Bibliotheca_ and _Pandectes_ for Bible manuscripts,
see Zahn, _GK._ i. 65. On τεῦχος, _ibid._ 67. He informs us that the
earliest mention of a Christian _bibliotheca_ and its _armaria_ is in
the heathen protocol of the year 304, in the _Gesta apud Zenophilum_
given in Dupin after Optatus, p. 262. The next earliest notice is in
Augustine. The custodians of the bibliothecae were probably the Readers.
In Ruinart’s _Acta Saturnini_ a certain Ampelius is mentioned as “custos
legis, scripturarumque divinarum fidelissimus conservator.” From
Irenaeus, iv. 33, 2 Lessing concluded that at that time the few existing
copies of the Scriptures were in the custody of the clergy, and were
only to be perused in their presence. (_Zusätze zu einer nötigen
Antwort._ Works, ed. Maltzahn, xi. 2, 179.) On this point see Zahn,
_GK._ i. 140.
(_a._) UNCIAL MANUSCRIPTS.
[Sidenote: א]
א CODEX SINAITICUS, now in St. Petersburg, contains the entire New
Testament written in the fourth or more probably at the beginning of the
fifth century. The story of its discovery and acquisition is quite
romantic. When Tischendorf, under the patronage of his sovereign King
Frederick Augustus of Saxony, came to the Convent of St. Catherine on
Mount Sinai for the first time in 1844, he rescued from a basket there
forty-three old sheets of parchment which, with other rubbish, were
destined for the fire. In this way he obtained possession of portions of
one of the oldest MSS. of the Old Testament, which he published as the
Codex Frederico-Augustanus (F-A) in 1846. At the same time he learned
that other portions of the same Codex existed in the Monastery. He could
find no trace of these, however, on his second visit in 1853. But on his
third visit, undertaken with the patronage of the Emperor of Russia, the
steward of the monastery brought him, shortly before his departure on
the 4th February 1859, what surpassed all his expectations, the entire
remaining portions of the Codex comprising a great part of the Old
Testament and the whole of the New, wrapped up in a red cloth. Not only
was the New Testament perfect, but in addition to the twenty-seven
books, the MS. contained the Epistle of Barnabas and part of the
so-called Shepherd of Hermas, two books of the greatest repute in early
Christian times, the Greek text of which was only partially extant in
Europe. Tischendorf managed to secure the MS. for the Emperor of Russia,
at whose expense it was published in four folio volumes in the year 1862
on the thousandth anniversary of the founding of the Russian Empire. In
return for the MS. the monastery received a silver shrine for St.
Catherine, a gift of 7000 roubles for the library and 2000 for the
monastery on Mount Tabor, while several Russian decorations were
distributed among the Fathers.
Unfortunately the art of photography was not so far advanced
thirty-eight years ago as to permit a perfect facsimile to be made of
the MS., and Tischendorf had to be content with a printed copy executed
as faithfully as the utmost care and superintendence would admit.
To what date does the manuscript belong? There is still extant a letter
of the first Christian Emperor Constantine dating from the year 331, in
which he asks Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea in Palestine, to provide him
with fifty copies of the Old and New Testament for use in the principal
churches of his empire (πεντήκοντα σωμάτια ἐν διφθέραις ἐγκατασκεύοις)
and puts two public carriages at the bishop’s disposal for their safe
transport. We have also the letter that Eusebius sent along with these
Bibles, in which he consigns them ἐν πολυτελῶς ἠσκημένοις τεύχεσι τρισσᾶ
καὶ τετρασσᾶ—_i.e._ “in expensively prepared volumes of three and four.”
With former scholars Tischendorf understood the expression τρισσᾶ καὶ
τετρασσᾶ of the number of sheets in the quires of the manuscripts, as
though they had been composed of ternions and quaternions of twelve and
sixteen pages respectively. Others took it as referring to the number of
columns on the pages, Codex Sinaiticus, which Tischendorf believed to be
one of these fifty Bibles, being unique in showing four columns to the
page. The most probable explanation of the phrase is, however, that it
indicates the number of volumes each Bible comprised, and means that
each Bible of three or four parts, as the case might be, was packed in a
separate box.[59] Tischendorf, as has been said, saw in Codex Sinaiticus
one of these fifty Bibles. He also thought that א was the work of four
different scribes, and was confident that one of these, the one who had
written only six leaves of the New Testament, was the scribe of Codex
Vaticanus. But other authorities bring א down to the beginning of the
fifth century.
One can understand how it was that Tischendorf was led to overrate the
value of this manuscript at first, and to call it by the first letter of
the Hebrew alphabet to signify its pre-eminence over all other
manuscripts. The claim is so far justified that it is at least one of
the oldest manuscripts, and of the oldest the only one that contains the
entire New Testament. The order is that of the Gospels, Pauline Epistles
(among which Hebrews is found after 2 Thess.), Acts, Catholic Epistles,
Apocalypse, after which come Barnabas and Hermas.[60] This same order is
observed in the Old Syriac Bible, and in the first printed Greek New
Testament, the Complutensian Polyglot. The fact that Barnabas is still
tacitly included in the books of the New Testament may be taken equally
as indicating the age of א itself or that of the exemplar from which it
was copied.[61] Jerome’s recension of Origen’s Lexicon of Proper Names
in the Greek New Testament is still extant, and in it Barnabas is cited
like the other books. In the Catalogus Claromontanus, which is a very
old list of the books of the New Testament, Barnabas is even found
before the Apocalypse, an arrangement which is not found again in the
succeeding centuries.
[Transcriber’s Note: In this paragraph, there are two cases of letters
separated by a slash, as if describing arithmetic division, like “a/b”.
In the original book they are printed with the first item, “a”, raised
up, and the second item, “b”, printed below the first. In this e-book,
they are represented in this “a/b” form.]
[Sidenote: Canons.]
א is also the oldest MS. that has the so-called =Ammonian Sections= and
=Eusebian Canons=. In order to facilitate the study of the Gospels,
Ammonius of Alexandria arranged, alongside of Matthew’s Gospel, the
parallel passages in Mark, Luke, and John. For this purpose he was
obliged of course to dislocate these last.[62] Eusebius, however, simply
divided the four Gospels into 1162 sections—viz., 355 in Matthew, 233 in
Mark, 342 in Luke, and 232 in John. These he numbered consecutively in
each Gospel, and then arranged the numbers in ten Canons or Tables. The
first contained those passages which are found in all the four Gospels;
the second, third, and fourth those common to any particular combination
of three; the fifth to the ninth comprised the passages common to any
two, and the tenth those peculiar to each one. The number of its Canon
was then set under that of the section in the margin, and the Table
inserted at the beginning or end of the manuscript. By this means it was
possible to know in the case of each section whether a parallel was to
be found in the other Gospels, and where. In the margin opposite John
xv. 20, _e.g._, we find the numbers ρλθ/γ, _i.e._ 139/3. This tells us
that this 139th section of John is also found in Matthew and Luke. For
on referring to Canon 3 we find that it contains the passages common to
John, Matthew, and Luke, and that this section numbered 139 in John, is
90 in Matthew and 58 in Luke. And the sections being numbered
consecutively in each Gospel, we easily ascertain that the former is
Matthew x. 24, and the latter Luke vi. 40. These, or similar numbers,
were afterwards inserted in the lower margin of manuscripts, as, _e.g._,
in Codex Argenteus of the Version of Ulfilas. They are still printed
alongside the text in our larger editions, though, of course, owing to
the introduction of our system of chapter and verse division they have
lost their main significance.
[Sidenote: Revisions.]
Now, a Codex like א represents to us not one manuscript only, but
several at once. It embodies first of all the manuscript from which its
text was immediately derived, and then also that or those by which it
was revised. That is to say, after the manuscript was written by the
scribe, either to dictation or by copying, it was, particularly in the
case of a costly manuscript, handed over to a person called the
διορθωτής and revised. This might be done several times over; it might
be done by a later owner if he were a scholar. But it might happen, as
in the case of א _e.g._, that the exemplar by which the manuscript was
revised was not the identical one from which it had been copied but a
different one, perhaps older, perhaps exhibiting another form of text
altogether. Tischendorf distinguished no fewer than seven correctors in
א. One of these, belonging, it may be, to the seventh century, adds a
note at the end of the book of Ezra to the following effect,—“This codex
was compared with a very ancient exemplar which had been corrected by
the hand of the holy martyr Pamphilus; which exemplar contained at the
end the subscription in his own hand: ‘Taken and corrected according to
the Hexapla of Origen: Antonius compared it: I, Pamphilus, corrected
it.’”[63] A similar note is found appended to the Book of Esther, where
it is also pointed out that variants occurred in the case of proper
names. Traces are still discoverable in the Psalms which go to prove
that the corrector’s Bible agreed with that of Eusebius, while the
manuscript itself had been copied from one that was very different.
A considerable number of scholars are of opinion that א was written in
the West, perhaps in Rome. (_See Plate I._)
Tischendorf: (1) _Notitia editionis_, 1860; (2) _Bibliorum Codex
Sinaiticus Petropolitanus_, Petropoli, 1862, fol. Vol. I.,
Prolegomena et Commentaria; Vol. IV., Novum Testamentum. (3) _N. T.
Sinaiticum_, Lips. 1863. (_Die Anfechtungen der Sinaibibel_, Lips.
1863; _Waffen der Finsterniss wider die Sinaibibel_, Lips. 1863.)
(4) _N. T. Graece ex Sinaitico Codice omnium antiquissimo_, Lips.
1865. _Collatio textus graeci editionis polyglottae cum Novo
Testamento Sinaitico. Appendix editionis Novi Testamenti
polyglottae_, Bielefeldiae. Sumptibus Velhagen et Klasing, 1894,
large 8vo, pp. iv. 96. (Preface only by Tischendorf.) On Kenyon’s
showing, the recent papyrus discoveries give no occasion for
abandoning the conclusions formerly come to regarding the age of
these parchment manuscripts (_Palaeography_, p. 120). Scrivener, _A
full Collation of the Codex Sinaiticus with the Received Text of the
N. Testament_, 2nd edition, 1867. Ezra Abbot, “On the comparative
antiquity of the Sinaitic and Vatican Manuscripts of the Greek
Bible,” _Journal of the American Oriental Society_, vol. x., i.
1872, pp. 189 ff.
[Sidenote: A.]
A. CODEX ALEXANDRINUS: middle or end of the fifth century: written
probably at Alexandria: contains a note in Arabic stating that it was
presented to the library of the Patriarch of Alexandria in the year
1098. The Codex was sent by Cyril Lucar, Patriarch of Constantinople, to
Charles I. of England in 1628, and was deposited in the library of the
British Museum on its foundation in 1753, where it has been ever since.
It has been employed in the textual criticism of the New Testament since
the time of Walton. It was printed in 1786 by Woide in facsimile from
wooden type. The Old Testament portion of it was also published in
1816-1828 by Baber. The entire manuscript was issued in autotype
facsimile in 1879 and 1880.
The Codex is defective at the beginning of the New Testament, the first
twenty-six leaves down to Matthew xxv. 6 being absent, as also two
containing John vi. 50-viii. 52, and three containing 2 Cor. iv. 13-xii.
6. It also contains after the Apocalypse the (first) Epistle of Clement
of Rome and a small fragment of the so-called second Epistle, which is
really an early sermon. In the Codex these are recognised as parts of
the New Testament, inasmuch as in the table of contents prefixed to the
entire work they are included with the other books under the title ἡ
καινη διαθηκη.[64] After them is given the number of books ὁμου βιβλια,
only the figures are now, unfortunately, torn away. The contents
indicate that the Psalms of Solomon should have followed, but these have
been lost with the rest of the manuscript.
A is distinguished among the oldest manuscripts by the use of capital
letters to indicate new sections. But in order to economize room and to
obviate spacing the lines, the first letter of the section, if it occurs
in the middle of a line, is not written larger, but the one that occurs
at the beginning of the next whole line is enlarged and projects into
the margin. (_See Plate I. 2._) Later scribes have copied this so
slavishly that they have written these letters in capitals even when
they occur in the middle of the line in their manuscripts. The Egyptian
origin of this Codex is shown by its use of Coptic forms for A and M. In
several books A displays a remarkable affinity with Jerome in those very
passages where he deviates from the older Latin version.
The books in A follow the order—Gospels, Acts, Catholic Epistles,
Pauline Epistles, Apocalypse. (Westcott, _Canon_, Appendix D. xii.;
_Bible in the Church_, Appendix B.)
Woide, 1786; eiusdem, _Notitia codicis Alexandrini, Recud. cur.
notasque adjecit_ G. L. Spohn, Lipsiae, 1788; Cowper, 1860, Hansell,
1864; Photographic facsimile by Thompson, 1879; and in the
Facsimiles of the Palæographical Society, Pl. 106.
The mixed character of the text of A was early observed; see
Lagarde, _Gesammelte Abhandlungen_, p. 94.
C. F. Hoole ascribes the Codex Alexandrinus to the middle of the
fourth century (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1891; see _Academy_, July
25, 1891, 73).
[Sidenote: B.]
B. CODEX VATICANUS _par excellence_, No. 1209 in the Vatican Library at
Rome, inserted there shortly after its foundation by Pope Nicolas V.,
and one of its greatest treasures. Like A it once contained the whole of
the Old Testament with the exception of the Books of Maccabees. The
first 31 leaves, containing Gen. i. 1-xlvi. 28, are now wanting, as well
as 20 from the Psalms containing Ps. cv. (cvi.) 27-cxxxvii. (cxxxviii.)
6. The New Testament is complete down to Heb. ix. 14, where it breaks
off at καθα[ριει]. 1 and 2 Tim., Titus, Philemon, and the Apocalypse
are, therefore, also wanting. Rahlfs supposes that the manuscript may
have originally contained the Didache and the Shepherd of Hermas as
well. Erasmus obtained some account of this manuscript, and Pope Sixtus
V. made it the basis of an edition of the Greek Old Testament, which was
published in 1586, thereby determining the _textus receptus_ of that
portion of the Bible.—Would he had done the same for the New Testament!
This task was undertaken afterwards, specially by Bentley and Birch.
Professor Hug of Freiburg recognised the value of the Codex when it was
removed from Rome to Paris by Napoleon in 1809. Cardinal Angelo Mai
printed an edition of it between 1828 and 1838, which, however, did not
appear till 1857, three years after his death, and which was most
unsatisfactory. After Tischendorf had led the way with the Codex
Sinaiticus, Pope Pio Nono gave orders for an edition, which was printed
between 1868 and 1872 in five folio volumes. Not till 1881, however, did
the last volume of this edition appear containing the indispensable
commentary prepared under the supervision of Vercellone, J. Cozza, C.
Sergio, and H. Fabiani, with the assistance of U. Ubaldi and A. Rocchi.
Then at last the manuscript was photographed, the New Testament in 1889,
and the Old Testament, in three volumes, in 1890—a veritable ἡλίου
ἀνάθημα. No facsimile now can give any idea of its original beauty,
because a hand of the tenth or eleventh century—or as the Roman editors
say, a monk called Clement in the fifteenth century—went over the whole
manuscript, letter by letter, with fresh ink, restoring the faded
characters and at the same time adding accents and breathings in
accordance with the pronunciation of his time (ἄμαξα, for example, and
ἁλώπηξ, δἒ). The Old Testament is the work of at least two scribes, one
of whom wrote down to 1 Sam. ix. 11, and the other to the end of 2
Esdras. Tischendorf’s opinion with regard to the writer of the New
Testament has been already noticed. There can be no question that B is
more carefully written than א. In the Gospels the Vatican exhibits a
peculiar division into 170, 62, 152, and 80 sections respectively, which
is found also in Ξ; in the Acts there is a double division into 36 and
69.[65] The enumeration affixed to the Pauline Epistles shows that these
were copied from a manuscript in which Hebrews came after Galatians,
though in B its position has been changed so as to follow 2
Thessalonians. The copyist has also retained in part of the Old
Testament the enumeration of the stichoi which he found in his original.
In the New Testament the order of the books is Gospels, Acts, Catholic
Epistles, Pauline Epistles. An increased interest would be lent to this
manuscript if, as has been supposed, it represents the recension of the
Egyptian Bishop and Martyr Hesychius, of which Jerome makes mention in
two places. (Bousset, _Textkritische Studien zum Neuen Testament_, pp.
74-110, see especially p. 96.) On the Egyptian character of B, see also
Burkitt in _Texts and Studies_, v. p. viii. f., and compare below, p.
183 f. (_See Plate IV._)
Hug, _Commentatio de antiquitate codicis Vaticani_, 1810.
Vercellone, _Dell’ antichissimo codice Vaticano della Bibbia Greca_,
1859; reprinted in his _Dissertazioni accademiche_, Roma, 1864, 115
ff. First facsimile reproduction, _Bibliorum sacrorum Graecus Codex
Vaticanus ... collatis studiis Caroli Vercellone et Josephi Cozza
editus_, vol. v., Rome, 1868; vol. vi. (Proleg. Comment. Tab. ed.
Henr. Fabiani et Jos. Cozza), 1881; _cf._ _ThLz._, 1882, vi. 9. A.
Giovanni, _Della Illustrazione dell’ edizione Romana del Codice
Vaticano_, Rome, 1869. Photographic edition, _Novum Testamentum e
Codice Vaticano 1209 ... phototypice repraesentatum ... curante Jos.
Cozza-Luzi_, Rome, 1889, fol.; see H. C. Hoskier, _The Expositor_,
1889, vol. x. 457 ff.; O. v. Gebhardt, _ThLz._, 1890, 16; Nestle,
_Sep.-St._, ii. 16 ff. Alf. Rahlfs, _Alter und Heimat der
Vatikanischen Bibelhandschrift_ (Nachrichten der Gesell. der Wiss.
zu Göttingen, Philologisch-historische Klasse, 1889, Heft i. pp.
72-79). In this article Rahlfs seeks to prove that the number and
order of the books in the Old and New Testaments contained in B
correspond exactly to the Canon of the Scriptures given by
Athanasius in his thirty-ninth Festal Letter of the year 367. In it,
Athanasius, after mentioning all the canonical books of the Bible,
including those of the N. T., cites the extra-canonical books of the
O. T. which are allowed to be read, putting them after the second
group, βίβλοι στιχήρεις, because two of these books, Wisdom and
Sirach, were to be written στιχηδόν. In the N. T. the Greek and
Syriac forms of the Festal Letter put Hebrews expressly between the
Epistles to the Churches and the Pastoral Epistles. In the Sahidic
version of the Letter, however, Hebrews stands before Galatians.
This latter arrangement is evidently the survival of a
pre-Athanasian order which has been longer preserved in the Sahidic
translation.[66] But if B is the work of Athanasius, it follows that
it cannot be one of the Bibles ordered by Constantine. In this case
it would rather be written in Egypt, and we should have in it the
Recension of Hesychius, as Grabe supposed was the case in the O. T.,
while Hug held the same view in regard to the N. T. text of this
manuscript (see below, c. III.). Against the theory of Rahlfs, see
O. v. Gebhardt in the _Theologische Litteraturzeitung_, 1899, n. 20.
[Sidenote: C.]
C. CODEX EPHRAEMI RESCRIPTUS, No. 9 in the National Library at Paris,
the most important of the palimpsests. This manuscript receives its name
from the fact that in the twelfth century thirty-eight treatises of
Ephraem, the Syrian Father (d. 373), were written over the original
text. After various attempts had been made at its decipherment by
Wettstein and others, Tischendorf in 1843 and 1845 published as much of
the New and Old Testaments as he was able to make out after eighteen
months’ labour, thereby establishing his reputation as a textual critic.
The manuscript once contained the entire Bible, but the whole of 1 and 2
Thessalonians has been lost, as also some 37 chapters from the Gospels,
10 from the Acts, 42 from the Epistles, and 8 from the Apocalypse. There
is no trace of a chapter division in Acts, Epistles, or Apocalypse. This
last seems to have been copied from an exemplar consisting of about 120
small leaves, one of which had been displaced by some mistake. The Codex
dates from the fifth century, and may possibly have been written in
Egypt. Its earliest corrections are important, and were inserted in the
sixth century.
A detailed list of the contents of C is given by Scrivener, vol. i. 121.
Facsimile, _ibid._, Plate X. p. 121.
Tischendorf, _Th. St. und Kr._, 1841, 126 ff; N. T. edited 1843, O.
T. 1845. Lagarde, _Ges. Abhandlungen_, p. 94. The page of the O. T.
which Tischendorf issued in facsimile has most unfortunately
disappeared, as Martin points out in his _Description technique des
manuscrits grecs relatifs au N. T., etc._, Paris, 1884, p. 4. A.
Jacob, _Notes sur les MSS. grecs palimpsestes de la Bibliothèque
Nationale_, in _Melanges Julien Havet_, 759-770.
The foregoing is what remains of the four great manuscripts which once
contained the whole Bible. It will be observed that at the present time
they are distributed among the Capitals of the great branches of the
Christian Church—viz., St. Petersburg (Greek), Rome and Paris (Roman),
and London (Anglican). German scholars have taken a foremost place in
the work of their investigation.
[Sidenote: D.]
D. CODEX BEZAE CANTABRIGIENSIS, inferior to the foregoing in age,
compass, and repute, but perhaps surpassing all of them in importance,
by reason of its unique character. The manuscript was presented to the
University of Cambridge in 1581 by Calvin’s friend Theodore Beza, “ut
inter vere christianas antiquissimae plurimisque nominibus
celeberrimae.” It is not earlier than the beginning of the sixth
century, but is of peculiar importance as the oldest of the Greek-Latin
manuscripts of the Bible. It now contains, with certain lacunæ, the
Gospels (in the order Matthew, John, Luke, Mark), the concluding verses
of the Latin text of 3 John, followed immediately by the Acts, showing
that in this manuscript the Epistle of Jude either stood somewhere else
or was absent altogether. At least nine later hands can be distinguished
in it. The first scribe was more familiar with Latin than Greek, and
therefore inserts a Roman letter here and there in the middle of a Greek
word, and has frequently to use the sponge to wash out the mistakes he
makes in writing his manuscript.[67] Innumerable passages occur,
particularly in Luke and Acts, where the text of D differs in the most
remarkable manner from that of all the Greek manuscripts we are
acquainted with. It alone, _e.g._, contains after Luke vi. 4 the
incident of the man working in the field on the Sabbath day, to whom
Jesus said, “O Man, if thou knowest what thou doest, blessed art thou,
but if thou knowest not, thou art cursed and a transgressor of the Law.”
It is the only one also that has the words in Luke xi. 2, “when ye pray,
use not vain repetitions as the λοιποί.” In Luke xxiii. 53, it says that
the stone before the grave of Jesus was of such a size ὃν μόγις εἴκοσι
ἐκύλιον, an addition in which it has the support of only one Latin MS.
and the Sahidic Version. Again in Acts xii. 10, it is alone in recording
that there were seven steps down from the prison in Jerusalem (κατέβησαν
τοὺς ἑπτὰ βαθμούς). Other examples might be given of similar peculiar
interpolations for the explanation of which reference must be made to c.
III. below.
Its companion Latin text d is not translated directly from its own Greek
but from the Greek of the parent manuscript. Seeing that the manuscript
was discovered in the Monastery of Irenæus at Lyons, and that its text
agrees with the Scripture quotations found in that Father even in the
matter of clerical mistakes, it is possible that the Greek text is
derived from his copy. The Greek occupies the left-hand page of the open
volume, which is the place of honour. (_See Plates II and III._)
Kipling, Facsimile edition, _Codex Th. Bezae Cantabrigiensis_, 1793,
2 vols.; Scrivener, _Bezae Codex Cantabrigiensis. An exact copy in
ordinary type ... with critical introduction, annotations, and
facsimiles_. 4to, pp. lxiv + 453, 1864. Collation of the same by
Nestle, _Supplementum_, 1896 (see p. 26). Cambridge University
Press, _Photographic facsimile_. _Codex Bezae Cantabrigiensis
Quattuor Evangelia et Actus Apostolorum continens Graece et Latine._
2 vols., pp. 830, 1899. 12 guineas. (See _Literature_, 29th April
1899, p. 451 ff.); Dav. Schulz, _Disputatio de Codice D._, 1827; K.
A. Credner, _Beiträge zur Einleitung_, vol. i., 1832, pp. 452-518;
J. R. Harris, _Codex Bezae. A study of the so-called Western Text of
the N. T._ (_Texts and Studies_, vol. ii.) Cambridge, 1891; also
_Credner and the Codex Bezae. A Lecture delivered in the Divinity
School, Cambridge, 19th Nov. 1892._ (_The Classical Review_, vol.
vii. 6, _June 1893_, pp. 237-243); Chase, _The Old Syriac Element in
the text of Codex Bezae_, London, 1893; also _The Syro-Latin Text of
the Gospels_, London, 1895; Nestle, _Some Observations on the Codex
Bezae_ in the _Expositor_, v. 2, 1895, p. 235; H. Trabaud, _Un
curieux manuscrit du N. T._ in the _Revue de théologie et de
philosophie_, Lausanne, 1896, p. 378; Fr. Blass: 1. _Die zwiefache
Textüberlieferung in der Apostelgeschichte_ (_Th. St. Kr._, 1894, p.
86 ff.); 2. _Acta Apostolorum sive Lucae ad Theophilum Liber alter.
Editio philologica_, Göttingen, 1895; 3. _Acta Apostolorum ...
secundum formam quae videtur Romanam_, Leipzig, 1896; 4. _Ueber die
verschiedenen Textformen in den Schriften des Lukas_ (_Neue
Kirchliche Zeitschrift_, 1895, p. 712); 5. _De duplici forma Actorum
Lucae_ (_Hermathena_, Dublin, 1895, p. 121); 6. _De variis formis
Evangelii Lucani_ (_Ibid._, Dublin, 1896, p. 291); 7. _Neue
Texteszeugen für die Apostelgeschichte_ (_Th. St. Kr._, 1896, p.
436); 8. _Evangelium secundum Lucam sive Lucae ad Theophilum Liber
prior. Secundum formam quae videtur Romanam_, Leipzig, 1897; B.
Weiss, _Der Codex D in der Apostelgeschichte. Textkritische
Untersuchung_, Leipzig, 1897, (= Texte und Untersuchungen. N. F.
Zweiter Band, Heft 1); F. Graefe, _Der Codex Bezae und das
Lucasevangelium_, _Th. St. Kr._, 1898, i. 116-140; compare
especially, _On the Italian Origin of Codex Bezae. 1. Codex Bezae
and cod. 1071_, by the Rev. K. Lake; _2. The Marginal Notes of
Lections_, by the Rev. F. E. Brightman in the _Journal of
Theological Studies_, i. 3 (April 1900) pp. 441-454. Codex 1071 is a
minuscule on Mt. Athos, in which the text of the Pericope Adulterae
(John viii.) is essentially the same as the singular text exhibited
by D. It seems to have come from Calabria. The lectionary indicated
in the margin of D points to a mixed Greek and Latin population such
as that in the South of Italy.
In what follows the manuscripts are grouped according to their contents
as copies of the Gospels, Acts and Catholic Epistles, Pauline Epistles,
or of the Apocalypse.
[Sidenote: Gospels.]
E. CODEX BASILIENSIS, by some ascribed to the seventh century, but
belonging more probably to the eighth: brought to Europe by Cardinal
John de Ragusio, who was sent on a mission to the Greeks by the Council
of Basel (1431): used by Mill, Bengel, and Wettstein: Luke iii. 4-15 and
xxiv. 47-53 wanting: has been in the University Library at Basel since
1559. (Scrivener, i. p. 131, Plate XI. 27.)
F. BOREELIANUS, written in the ninth century: so called as belonging at
one time to a Dutchman named John Boreel: now in Utrecht: has many
lacunæ, some of which have arisen since Wettstein collated the
manuscript in 1730. (Scrivener, i. 131, Plate XI. 28.)
F^a. COISLINIANUS, of the seventh century, though some say the sixth and
others the eighth: consists of only 26 verses from Matthew, Luke, John,
Acts, 1 and 2 Cor., Gal., Col., and Heb., written on the margin of a
famous Parisian manuscript of the Octoteuch in Greek containing
Gen.-Deut., Josh., Jud., and Ruth. List of contents of F^a in Scrivener,
i. 134.
G. SEIDELIANUS, of the tenth century: part of it in the British Museum
in London and part in Trinity College, Cambridge: brought from the East
by Seidel and presented in 1718 by the Berlin Librarian La Croze to J.
Chr. Wolf, a clergyman in Hamburg who cut out half a page to send to
Bentley in 1721. (Scrivener, i. 131, Plate XI. 29.)
H. SEIDELIANUS II., of the ninth century, in Hamburg: bequeathed with
his library to his native city by Wolf, and rediscovered there in 1838.
(Scrivener, i, 134, Plate XII. 31.)
I. TISCHENDORFIANUS II., fragments of seven manuscripts in St.
Petersburg found by Tischendorf in the Monastery of Mar Saba, near the
Dead Sea: consists of 28 palimpsest leaves with Greek writing of the
tenth century containing only 255 verses of the New Testament, of which
190 are from the Gospels: the three oldest leaves are of the fifth
century; some of them are perhaps parts of a once complete Bible:
detailed list of contents in Scrivener, i. 134 f.
I^b. So indicated by Tischendorf in his eighth edition, formerly known
as N^b, of the fourth or more probably the fifth century: a threefold
palimpsest written first in Greek and afterwards twice in Syriac:
contains 17 verses from John’s Gospel: now in the British Museum: list
of verses in Scrivener, i. 141.
K. CYPRIUS, No. 63 in the National Library at Paris: middle of the ninth
century: purchased in Cyprus for Colbert in 1673: one of the six, or
including Ω seven, complete uncial manuscripts of the Gospels, the
others being א BMSU (Ω). Facsimile in Scrivener, i., Plate VII. p. 153.
L. REGIUS, No. 62 in the National Library at Paris: of the eighth
century: contains the four Gospels complete with the exception of five
lacunæ in Matthew iv. v. and xxviii., Mark x. and xv., and in John xxi.:
important as showing the double conclusion of Mark’s Gospel which is
exhibited as yet, except in versions, in only three other uncials (ד, ק,
and Ψ) and one minuscule (see Plate X.). Facsimile of L, Mark xvi. 8, 9,
in Scrivener, i., Plate IX. 21, p. 137. The conclusions, as found in L,
ד, ק, and Ψ, are printed and discussed in Swete’s _Gospel according to
St. Mark_, pp. xcviii, xcix. See also Westcott and Hort’s Introduction,
Appendix, p. 28 ff.; Scrivener, ii. 337; Hastings’ _Dictionary of the
Bible_, iii. p. 13.
M. CAMPIANUS, 48 in the National Library, Paris: of the ninth century:
presented to Louis XIV. by the Abbé François de Camps, 1st January 1706:
contains the four Gospels complete: one of the oldest manuscripts, with
the exception of D, that exhibit the pericope of the adulteress, John
vii. 53 ff. Facsimile in Scrivener, i., Plate XII. p. 134.
N. PURPUREUS, belonging to the end of the sixth century: one of the most
lovely manuscripts, consisting of 45 leaves, of which 6 are in the
Vatican Library at Rome, 4 in the British Museum, 2 in Vienna, and the
remaining 33 in the Monastery of St. John in Patmos, from which, in all
probability, the others were carried off. The manuscript is written with
silver letters on a purple ground, only the letters are not printed on
it with movable type as was formerly supposed in the case of the similar
Codex Argenteus of Ulfilas. The contents are given in Scrivener, i. 139
f., and a facsimile at p. 98, Plate V. 182 other leaves belonging to
this manuscript were recently acquired in Cappadocia for Russia.
The Vienna fragment is most beautifully printed in facsimile in that
superb work, _Die Wiener Genesis_, edited by Wilh. Ritter von Hartel
and Franz Wickhoff: Supplement to vols. xv. and xvi. of the
_Jahrbuch der kunsthistorischen Sammlungen des Allerhöchsten
Kaiserhauses_. Vienna, 1895. Hartel (p. 142) sees no reason why the
manuscript should not be ascribed to the fifth century.
The text of Codex N, including the new Russian fragments, has been
published with Introduction and Appendix by the Rev. H. S. Cronin in
_Texts and Studies_, v. 4, 1899. The Appendix contains a collation
of the Gospel of Mark in the Codex Imperatricis Theodorae (Scriv.
473: Hort 81: Tisch. 2^{pe}: Greg. 565; see note on p. 151). See
Nestle in the _Zeitschrift für wiss. Theologie_, 42 (1899), pp.
621-623.
Some leaves of another purple manuscript have been acquired in
Paris. See H. Omont, _Acad. des Inscr._, Mars-Avril 1900.
O. In Moscow, consists of a few leaves taken from the binding of a book:
contains 15 verses from John’s Gospel i. and xx.: written in the ninth
century.
O^{a-h}. Psalters, in which are found, after the Psalms among the poetic
selections from the Bible, the Magnificat, the Benedictus, and the Nunc
Dimittis from the first and second chapters of Luke’s Gospel. O^c is a
Greek Psalter of the sixth century written in Latin characters and is at
Verona. O^d is a purple Psalter of the seventh century at Zurich. O^e at
St. Gall is a Psalter of the ninth century, written partly in Latin and
partly in Greek.
P and Q. Two palimpsests at Wolfenbüttel, the former belonging to the
sixth and the latter to the fifth century. P, it appears, came from
Bobbio and was afterwards at Weissenburg, Mayence, and Prague. Q,
together with a portion of Ulfilas’s Gothic Bible, has been employed to
receive the works of Isidore of Seville. The codices were edited with
great care by Tischendorf in 1869.
R. NITRIENSIS, of the sixth century: in the British Museum: consists of
48 leaves containing some 516 verses from Luke’s Gospel, over which and
a manuscript of 4000 verses of the Iliad, the Syriac works of Severus of
Antioch were written in the ninth century. The palimpsest was brought
from the Nitrian Desert in 1847, and deposited in the British Museum.
(Scrivener, i. 145, Plate VI, 17.)
S. VATICANUS 354: one of the earliest manuscripts of the Greek New
Testament that bears an exact date. At the end is written, ἐγράφη ἡ
τιμία δέλτος αὕτη διὰ χειρὸς ἐμοῦ Μιχαὴλ μοναχοῦ ἁμαρτωλοῦ μηνὶ Μαρτίῳ
α’, ἡμέρᾳ έ, ὥρᾳ ϛ’, ἔτους ϛυνζ’, ἰνδικτιῶνος ζ’, _i.e._ at six o’clock
on Thursday, 1st March 6457 in the 7th Indiction[68] or 949 A.D.
T^a. Of the fifth century: in the Museum Borgianum at Rome: written
probably by a Coptic monk: unfortunately a mere fragment containing only
17 leaves from Luke and John: is written in two columns, that on the
left containing a Sahidic version. T^b, similar small fragments of John
in St. Petersburg of the sixth century. T^c, also of the sixth century,
a fragment of Matthew, formerly in the possession of Bishop Porfiri
Uspenski of Kiev, and now at St. Petersburg. T^d, of the seventh
century, in Rome, part of a Sahidic-Greek Evangeliarium, containing a
few verses from Matthew, Mark, and John. T^e, of the sixth century (?),
at Cambridge, consists of four verses, Matthew iii. 13-16. T^h (T^k in
_TiGr._ p. 450), three leaves from Matthew xx. and xxii. T^{i-r},
fragments of six Greek-Coptic and three Greek Gospels of the ninth and
tenth centuries, but possibly the seventh and eighth, published by
Amélineau in vol. xxxiv. of the _Notices et Extraits de la Bibliothèque
Nationale_, 1895, 363 ff.; _cf._ v. Dobschütz in the _Lit.
Cent.-Blatt._, 1895, 42, 1857. T^l contains the double conclusion of
Mark’s Gospel. T^{woi}, similar leaves at Oxford which once belonged to
Woide, but by a different hand from T^a.
To these Græco-Coptic fragments there is now to be added two chapters of
John’s Gospel (iii. 5-iv. 49), in Greek and Middle Egyptian, written in
the sixth century. They are published by W. E. Crum and F. G. Kenyon in
the _Journal of Theological Studies_, i. 3 (April 1900), pp. 415-433.
The find contains no remarkable readings. The editors call its text
neutral, and think it helps to show that Egypt was the home of such
correct and upright texts. (T^w Greg.)
U. NANIANUS, so called from a former possessor: of the end of the ninth
or beginning of the tenth century: in Venice: a very beautiful and
complete manuscript of the Gospels, with ornamentations in gold.
(Scrivener, i. 137, Plate IX. 22.)
V. Formerly at Mount Athos, now in Moscow: of the ninth century: first
employed by Bengel and Wettstein through the medium of G. B. Bilfinger.
W. Various small fragments: W^a of the eighth century in Paris: a
fragment of Luke. W^b of the eighth century (or the ninth) in Naples: a
palimpsest with parts of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. W^c of the ninth
century at St. Gall: a palimpsest, containing fragments of Mark and
Luke, perhaps once bilingual, Greek-Latin. W^d of the ninth century in
Cambridge. W^e of the ninth century: part of John, at Mount Athos,
Oxford, and Athens. W^f of the ninth century: in Oxford: fragment of
Mark. W^g of the ninth century: consisting of 36 palimpsest leaves with
497 verses from Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, in the British Museum.
W^h of the ninth century: in Oxford: part of Mark. W^{i-m} in Paris, of
the seventh to the eighth or ninth century: fragments of Mark and Luke,
of which W^l and W^k are printed in Omont’s _Catalogue des Manuscrits
Grecs, Latins, Français, et Espagnols et des Portulans, recueillis par
feu Emmanuel Miller_, Paris, 1897. W^n of the seventh century, in
Vienna: fragments of John. W^o of the ninth century, in Milan: 16
mutilated palimpsest leaves, containing portions of Matthew, Mark, and
Luke.
X. MONACENSIS, written at the end of the ninth or beginning of the tenth
century, now in Munich, contains the Gospels, with lacunæ, and a
commentary, in the order Matthew, John, Luke, Mark. Scrivener, i. 343,
Plate XIII. 38; for contents see _ibid._, p. 152.
X^b. Fragment containing Luke i. 1-ii. 40, hitherto reckoned among the
minuscules and numbered 429; also in Munich.
Y. Belonging to the eighth century, in the Barberini Library at Rome: 6
leaves containing John xvi. 3-xix. 41.
Z. A palimpsest in Dublin of the fifth or sixth century, containing 295
verses of Matthew’s Gospel. Scrivener, i. 153; Plate VII. 18.
The Roman alphabet not being sufficient for the number of uncial
manuscripts, recourse was taken to those letters of the Greek and Hebrew
which have a distinct form from those already employed. It was proposed
by others to reserve the Greek letters for those manuscripts no longer
extant, whose text can be reconstructed from a number of kindred
manuscripts as their common archetype.
Γ. Of the ninth or tenth century: part in Oxford and part in St.
Petersburg, the former having been obtained from Tischendorf in 1855 and
the latter in 1859: contains the whole of Luke and John, but Mark is
defective from iii. 34 to vi. 20, while Matthew is still more defective.
The writing of the manuscript was finished on a certain Thursday, the
27th November, in the eighth year of an indiction. Tischendorf
accordingly fixed its date as 844. It was previously assigned by
Gardthausen to the year 979. Scrivener, i. 134, Plate XII. 35.
Δ. SANGALLENSIS, written at the end of the ninth or beginning of the
tenth century: now at St. Gall, where it was probably transcribed by an
Irish monk: has an interlinear Latin version, and was not, therefore,
like D, intended for church but for school purposes. The Codex has the
four Gospels complete with the exception of John xix. 17-35. In Mark the
text shows a closer agreement with CL than in the other Gospels. The
manuscript has been copied from one written _scriptione continua_, and
in consequence the words are often wrongly divided. See G_{3} below, p.
77.
Θ^{a-d}. Small fragments brought from the East by Tischendorf, of which
Θ^a belongs to the seventh century, and Θ^{bcd} to the seventh, sixth,
and seventh or eighth century respectively. The first is in Leipzig, the
others in St. Petersburg. Θ^{e-h} were formerly in the possession of
Bishop Porfiri of Kiev.
Λ. Of the ninth century: contains the Gospels of Luke and John entire:
evidently the second part of a minuscule brought to St. Petersburg by
Tischendorf, No. 566^{evv} (Greg.)[69]: marginal scholia are affixed to
four passages in Matthew—viz. iv. 5, xvi. 17, xviii. 22, xxvi. 74,
giving the readings of τὸ Ἰoυδαϊκόν, _i.e._ the lost Gospel according to
the Hebrews, and its subscription runs, ἐγράφη καὶ ἀντεβλήθη ἐκ τῶν
Ἱεροσολύμοις παλαιῶν ἀντιγράφων τῶν ἐν τῷ ὄρει ἁγίῳ ἀποκειμένων· ἐν
στίχοις βφιδ’ (2514) κεφαλαῖς τνε’ (345). The manuscript is in the
Bodleian Library at Oxford. Scrivener, i. 131, Plate XI. 30.
_Cf._ von Dobschütz, _Zwei Bibelhandschriften mit doppelter
Schriftart_ (_Th. Lz._, 1889, iii. 74 f.).
Ξ. ZACYNTHIUS, a palimpsest of the eighth century from Zante, now in the
Library of the British and Foreign Bible Society in London: the earliest
manuscript with a commentary: has the same system of chapter division as
B, and is oftener found supporting B against A than _vice versa_.
Π. Of the ninth century: contains the Gospels almost complete: once the
property of a Greek of Smyrna called Parodos: procured by Tischendorf
for the Emperor of Russia.
Σ. Of the sixth century: written on purple with gold and silver
lettering and 17 miniatures, being the earliest manuscript to contain
such: rescued from obscurity in 1879 by Oscar v. Gebhardt and A.
Harnack, who discovered it at Rossano in Calabria: hence designated as
Codex Rossanensis: is nearly related to N. Scrivener, i. 124, Plate XIV.
43.
O. v. Gebhardt, _Die Evangelien des Matthäus und des Marcus aus dem
Codex Purpureus Rossanensis herausgegeben_ (T. und U., i. 4, 1883).
A. Haseloff, _Cod. Pur. Rossanensis. Die Miniaturen der griechischen
Evangelien-Handschrift in Rossano. Nach photographischen Aufnahmen
herausgegeben._ Leipzig, 1898 (contains 14 facsimiles of the text
and 15 photographic plates). _Vide_ S. Berger in _Bull. Crit._,
1899, 6: also F. X. v. Funk, _Die Zeit. des Cod. Rossanensis_ in the
_Hist. Jahrbuch der Görresgeschellschaft_, xvii. 2, 1896, 331-344.
Φ. CODEX BERATINUS, of the sixth century: at Berat in Albania: like the
last a purple Codex with silver writing: contains portions of Matthew
and Mark: seen and published by Batiffol. Scrivener, i. 166, Plate XV.
Ψ. Fragments of the eighth or ninth century at Athos: contains Mark ix.
5 to the end, Luke, John, Acts, seven Catholic Epistles, Romans to
Philemon, and Hebrews: exhibits after Mark xvi. 8 the same double
conclusion as is found in L and one Sinai manuscript. On some readings
of Ψ, see Lake in the _Journal of Theological Studies_, No. i. p, 88;
ii. pp. 290-292.
Ω. Of the eighth or ninth century: in the Monastery of Dionysius at
Athos: contains the Gospels entire.
The last-mentioned codices have not yet been thoroughly collated, some
of them having been only recently discovered.
The following are indicated by Hebrew letters.
ב. Of the ninth or tenth century: in the Monastery of St. Andrew at
Athos: contains the Gospels with lacunæ.
ג. GREGORIANUS, a purple manuscript from Cappadocia now admitted to be
part of N.
ד^{6-13}. Several leaves dating from the fifth to the ninth century,
discovered at Sinai by J. R. Harris and published by him (_Biblical
fragments from Mount Sinai_, 1890): ד^{12} contains the double
conclusion of Mark: ד^{13} is a purple fragment of the seventh century
containing a few verses from the first chapter of Luke, perhaps only a
quotation.
ק. Swete indicates with this letter the fragment cited above as T^l,
which exhibits the double conclusion of Mark’s Gospel. See his _Gospel
according to St. Mark_, pp. xcii., xcix.
ר. An Oxyrhynchus fragment of the fifth or sixth century, published by
Grenfell and Hunt, _The Oxyrhynchus Papyri_, Part I. with eight Plates,
London, 1898: contains only Mark x. 50 f. and xi. 10 f.: cited by Swete.
(T^g Greg.)
Part II. of _The Oxyrhynchus Papyri_ (1899, pp. 1-8) contains a fragment
of John’s Gospel (cc. i. and xx.) from a sheet of a papyrus codex
written between 200 and 300 A.D. This is one of the earliest fragments
that have been discovered of a papyrus _book_ (not a _roll_). It
exhibits already the abbreviations usually found in theological
manuscripts, such as Θ̅Σ̅, Ι̅Η̅Σ̅, Χ̅Σ̅, Π̅Ν̅Α̅. The Codex agrees with א
in several readings not found elsewhere. (T^x Greg.) See _Addenda_, p.
xv.
[Sidenote: Acts and Catholic Epistles.]
The second group is composed of manuscripts of the Acts and Catholic
Epistles which are distinguished from those in the first by affixing the
exponent _{2} at the bottom of the symbol.
א A B exhibit the Acts and Catholic Epistles complete:
E_{2} D have the Acts all but entire:
K L have the Catholic Epistles complete:
C P have the greater part of them.
For א A B C D F^a (a few verses of the Acts), see above.
E_{2}. LAUDIANUS 35, in Oxford, written at the end of the sixth century:
bilingual, Latin-Greek, the Latin occupying the place of honour on the
left: breaks off at Acts xxvi. 29: the text very peculiar and somewhat
like that of D. The manuscript was formerly in Sardinia, and was
probably brought to England by Theodore of Tarsus in 668. It was
employed by the Venerable Bede (d. 735) in his _Expositio_ of the Acts
and afterwards in his _Expositio Retractata_. Archbishop Laud presented
the manuscript with many others to the University of Oxford. Fell and
Mill made use of it. Scrivener, i. 121, Plate X. 25.
G_{2}. Of the seventh century, a single leaf in St. Petersburg
containing Acts ii. 45-iii. 8, torn from the cover of a Syriac
manuscript.
G^b. Of the ninth century, a palimpsest of six leaves in Rome containing
portions of Acts xvi. 32-xviii. 20. (Vat. Gr. 2302.)
H_{2}. Ninth century, in Modena, has the Acts with some lacunæ.
I_{2}. Fragments in St. Petersburg of the fifth and seventh centuries:
four leaves from three different manuscripts of the Acts.
K_{2}. Of the ninth century: brought to Moscow from Athos: contains the
Catholic and Pauline Epistles.
L_{2}. Written at the end of the ninth century: in the Angelica Library
at Rome: contains the Acts from c. viii. onwards, the Catholic Epistles,
and the Pauline down to Hebrews xiii.
P_{2}. Of the ninth century: formerly in the possession of Bishop
Porfiri of Kiev and now at St. Petersburg: published by Tischendorf:
contains Acts, Catholic and Pauline Epistles, and Apocalypse, with
several lacunæ.
S_{2}. Of the eighth or ninth century: at Athos: contains Acts, Catholic
Epistles, Romans, portions of 1 and 2 Corinthians, and Ephesians.
ב_{2}. A palimpsest of the fifth century: in Rome: rediscovered by
Batiffol: consists of fragments of Acts, James, 1 and 2 Peter, 1, 2, and
3 John, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians,
1 Thessalonians, 1 and 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon, and Hebrews.
[Sidenote: Pauline Epistles.]
The third group is composed of manuscripts of the Pauline Epistles. Of
these there is a comparatively large number, which may be taken as
indicating the important position ascribed to Paul even in early times.
א, however, is the only Codex that contains his Epistles complete; in D
L they are almost complete, and A B C E F G K exhibit the greater part
of them.
For א A B C, see above.
A is defective in 2 Cor. iv. 13-xii. 6 inclusive.
B breaks off at Hebrews ix. 14, consequently 1 and 2 Timothy, Titus, and
Philemon are wanting.
D_{2}. CODEX CLAROMONTANUS: takes its name from Clermont near Beauvais.
The manuscript was written in the sixth century, and is bilingual in
Greek and Latin, having the Greek on the left-hand page. The Greek is
wanting in Rom. i. 1-7, 27-30, and in 1 Cor. xiv. 13-22. In Gal. v. 9
D_{2} reads δολοῖ, and in verse 14 ἐν ὑμῖν, in both places agreeing with
Marcion. At least nine hands are distinguishable in the manuscript, one
of whom corrected the text in over 2000 places in the ninth or tenth
century. Two leaves are palimpsest, their text being written over part
of a play of Euripides. Hebrews has evidently been copied into the Codex
from a different manuscript by a later scribe. Before it is a list of
“versus scribtuarum sanctarum,” one of the oldest stichometric
catalogues of the books of the Old and New Testaments, which is derived
from an early Greek original. This Catalogus Claromontanus is given in
Westcott’s _History of the Canon_, App. D, xx. p. 563, and in his _Bible
in the Church_, App. B, p. 309. See also Zahn, _Geschichte des N. T.
Kanons_, II. 157-172, 1012; Jülicher, _Einleitung_, § 40. Thirty-five
leaves of Codex D_{2} were stolen by John Aymont in 1707, but afterwards
restored by their purchasers, some of them in 1720, and the others in
1729. (_See Plates II. and III._)
E_{3}. SANGERMANENSIS, of the ninth century: also Greek-Latin: brought
from St. Germain de Près to St. Petersburg during the Revolution: in the
Greek merely an incorrect transcript of D_{2}, and may therefore be
dismissed. See p. 179 n. 1.
F_{2}. AUGIENSIS, of the ninth century: another Greek-Latin manuscript:
defective in Rom. i. 1-iii. 19; 1 Cor. iii. 8-16; vi. 7-14; Col. ii.
1-8; Philemon 21-25: Hebrews from the first only in the Latin. The
manuscript was formerly at Reichenau (Augia Dives, hence its name). It
was purchased by Bentley in 1718 for 250 Dutch florins, and is now at
Cambridge. An edition of it was published by Scrivener in 1859. For F^a,
see above, p. 66.
Scrivener, _An exact transcript of the Codex Augiensis ... to which
is added a full collation of fifty manuscripts containing various
portions of the Greek N. T._, 1859. F. Zimmer, _Der Codex Augiensis
eine Abschrift des Boernerianus_ (_ZfwTh._, 1887, i. 76-91).
G_{3}. BOERNERIANUS, of the ninth century, so called from Professor C.
F. Boerner of Leipzig, who purchased it in 1705: now in Dresden. It is a
Greek-Latin manuscript, the Latin being interlinear. It is manifestly
the second part of Δ, and has a close affinity with F_{2}, though the
Greek of F was not copied from G, as Zimmer and Hort assert. The fact is
rather that both are derived from one and the same original, in which
_e.g._ ως γαγγρα ινα νομην εξει, sicut cancer ut serpat, was found in 2
Tim. ii. 17, and ημεθα δε δουλωμενοι, eramus autem servientes, in Gal.
iv. 3. This manuscript contains some interesting Irish verses.[70] At
the end of Philemon there stands the title προς Λαουδακησας, ad
laudicenses, but the Epistle that should have followed has been lost.
P. Corssen, _Epistularum Paulinarum codices graece et latine
scriptos Augiensem, Boernerianum, Claromontanum examinavit, inter se
comparavit, ad communem originem revocavit. Specimen primum_, 1887.
_Alterum_, 1889.
[Sidenote: Euthalian Recension.]
H_{3}. Written in the sixth century, one of the most valuable
manuscripts, but unfortunately incomplete. Its leaves were used in 975
and 1218 to cover some manuscripts at Mount Athos. Forty-one of these
have been rescued, of which 22 are now in Paris, 8 at Mount Athos, 3 in
St. Petersburg, 3 in Moscow, 2 in Turin, and 3 in Kiev. They contain
portions of 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Colossians, 1 Thessalonians,
1 and 2 Timothy, Titus, and Hebrews. The value of the manuscript is
indicated in the subscription, which runs, “I, Euthalius,[71] wrote this
volume of the Apostle Paul as carefully as possible in stichoi, so that
it might be read with intelligence: the book was compared with the copy
in the library at Cæsarea, written by the hand of Pamphilus the
saint.”[72] The subscription may of course have stood in the original of
H, and simply been copied into it along with the text, as in the case of
the minuscules 15, 83, and 173 of the Acts. But no matter, it serves to
locate the text of this manuscript, and it is one of our main witnesses
for the so-called =Euthalian Recension= of the Acts and Catholic
Epistles.
In or previous to the year 396, a deacon called Euthalius, afterwards
known as Bishop of Sulce,[73] published an edition of the Acts and
Catholic and Pauline Epistles, in which, following the rules laid down
by the Greek schools of oratory, the text was carefully broken up into
lines, the length of which depended on the sense (_sense-clauses_), and
divided into paragraphs or chapters. Euthalius also provided a system of
Church lections, added a summary of contents to the various chapters,
and catalogued the quotations from the Old Testament and elsewhere in
the separate Epistles and in the entire group. This edition became a
sort of model for later times, and seems to have been made use of for
the Armenian version among the rest. The comparison of the manuscript
with those of Pamphilus, as well as other additions, would seem then to
have been made on the occasion of a later revision. Ehrhard, however,
thinks that we have the autograph edition of this system in Codex H, but
that Evagrius is to be read instead of Euthalius in the place where the
name has been erased. This view is combated by Dobschütz, and in part
rightly. Working independently of both, Conybeare, from Armenian
sources, establishes the year 396 as the date of Euthalius. But in a
parchment manuscript of the eleventh century in the library of the Laura
at Mount Athos, Wobbermin found a fragment of a dogmatic treatise with
the inscription, Εὐθαλίου ἐπισκόπου Σούλκης ὁμολογία περὶ τῆς ὀρθοδόξου
πίστεως, from which he makes out that Euthalius lived in the second half
of the seventh century and that Sulce was in Sardinia. See G. Krüger in
the _Lit. Cent. Blatt_ 1899, No. 14.
Omont, _Notice sur un très ancien manuscrit grec en onciales des
épîtres de S. Paul_, Paris, 1889. J. A. Robinson, _Euthaliana_,
Texts and Studies, iii. 3, 1895. (See S. Berger, _Bull. Crit._, 96,
8.) Th. Zahn, _Euthaliana_, _Theol. Lit. Blatt._, 1895, 593, 601.
Ehrhard, _Der codex H ad Epistolas Pauli und Euthalius diaconus,
Eine palaeographisch-patrologische Untersuchung_ in the
_Centralblatt für Bibliothekswesen_, 1891, pp. 385-411. E. v.
Dobschütz, _Ein Beitrag zur Euthaliusfrage_, in the same magazine,
1893, pp. 49-70; _Euthaliusstudien_ in the ZKG. xix. pp. 107-154
(1898): also, _Euthalius_, in the PRE^3, v. pp. 631-633 (1898).
Islinger, _Die Verdienste des Euthalius um den neutestamentlichen
Bibeltext_, Hof. 1867 (Prog.). Conybeare, _On the Codex Pamphili and
date of Euthalius_, in the _Cambridge Journal of Philology_, xxiii.
241 (1895). R. L. Bensly, _The Harklean Version etc._, pp. 9, 27
(1889). See also J. A. Robinson, _Texts and Studies_, vi. 1; C.
Butler, _The Lausiac History of Palladius_, p. 104 ff., and note 2,
p. 188 below.
I_{2}, K_{2}, L_{2}, P_{2}: See above, p. 75.
M_{2}. CODEX RUBER, of the ninth century: four leaves written in bright
red ink or other colouring matter, two of them in London and the other
two in Hamburg.
N_{2}. Of the ninth century, consisting of two leaves with portions of
Galatians and Hebrews: in St. Petersburg.
O_{2}. Of the ninth century, two leaves in the same library containing
portions of 2 Corinthians.
O^b. Of the sixth century, one leaf with part of Ephesians: in Moscow.
Q_{2}. Of the fifth century, five _papyrus_ leaves with fragments of 1
Corinthians: in St. Petersburg.
R_{2}. Of the seventh century, a single leaf with part of 2 Corinthians:
in Grotteferrata.
S_{2}. See above, p. 75.
T^g. A few sentences from 1 Timothy. See _TiGr._, p. 441.
T^s. Two leaves containing 1 Corinthians i. 22-29, written in the ninth
or tenth century, and published simultaneously with T^{i-r}. Gregory now
designates T^g as T^{a Paul}, and T^s as T^{b Paul}.
ב_{2}. See above, p. 75.
ד^{14}. A fragment of papyrus containing part of 1 Corinthians, cc. i.,
ii., iii., written in the fifth century.
The first seven verses of the first chapter of Romans have been
published in _The Oxyrhynchus Papyri_, Part II. (pp. 8 f., Plate II.).
The fragment is probably a schoolboy’s exercise. It is written in a
large rude uncial hand, and dates from the first half of the fourth
century. In verse 7 it reads Κ̅Υ̅ Χ̅Ρ̅Υ̅ Ι̅Η̅Υ̅.
[Sidenote: Apocalypse.]
There are fewest manuscripts of the Apocalypse. It is found entire only
in א A B, while C and P exhibit portions of it. In the Apocalypse,
however, it is to be observed that Codex B is not the famous Codex
Vaticanus 1209 but a much later manuscript 2066, dating from the end of
the eighth century. It would be better, therefore, with some editors, to
call it Q or B_{2}.
Altogether the number of Greek manuscripts is as follows[74]:—
UNCIALS:
Gospels, 73
Acts and Catholic Epistles, 19
Pauline Epistles, 28
Apocalypse, 7
—-
Total, 127
CURSIVES, 3702
[Sidenote: Book-hand and hand of common life.]
In closing our survey of the extant uncials, it is to be borne in mind
that we are not at liberty to regard even the oldest of them as
presenting the very form of the New Testament autographs. The books of
the New Testament, at all events the majority of them, were not
originally intended for publication at all, while the others were meant
for only a limited circle of readers. Now these recent papyrus
discoveries have shown conclusively what a vast difference existed even
in those days between the =book-hand= and what we may call the =hand of
common life= and business. A glance at Kenyon’s _Palæography of Greek
Papyri_ will show how fundamental is the distinction between literary
and non-literary papyri. That writer states that in many cases the
difference is just as marked as between handwriting and print at the
present day, and he instances also the distinction between the book-hand
and the charter-hand of the Middle Ages. Of course documents of this or
the other class may occasionally be found written in the hand that is
not the usual one, a prescription, _e.g._, in book-hand, or conversely a
literary text in the hand of common life. The greater part of
Aristotle’s work on the _Polity of the Athenians_, for instance, has
been preserved in the common hand. This papyrus, which is attributed to
the first century of the Christian era, is the work of four scribes. But
only one of these writes in a style approximating to the book-hand; the
other parts are written in a very cursive style on the back of an old
account, probably by one who had borrowed a copy of the work for a short
time and transcribed it with the help of two or three friends or slaves.
Kenyon quite properly instances this as an illustration of the manner of
the origin and propagation of the New Testament books, and suggests that
this mode of propagation has to be considered in connection with times
of persecution. Our very oldest manuscripts are superb codices, editions
de luxe, such as could be prepared only in an age when the Church had
attained a position of affluence and power. The distinction referred to
above is one that has had but little attention paid to it hitherto, as
is shown by the illustration given in Harris’s excellent work on the New
Testament autographs. It is manifest at the same time that this
consideration is of great importance in trying to understand the origin
and dissemination of the various readings that occur in our manuscripts.
It is just a pity that Kenyon has not given a sample of this manuscript
of Aristotle in his book, seeing that the latter is more accessible to
the ordinary student than the complete facsimile edited in 1891 by the
Trustees of the British Museum, or the Plate published in the second
volume of the work of the Palæographical Society.
[Sidenote: Uncial and minuscule script.]
A further consideration is emphasised by means of these papyrus
discoveries—viz. that =no distinction of time= can be drawn between the
uncial and cursive hands found in the manuscripts. Even in the very
earliest documents the hand of common life displays a very cursive
character, and a fairly cursive uncial hand with ligatures is not
necessarily later than an uncial hand without ligatures. It is somewhat
different in the case of writing on parchment: here the old distinction
of uncial and minuscule manuscripts is rightly maintained, only we must
guard against supposing that the minuscule hand and the cursive are
quite the same thing; nor must we forget that for a considerable time
the older uncial and the later minuscule scripts were in use
together.[75] The sharp line of demarcation, therefore, which has
hitherto been drawn in the textual criticism of the New Testament
between these two classes of manuscripts has no real justification in
fact. The present account, however, is intended merely as a survey of
the position of things up to the present, and the following description
of the minuscules is subject to that limitation.
(_b._) SOME OF THE MORE IMPORTANT MINUSCULES.
[Sidenote: Minuscules.]
When the Greek New Testament began to be printed, the editors had
necessarily to be content with indifferent and late minuscules, and even
those who followed them, like Bentley and Lachmann, thought they were at
liberty to disregard these altogether and to found their text
exclusively on the oldest uncials. They forgot that the text of a late
manuscript may be derived from a very early and good source through
comparatively few intermediaries, and that it is possible to reconstruct
a lost original by means of a comparison of several witnesses.
Accordingly, in more recent times, English editors like Tregelles,
Burgon, Ferrar, Hoskier, and Scrivener have rendered great service in
the way of collating manuscripts, and the last-mentioned as well as
Gregory in Germany has also catalogued them. At the present moment a
systematic investigation in this department is being carried on in
Berlin. Most of the minuscules are still written on parchment which
began to be mixed with paper in the ninth century, and was ultimately
superseded by it. Various minuscules contain commentaries and other
additional matter, such as the List of the Seventy Apostles, short
Biographies of the Apostles, Summaries of the journeys of St. Paul, or
notes as to the date and place of the composition of the different
books. When dates are given in the manuscripts, they are still as a rule
computed in the Byzantine manner, reckoning from the Creation of the
world (5508 B.C.). In only a few cursives is the date reckoned from the
Birth of Christ.
Since the time of Wettstein the minuscule manuscripts have been
indicated by Arabic numerals, the numbers in each of the four groups
beginning with 1, so that one and the same manuscript may have three or
four numbers—18^{evv.} _e.g._ being 113^{Acts,} 132^{Paul,} and
51^{Apoc.,} while 209^{evv} is the same as 95^{Acts,} 108^{Paul,} and
46^{Apoc.} It is still more awkward that in the two principal works on
the minuscules, that of Scrivener and of Gregory, the recently
discovered manuscripts are numbered differently. Our enumeration will
follow that of Scrivener.
MINUSCULES OF THE GOSPELS.
1 (Acts 1, Paul 1). Of the tenth century, but according to others of the
twelfth or the thirteenth, in Basel, with beautiful miniatures which
were stolen prior to 1860. The manuscript was borrowed by Reuchlin and
used by Erasmus for his second edition. (Scrivener, i. 137, Plate IX.
23.)
2. Of the twelfth century, though some strangely suppose the fifteenth:
also in Basel: formerly purchased for two Rhenish florins: printed by
Erasmus.
3. Of the twelfth century, in Vienna, lent to Erasmus for his second
edition.
[Sidenote: Ferrar Group.]
4-41 are all in the National Library at Paris. 4-9 and 38 were used by
Stephen. The most notable among them is 13, together with 69, 124, 211,
346, 348, 556, 561 (788), 624, and 626, which are remarkable for their
very peculiar form of text and their additions.[76] Luke xxii. 43, 44 is
found after Matthew xxvi. 39, and John vii. 53—viii. 11 after Luke xxi.
38. The subscriptions, moreover, state that Matthew was written in
Hebrew eight years after our Lord’s Ascension, and contained 2522 ρηματα
and 2560 stichoi, Mark ρωμαιστι ten years after the Ascension with 1675
ρηματα and 1604 stichoi, Luke ελληνιστι fifteen years after with 3803
(_lege_ 3083) ρηματα and 2750 stichoi, and John thirty-two years after
with 1938 ρηματα. These manuscripts were referred to a common archetype
by the Irish scholar Ferrar, and were accordingly denominated the Ferrar
Group, and indicated by the letter Φ before that symbol was appropriated
to the Codex Beratinus. Most of them came from Calabria, and another has
lately been added to the number. Their additions, however, as Rendel
Harris shows, are rather of Syrian origin. In the first edition I
ventured to suggest that these manuscripts might go back to Lucian the
Martyr (d. 312) of whom Jerome makes mention, saying that he knew of
codices quos a Luciano (et Hesychio) nuncupatos paucorum hominum adserit
perversa contentio, quibus ... nec in novo testamento profuit emendasse,
cum multarum gentium linguis scriptura ante translata doceat falsa esse
quae addita (cod. E _edita_) sunt. That, however, is not possible in the
event of the so-called Syrian recension being the work of Lucian, which
Hort indicates as possible. In any case, these minuscules have preserved
to us a very early attempt to restore the text.
16 is noteworthy as being written in four different colours according to
the contents. The continuous narrative is written in green, the words of
Jesus and the Angels are in red and occasionally in gold, the words of
His followers are in blue, while those of the Pharisees, the multitude,
and of the devil, are written in black.
28. Contains relics of a very ancient text and bears some resemblance to
D.
33. Written about the tenth century: the “queen of the cursives”: its
text bears a greater resemblance to that of B, D, L than does that of
any other cursive. The manuscript is much damaged, but 34, which is
equally old, is still in splendid condition, as though it were fresh
from the hand of the artist. (Scrivener, i. 343, Plate XIII. 39.)
38. Sent by the Emperor Michael Palæologus to St. Louis (d. 1270).
51. At Oxford: text resembles that of the Complutensian.
59. At Cambridge: has many points of connection with D.
61. Of the fourteenth or fifteenth century. This is the notorious Codex
Montfortianus, now in Dublin, which derives its name from one of its
later possessors. It was this manuscript, “codex apud Anglos repertus,”
that decided Erasmus to insert in his third edition of 1522 the passage
of the Three Heavenly Witnesses, 1 John v. 7, 8. It was probably written
by a Franciscan monk of the name of Froy or Roy. Its twin brother, the
parchment codex Ravianus (Rau), formerly numbered 110, and now in
Berlin, which also contains the passage, proves to be nothing more than
a transcript of the text of the Complutensian. Manuscripts, it may be
observed, continued to be prepared long after the invention of printing.
Melanchthon, _e.g._, wrote out the Epistle to the Romans three times in
Greek; and the manuscript in the Zurich Library hitherto cited as
56^{Paul} is nothing else than a copy of Erasmus’s printed edition of
1516 made by Zwingli in the following year.
69. _Cf._ 13 above, and see J. R. Harris, _Origin of the Leicester Codex
of the New Testament_, 1887. (Scrivener, i. 343, Plate XIII. 40.)
77 and 78. Formerly in the fine library of Matthias Corvinus, King of
Hungary (d. 1490).
90. In this manuscript the Gospels are in the order John, Luke, Matthew,
Mark.
106. Would be important, but has been lost sight of since the time of
Wettstein.
140. Presented to Pope Innocent VII. by the Queen of Cyprus. This
manuscript reads διηρθρώθη in Luke i. 64, therein agreeing with the
Complutensian.
146-153. In Rome, came from Heidelberg.
154-156. Once the property of Christina, Queen of Sweden.
157. In Rome: its text is said to bear a considerable resemblance to the
quotations found in the early Christian writer Marcion. See below, p.
211.
164. The subscription of this manuscript states that it was compared
with certain ancient manuscripts in Jerusalem.
205-215 and 217 are in Venice, being part of the donation of Cardinal
Bessarion. 209 contains the whole of the New Testament, and was the
Cardinal’s own copy which he had with him at the Council of Florence in
1439.
218-225 are in Vienna.
226-233 are in the Escorial.
237-259 are at Moscow, with the exception of four at Dresden.
263-320 are in Paris, with the exception of 272, which was removed
thence to the British Museum.
274 exhibits the shorter conclusion of Mark’s Gospel in the lower
margin. (See Plate X.)
405-418 are now in Venice, and, like U, once belonged to the Nani
family.
422-430. In Munich.
431. This manuscript is sometimes stated to have perished at Strassburg,
in the war of 1870, like 180^{Acts.} This, however, is incorrect.
452. In Parma, one of the most superb codices.
473. Of the ninth and tenth centuries, a purple manuscript with gold
lettering, said to have been written by the Empress Theodora. See under
N. above, and note, p. 151.
481, dated 7th May 835, is the earliest manuscript of the Greek New
Testament bearing an exact date.
531. Written in a microscopic hand.
604. Written in the twelfth century, now in the British Museum, exhibits
2724 variations from the Textus Receptus, and has besides 270 readings
peculiar to itself. It is the only witness we know that supports that
peculiar form of the second petition of the Lord’s Prayer found in
Marcion in the second century, and in Gregory of Nyssa in the fourth,
ἐλθέτω τὸ ἅγιον πνεῦμά σου ἐφ’ ἡμᾶς καὶ καθαρισάτω ἡμᾶς (Luke xi.
2).[77]
743 has the double conclusion in Mark.
1071. See under D, p. 66.
In his _Gospel according to St. Mark_, Swete cites frequently, in
addition to those just mentioned and those of the Ferrar Group, 1, 28,
33, 66, 109, 118, 131, 157, 209, 238, 242, 299, 435, 473, 475, 556, 570,
736.
ACTS.
2 and 4. Used by Erasmus.
7-10. Used by Stephen.
15, 83, 173. These, like א in the Old Testament and H_{3}, were compared
with the Codex of Pamphilus—_i.e._ were faithfully copied from such an
exemplar.
33. The parent manuscript of Montfortianus. See above, p. 86.
42. Closely related to the Complutensian.
52. Once in the possession of Stunica, the chief editor of the
Complutensian. It has now disappeared.
61 has been designated the most important minuscule of the Acts. This,
however, is an exaggeration.
137 supplements D E where these are defective.
158. Used by Cardinal Mai to supply the defects of Codex B in the
Pauline Epistles.
162. Of the fourteenth or fifteenth century, now in Rome: a bilingual in
Latin and Greek: contains the passage 1 John v. 7.
182. Numbered 110 by Hort, who calls it one of the best of the cursives.
220. One of the finest manuscripts of the latter part of the New
Testament.
232. An equally superb copy, on which a monk called Andreas bestowed
three years’ labour.
246. Written in gold letters for Charlotte, Queen of Cyprus (d. 1487).
419. Written in 800 by the Empress Maria, after being divorced by
Constantine VI.
PAULINE EPISTLES.
7. Used by Erasmus.
56 and 66 are quite worthless, being simply copies of Erasmus’s printed
text. (See above under 61^{evv}).
67. A valuable manuscript on account of its corrector having evidently
made use of an exemplar with a text very closely akin to that of B M.
80 bears a close resemblance to 69^{evv}.
APOCALYPSE.
1. This was the only manuscript at Erasmus’s command for this part of
the New Testament. It is defective in the last chapter from verse 16 to
the end. For the rest it exhibits a fairly good text. (See p. 3 f.)
36. A text akin to א.
38 has a text resembling that of A C.
68. Resembles A.
95 does so still more. This last has the reputation of being one of the
best minuscules of the Apocalypse.
The number of minuscules under each class is, according to Scrivener
(Miller), as follows:—
Gospels, 1326
Acts and Catholic 422
Epistles,
Pauline Epistles, 497
Apocalypse, 184
——
2429
A great many New Testament manuscripts are in England. Some are in the
possession of private individuals, like those at Parham Park in Sussex
belonging to Lord de la Zouche. In 1870-72 the Baroness Burdett Coutts
brought with her from Janina in Epirus over one hundred manuscripts, of
which sixteen were of the Gospels, one of them belonging to the Ferrar
Group, and as many were Evangeliaria. There are 136 manuscripts of the
New Testament in the British Museum.
The number in Great 438
Britain is
In the National 298
Library of Paris,
In Germany, 140
In Italy, 644
For the total number of Greek manuscripts arranged according to
countries, see Scrivener, i., Indices I., II., pp. 392 ff.
What a vast number of manuscripts are still waiting to be examined is
shown by the account given by Dr. von der Goltz. Accompanied by Dr. G.
Wobbermin, he made a journey to Athos in the winter of 1897-98, and
there in that ancient Monastery, the Laura of St. Athanasius, he found,
among about 1800 manuscripts altogether, including Lectionaries, some
250 codices of the New Testament, of which only a very few have been
noted by Gregory. And these manuscripts may be of the very utmost
importance, as witness the further statement of the same explorer. He
was looking through the manuscripts of the Apostolos, to which he and
his companion had to give most of their attention, when his eye fell on
one written in the tenth or eleventh century, containing the following
note before the Pauline Epistles: γεγράφθαι ἀπὸ ἀντιγράφου παλαιοτάτου,
οὗ πεῖραν ἐλάβομεν ὡς ἐπιτετευγμένου ἐκ τῶν εἰς ἡμᾶς ἐλθόντων Ὠριγένους
τόμων ἢ ὁμιλιῶν εἰς τὸν ἀπόστολον ... ἐν οἷς οὖν παραλλάττει ῥητοῖς πρὸς
τὰ νῦν ἀποστολικά, διπλῆν τὴν λεγομένην παρεθήκαμεν ἔξωθεν, ἵνα μὴ
νομισθῇ κατὰ προσθήκην ἢ λεῖψιν ἡμαρτῆσθαι τουτὶ τὸ ἀποστολικόν. And
from the subscription at the end of the Pauline Epistles we learn that
the manuscript, or, as von der Goltz believes, the exemplar from which
it was copied, was written by a monk called Ephraim. See further in von
der Goltz, _Eine textkritische Arbeit des zehnten bezw. sechsten
Jahrhunderts herausgegeben nach einem Kodex des Athosklosters Lawra. Mit
einer Doppeltafel in Lichtdruck._ Leipzig, 1899. (Texte und
Untersuchungen, Neue Folge, ii. 4); and compare below, p. 190.
LITERATURE.—On 2^{evv}, see Hoskier, above, p. 5.
On 13, see W. H. Ferrar, _Collation of four important Manuscripts of
the Gospels_, edited by T. K. Abbott, Dublin, 1877. J. P. P. Martin,
_Quatre manuscrits du N. T., auxquels on peut ajouter un cinquième_,
Amiens, 1886. J. R. Harris, _On the Origin of the Ferrar Group_,
London, 1894. K. Lake, “Some new members of the Ferrar Group of MSS.
of the Gospels,” in the _Journal of Theological Studies_, I. i. pp.
117-120. The well-known manuscript of the pre-Lutheran German Bible,
the Codex Teplensis, has the words from John viii. 2, “in the
morning he came again into the temple,” after Luke xxi. 38, an
arrangement similar to that which is characteristic of the Ferrar
Group, in which John vii. 53-viii. 11 is found after Luke xxi. 38.
See S. Berger, _Bull. Crit._, 1894, p. 390. See _Addenda_, p. xv.
On 561, Codex Algerinae Peckover, see J. R. Harris in the _Journal
of the Exegetical Society_, 1886, 79-96.
On 892^{evv}, see Harris, “An Important Manuscript of the N. T.” in
the _Journal of Biblical Literature_, ix., 1890, 31 ff.
On Minuscules of the Apocalypse, see Bousset, _Textkritische
Studien_ in _T. und U._, xi. 4.
C. R. Gregory, “Die Kleinhandschriften des N. Testaments”
(_Theologische Studien für B. Weiss._, Göttingen, 1897, 274-283).
E. J. Goodspeed, “A Twelfth Century Gospel Manuscript” (_Biblical
World_, x. 4).
(_c._) LECTIONARIES.
[Sidenote: Lectionaries.]
Till quite recently the Lectionaries, or Books of Church Pericopae, were
even more neglected than the minuscules. And yet they are reliable
witnesses to the text of the Bible in the provinces to which they
belong, on account of their official character and because their
locality can be readily distinguished. The slight alterations of the
text occurring at the beginning of the pericopae, and consisting usually
in the insertion of the subject of the sentence or of an introductory
clause, are easily recognisable as such, and deceive no one. It is not
always easy to determine the date of such books, because the uncial hand
was employed in this sort of manuscript much longer than in the others.
Among the oldest, perhaps, is 135, a palimpsest (of which there is a
considerable number among the Lectionaries), assigned by Tischendorf to
the seventh century, and 968, written on papyrus and ascribed to the
sixth century, which was found in Egypt in the year 1890. When these
Lectionaries originated has not yet been clearly made out.[78] Up till
the present 980 Evangeliaria—_i.e._ Lessons from the Gospels—have been
catalogued, and 268 Apostoli or Praxapostoli—_i.e._ Lessons from the
Acts and Epistles. Some of them are magnificently executed; some, alas,
have been sadly mutilated. 117, in Florence, is a very beautiful codex;
and 162, in Siena, is perhaps “one of the most splendid Service-books in
the world.” 235 may have been written in part by the Emperor Alexius
Comnenus (1081-1118). 286 is the Golden Evangeliarium on Mount Sinai,
dating from the ninth to the eleventh century, though the tradition of
the monks says that it was written by no less a personage than the
Emperor Theodosius (d. 395). Tischendorf’s 352-360 are now in the
National Library at Paris. 355 is printed in Omont’s _Catalogue_ (see
above, p. 71). 45^{evl} is a fragment of black parchment inscribed with
gold letters preserved at Vienna.[79] 40 is kept in the Escorial along
with the reliques of St. Chrysostom, and regarded as his autograph.[80]
Bilingual Lectionaries are also found, in Greek and Arabic for example.
The arrangement of these Service-books varies with the time and region
in which they were composed. Several fragments which were formerly
regarded as parts of manuscripts of the Gospels should perhaps be
classed among the Evangeliaria—_e.g._ the solitary leaf of a Bible
manuscript Württemberg is known to possess, and the Tübingen Fragment,
formerly classed among the uncials as R of the Gospels, but now
enumerated as 481^{evl}. An important Syriac Lectionary will fall to be
considered under the head of the Versions.
For further details, reference must be made to Scrivener, to _TiGr._,
and now especially to Gregory, _Textkritik_, i. pp. 327-478.
2. VERSIONS.
[Sidenote: Versions.]
Our second source of material for the reconstruction of the text of the
New Testament is the early Versions. The value of their testimony
depends on their age and fidelity. When did the first versions
originate? This question reminds us of the Inscription on the Cross, a
portion of which is still exhibited in Rome. It was written in Hebrew,
Greek, and Latin. But we may get further back still. Palestine at the
time of Christ was a country where the most diverse languages and
dialects came into contact with each other. In the last century B.C. a
transformation had occurred, which might be regarded as a counterpart to
the supplanting of Norman French by English, or of Low by High German.
Aramaic had already taken the place of the old Hebrew, and after the
time of Alexander came the intrusion of Greek, and later still of Latin.
Some of the disciples of Jesus bore old Hebrew names, like James
(Ἰάκωβος) and John (Ἰωάννης); others had names wholly or partly Aramaic,
as Cephas (= Peter), the cognomen of Simon, and Bartholomew; while
others, again, had Greek names, as Philip (Φίλιππος) and Andrew
(Ἀνδρέας). To the question what language Jesus Himself spoke, the most
probable answer is that it was Aramaic with a Galilean colouring. “Thou
art a Galilean, thy speech bewrayeth thee,” said the Jerusalem girl to
Peter. The Galileans, like the Babylonians and the Samaritans, were
recognisable by their not distinguishing the gutturals so sharply as the
pure Jews did. At the same time, Jesus certainly understood the Hebrew
of the Old Testament. But those words of His that have been preserved
are Aramaic—_talitha_, _abba_, and so is _sabaqtani_ in Matthew xxvii.
46, and Mark xv. 34, if that is the original form of the text, and not
_asabthani_, as a number of manuscripts show.
In what language, however, the first record of the preaching of the
Gospel was made, whether it was in the classic Hebrew of the Old
Testament or in the Aramaic of the time, is still subject of
dispute.[81] But as this question is of moment only for the original
sources, and even then for only a certain part of the New Testament—viz.
the Gospels—it does not fall to be considered here. We have to do only
with those versions that are derived from the Greek, and again with
those of them only that are important for the criticism of the text,
which are the oldest.
The versions which are of consequence here may be placed under three or
four heads.
[Sidenote: East.]
In the East, Antioch, with its semi-Greek, semi-Syrian population, very
early became the centre of the new faith, which, indeed, obtained its
name there, and must very soon have established itself in Damascus and
Mesopotamia. In that region the form of Aramaic now commonly known as
Syriac was spoken.
[Sidenote: West, South.]
In the West, Greek was mostly spoken and understood, even in Rome. Paul
consequently, and others as well as he, wrote to Rome in Greek. At the
same time, the need must have existed, even in the second century, of
having the Gospel in the Latin language in parts of Africa, in the north
of Italy, and in the South of Gaul. Quite as early, perhaps, the new
faith spread to Egypt, which at that time was a kind of centre of
religious culture, and so we find in Egypt not one but several versions
in various dialects.
The Gothic version of Ulfilas deserves special mention as being the
oldest monument of Christianity among the Germanic people, and valuable
too in the criticism of the text.
L. J. M. Bebb, _Evidence of the Early Versions and Patristic
Quotations_, etc., in _Studia Biblica_, ii., Oxford, 1890. Lagarde,
_De Novo Testamento ad Versionum Orientalium fidem edendo_. Berlin
(1857); with slight alterations in his _Ges. Abhandlungen_, 1886,
pp. 84-119. Reprinted 1896. _Urtext_ (see p. 7). Copinger (see p.
6). An earlier bibliographical work is the _Bibliotheca Sacra post
... Jacobi Le Long et C. F. Boerneri iteratas curas ordine
disposita, emendata, suppleta, continuata ab A. G. Masch_. Halle,
1778-90, 4to. _Pars I., De editionibus textus originalis. Pars II.,
De versionibus librorum sacrorum_ (3 Vols.). R. Simon, _Histoire
critique des versions du N. T._, 1690. _Nouvelles observations sur
le texte et les versions du N. T._, 1695.
(_a._) SYRIAC VERSIONS.
[Sidenote: Peshitto.]
The Bible used in the Syrian Church has long and deservedly borne the
honourable appellation of “the Queen of the Versions.” It was first
published in 1555 at the expense of the Emperor Ferdinand I. by J.
Albert Widmanstadt with the assistance of a Syrian Jacobite called
Moses, who came from Mardin as legate to Pope Julius III. The type for
this edition was beautifully cut by Caspar Kraft of Ellwangen. All the
branches into which the Syrian church was divided in the fifth century
have used the same translation of the Scriptures. To this day the Syriac
New Testament wants the five so-called Antilegomena—viz. 2 Peter, 2 and
3 John, Jude, and the Apocalypse—a sufficient proof that it goes back to
a time and a region in which these books were not yet reckoned in the
Canon of the New Testament. In place of these it contained in early
times an alleged Third Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians, and an
Epistle of the Corinthians to Paul (_cf._ below, p. 142). To distinguish
it from other Syriac translations, this Version has been called by
Syriac scholars, since the tenth century, the Peshiṭto—_i.e._ the
“Simple” or perhaps the “Common,” which is sometimes pronounced Peshiṭtå
(פְשִׁיטתָא) and spelt simply =Peshitto=.
When and where was this translation made? An ancient Syrian tradition
asserts that it was done by the Apostle Thaddaeus, who came on a mission
to Abgar Uchama—_i.e._ Abgar the Black—King of Edessa, after the death
of Jesus, which mission, they say, arose out of a correspondence that
Abgar had previously had with Jesus. Another tradition ascribes it to
Aggaeus (Aggai), the disciple of Thaddaeus, and it is even attributed to
Mark the Evangelist. It is also said that Luke was by birth a Syrian of
Antioch, a tradition which may preserve an element of truth.
The earliest notice of a Syriac Gospel is found in Eusebius’s
_Ecclesiastical History_, iv. 22. That historian mentions that
Hegesippus (c. 160-180) quotes certain things from the Gospel of the
Hebrews—_i.e._ of the Palestinian (?) Jewish Christians, and from the
Syriac (_sc._ Gospel), and particularly from the Hebrew dialect, showing
that he himself was a convert from the Hebrews (ἔκ τε τοῦ καθ’ Ἑβραίους
εὐαγγελίου καὶ τοῦ Συριακοῦ καὶ ἰδίως ἐκ τῆς Ἑβραΐδος διαλέκτου τινὰ
τίθησιν, ἐμφαίνων ἐξ Ἑβραίων ἑαυτὸν πεπιστευκέναι). This can hardly be
understood otherwise than as implying that a Syriac version was already
in existence. Whether it contained all the four Gospels or only one of
them, or Tatian’s Harmony of the Gospels, as Michaelis supposed and as
Zahn has recently shown some ground for believing, or whether it
contained a primitive Gospel, now perished, cannot be established with
certainty.
From the middle of the present century manuscripts of this version have
found their way into European libraries in great numbers. Some of these
are inestimable. At least ten date from the fifth, and thirty from the
sixth century. This is somewhat remarkable when we remember how small a
remnant of the Greek manuscripts has been preserved. G. H. Gwilliam is
at present engaged on an edition of the Syriac Tetraevangelium for the
University of Oxford on the basis of forty manuscripts. The task might
seem to be an easy one, considering that these Syriac manuscripts
display a far greater unanimity in their text than is found in any
written in Greek. The difficulty in their case lies in another
direction.
[Sidenote: Curetonian.]
In the year 1842 a Syriac manuscript containing considerable portions of
the Gospels was brought from Egypt and deposited in the British Museum.
It was afterwards published by Dr. Cureton in 1858 with the title
“Remains of a very antient recension of the four Gospels in Syriac
hitherto unknown in Europe.” Cureton himself thought he had discovered
the original of St. Matthew’s Gospel in this version. While this was
easily shown to be a mistake, the question as to the relationship
between the Curetonian Syriac and the Peshitto, whether the two texts
are independent of each other, or if not, which is the earlier and which
the recension, is not yet decided.
[Sidenote: Lewis.]
It seemed as if the solution of the problem was in sight when fragments
of a Syriac palimpsest were discovered on Mount Sinai in February 1892
by Mrs. Lewis and her sister, Mrs. Gibson. These they perceived to be
part of a very old manuscript of the Gospels, and Professor Bensly of
Cambridge recognised that their text was closely related to that of the
Curetonian. (_See Plate V._) A second expedition was made to Sinai in
the spring of 1893, when the fragments were transcribed by Professor
Bensly, F. C. Burkitt, and J. R. Harris. As Bensly died three days after
their return, the manuscript was published by the others in 1894, with
an introduction by Mrs. Lewis. On a third visit to Sinai this lady
completed the work of the triumvirate, and also published an English
translation of the whole. How, then, is this Sinai-Syriac or
Lewis-Syriac, as it is called, related to the Curetonian and to the
Peshitto? The problem becomes more complicated still by the introduction
of a fourth factor, the most important of them all.
[Sidenote: Tatian.]
From early sources it was known that Tatian,[82] a Syrian and a pupil of
Justin Martyr, composed a harmony of the Gospels called the
=Diatessaron=—_i.e._ τὸ διὰ τεσσάρων εὐαγγέλιον, an expression which may
be taken either as referring to the four Gospels or as a musical term
equivalent to _harmony_ or _chord_. This Harmony was in use among the
Syrians till the fifth century. Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrus, informs us
that he destroyed 200 copies of it in his semi-Syriac, semi-Greek
diocese.[83] About the same time Bishop Rabbulas of Edessa (407-435)
instructed his presbyters and deacons to see that all the churches
possessed and read a copy of the Distinct Gospel—_i.e._ not mixed or
harmonised. The Lewis-Syriac bears this very title, _Gospel of the
Distinct_ or _Divided_, which is found also as the title of Matthew’s
Gospel in the Curetonian version. Tatian’s Harmony has not yet been
discovered in Syriac, but a Latin Harmony of the Gospels derived from it
has long been known, and in 1883 a Harmony in Arabic was published by
Ciasca which proves to be a translation from the Syriac made by Ibn
et-Tabib (d. 1043) or a recension of it. Again, in 1836 the Armenian
version of a Syriac Commentary by Ephraem of Edessa (d. 373) was
printed, and translated into Latin in 1876. [_Evangelii concordantis
expositio facta a S. Ephraemo doctore Syro. In Latinum translata a J. B.
Aucher, ed. G. Moesinger._ Venetiis.] Finally Theodor Zahn discovered in
the works of the Syriac writer Aphraates, who wrote between 337 and 345,
quotations which must be derived from this Harmony of Tatian; and
isolated quotations from Tatian are also found in later Syriac authors.
And so the materials are provided for deciding the question whether or
not Tatian made use of an earlier Syriac version in the preparation of
his Harmony, and how T^{(atian)}, Syr^{cu(reton)}, Syr^{sin} and
Syr^{sch(aaf)}[84] are related to each other. The most probable view
perhaps is that T is the earliest form in which the Gospel came to
Syria, that in Syr^{cu} and Syr^{sin} we have two attempts to exhibit T
in the form of a version of the separate Gospels which were not
generally accepted, while Syr^{sch} actually succeeded and passed into
general use.
The interest attaching to this question may be learned from the form in
which the text of Matthew i. 16 is given in these witnesses. Syr^{sch}
agrees exactly with our present Greek text, but Syr^{cu} presents a form
which, when translated into Latin, reads, _Joseph cui desponsata virgo
Maria genuit Jesum Christum_. Now, the only Greek manuscripts that
present a form corresponding to this are four minuscules, 346, 556, 624
and 626, which differ in this respect even from the other members of the
Ferrar Group to which they belong. In these four manuscripts the verse
reads, Ἰωσὴφ ᾧ μνηστευθῆσα (_sic_) παρθένος Μαριὰμ ἐγέννησεν Ἰησοῦν τὸν
λεγόμενον Χριστόν. In the Latin, however, this text is represented by a
number of the oldest manuscripts, seven at least, one of which omits the
word _virgo_, while two have _peperit_ instead of _genuit_, and τὸν
λεγόμενον is omitted. But in Syr^{sin} we find: _Joseph: Joseph autem
cui desponsata (erat) virgo Maria genuit Jesum Christum_. The passage is
similarly cited in the recently published _Dialogue of Timotheus and
Aquila_,[85] along with two other forms, thus:—Ἰακὼβ ἐγέννησεν τὸν Ἰωσὴφ
τὸν ἄνδρα Μαρίας, ἐξ ἧς ἐγεννήθη Ἰησοῦς ὁ λεγόμενος Χριστὸς, καὶ Ἰωσὴφ
ἐγέννησεν τὸν Ἰησοῦν τὸν λεγόμενον Χριστόν.
The exact wording of Tatian can no longer be determined, but it is
evident that of these three forms in which the verse is found, only one
or none can be the original. If we had no more than our oldest uncials
or the great body of our minuscules to go by, no one could have the
slightest suspicion that in our Greek text all is not in perfect order.
But here, in an old Syriac fragment from the far East, there suddenly
appears a reading which is also found in Latin witnesses from the far
West, and which is confirmed by four solitary Greek manuscripts, written
probably in Calabria at the close of the Middle Ages. How are these
facts connected, and how do they stand to the other two readings, that
of the common Greek text, and that of the Lewis-Syriac? The history of
the text of the New Testament presents many such problems.
[Sidenote: Philoxenus-Polycarp.]
But Syrian scholars were not satisfied with those forms of the New
Testament already mentioned. In the year of Alexander 819 (A.D.
508),[86] a new and much more literal version was made from the Greek at
the desire of Xenaia (Philoxenus), Bishop of Mabug[87] (488-518), by his
rural Bishop Polycarp. Part of this version was published in England by
Pococke in 1630—viz. the four Epistles in the Antilegomena not included
in the Peshitto, 2 Peter, 2 and 3 John, and Jude. Unfortunately this
edition was prepared from a somewhat inaccurate manuscript, which is now
in the Bodleian Library. The later European editions of the Syriac New
Testament took the text of these Epistles from Pococke’s edition, which
was also the one used for critical editions of the Greek text. In 1886
Isaac H. Hall published a phototype edition of another manuscript of
this version (the Williams MS.), the property of a private gentleman in
America, and corrected from it the text of the Syriac New Testament
issued by the American Bible Society. The other parts of this version
have not yet been found, but the same American scholar thought he
discovered the Gospels in a ninth century manuscript belonging to the
Syrian Protestant College in Beirut, and deposited in the Library of the
Union Theological Seminary in New York.[88] Bernstein thought he made
the same discovery in 1853 in a manuscript belonging to the Angelica
Library in Florence.
[Sidenote: Thomas of Heraclea.]
On the basis of four manuscripts sent from Diarbeker in 1736 to Dr.
Gloucester Ridley, Joseph White published, between 1778 and 1803,[89] a
version which he designated by the name of _Versio Philoxenia_, and
which still passes under this title. But this so-called Philoxenian
version is not the identical version made for Philoxenus by Polycarp,
but a revision undertaken by Thomas of Heraclea (Charkel), in the year
616-7. This revision was made at Alexandria with the object of making
the Syriac text represent the Greek as closely as possible, even to the
order of the words and the insertion of the article. The critical
symbols used by Homeric commentators, the asterisk and the obelus, as
well as numerous marginal notes, were employed to indicate the various
readings found in the manuscripts. And it is very remarkable to observe
that there were manuscripts in Alexandria at the beginning of the
seventh century which were regarded by Thomas of Harkel as particularly
well authenticated, but which deviate in a marked degree from the bulk
of our present manuscripts, and which, especially in the Acts, agree
almost entirely with Codex D, which occupies so singular a position
among Greek manuscripts. A new edition of the Syriac text is necessary
before any further use can be made of it in the criticism of the New
Testament. Mr. Deane set himself to this task, going on the basis of
sixteen manuscripts in England alone, but unfortunately he was unable to
bring it to a conclusion.
[Sidenote: Apocalypse.]
The Apocalypse was first edited in 1627 by de Dieu at Leyden, from a
manuscript that had been in the possession of Scaliger. It is found in a
few other manuscripts, in one, _e.g._, that was transcribed about this
same time for Archbishop Ussher from a Maronite manuscript at Kenobin on
Mount Lebanon. It is not found in the Syriac New Testament, but the
later editions insert it from de Dieu. In Apoc. viii. 13, instead of “an
eagle in the midst of heaven” (ἐν μεσουρανήματι), the Syriac translator
took it as “in the midst with a bloody tail” (μεσος, ουρα, αιμα).
Another Syriac version, in which this error is avoided, was discovered
in 1892 by J. Gwynn in a Codex belonging to Lord Crawford, and published
by him as the first book printed in Syriac at the Dublin University
Press. Still more interesting is it to know that in a manuscript, once
the property of Julius Mohl, and now in Cambridge, both the so-called
Epistles of Clement are found after the Catholic Epistles. This
manuscript, part of which was published by Bensly in 1889 (see above, p.
79), contains a note at the end to the effect that it was derived, so
far as the Pauline Epistles are concerned, from the copy of
Pamphilus.[90]
About the same time and in the same region, Paul of Tella translated one
of the best Greek manuscripts of the Old Testament into Syriac almost as
literally as Thomas of Harkel, thereby doing immense service in the
construction of the Syriac Hexapla, a work of inestimable value for the
textual criticism of the Old Testament.
[Sidenote: Evangeliarium Hierosolymitanum.]
Mention may be made here of another Syriac version of the New Testament,
the so-called _Jerusalem_ or _Palestinian Syriac_ (Syr^{hr} or
Syr^{hier}). This version, hitherto known almost solely from an
Evangeliarium in the Vatican of the year 1030, was edited by Count
Miniscalchi Erizzo at Verona in 1861-4, and an excellent edition was
published in 1892 in _Bibliothecae Syriacae a Paulo de Lagarde collectae
quae ad philologiam sacram pertinent_. And now not only have two fresh
manuscripts of this Evangeliarium been discovered on Mount Sinai by J.
R. Harris and Mrs. Lewis, and edited by Mrs. Lewis and Mrs. Gibson, but
fragments of the Acts and Pauline Epistles have also been found and
published, as well as portions of the Old Testament and other Church
literature.[91] The dialect in which these fragments are written is
quite different from ordinary Syriac, and may, perhaps, bear a close
resemblance to that in which Jesus spoke to His disciples. At what time
and in what region this entire literature took its rise is not yet
determined with certainty. The Greek text on which the Evangeliarium is
based has many peculiarities. In Matthew xxvii. 17, _e.g._, the robber
is called Jesus Barabbas, or, rather, Jesus Barrabbas, a fact known to
Origen, but now recorded only in a few Greek minuscules by the first or
second hand.
What used to be called the Versio Karkaphensis or Montana is not really
a version, but merely the Massoretic work of a monastery school intended
to preserve the proper spelling and pronunciation of the text of the
Bible.
No other branch of the Church has taken such pains as the Syrian,
faithfully to transmit and to circulate the Gospel. From the mountains
of Lebanon and Kurdistan, from the plains of Mesopotamia and the coast
of Malabar, and even from distant China there have come into the
libraries of Europe Syriac manuscripts of the utmost value for the
textual criticism of the New Testament.
LITERATURE on the Syriac Versions:—
J. G. Christian Adler, _Novi Testamenti Versiones Syriacae, Simplex,
Philoxeniana, et Hierosolymitana. Denuo examinatae et ad fidem
codicum manu scriptorum ... novis observationibus atque tabulis aere
incisis illustratae._ Hafniae, pp. viii. 206. _With eight Plates._
1789, 4to. For the complete list of editions up to 1888, see my
_Litteratura Syriaca_ (Syr. Gr., 2nd edition, pp. 20 ff.). Appendix
thereto in _Urt._, 227 ff.; R. Duval, _La Littérature Syriaque_.
Paris, 1899, pp. 42-67; _TiGr._, 813-822; Scrivener, fourth edition,
ii. 6-40, with the help of Gwilliam and Deane; _The Printed Editions
of the Syriac New Testament_, in the _Church Quarterly Review_,
1888, July, 257-297; G. H. Gwilliam, in the _Studia Biblica et
Ecclesiastica_ (Oxford), ii. 1890, iii. 1891; F. C. Conybeare, _The
growth of the Peshitta Version of the New Testament_, in the
_American Journal of Theology_, 1897, iv. 883-912; Burkitt, in the
_Journal of Theological Studies_, i. (July 1900), 569 ff., referring
to his forthcoming edition of the Evangelion da-Mepharreshe, says
that he has had to go over the Gospel quotations of St. Ephraem, and
closes by saying, “I confess that I am unconvinced that what we call
the New Testament Peshitta was in existence in St. Ephraem’s day,
and I believe that we owe both its production and victorious
reception to the organizing energy of the Great Rabbula, Bishop of
Edessa from 411 to 435 A.D.”
1. Till Gwilliam’s edition of the Gospels appears, which has been
promised since 1891, the best edition will be the Editio Princeps of
Widmanstadt, 1555; then that of Leusden and Schaaf, _Novum Domini
nostri Jesu Christi Testamentum Syriacum cum versione latina cura et
studio J. Leusden et C. Schaaf editum. Ad omnes editiones diligenter
recensitum et variis lectionibus magno labore collectis adornatum._
Lugd. Bat., 1709, 4to. _Acc. Schaaf, Lexicon Syriacum
concordantiale._ The text reprinted by Jones at Oxford, 1805; the
editions of the London Bible Society, 1816 and 1826, and better
still, the Syriac and New-Syriac editions of the American Mission in
Urmia, 1846, and of the American Bible Society of New York, 1868,
1874, and frequently (with the Nestorian vocalisation). An edition
is promised from the Jesuit Press at Beyruth, _Nouveau Testament
Syriaque en petits caractères, d’après plusieurs manuscrits anciens,
éd. par le P. L. Cheikho_.
The New Testament part of the Peshitto has been very much neglected
in the present century. On the O.T., investigations, chiefly in the
form of dissertations on most of the books, have been published,
establishing the relation of the Syriac to the Massoretic text, the
Septuagint, and the Targum. But almost nothing of this sort has been
done for the N.T., at least in Germany, since the time of Michaelis
and Löhlein. The question has never once been taken up how many
translators’ hands can be distinguished in the N.T.
J. D. Michaelis, _Curae in Versionem Syriacam Act. Apost. cum
consectariis criticis de indole, cognationibus et usu versionis
Syriacae tabularum Novi Foederis_. Göttingen, 1755. C. L. E.
Löhlein, _Syrus Epistolae ad Ephesios interpres in causa critica
denuo examinatus_, Erlangen, 1835.
2. Cureton’s _Remains_ (1858) is now out of print. Till Burkitt’s
new edition appears its place will be taken by Baethgen’s
Retranslation into Greek (_Evangelienfragmente. Der griechische Text
des Curetonschen Syrers wiederhergestellt_, Leipzig, 1885); and more
especially by Albert Bonus’s _Collatio codicis Lewisiani rescripti
evangeliorum Syriacorum cum codice Curetoniano_, Oxford, 1896; and
by Carl Holzhey’s _Der neuentdeckte Codex Sinaiticus untersucht. Mit
einem vollständigen Verzeichnis der Varianten des Codex Sinaiticus
und Codex Curetonianus_, Munich, 1896. See A. Bonus, _The Sinaitic
Palimpsest and the Curetonian Syriac_, in the _Expository Times_,
May 1895, p. 380 ff. The publications of T. R. Crowfoot, _Fragmenta
Evangelica, Pars I., II._, 1870, 1872, and _Observations on the
Collations in Greek of Cureton’s Syriac Fragments_, 1872, contain
useful material, but there are a good many mistakes.
3. The Editio Princeps of the Lewis text is, of course, that of
Bensly, Harris, and Burkitt, _The Four Gospels in Syriac,
transcribed from the Sinaitic Palimpsest ..._ Cambridge, 1894. To
this must be added its complement by Mrs. Lewis, _Some Pages of the
Four Gospels retranscribed_ (with or without an English
translation), London, 1896; further, _Last Gleanings from the Sinai
Palimpsest_, _Expositor_, Aug. 1897, pp. 111-119; also, _An Omission
from the Text of the Sinai Palimpsest_, _Expositor_, Dec. 1897, p.
472. On the discovery of the manuscript, see Mrs. Gibson, _How the
Codex was found, ..._ Cambridge, 1893, and Mrs. Lewis, _In the
shadow of Sinai, ..._ Cambridge, 1898; also Mrs. Bensly, _Our
Journey to Sinai, ... With a chapter on the Sinai Palimpsest_.
London, 1896. See also Mrs. Lewis, _The Earlier Home of the Sinaitic
Palimpsest_, _Expositor_, June 1900, pp. 415-421. The text has been
translated into German by Adalbert Merx, who has added a brief but
valuable critical discussion. Berlin (Reimer), 1897. The second
part, comprising the commentary, has not yet appeared. See also
Gwilliam’s notice of the editio princeps in the _Expository Times_,
Jan. 1895, p. 157 ff.
4. On Tatian, the latest and best is Zahn, _Evangelienharmonie_,
PRE^3, v. (1898), 653 ff.; also his _Forschungen_, i. (1881),
_Tatian’s Diatessaron_, ii. p. 286 ff. (1883), iv. (1891); _Gesch.
des Kanons_, i. 387-414, ii. 530-556. J. H. Hill, _The earliest Life
of Christ ever compiled from the Four Gospels, being the Diatessaron
of Tatian_ (c. A.D. 160), _literally translated from the Arabic
Version_. Edinburgh, 1893. J. R. Harris, _The Diatessaron of Tatian,
a Preliminary Study_. Cambridge, 1890. _The Diatessaron, a Reply_,
in the _Contemporary Review_, Aug. 1895, in answer to W. R. Cassels,
in the _Nineteenth Century_, April 1895; also by the same writer,
_Fragments of the Commentary of Ephrem Syrus upon the Diatessaron_.
London, 1895.... J. H. Hill, _A Dissertation on the Gospel
Commentary of S. Ephrem the Syrian ..._ Edinburgh, 1896. J. A.
Robinson, _Tatian’s Diatessaron and a Dutch Harmony_, in the
_Academy_, 24th March 1894. Hope W. Hogg, _The Diatessaron of
Tatian, with introduction and translation_, in the _Ante-Nicene
Library. Additional Volume ..._ edited by Allan Menzies. Edinburgh,
1897, pp. 33-138. W. Elliott, _Tatian’s Diatessaron and the Modern
Critics_. Plymouth, 1888. I. H. Hall, _A Pair of Citations from the
Diatessaron_, in the _Journal of Biblical Literature_, x. 2 (1891),
153-155. J. Goussen, _Pauca Fragmenta genuina Diatessaroniana_,
appended to the _Apocalypsis S. Joannis Versio Sahidica_, 1895. See
also Bäumer in the _Literarischer Handweiser_, 1890, 153-169; the
article _Tatian_ in the _Encyclopædia Britannica_, and Hastings’
_Bible Dictionary_, vol. ii. p. 697 f.
5. On the later Syriac versions, see _Urt._, 228, 236 f.; Gwynn,
_The older Syriac Version of the four Minor Catholic Epistles_,
_Hermathena_, No. xvi. (vol. vii.), 1890, 281-314. Merx, _Die in der
Peschito fehlenden Briefe des Neuen Testamentes in arabischer der
Philoxeniana entstammender Uebersetzung ..._ _Zeitschrift für
Assyriologie_, xii. 240 ff., 348 ff., xiii. 1-28. Bensly, _The
Harklean Version of the Epistle to the Hebrews, ..._ Cambridge,
1889. In this edition will be found the subscription mentioned
above, connecting the manuscript with that of Pamphilus. See
_Addenda_, p. xv.
6. On the Jerusalem Evangeliarium, see _Urt._, 228, 237. Zahn,
_Forschungen_, i. 329 ff. Lagarde, _Mitteilungen_, i. 111, iv. 328,
340. A. de Lagarde, _Erinnerungen an P. de Lagarde_, p. 112 ff.
Lewis and Gibson, _The Palestinian Syriac Lectionary of the Gospels
re-edited from two Sinai MSS. and from P. de Lagarde’s edition of
the Evangeliarium Hierosolymitanum_, London, 1899. The Lectionary
published in the _Studia Sinaitica_, vi., contains, in the N.T.,
passages from Acts, Romans, 1 and 2 Cor., Gal., Ephes., Philip.,
Col., 1 Thess., 1 and 2 Tim., Heb., James. See notice in the
_Expository Times_, Jan. 1898, p. 190 ff. _The Liturgy of the Nile_,
published by G. Margoliouth, 1896 (_Journal of the Royal Asiatic
Society_, Oct. 1896, 677-731, and also published separately),
contains Acts xvi. 16-34. See also Woods, _The New Syriac Fragments_
in the _Expository Times_, Nov. 1893.
(_b._) LATIN VERSIONS.
[Sidenote: Jerome.]
The name most closely associated with the Latin Versions of the New
Testament is that of =Jerome= (Hieronymus). This scholar was born at
Stridon, on the borders of Dalmatia,[92] about the year 345, and
educated at Rome. After leading for some time a hermit life in
Palestine, Jerome returned to Rome, and it was during his residence
there, in the year 382, that he was urged by Pope Damasus to undertake a
revision of the Latin version of the New Testament then in use. This he
did, and in 383 sent the Pope, who died in the following year, the first
instalment of the work, the Four Gospels, accompanied with a letter
beginning thus:—“Thou compellest me to make a new work out of an old;
after so many copies of the Scriptures have been dispersed throughout
the whole world, I am now to occupy the seat of the arbiter, as it were,
and seeing they disagree, to decide which of them accords with the truth
of the Greek; a pious task, verily, yet a perilous presumption, to pass
judgment on others and oneself to be judged by all.” He anticipates that
everyone, no matter who, learned or ignorant, that takes up a Bible and
finds a discrepancy between it and the usual text will straightway
condemn him as an impious falsifier who presumed to add to or alter or
correct the ancient Scriptures. But he comforts himself with the
reflection that it is the High Pontiff himself that has laid this task
upon him, and that the testimony of his jealous opponents themselves
proves that discrepancies are an indication of error (verum non esse
quod variat, etiam maledicorum testimonio comprobatur); for if they tell
us we are to rest our faith on the Latin exemplars, they must first say
which, because there are almost as many versions as manuscripts (tot
enim sunt exemplaria paene quot codices); if it is to be the majority of
these, why not rather go back to the Greek original which has been badly
rendered by incompetent translators (a vitiosis interpretibus male
edita), made worse instead of better by the presumption of unskilful
correctors (a praesumptoribus imperitis emendata perversius), and added
to or altered by sleepy scribes (a librariis dormitantibus aut addita
sunt aut mutata). In a letter to his learned friend Marcella, written in
the year 384, he gives instances of what he complains of, citing,
_e.g._, Romans xii. 11, where _tempori servientes_ had hitherto been
read instead of _domino servientes_ (καιρῷ instead of κυρίῳ), and 1 Tim.
v. 19, “against an elder receive not an accusation,” where the
qualifying clause, “except before two or three witnesses,” was dropped,
and also 1 Tim. i. 15, iii. 1, where _humanus sermo_ was given in place
of _fidelis_. In all three instances, our most recent critical editions
decide in favour of Jerome, against the Old Latin Version. In the last
instance cited, we know of only one Latin-Greek manuscript that has
ἀνθρώπινος instead of πιστός, and that only in c. iii. 1, viz. D*.
Jerome accordingly issued an improved version of the New Testament,
beginning with the Gospels. For this purpose he made a careful
comparison of old Greek manuscripts (codicum Graecorum emendata
conlatione sed veterum). In his version he was also careful only to make
an alteration when a real change of meaning was necessary, retaining in
all other cases the familiar Latin wording. The Gospels were in the
order which has been the prevailing one since his day—Matthew, Mark,
Luke, John.
[Sidenote: Augustine.]
We learn from the great Church Teacher AUGUSTINE, who lived in Africa
about the same time (354-430), that there was an endless variety and
multitude of translators (latinorum interpretum infinita varietas,
interpretum numerositas). He tells us that while it was possible to
count the number of those who had translated the Bible—_i.e._ the Old
Testament—from Hebrew into Greek, the Latin translators were
innumerable; that in the early age of the Christian faith (primis fidei
temporibus), no sooner did anyone gain possession of a Greek Codex, and
believe himself to have any knowledge of both languages, than he made
bold to translate it (ausus est interpretari). [Sidenote: Itala.] The
advice he himself gives is to prefer the _Italic_ version to the others,
as being the most faithful and intelligible (in ipsis autem
interpretationibus Itala praeferatur; nam est verborum tenacior cum
perspicuitate sententiae. _De Doctrina Christiana_, ii. 14, 15).
[Sidenote: Vulgate.] On the ground of this passage, the pre-Jeromic
versions have been comprehended under the title of the =Itala=, as
distinguished from Jerome’s own work, which is called the =Vulgate=,
seeing that it became the prevailing text in the Church of the Middle
Ages. By the Itala, Augustine himself, however, must have referred to a
particular version, and, according to the usage of that time, the word
cannot mean anything else than a version originating in or prevalent in
Italy—_i.e._ the North of Italy, what is called Lombardy. It is not
difficult to understand how it came to pass that Augustine used such a
version in Africa, seeing that he was a pupil of Ambrose, Bishop of
Milan. In recent times Burkitt has revived the opinion that by Itala
Augustine means neither more nor less than Jerome’s Revision of the
Gospels. He demonstrates that Augustine’s _De Consensu_, written about
the year 400, is based on Jerome’s revised text. In this, Zahn[93]
agrees with him on grounds that admit of no question so far as this
point is concerned. But Wordsworth-White[94] will not admit the
inference that Augustine must have meant this Revision when he spoke of
Itala in the year 397, seeing that in his letter to Jerome,[95] written
in 403, he thanks God for the interpretation of the Gospel, “quasi de
opere recenter cognito,” while in his earlier letters to Jerome[96] he
makes no mention of it: “quod mirandum esset si in opere ante sex annos
publici iuris facto eam collaudasset.”[97]
(1.) LATIN VERSIONS BEFORE JEROME.
[Sidenote: Old Latin Texts.]
Where, when, and by whom was the New Testament, or at least were parts
of it, first translated into Latin? From the passage in Augustine quoted
above, we learn that it was done by all and sundry in the very earliest
times of the Christian faith. Rome used to be regarded as the place
where the Latin versions took their rise. But it was observed that Greek
was very commonly employed as the written language at Rome, especially
among Christians. The first Bishops of Rome have pure Greek names, and
even the first representative of the Roman Church with a Latin name, the
Clement that wrote the Epistle to the Corinthians about the year 95,
even he wrote in Greek. Moreover, when the relics of the Old Latin
Bibles began to be examined, it was observed that their language, both
in vocabulary and grammar, entirely agreed with that found in African
writers of that age, and in some things agreed with these alone.
[Sidenote: African Latin.] It is, of course, a fact that the majority of
the writers of that age known to us are African. Till quite recently,
therefore, it was held to be tolerably well made out that the birthplace
of the Latin Bible is to be found in Africa. It was regarded by many as
equally certain, that in spite of the statements of Jerome and
Augustine, and in spite too of the various forms in which the Old Latin
Bible now exists, these all proceed from a common origin, or at most
from two sources, so that it was not quite correct to speak of a
“multitude of translators” in the very earliest times. The settlement of
this question is rendered more difficult by the fact that, while the
extant copies of the pre-Jeromic Bible are undoubtedly very early, they
are few in number, and for the most part mutilated. The reason of this
is not far to seek. For, as time went on and Jerome’s new version came
to be more and more exclusively used, manuscripts of the earlier version
lost their value, and were the more frequently used for palimpsests and
book covers. One has also to take into account how liable the text of
both was to be corrupted, either by the copyist of an Old Latin Bible
inserting in the margin, or even interpolating in the text, various
passages from Jerome’s translation that seemed to him to be a decided
improvement, or conversely, by the scribe who should have written the
new rendering involuntarily permitting familiar expressions to creep in
from the old. It is estimated that we have about 8000 manuscripts of
Jerome’s recension, of which 2228 have been catalogued by Gregory.
Samuel Berger, the most thorough investigator in this field, examined
800 manuscripts in Paris alone. But on the other hand, only 38
manuscripts of the Old Latin Version of the New Testament are known to
exist. The credit of collecting the relics of these pre-Jeromic versions
of the Old and New Testament, so far as they were accessible at that
time, belongs to Peter Sabatier the Maurist (Rheims, 1743, 3 vols.
folio).
In critical editions of the New Testament the manuscripts of the
pre-Jeromic versions are indicated by the small letters of the Roman
alphabet. They are the following:—
1. GOSPELS.
a. Vercellensis: according to a tradition recorded in a document of the
eighth century this manuscript was written by Eusebius, Bishop of
Vercelli, who died in the year 370 or 371. Recent scholars, however,
date it somewhat later. It is written on purple with silver letters. The
order of the Gospels is that found in most of these Old Latin MSS.—viz.
Matthew, John, Luke, Mark. The manuscript is defective in several
places.
The codex was edited by Irico in 1748, and by Bianchini in 1749
along with some of the others in his Evangeliarium Quadruplex. This
latter edition was reprinted, with some inaccuracies, in Migne’s
_Patrologia Latina_, vol. xii. The manuscript was again edited by
Belsheim; _Codex Vercellensis. Quatuor Evangelia ante Hieronymum
latine translata ex reliquiis Codicis Vercellensis, saeculo ut
videtur quarto scripti, et ex Editione Iriciana principe denuo
ededit_ (sic) _Jo. Belsheim._ Christiania, 1894.
b. Veronensis: of the fourth or fifth century, also written with silver
on purple. In this Codex, John vii. 44-viii. 12 has been erased. The
manuscript is defective.
Edited by Bianchini (see above). A Spagnolo, _L’Evangeliario
Purpureo Veronese_. Nota (Torino, 1899. Estratta dagli Atti dell’
Accademia Reale delle Scienze di Torino).
c. Colbertinus: in Paris, written in the twelfth century, but still
containing the Old Latin text in the Gospels, though exhibiting Jerome’s
version in other parts.
Edited by Sabatier, and again by Belsheim; _Codex Colbertinus
Parisiensis. Quatuor Evangelia ante Hieronymum latine translata post
editionem Petri Sabatier cum ipso codice collatam denuo edidit Jo.
Belsheim._ Christiania, 1888.
d. The Latin part of Codex D; see p. 64 ff.
e. Palatinus: of the fourth or fifth century, written like a b f i j on
purple with gold and silver letters: now in Vienna, with one leaf in
Dublin.
Two other fragments were published in 1893 by Hugo Linke from a
transcript made for Bianchini in 1762. The entire codex was edited
by Belsheim, Christiania, 1896. See von Dobschütz in the _LCbl._,
1896, 28.
f. Brixianus, of the sixth century, in Brescia. In their new edition of
the Vulgate, Wordsworth and White printed the text of this manuscript
underneath that of Jerome for comparison’s sake as probably containing
the text most nearly resembling that on which Jerome based his
recension. But see Burkitt’s Note in the _Journal of Theological
Studies_, I. i. (Oct. 1899), 129-134, and the note to p. 139 in
_Addenda_.
ff_{1}. Corbeiensis I., contains the Gospel according to Matthew alone.
The manuscript formerly belonged to the Monastery of Corbey, near
Amiens, and with others was transferred to St. Petersburg during the
French Revolution.
ff_{2}. Corbeiensis II., written in the sixth century and now in Paris:
contains the Gospels with several lacunæ.
On Belsheim’s editions of ff_{1} and ff_{2} (1881 and 1887), see E.
Ranke in the _ThLz._, 1887, col. 566, and S. Berger, _Bull. Crit._,
1891, 302 f.
g_{1}. Sangermanensis I., of the ninth century, in Paris, exhibits a
mixed text. The manuscript was used by Stephen for his Latin Bible of
1538.
g_{2}. Sangermanensis II., written in an Irish hand of the tenth
century, has a mixed text: in Paris (Lat. 13069).
h. Claromontanus, of the fourth or fifth century, now in the Vatican:
has the Old Latin text in Matthew only. The manuscript is defective at
the beginning down to Matt. iii. 15 and also from Matt. xiv. 33-xviii.
12.
Edited by Mai in his _Scriptorum Veterum Nova Collectio_, iii.
257-288, and by Belsheim, Christiania, 1892.
i. Vindobonensis, of the seventh century, contains fragments of Luke and
Mark written on purple with silver and gold.
Edited by Belsheim, _Codex Vindobonensis membranaceus purpureus ...
antiquissimae evangeliorum Lucae et Marci translationis Latinae
fragmenta edidit Jo. Belsheim_. Lipsiae, 1885 (cum tabula).
j (z in _TiGr._). Saretianus or Sarzannensis, of the fifth century,
contains 292 verses from John written on purple. The manuscript was
discovered in 1872 in the Church of Sarezzano, near Tortona, and is not
yet completely edited.
Compare G. Amelli, _Un antichissimo codice biblico Latino purpureo
conservato nella chiesa di Sarezzano presso Tortona_. Milan, 1872.
k. Bobiensis, of the fifth century, is perhaps the most important of the
Old Latin manuscripts, but unfortunately contains only fragments of
Matthew and Mark. It is said to have belonged to St. Columban, the
founder of the monastery of Bobbio, who died in the year 615. It is now
preserved at Turin. See Burkitt on Mark xv. 34 in Codex Bobiensis in the
_Journal of Theological Studies_, i. 2 (Jan. 1900), p. 278 f.
l. Rehdigeranus, in Breslau, purchased in Venice by Thomas von Rehdiger
in 1569. Matthew i. 1-ii. 15 and a good deal of John wanting.
Edited by H. Fr. Haase, Breslau, 1865, 1866: _Evangeliorum quattuor
vetus latina interpretatio ex codice Rehdigerano nunc primum edita_.
m. Does not represent any particular manuscript and should properly be
omitted here. It indicates the _Liber de divinis scripturis sive
Speculum_, a work mistakenly ascribed to Augustine, consisting of a
collection of proof-passages (testimonia) from the Old and New
Testaments. All the books of the latter are made use of except Philemon,
Hebrews, and 3 John, but the Epistle to the Laodicæans is cited among
the number.
_Fragmenta Novi Testamenti in translatione latina antehieronymiana
ex libro qui vocatur Speculum eruit et ordine librorum Novi
Testamenti exposuit J. Belsheim._ Christiania, 1899.
n o p. Are fragments at St. Gall: published in the Old Latin Biblical
Texts, see below, p. 131 f.
n. Written in the fifth or sixth century, has probably been in the
Library at St. Gall since its foundation. It contains portions of
Matthew and Mark, with John xix. 13-42.
o. Written in the seventh century, possibly to take the place of the
last leaf of n, which is wanting, contains Mark xvi. 14-20.
p. Two leaves of an Irish missal written in the seventh or eighth
century.
a_{2}. Is part of the same manuscript as n. It consists of a leaf
containing Luke xi. 11-29 and xiii. 16-34. It was found in the Episcopal
archives at Chur, and is preserved in the Rhætisches Museum there.
q. Monacensis, written in the sixth or seventh century, came originally
from Freising. Published in the Old Latin Biblical Texts.
r or r_{1} and r_{2}. Usserianus I. and II., are both in Dublin. The
former is written in an Irish hand of the seventh century, and has
several lacunæ. r_{2} belongs to the ninth or tenth century and has an
Old Latin text in Matthew resembling that of r_{1}. It shows affinity
with Jerome’s text in Mark, Luke, and John, of which, however, only five
leaves remain.
Edited by T. K. Abbott, _Evangeliorum versio antehieronymiana ex
codice Usseriano (Dublinensi), adjecta collatione codicis Usseriani
alterius. Accedit versio Vulgata...._ Dublin, 1884, 2 Parts.
s. Four leaves with portions of Luke, written in the sixth century. The
fragments came originally from Bobbio, and are now in the Ambrosian
Library at Milan. Published in the Old Latin Biblical Texts.
t. A palimpsest very difficult to decipher, containing portions of the
first three chapters of Mark, written in the fifth century, and now at
Berne. Published in the Old Latin Biblical Texts.
v. Bound in the cover of a volume at Vienna entitled, _Pactus Legis
Ripuariæ_: exhibits John xix. 27-xx. 11. Published in the Old Latin
Biblical Texts.
aur. Aureus or Holmiensis, written in the seventh or eighth century,
exhibits the Gospels entire, with the exception of Luke xxi. 8-30. An
inscription in old English states that the manuscript was purchased from
the heathen (the Danes?) by Alfred the Alderman for Christ Church,
Canterbury, when Alfred was King and Ethelred Archbishop (871-889). It
was afterwards in Madrid, and is now at Stockholm. It is really a
Vulgate text with an admixture of Old Latin readings. Published by
Belsheim in 1878.
δ. Is the interlinear Latin version of Δ (see p. 72), and is interesting
on account of its alternative readings given in almost every verse—e.g.
_uxorem vel conjugem_ for γυναῖκα, Matt. i. 20. Compare Harris, _The
Codex Sangallensis_, Cambridge, 1891.
On the Prolegomena found in many Old Latin and Vulgate manuscripts
of the Gospels, see Peter Corssen, _Monarchianische Prologe zu den
vier Evangelien_. Leipzig, 1896 (_TU._, xv. 1). This has been
supplemented by von Dobschütz’s _Prolog zur Apostelgeschichte_. See
also Jülicher in the _GGA._, 1896, xi. 841-851. J. S. in the _Revue
Critique_, 1897, vii. 135 f. H. Holtzmann in the _Th. Lz._, 1897,
xii. col. 231 ff. A. Hilgenfeld, _Altchristliche Prolegomena zu den
Evangelien_ in the _ZfwTh._, 1897, iii. 432-444.
2. ACTS.
d m As for the Gospels.
e. The Latin text of E. See above, p. 75.
g. Gigas Holmiensis, the immense manuscript of the entire Latin Bible
preserved at Stockholm. The text is Old Latin only in the Acts and
Apocalypse, the rest of the New Testament exhibiting Jerome’s version.
The manuscript was brought to Sweden from Prague as a prize of war in
1648, along with the Codex Argenteus.
The Acts and Apocalypse were edited by Belsheim, Christiania, 1879.
On this see O. v. Gebhardt in the _ThLz._, 1880, col. 185. A new
collation of this manuscript was made for W.-W. by H. Karlsson in
1891.
g_{2}. In Milan, is part of a Lectionary written in the tenth or
eleventh century, and contains the pericope for St. Stephen’s day, Acts
vi. 8-vii. 2, vii. 51-viii. 4.
Published by Ceriani in his _Monumenta Sacra et Profana_, i. 2, pp.
127, 128. Milan, 1866.
h. Floriacensis, a palimpsest formerly belonging to the Abbey of Fleury
on the Loire, and now in Paris, written probably in the seventh century.
It contains fragments of the Apocalypse, Acts, 1 and 2 Peter, and 1
John, in this order. (Tischendorf’s reg.: Blass’s f.)
The latest and best edition is that of S. Berger: _Le Palimpseste de
Fleury_. Paris, 1889.
p_{2}, written in the thirteenth century, exhibits a text with an
admixture of Old Latin readings in the Acts only. The manuscript came
originally from Perpignan, and is now in Paris, No. 321. It was used by
Blass.
Published by Berger: _Un ancien texte latin des Actes des Apôtres_,
etc. Paris, 1895. See von Dobschütz in the _ThLz._, 1896, 4;
Haussleiter in the _Th. Lbl._, no. 9; Schmiedel in the _L. Cbl._,
no. 33; E. Beurlier, _Bull. Crit._, 1896, 32, p. 623.
s_{2}. Bobiensis, a palimpsest of the fifth or sixth century at Vienna,
containing fragments of Acts xxiii., xxv.-xxviii., and of James and 1
Peter.
x_{1}. Written in the seventh or eighth century, contains the Acts with
the exception of xiv. 26-xv. 32. The manuscript is preserved at Oxford
and is not completely published.
w. Is the symbol given by Blass to a paper manuscript of the New
Testament written, it seems, in Bohemia in the fifteenth century, and
now at Wernigerode. In the main it exhibits Jerome’s text even to a
greater extent than p, but preserves elements of the Old Latin,
particularly in the latter half of the Acts. The mixture is similar to
that observed in the Provençal New Testament,[98] which is derived from
a Latin manuscript of this nature, and to that in the pre-Lutheran
German Bible. (See _Urt._, p. 127 f.)
On Acts, see especially P. Corssen, _Der Cyprianische Text der Acta
Apostolorum_. Berlin, 1892.
3. CATHOLIC EPISTLES.
h m s. As above.
ff. Corbeiensis, at St. Petersburg, of the tenth century, contains the
Epistle of James.
Edited by Belsheim in the _Theologisk Tidsskrift for den
evangelisk-lutherske Kirke i Norge_ (N.S. Vol. ix. Part 2); also by
J. Wordsworth, _The Corbey St. James_, etc., in _Studia Biblica_, i.
pp. 113-150. Oxford, 1885.
q. Written in the seventh century, and preserved at Munich, contains
fragments of 1 John, and of 1 and 2 Peter. The text exhibits the passage
of the Three Heavenly Witnesses in 1 John v., but verse 7 follows verse
8.
Published by Ziegler in 1877, _Bruchstücke einer
vorhieronymianischen Uebersetzung der Petrusbriefe_.
4. PAULINE EPISTLES.
m. As for the Gospels.
d e f g. The Latin versions of the Greek Codices D E F G.
gue. Guelferbytanus, of the sixth century, contains fragments of Romans
cc. xi.-xv., found in the Gothic palimpsest at Wolfenbüttel. See p. 69.
Published by Tischendorf in his _Anecdota Sacra et Profana_, 1855,
pp. 153-158. See Burkitt, in the _Journal of Theological Studies_,
i. 1 (Oct. 1899), p. 134, and compare the note to p. 139 in the
_Addenda_, p. xv.
r. Written in the fifth or sixth century, came originally from Freising,
and is now at Munich: contains portions of Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians,
Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, 1 Timothy, and Hebrews.
Ziegler, _Italafragmente der paulinischen Briefe_. Marburg, 1876.
Wölfflin, _Neue Bruchstücke der Freisinger Itala_ (Münchener
Sitzungsberichte, 1893, ii. 253-280).
r_{2}. Also at Munich, a single leaf, with part of Phil. iv. and of 1
Thess. i.
r_{3}. In the Benedictine Abbey of Göttweih on the Danube: fragments of
Romans v. and vi. and of Galatians iv. and v., written on leaves used as
a book cover.
Published by Rönsch in the _ZfwTh._, xxii. (1879), pp. 234-238.
x_{2}. At Oxford, of the ninth century, contains the Pauline Epistles:
defective from Heb. xi. 34-xiii. 25.
See also Fr. Zimmer, _Der Galaterbrief im altlateinischen Text, als
Grundlage für einen textkritischen Apparat der Vetus Latina_ in the
_Theologische Studien und Skizzen aus Ostpreussen_. Königsberg, i.
(1887), pp. 1-81.
5. APOCALYPSE.
The only manuscripts are m as for the Gospels, and g and h as for the
Acts, h exhibits only fragments of cc. i. and ii., viii. and ix., xi.
and xii., and xiv.-xvi.
For the Old Latin Biblical Texts edited by Wordsworth and White, see
below, p. 131.
[Sidenote: Latin Fathers.]
On account of the small number of these manuscripts the quotations of
the Latin Fathers are valuable, especially those of _Cyprian_ of
Carthage,[99] and after them the recently discovered citations in
_Priscillian_, who was the first to suffer death as a heretic in the
year 385. In the Apocalypse we have the quotations of _Primasius_,
Bishop of Hadrumet (ca. 550), who used in his commentary on the
Apocalypse not only his own Old Latin Bible but also a revised version
the same as that used by the African Donatist _Tyconius_. In attempting
to classify these witnesses it was found that the text of certain
manuscripts coincided with that of the Bible used by Cyprian—viz., in
the Gospels k especially, in Acts h, and in the Apocalypse Primasius and
h. This family has accordingly been designated the =African=.
_Tertullian_, a still earlier African Father, undoubtedly refers to the
existence of a Latin Version in his time, but the quotations found in
his Latin works cannot be taken into account, for this reason, that in
citing the New Testament he seems to have made an independent
translation from the Greek for his immediate purpose.[100]
As for the quotations in Augustine, they are found to resemble the text
of f and q in the Gospels, particularly the former, and that of q, r,
and r_{3} in the Epistles. To this group, therefore, the name =Italian=
has been given. It has, however, been deemed necessary to regard this
Italian family as being itself a revised and smoother form of a still
earlier version styled the =European=, which is thought to be
represented by g, g_{2}, and s in the Acts, by ff in the Epistles, and
by g in the Apocalypse.
[Sidenote: Old Latin Texts.]
As illustrating the way in which the various forms deviate from each
other, take the text of Luke xxiv., verses 4, 5, 11, and 13 as exhibited
by a b c d e f and the Vulgate (vg).
v. 4.—All the seven agree in the opening words, Et factum est dum; but
after that there follows:—
(1) stuperent a c, mente consternatae essent b, vg; mente consternatae
sunt e, aporiarentur d, haesitarent f.
(2) de hoc a c f, de facto b, de eo d, de isto e, vg.
(3) ecce a c d f, vg; et ecce b e.
(4) viri duo a f, duo viri b c d e, vg.
(5) adstiterunt a f, astiterunt c, adsisterunt d, steterunt b e, vg.
(6) iuxta illas a f, secus illas b c e, vg; eis d.
(7) in veste fulgenti a f, vg; in veste fulgente b c e, in amictu
scoruscanti d.
(8) v. 5: timore autem adprehensae inclinantes faciem ad terram a; cum
timerent autem et declinarent vultum in terram b e f, vg; conterritae
autem inclinaverunt faciem in terram c; in timore autem factae
inclinaverunt vultus suos in terra d.
(9) v. 11: et visa sunt a b c (visae) e f, vg; et paruerunt d.
(10) illis a, ante illos b, vg; apud illos c e, in conspectu eorum d,
coram illos f.
(11) tanquam a, sicut b e, vg; quasi c d f.
(12) delira a, deliramentum b e f, vg; (b spells -lirr-, and f -ler-),
deliramenta c, derissus d.
(13) v. 13: municipium a, castellum b c d e f, vg.
(14) stadios habentem LX ab hierusalem a, quod aberat stadia sexaginta
ab hierusalem b, quod abest ab ierosolymis stadia sexag. c, iter
habentis stadios sexag. ab hierus. d, quod est ab hierosolymis stadia
septem e, quod aberat spatio stadiorum LX ab hierus. f, quod erat in
spatio stadiorum sexaginta ab hierusalem vg.
(15) cui nomen a, nomine b c d e f, vg.
(16) ammaus a, cleopas et ammaus b, emmaus c f, vg; alammaus d, ammaus
et cleopas e.
Is not this almost exactly as Jerome said: tot exemplaria, quot codices?
And when we take into account that all this variety in the Latin
manuscripts is not simply due to a difference in translation, but that a
similar diversity exists in the Greek,[101] we can easily understand
what a task it is to extricate the original text from out these
conflicting witnesses. At the same time, we have evidence of the
singular position in which D stands to all the others; while the last
example also affords an illustration of the way in which mistakes might
arise. The reading ᾗ ὄνομα in verse 13 would preclude any possibility of
misunderstanding. But suppose the reader or the translator had before
him a manuscript like D, in which the reading was ὀνόματι. What
happened, we shall suppose, was this. The phrase, “Emmaus by name,” was
taken as referring, not to the village, but to the subject of the
sentence; the other name, Cleopas, was then inserted from verse 18, and
in time placed even before Emmaus by a later copyist. And accordingly we
find, even in Ambrose of Milan, that the two travellers are regularly
called Ammaon et Cleopas. It was just as Jerome said: a vitiosis
interpretibus male edita, a praesumptoribus imperitis emendata
perversius, a librariis dormitantibus aut addita aut mutata.
(2.) THE LATIN VERSION OF JEROME.
[Sidenote: Codex Epternacensis.]
It is a comparatively easy task to restore the work of Jerome; first of
all because all our present manuscripts are derived from one and only
one source, secondly because the number of existing manuscripts is very
great, and lastly because some of them at least go back to the sixth
century. There is a Codex in Paris which formerly belonged to the Church
of St. Willibrord at Echternach, written by an Irish hand of the eighth
or ninth century, and containing a subscription copied from its original
to the following effect: proemendavi ut potui secundum codicem in
bibliotheca Eugipi praespiteri quem ferunt fuisse sci Hieronymi,
indictione VI. p(ost) con(sulatum) Bassilii u. c. anno septimo decimo.
That must have been in the year 558. [Sidenote: Codex Amiatinus.] Codex
Amiatinus, now in Florence, was formerly supposed to belong to the same
time, but this turns out to be a mistake, because it has been proved
that it was written for Ceolfrid, Abbot of Wearmouth, who died at
Langres on the 25th September 716, on his way to Rome, where he intended
to present this Codex to the Pope. [Sidenote: Codex Fuldensis.] One of
the oldest and most valuable manuscripts of the Vulgate is at Fulda,
where it has been preserved, perhaps, from the time of Boniface. This
Codex Fuldensis was written between 540 and 546, by order of Bishop
Victor of Capua, and corrected by himself. It contains the whole of the
New Testament according to Jerome’s version, only in place of the four
separate Gospels it has a Harmony composed by Victor, who followed
Tatian’s plan, using the Latin text of Jerome. Victor’s Harmony in turn
became the basis of the so-called Old German Tatian.
[Sidenote: Wordsworth and White.]
The task of restoring the original text of Jerome’s version has been
undertaken in England by the Bishop of Salisbury, who has been at work
on all the available material for more than fifteen years. The edition
bears the title, _Novum Testamentum Domini nostri Jesu Christi secundum
editionem sancti Hieronymi ad codicum manuscriptorum fidem recensuit
Johannes Wordsworth in operis societatem adsumpto Henrico Juliano
White_. Five parts of the first volume have already appeared, containing
the four Gospels with an _Epilogus ad Evangelia_.[102] In France, J.
Delisle, the Director of the Paris National Library, has rendered great
service by his work upon the manuscripts under his care; while Samuel
Berger has constituted himself pre-eminently the historian of the
Vulgate by bringing fresh testimony from the early Middle Ages and the
remotest provinces of the Church to bear upon the history of the Vulgate
and its text as well as on the origin and dissemination of the different
forms. In his compendious _Histoire de la Vulgate pendant les premiers
siècles du moyen âge_ (Paris, 1893), he has, _e.g._, indicated no fewer
than 212 different ways in which the books of the Old Testament were
arranged in the manuscripts that he examined, and thirty-eight varieties
in the order of the New Testament books. In Germany Bengel applied
himself to the reconstruction of the Latin text of the Bible in the last
century, and in this he was followed by Lachmann in the present century,
while Riegler, van Ess, and Kaulen have added to our knowledge of the
history of the Vulgate. Dr. Peter Corssen has followed up the labours of
Ziegler and Rönsch in the particular field of the pre-Jeromic Bible and
its text with a methodical examination of the earlier editions, and E.
v. Dobschütz has begun to publish _Studies in the Textual Criticism of
the Vulgate_. The valuable researches of Carlo Vercellone (1860-64) were
concerned almost exclusively with the Old Testament, and do not seem to
have been followed up in Italy. “Utinam Papa Leo XIII.,” says Gregory,
“tanta scientia tanta magnanimitate insignis curam in se suscipiat
textus sacrosanctorum Bibliorum Latini edendi; cura, opus ecclesia et
Papa dignum.” Meanwhile Wordsworth and White appear to have accomplished
as much as is possible at present in the field of the Gospels.[103]
[Sidenote: MSS. used by Jerome.]
The principles on which Jerome went in his revision of the text have
been already referred to, but what the early Greek manuscripts were that
he employed is not yet clearly made out. The relics of the material he
used are as scanty as those of his own work. He must, however, have been
able to make use of manuscripts that went back to Eusebius, seeing that
he adopted the Eusebian Canons in his New Testament. But there are
certain readings in Jerome which we have not yet been able to discover
in any Greek manuscript that we know. For instance, he gives _docebit
vos omnem veritatem_ in John xvi. 13, where our present Greek editions
read ὁδηγήσει ὑμᾶς ἐν τῇ ἀληθείᾳ πάσῃ, so that he would seem to have
read διηγήσεται ὑμῖν τὴν ἀλήθειαν πᾶσαν. As a matter of fact, this
reading does occur in two passages of Eusebius and in Cyril of
Jerusalem, as well as in the Arabic version of Tatian, but it has not
been discovered in any Greek manuscript.[104] In the other parts of the
New Testament, the revision of which was perhaps completed by the year
386, Jerome inserted hardly any new readings from the Greek, but
contented himself with improving the grammar and diction of the Latin.
His work on the Old Testament was much more comprehensive, but does not
fall to be discussed here.
[Sidenote: History of the Vulgate.]
It was only by degrees that Jerome’s recension gained ground. In Rome,
Gregory the Great (d. 604) for one preferred it to the old, though at
the same time he says expressly: sedes apostolica, cui auctore Deo
praesideo, utraque utitur. [Sidenote: Alcuin.] Owing to the use of both
forms the diversity of copies grew to such an extent that in 797 Charles
the Great ordered =Alcuin= to make a uniformly revised text from the
best Latin manuscripts for use in the Churches of his Empire. For this
purpose Alcuin sent to his native Northumbria for manuscripts, by which
he corrected the text of the Bible, and he was able to present the first
copy to the Emperor at Christmas 801. A good many of the superb
_Carolingian_ manuscripts, as they are called, which are found in our
libraries, contain Alcuin’s Revision, as for instance the Bible of
Grandval near Basel, which was probably written for Charles the Bald,
and which is now in the British Museum (see Plate VII.); the Bible
presented to the same monarch by Vivian, Abbot of St. Martin of Tours,
which was sent by the Chapter of Metz from the Cathedral treasury there
to Colbert in 1675, and is now in Paris (B. N., Lat. 1); another written
in the same monastery of St. Martin, and now at Bamberg; and that in the
Vallicellian Library of the Church of Sta. Maria in Rome, which is
perhaps the best specimen of the Alcuinian Bible.
[Sidenote: Theodulf.]
Another revision was introduced into France by Alcuin’s contemporary
=Theodulf=, Bishop of Orleans (787-821). He was a Visigoth, born in the
neighbourhood of Narbonne, and the type of text he introduced was taken
essentially from Spanish manuscripts. We have his revision in the
so-called Theodulfian Bible, which formerly belonged to the Cathedral
Church of Orleans, and is now in Paris (Lat. 9380); in its companion
volume, formerly in the Cathedral of Puy, and now in the British Museum
(24142); and in the Bible of St. Hubert, which came from the monastery
of that name in the Ardennes.
[Sidenote: Harding.]
A further revision was made by Stephen =Harding=, third Abbot of
Citeaux. About the year 1109 he prepared a standard Bible for his
congregation, in which the Latin text of the New Testament was corrected
by the Greek. At the same time the Old Testament was revised from the
Hebrew with the help of some Jewish scholars. Harding’s copy of the
standard Bible, in four volumes, is still preserved in the Public
Library at Dijon. A similar work was done for his monastery by William,
Abbot of Hirsau.
[Sidenote: Correctoria.]
Attempts were also made to settle the text by means of the so-called
=Correctoria Bibliorum=, in which those readings which were supposed to
be correct were carefully collected and arranged. The University of
Paris in particular did a great deal in this way, and such was its
influence, that by the middle of the fifteenth century the Parisian text
was the one most commonly followed in manuscripts, and the invention of
printing gave it a complete ascendancy over the others.
[Sidenote: Printed text.]
The first fruits of the printing press are understood to be the undated
“forty-two line Bible,” usually called the _Mazarin_ Bible, seeing that
it was the copy in the library of Cardinal Mazarin that first attracted
the attention of bibliographers. The first dated Bible is of the year
1462. Copinger estimates that 124 editions were printed before the close
of the fifteenth century, and over 400 during the sixteenth. The first
edition in octavo, “for the poor man,” was issued at Basel in 1491 from
the Press of Froben, the same printer who prompted Erasmus to prepare
the first Greek New Testament. The first edition in Latin with various
readings was printed in 1504. In the following year Erasmus published
the _Annotationes_ which Laurentius Valla had prepared for the Latin
Bible as early as 1444. The year 1528 saw the first really critical
edition. It was brought out by Stephen, who used in its preparation
three good Paris manuscripts—the Bible of Charles the Bald already
referred to, that of St. Denis, and another of the ninth century, the
New Testament portion of which has now disappeared. He afterwards
published in 1538-40 another edition, for which he employed seventeen
manuscripts, and which became the foundation of the present authorised
Vulgate. [Sidenote: Henten.] About the same time John =Henten= published
a very valuable edition [1547] on the basis of thirty-one manuscripts,
in the preparation of which he was assisted by the theologians of
Louvain. This was followed in 1573 and 1580 by two further editions
containing important annotations by Lucas of Brügge. [Sidenote:
Authorised Vulgate.] In the year previous to that in which Henten’s
edition appeared, the Council of Trent, in its fourth sitting of the 8th
April 1546, decided “ut haec vetus et vulgata editio in publicis
lectionibus, disputationibus, praedicationibus et expositionibus pro
authentica habeatur,” and at the same time ordained “posthac sacra
scriptura, potissimum vero haec ipsa vetus et vulgata editio quam
emendatissime imprimatur.”
[Sidenote: Sixtine.]
The latter part of this decree was carried into effect in the papacy of
Sixtus V. His predecessor, Pius V., began the work of revising the text
of the Bible, and a “Congregatio pro emendatione Bibliorum” gave
twenty-six sittings to it in the year 1569. His successor seems to have
allowed the work to lapse, but Sixtus V. appointed a new commission for
the purpose under the Presidency of Cardinal Caraffa. The Pope himself
revised the result of their labours, which was printed at the Vatican
Press that he had founded. This edition, which takes its name from him,
was issued under the Bull “Aeternus ille” of the 1st March 1589, and
published in the following year. It is the first official edition of the
Vulgate. Sixtus died on the 27th August 1590, and was succeeded by four
Popes in the space of two years. [Sidenote: Clementine.] His fourth
successor in the Chair of Peter, Clement VIII., issued a new edition
under the name of the old Pope, accompanied by the Bull “Cum sacrorum”
of the 9th November 1592. This edition, containing a preface written by
Cardinal Bellarmin, was substituted for the former, and has continued
from that day without any alteration as the authorised Bible of the
entire Roman Church. The text of this second edition approximated more
closely to that of Henten, for which the Commission of Pope Sixtus had
also expressed their preference, though their printed edition went
rather by that of Stephen. The number of the variations between these
two editions has been estimated at 3000. For our purpose both alike are
superseded by the edition of Wordsworth and White. It may be added that
the first edition to contain the names of both the Popes upon the title
page is that of 1604. The title runs: “Sixti V. Pont. Max. iussu
recognita et Clementis VIII. auctoritate edita.” Those printed at Rome
at the present day are entitled: “Sixti V. et Clementis VIII. Pontt.
Maxx. iussu recognita atque edita.” See below, p. 132.
An enumeration of all the manuscripts of the Vulgate mentioned by
Tischendorf in his eighth edition, or even of the earliest and most
important of them, cannot be attempted. Those, however, mentioned by
Gebhardt in his _Adnotatio Critica_ are given here, with the notation
adopted by Wordsworth and White.
The best manuscripts, in the judgment of the English editors, are Codex
Amiatinus, Codex Fuldensis, and the one in the Ambrosian Library at
Milan (C 39 inf.), written in the sixth century. (M in W.-W.; not cited
by Tischendorf.)
am. Amiatinus (_vide supra_, p. 122), written ca. 700, is an excellent
manuscript, and particularly interesting as containing in the
introduction a double catalogue of the Books of the Bible resembling
that of the Senator Cassiodorus. See Westcott, _Bible in the Church_,
Appendix B; _Canon_, Appendix D. (A in W.-W.) (See Plate VI.)
bodl. Bodleianus, of the seventh century, formerly belonging to the
Library of St. Augustine at Canterbury. (O in W.-W.)
demid. Demidovianus, belonging to the thirteenth century, but copied
from an earlier exemplar; formerly at Lyons; present locality unknown;
not cited in W.-W.
em. Emeram, written in the year 870, in gold uncials with splendid
miniatures: at Munich, Cimelie 55: not cited in W.-W.
erl. Erlangen, of the ninth century (Irmischer’s Catalogue, 467): used
only indirectly by Tischendorf, and not cited in W.-W.
for. Foroiuliensis, written in the sixth or seventh century, and now at
Cividale, Friuli: fragments of it at Venice and Prague. (J in W.-W.)
fos. Of the ninth century: from St. Maur des Fossés, now in Paris. (Lat.
11959.)
fu. Fuldensis (_vide supra_, p. 122), written between 540 and 546:
contains the Epistle to the Laodicaeans after Colossians: edited with
facsimiles by E. Ranke. (F in W.-W.)
gat. Gatianus, from St. Gatien’s in Tours: written in the eighth or
ninth century: stolen from Libri: purchased by Lord Ashburnham and now
in Paris: not cited in W.-W.
harl. Harleianus 1775, of the sixth or seventh century: in the British
Museum, formerly in Paris 4582: stolen from there by John Aymont in
1707. (Z in W.-W.)
ing. Ingolstadt, of the seventh century, now in the University Library
at Munich: defective. (I in W.-W.) See von Dobschütz, _Vulgatastudien_
(with two facsimiles).
mm. Of the tenth or eleventh century, from Marmoutiers, near Tours: in
the British Museum, Egerton 609. (E in W.-W.)
mt. Of the eighth or ninth century, from St. Martin’s, and still at
Tours: written in gold letters. (M̅, in W.-W.)
pe. A very old purple manuscript of the sixth century at Perugia,
containing Luke i. 1-xii. 7. (P in W.-W.)
prag. The fragments cited under _for._ (see above).
reg. Regius, of the seventh or eighth century, a purple manuscript
inscribed in gold, containing Matthew and Mark, with lacunæ: at Paris
11955: not cited in W.-W.
rus. The so-called Rushworth Gospels, written by an Irish scribe who
died in the year 820: has an interlinear Anglo-Saxon version. (R in
W.-W.)
san. At St. Gall, a fragment containing Matthew vi. 21-John xvii. 18,
written by a scribe who says that he used two Latin and one Greek
manuscripts. In the Epistles san. is a palimpsest at St. Gall containing
Ephes. vi. 2 to 1 Tim. ii. 5, the Biblical text being the uppermost.
taur. Of the seventh century, at Turin, contains the Gospels beginning
at Matthew xiii. 34: not cited in W.-W.
tol. Written in the eighth century: this manuscript, which was written
by a Visigoth, was given by Servandus of Seville to John, Bishop of
Cordova, who presented it to the See of Seville in 988: it was
afterwards at Toledo, and is now at Madrid. It was collated for the
Sixtine Recension by Palomares, but reached Rome too late to be of use.
(T in W.-W.)
In addition to the eleven manuscripts mentioned above as cited by
Wordsworth and White, twenty-one others are regularly used by them, and
a great number are cited occasionally. For these reference must be made
to their edition, and for further particulars to Berger’s incomparable
work.
On the Latin Versions compare _TiGr._, 948-1108, 1313, and
especially Scrivener. The chapter on _The Latin Versions_ in the
Fourth Edition of the latter work (c. iii.) was re-written by H. J.
White, the collaborateur of Wordsworth. See also _Urt._, 85-118,
which deals with the Old Testament as well, and the article on the
_Old Latin Versions_ in Hastings’ _Dictionary of the Bible_, iii.
47-62.
1. G. Riegler, _Kritische Geschichte der Vulgata_, Sulzbach, 1820;
Lean. van Ess, _Pragmatisch-kritische Geschichte der Vulgata im
Allgemeinen und zunächst in Beziehung auf das Trientische Decret_,
Tübingen, 1824; Kaulen, _Geschichte der Vulgata_, Mainz, 1868;
Berger, _Histoire de la Vulgate pendant les premiers siècles du
moyen âge_, Paris, 1893 (List of the chief works dealing with the
history of the Vulgate given on p. xxii. ff.).
2. On the subject of the Itala see Ziegler, _Die Lateinischen
Bibelübersetzungen vor Hieronymus und die Itala des Augustinus_,
Munich, 1879; Zycha, _Bemerkungen zur Italafrage_, in the _Eranos
Vindobonensis_, 1893, 177-184; Burkitt, _The Old Latin and the
Itala_ (_Texts and Studies_, vol. iv., No. 3, 1896).
3. On the language see Rönsch (d. 1888), _Itala und Vulgata_, 2nd
Edition, 1875; also _Die ältesten lateinischen-Bibelübersetzungen
nach ihrem Werthe für die lateinische Sprachwissenschaft_, by the
same writer in the _Collectanea Philologa_, Bremen, 1891, 1-20;
Kaulen, _Handbuch zur Vulgata, Eine systematische Darstellung ihres
Sprachcharakters_, Mainz, 1870. Saalfeld, _De Bibliorum S. Vulgatæ
Editionis Graecitate_, Quedlinburg, 1891.
4. Editions of the Text:—Among the earlier works the most important
is that of Sabatier, which is not yet superseded, in the Old
Testament at least, _Bibliorum sacrorum Latinæ Versiones antiquæ,
seu Vetus Italica, et cæteræ quæcunque in codicibus MSS. et
antiquorum libris reperiri potuerunt, etc., opera et studio D. Petri
Sabatier_, 3 vols. folio,[105] Rheims, 1743. Jos. Bianchini
(Blanchinus), _Evangeliarium Quadruplex_, 2 vols. folio, Rome, 1749
(copies now cost about £4). After a long interval work in this field
has been resumed in the _Old Latin Biblical Texts_, published at the
Clarendon Press, Oxford, of which four parts have appeared:—1. _The
Gospel according to St. Matthew from the St. Germain MS._ (g_{1}),
_now numbered Lat. 11553 in the National Library at Paris, with
Introduction and five Appendices, edited by John Wordsworth, D.D._,
1883 (6/-). 2. _Portions of the Gospels according to St. Mark and
St. Matthew from the Bobbio MS._ (k), _now numbered G. VII. 15 in
the National Library at Turin, together with other fragments of the
Gospels from six MSS. in the Libraries of St. Gall, Coire, Milan,
and Berne (usually cited as n, o, p, a_{2}, s, and t). Edited, with
the aids of Tischendorf’s Transcripts and the printed Texts of
Ranke, Ceriani, and Hagen, with two facsimiles, by J. Wordsworth,
D.D., ... W. Sanday, D.D., ... and H. J. White, M.A._, 1886 (21/-).
3. _The Four Gospels, from the Munich MS._ (q), _now numbered Lat.
6224 in the Royal Library at Munich, with a Fragment from St. John
in the Hof-Bibliothek at Vienna (Cod. Lat. 502). Edited, with the
aid of Tischendorf’s Transcript (under the direction of the Bishop
of Salisbury), by H. J. White,_ _M.A._, 1888 (12/6). 4. _Portions of
the Acts of the Apostles, of the Epistle of St. James, and of the
First Epistle of St. Peter from the Bobbio Palimpsest_ (s), _now
numbered Cod. 16 in the Imperial Library at Vienna. Edited, with the
aid of Tischendorf’s and Belsheim’s printed Texts, by H. J. White,
M.A., with a Facsimile_, 1897 (5/-). (See notice in the _Expository
Times_, April 1898, p. 320 ff.)
5. Wordsworth and White’s edition of the Vulgate is noticed by
Berger in the _Bull. Crit._, 1899, viii. 141-144. It may be added
here, as that critic observes, that insufficient regard is paid to
the later history of the Latin text in this edition. At least one
representative of a recension so important as that of the University
of Paris in the thirteenth century might have been collated, and
perhaps also the first printed edition, “the forty-two line” Bible.
On the authorised edition of 1590 and 1592, see Eb. Nestle, _Ein
Jubiläum der lateinischen Bibel. Zum 9 November 1892_, in
_Marginalien und Materialien_, 1893; also printed separately.
An exact reprint of the Latin Vulgate has recently been published by
M. Hetzenauer from his Greek-Latin New Testament (see above, p. 25),
entitled _Novum Testamentum Vulgatae Editionis. Ex Vaticanis
Editionibus earumque Correctorio critice edidit Michael Hetzenauer._
Oeniponte, 1899. As an introduction to this edition reference may be
made to the same writer’s _Wesen und Principien der Bibelkritik auf
katholischer Grundlage. Unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der
offziellen Vulgataausgabe dargelegt._ Innsbruck, 1900.
(_c._) EGYPTIAN VERSIONS.
Next in importance to the Syriac versions from the East and the Latin
from the West are the =Egyptian= versions from the South. Here too we
find not one early version but several.
[Sidenote: Dialects.]
What used till lately to be called Coptic[106] is merely one of the
dialects into which the language of ancient Egypt was divided. And here
we must distinguish three main branches—the Bohairic, the Sahidic, and
the Middle Egyptian.
[Sidenote: Bohairic.]
(1) =Bohairic=[107] is the name given to the dialect that was spoken in
the Bohaira—_i.e._ the district by the sea and therefore Lower Egypt,
the neighbourhood of Alexandria. It was the principal dialect, and being
that used for ecclesiastical purposes over the whole country, and,
moreover, that with which European scholars first became acquainted, the
versions written in it were described as the Coptic simply. The term
Memphitic, which was preferred for a time, is incorrect, because it was
not till the eleventh century that the Patriarchate was transferred to
Cairo—_i.e._ the district of Memphis, and in early times a different
dialect was spoken there.
[Sidenote: Sahidic.]
(2) =Sahidic= is the name used to describe the dialect of Upper Egypt.
It is sometimes and not improperly spoken of as the Thebaic in
distinction to the Memphitic.
[Sidenote: Middle Egyptian.]
(3) Under the =Middle Egyptian=[108] we have to distinguish—
(_a_) The _Fayumic_, spoken in the Fayum—_i.e._ the district to the S.W.
of the Delta, watered by the Joseph Canal, and separated from the valley
of the Nile by a narrow strip of the desert. It was in this district
that those recent papyrus discoveries were made which have enriched the
libraries and museums of Europe.
(_b_) The _Middle Egyptian proper_, or Lower Sahidic, a dialect which
has its home on the site of ancient Memphis.
(_c_) The dialect of _Achmim_, which preserves a more primitive form of
early Egyptian than any of those already referred to.
In the eleventh century the Coptic Bishop Athanasius specifies three
dialects of the Coptic language—the Bohairic, the Sahidic, and a third
which he says was already extinct, and to which he gives the name of
Bashmuric; but whether this last is to be identified with the dialects
included above under the name of Middle Egyptian, is not quite certain.
(1.) _The Bohairic Version._
[Sidenote: Bohairic.]
This version, formerly designated as the Coptic, was first used for the
New Testament by Bishop Fell of Oxford, who was indebted for his
knowledge of it to Marshall. It was afterwards employed by Mill for his
edition of 1707. It was first published in 1716 by Wilkins (or rather
Wilke), a Prussian who had settled in England, with the title, “Novum
Testamentum Aegyptium vulgo Copticum.” His edition was accompanied with
a Latin translation. In 1734 Bengel obtained a few particulars regarding
this version from La Croze, the Berlin Librarian. An edition of the
Gospels by Moritz Schwartze appeared in 1846-47, and after his death the
Acts and Epistles were published (1852) by Paul Boetticher, afterwards
distinguished under his adopted name of de Lagarde. About the same time
Tattam prepared a wholly uncritical edition of the entire New Testament,
including the Apocalypse which did not originally form part of this
version.[109] Steindorff is of opinion that the Bohairic version
originated in the Natron Valley during the fourth or fifth century, but
others affirm that it is older, or at all events rests on an older
foundation. The order of the New Testament books was originally: (1) the
Gospels, in which John stood first, followed by Matthew, Mark, Luke, (2)
the Pauline Epistles, with Hebrews between 2 Thess. and 1 Tim., (3) the
seven Catholic Epistles, and (4) the Acts. More than fifty Bohairic
manuscripts are preserved in the libraries of Europe, and from these an
edition has been prepared for the Clarendon Press in two volumes, with
exhaustive Introduction by G. Horner (1898).
The Greek text on which this version is based is regarded by present
critics as particularly pure, and free from so-called Western additions.
(2.) _The Sahidic Version._
[Sidenote: Sahidic.]
It was a long time before this version attracted any attention. In his
New Testament, Wilkins mentioned two manuscripts, “lingua plane a
reliquis MSS. Copticis diversa,” and Woide in 1778 announced his
intention of editing certain fragments of the New Testament “iuxta
interpretationem superioris Aegypti quae Thebaidica vocatur,” which were
afterwards published by Ford in 1799. At the close of last century and
the beginning of this, various other fragments were issued by Tuki,
Mingarelli, Münter, Zoega, and Engelbreth, but it was not till more
recent times that really important parts of the Old and New Testaments
were published by Amélineau, Ciasca (in two vols.), Bouriant, Maspero,
Ceugney, and Krall. In 1895 Goussen gave us a large part of the
Apocalypse.[110] This version, like the former, contained the entire New
Testament, with the exception of the Apocalypse, and originally
exhibited the Gospels in the same order—John, Matthew, Mark, Luke.
Hebrews, however, stood between 2 Corinthians and Galatians. Its Greek
original was quite different from that of the Bohairic version. (See
Plate VIII.)
(3.) _The Middle Egyptian Versions._
[Sidenote: Middle Egyptian.]
Of these only fragments are as yet known to exist. Portions of Matthew
and John, and of 1 Cor., Ephes., Phil., Thess., and Hebrews in the
Fayumic, or, as it used to be called, the Bashmuric dialect, were first
published by Zoega in 1809, by Engelbreth in 1811, and especially by
Bouriant (1889) and Crum (1893).
Fragments in the Lower Sahidic have been published in the _Mitteilungen
aus der Sammlung der Papyrus des Erzherzogs Rainer_.
In the Achmim dialect, James iv. 12, 13 and Jude 17-20 are the only
fragments that have been discovered as yet, and these have been
published by Crum. Whether these fragments are really parts of a
separate version, or merely dialectical modifications of the Sahidic, is
not quite certain.[111]
As to the =date= of these versions we have no definite information. It
has been understood from certain passages in the Life of St. Anthony,
who was born about the year 250, that in his boyhood he heard the Gospel
read in Church in the language of Egypt, but that need not imply the
existence of a written version, as the translation may have been made by
a reader who interpreted as he read. In the third century, however,
versions may have arisen, and it was certainly in the South that the
first attempts at translation were made. Our oldest known manuscripts, a
Sahidic containing 2 Thess. iii., and one in Middle Egyptian of Jude
17-20, date from the fourth or fifth century. The Sahidic version seems
to have been made first, then the Middle Egyptian, and finally the
Bohairic. To what extent the one influenced the other is a question
requiring further investigation.
A correct edition and a critical application of these Egyptian versions
is, next to a fresh examination of the minuscules, the task of most
importance at present for the textual criticism of the New Testament.
For the Sahidic version in particular represents a type of text found
hitherto almost exclusively in the West, and looked upon as the outcome
of Western corruption and licence, whereas it may really bear the most
resemblance to the original form. In the Acts especially its agreement
with the text of Codex D is remarkable. One might instance, _e.g._, the
mention of Pentecost in Acts i. 5, the insertion of the Golden Rule in
its negative form in xv. 20, 29, the relation of the vision in xvi. 10,
and the description of the stone which twenty men could not roll away in
Luke xxiii. 53, all of which are now found in a Greek-Sahidic
manuscript. The Sahidic version, like the Bohairic, is well represented
in European libraries, and the manuscripts are dated as a rule in the
Egyptian fashion according to the years of the Martyrs—_i.e._ according
to an era reckoned from August or September 284 A.D.
_TiGr._, 859-893. Scrivener^4, ii. 91-144, revised by Horner, with
additions by Headlam. H. Hyvernat, _Étude sur les Versions Coptes de
la Bible_ (_Revue Biblique_, v. (1896) 427-433, 540-569; vi. 1
(1897) 48-74.) _Urt._, 144-147. Forbes Robinson, _Egyptian
Versions_, in Hastings’ _Dictionary of the Bible_, vol. i. (1898)
668-673. W. E. Crum, _Coptic Studies_ from the _Egypt Exploration
Fund’s Report_ for 1897-1898, 15 pp. 4to. For the Gospels, Horner’s
edition eclipses all others. It is entitled, _The Coptic Version of
the New Testament in the Northern dialect, otherwise called
Memphitic or Bohairic, with Introduction, Critical Apparatus, and
literal English Translation. Vol. I. Introduction, Matthew and
Mark_, cxlviii. 484. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1898; _Vol. II. Luke
and John_, 548 pp., 1898. See notice by Hyvernat in the _Revue
Biblique_, 1899, pp. 148-150, and also W. E. Crum, _lib. cit._,
where reference is also made to the _Manuscrits Coptes au Musée ...
à Leide_, 1897. As Horner’s edition as yet only covers the Gospels,
the remaining portions of the New Testament must still be sought in
the two parts published by Lagarde after Schwartze’s death, _Acta
Apostolorum coptice_ (1852), and _Epistulae Novi Testamenti coptice_
(1852). On Brugsch’s _Recension_ in the _Zeitschrift der deutschen
morgenländischen Gesellschaft_, vii. (1853) pp. 115-121, see
_ibid._, p. 456, and Lagarde, _Aus dem deutschen Gelehrtenleben_,
pp. 25-65, 73-77. Tattam’s Bohairic-Arabic edition was published by
the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge.
The first fragments of the New Testament in Sahidic appeared in
Tuki’s _Rudimenta_ in 1778, and Woide’s editio princeps, announced
in the same year, was brought out after his death by Ford in 1799.
Amélineau’s _Fragments Thébaines inédits du Nouveau Testament_ were
published in vols. xxiv.-xxvi. of the _Zeitschrift für ägyptische
Sprache_ (1886-1888). Considerable portions of the Apocalypse were
issued in facsimile by Goussen in the first Fasciculus of his
_Studia Theologica_ (Lipsiae, 1897). Apocryphal and
Pseudepigraphical writings have also been discovered in recent
times, as, for example, the _Acta Pauli_ in a manuscript of the
seventh century, written in Sahidic consonants with Middle Egyptian
vocalisation. These are to be published by A. Schmidt. See
_Addenda_, p. xv.
See also Amélineau, _Notice des manuscrits coptes de la Bibliothèque
Nationale renfermant des textes bilingues du Nouveau Testament_, in
the _Athenæum_, No. 3601, p. 599.
The foregoing versions are those of most importance in the criticism of
the text. There are, however, one or two others which, though inferior
in value, are still interesting. Among these is—
(_d._) THE GOTHIC VERSION.
[Sidenote: Gothic.]
This is the work of =Ulfilas=—_i.e._ Wölflin—a Cappadocian by descent,
who in the year 340 succeeded Theophilus, the first Bishop of the
Goths.[112] While the tribe was still settled in the Crimea, he is said
to have invented an alphabet, and translated both the Old and the New
Testament for their use. In the Old Testament Ulfilas followed the
Septuagint according to the Recension of Lucian of Antioch (d. 312),
which circulated in the diocese of Constantinople. In the New Testament
the text is likewise essentially that of Chrysostom. The traces of Latin
influence which were supposed to be discernible in the version, and
which may either have existed from the first or been introduced at a
later time, relate at most, perhaps, to matters of orthography.
(1) The Gothic version first became known through the so-called Codex
Argenteus which Ant. Morillon, Granvella’s secretary, and Mercator the
geographer saw in the Monastery of Werden in the sixteenth century. It
was afterwards seen at Prague by Richard Strein (d. 1601). In 1648 it
was brought to Sweden as a prize of war, and presented to Queen
Christina, or her librarian, Isaac Voss. It was purchased by Marshall de
la Gardie in 1662, bound in silver, and deposited in the library at
Upsala, where it has since remained. Ten leaves were stolen from the
manuscript between 1821 and 1834, but restored, after many years, by the
thief upon his deathbed. This magnificent Codex was written in the fifth
or sixth century on purple with gold and silver lettering. It now
comprises 187 leaves out of 330, and contains fragments of the four
Gospels in the order, Matthew, John, Luke, Mark. It was published for
the first time in 1665, from a transcript made by Derrer ten years
before.
(2) Codex Carolinus, the Wolfenbüttel palimpsest already referred to as
Q of the Gospels (see p. 69 above) and the Old Latin gue of Paul (see p.
118), contains some forty verses of the Epistle to the Romans. It was
first published in 1762.
(3) Fragments of seven palimpsests in the Ambrosian Library at Milan,
discovered by Cardinal Mai in 1817. Like Codex Carolinus, they are in
all probability from the Monastery of Bobbio. They exhibit part of the
Pauline Epistles and fragments of the Gospels. A few quotations from
Hebrews are also found in a theological work. No portion of Acts,
(Hebrews), Catholic Epistles, or Apocalypse has as yet been discovered.
Editions of the Gothic version have been published by Gabelentz and Löbe
(1836-1843), Stamm (1858), Heyne ^5(1872) ^9(1896), Bernhardt (Halle,
1875, 1884), and Balg (Milwaukee, 1891). St. Mark was edited by Müller
and Höppe in 1881, and by Skeat in 1882.
LITERATURE.—On Ulfilas, see Scott, _Ulfilas, the Apostle of the
Goths_, Cambr., 1885. Bradley, _The Goths_, in the “Story of the
Nations” Series, 1888. Gwatkin, _Studies of Arianism_, 1882. _Urt._,
pp. 119-120, where see literature, to which add Eckstein, _Ulfilas
und die gothische Uebersetzung der Bibel_, in Westermann’s _Illustr.
Monatshefte_, Dec. 1892, 403-407; Jostes, _Das Todesjahr des Ulfilas
und der Uebertritt der Gothen zum Arianismus_ (_Beiträge zur
Geschichte der deutschen Sprache_, xxii. i. 158 ff.). Jostes gives
383 as the date of Ulfilas’s death. On the other side, see
Kauffmann, _Der Arianismus des Wulfila_ in the _ZfdPhil._, xxx.
(1897) 93-113; Luft, _Die arianischen Quellen über Wulfila_ in the
_ZfdAltert._, xlii. 4; Vogt, _Zu Wulfilas Bekenntnis und dem Opus
imperfectum_, _ibid._ Kauffmann, _Beiträge zur Quellenkritik der
gotischen Bibelübersetzung_ in the _ZfdPhil._; (ii.) _das N. T._
(xxx., 1897, 145-183); (iii.) _das gotische Matthäusevangelium und
die Itala_; (iv.) _die griechische Vorlage des gotischen
Johannesevangeliums_ (xxxi., 1898, 177-198): also by the same
author, _Aus der Schule des Wulfila. Auxentii Dorostorensis epistula
de Fide, Vita, et Obitu Wulfila im Zusammenhang der Dissertatio
Maximini contra Ambrosium herausgegeben._ Strassburg, 1899. P.
Batiffol, _De quelques homilies de St. Chrysostome et de la version
gothique des écritures_ (_Revue Biblique_, Oct. 1899, pp. 566-572),
see also _ThLz._, 1900, No. i.; _LCbl._, 1900, No. 28. On the
relation of the Gothic version to the codex Brixianus (f), see
Burkitt in the _Journal of Theological Studies_, i. p. 131 ff., and
compare _Addenda_, p. xv.
On the Gothic language and writing, see Douse, _Introduction to the
Gothic of Ulfilas_. London, 1886; the grammars of Braune and Skeat,
and the dictionaries of Schulze, Heyne, and Bernhardt; see also
Luft, _Studien zu den ältesten germanischen Alfabeten_, Gütersloh,
1898, viii. 115, who traces eighteen characters to the Greek
alphabet and nine to the Latin and Ulfilas’s own invention. On R.
Löwe’s _Reste der Germanen am schwarzen Meer_ (Halle, 1896), see the
story told by Melanchthon according to Pirkheimer (_Th. St. und
Kr._, 1897, 784 ff.).
To what extent the remaining ancient versions were taken directly from
the Greek or influenced by one or other of those already described is
still subject of dispute.
(_e._) THE ETHIOPIC VERSION.
According to the tradition of the Abyssinian Church, the Ethiopic
version of the New Testament was made from the Greek previous to the
fifth century. Dillmann accepts this as correct, but Gildemeister would
assign it to the sixth or seventh century, and thinks that traces are
discernible of Syrian Monophysitism. Guidi decides for the end of the
fifth or beginning of the sixth century. In addition to the usual
twenty-seven books, the Ethiopic New Testament has an Appendix
consisting of a work on Canon Law in eight books called the Synodos, so
that the Ethiopian Church reckons in all thirty-five books in the New
Testament. In later times the version was undoubtedly corrected from
Arabic and Coptic texts. The first edition appeared in Rome in
1548-1549, but neither it nor those issued since are of any real
critical worth.
At least a hundred Ethiopic manuscripts, mostly of late origin, exist in
the libraries of Europe. What is perhaps the oldest is preserved in
Paris. It dates from the thirteenth century, and exhibits the Gospels in
an unrevised text.
LITERATURE.—See _TiGr._, 894-912. Scrivener, ii. 154 ff. re-written
by Margoliouth. _Urt._, 147-150 (F. Praetorius). R. H. Charles,
_Ethiopic Version_ in Hastings’ _Dictionary of the Bible_, i.
791-793. C. Conti Rossini, _Sulla Versione e sulla Revisione delle
Sacre Scritture in Etiopico_, in the _Z. für Assyriologie_, x. 2, 3
(1895). The view of Lagarde (_Ankündigung_, 1882, p. 28; _cf._ also
_Gesammelte Abhandlungen_, lxi. 113), that this version may have
been made from the Arabic or Egyptian in the fourteenth century, is
now generally rejected.
(_f._) THE ARMENIAN VERSION.
La Croze, the Berlin Librarian, thought this the “Queen of the
Versions.”
Till the fifth century of the Christian era Syrian influence was supreme
in Armenia, and the inhabitants of that region first received the
Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments in the form of a translation
from the Syriac. But in the year 433 two pupils of Mesrob, returning
from the Synod of Ephesus, are said to have brought back with them from
Constantinople a Greek Bible, and having learned Greek in Alexandria, to
have translated it into Armenian. According to another account this was
done by St. Sahak (390-428) about the year 406. The first edition of the
Armenian New Testament was brought out in Amsterdam in the year
1666[113] by Osgan of Eriwan, who had been sent to Europe four years
previously by the Armenian Synod. It was edited from a defective
manuscript, the missing portions of which Osgan supplied from the
Vulgate. A better edition was published in 1789 by Zohrab, who used
twenty manuscripts, and especially a Cilician Codex of the year 1310. He
was of opinion that the Armenians did not receive the Apocalypse before
the eighth century. Zohrab’s text was collated for Tregelles by Rieu,
whom Tischendorf seems to have drawn upon in his editions.
The Armenian manuscripts display variations of several sorts. In some
John’s Gospel precedes the Synoptists, in others it is followed by the
Apocryphal “Rest of St. John.” The Apocalypse was not read in church
prior to the twelfth century. In the oldest manuscript of the entire New
Testament, at Venice, which dates from the year 1220, the order of the
other books is Acts, Catholic Epistles, Apocalypse, Pauline Epistles,
with the Epistle of the Corinthians to Paul. In Moscow there is a
manuscript of the year 887, in Venice one dated 902, in Etschmiadzin one
written in the year 986 and bound in ivory covers of the third or fourth
century. In the last-mentioned Codex the words, “of Ariston the
Presbyter,” are found after Mark xvi. 8, as the heading of what follows.
(_See Plate IX._) We learn from this, what is evidently correct, viz.,
that the present conclusion of Mark’s Gospel is due to a certain
Ariston, who may perhaps be identified with Aristion, the teacher of
Papias in the second century. The earlier Armenian version also
contained the two verses Luke xxii. 43, 44, which were omitted in the
later.
LITERATURE.—_TiGr._, 912-922. Scrivener, ii. 148-154. F. C.
Conybeare, _Armenian Versions of N. T._, in Hastings’ _Bible
Dictionary_, i. 153 f. See also J. A. Robinson, _Euthaliana_, c. v.;
_The Armenian Version and its supposed relation to Euthalius_, in
_Texts and Studies_, vol. iii. (1895). On Aristion see _Expositor_,
1894, p. 241, and below, p. 295.
(_g._) THE GEORGIAN VERSION.
This version, called also the Grusinian or Iberian, is thought to have
been made from the Greek in the sixth century, though it may also be
derived from the Armenian. It contains the pericope adulteræ (John vii.
53-viii. 11), but places it immediately after ch. vii. 44, which is the
more remarkable, seeing that in the Old Latin Codex b, the passage from
vii. 44 onwards has been erased. The Georgian version was first printed
at Moscow in 1743.
Scrivener, ii. 156-158; re-written by F. C. Conybeare. _TiGr._, 922
f.
(_h._) THE ARABIC VERSIONS.
Some of these were made directly from the Greek, others from the Syriac
and the Coptic, while there are also manuscripts exhibiting a recension
undertaken at Alexandria in the thirteenth century, The New Testament
was even cast into that form of rhymed prose made classic by the Koran.
As early as the eighth century we find Mohammedan scholars quoting
various passages of the New Testament, particularly the sayings
regarding the Paraclete in John xv. 26, 27, xvi. 13, which they
understood of Mohammed. He himself, however, knew the Gospel narrative
from oral tradition only. The oldest known manuscript is perhaps one at
Sinai, written in the ninth century, from which Mrs. Gibson edited the
text of Romans, 1 and 2 Cor., Gal., and Ephes. i. 1-ii. 9, in the
_Studia Sinaitica_, ii. The four Gospels were published in 1864 by
Lagarde from a Vienna manuscript, in which a number of various readings
were cited from the Coptic, Syriac, and Latin, this last, _e.g._, being
adduced in support of a reading hitherto found only in D, one Old Latin
(g), and the Lewis-Syriac: οὔκ εἰσιν δύο ἢ τρεῖς συνηγμένοι ... παρ’ οἷς
οὔκ εἰμι ἐν μέσῳ αὐτῶν (Matthew xviii. 20). The first edition of the
Gospels appeared at Rome in 1591. [Sidenote: Other versions.] In common
with the remaining versions of the New Testament, _Persic_, _Old High
German_, _Anglo-Saxon_, _Bohemian_, and _Slavonic_, these secondary
Arabic versions are not only exceedingly interesting from the point of
view of the history of language and culture, but they are also valuable
here and there for the restoration of the original text. In the present
work, however, we cannot enter more fully into them.
LITERATURE.—_TiGr._, 928-947. Scrivener, ii. 161-164. _Urt._,
150-155. F. C. Burkitt, _Arabic Versions_, in Hastings’ _Dictionary
of the Bible_, i. 136-138, where see literature. Burkitt thinks that
the oldest monument of Arabic Christianity is the manuscript
formerly belonging to the Convent of Mar Saba, now known as Cod.
Vat. Arab. 13, and numbered 101 in _TiGr._, which is generally
assigned to the eighth century. It originally contained the Psalter,
Gospels, Acts, and Epistles, and is derived from the Syriac.
Fragments of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and of the Pauline Epistles,
are all that now remain. From the same convent come two manuscripts
of the ninth century, containing a version made directly from the
Greek, and perhaps ultimately derived from the Greek-Arabic
manuscript cited as Θ^h, of which only four leaves have been
preserved (see above, p. 72). On a Græco-Arabic MS. connected with
the Ferrar Group (211^{ev}), see Lake in the _Journal of Theological
Studies_, i. 117 ff. Most of the Coptic manuscripts are accompanied
by an Arabic version. The one contained in Cod. Vat. Copt. 9 of the
year 1202 is the best, and forms the basis of our printed editions.
The first revision was undertaken in the year 1250, at Alexandria,
by Hibat Allâh ibn el-Assâl, and a second towards the end of the
thirteenth century, from which the variants in Lagarde’s edition are
derived. An Arabic version of the Acts and all seven Catholic
Epistles, found in a ninth century manuscript at Sinai, and numbered
154 in Mrs. Gibson’s Catalogue, is published by her in _Studia
Sinaitica_, vii. (1899).
For the remaining versions of the N. T., see Scrivener, ii. pp.
158-166 (Slavonic, Anglo-Saxon, Frankish, Persic). These minor
versions will be treated in vol. iv. of Hastings’ _Bible
Dictionary_, under the general heading of Versions. See also _Urtext
und Uebersetzungen der Bibel_.
3. QUOTATIONS.
Our third source of material for the restoration of the text of the New
Testament is =Quotations= found in other books. These are of great
value, because they represent, for the most part, definite manuscripts
existing in certain places at the time of the writer quoting them, and
also because a large number of them belong to a time from which no
codices have come down to us. The value of their testimony depends, of
course, on the conditions already mentioned (p. 32)—viz., that the
author quoted accurately, and the copyist copied faithfully, and the
editor edited correctly. Quotations made by _Jewish_ writers as well as
by Christian will fall to be considered, only it is doubtful if in their
case we have more than one or two uncertain allusions to Matthew v. 17.
So, too, will the quotations made by _pagan opponents_ of Christianity,
particularly those of _Celsus_ in the second century, and of the Emperor
Julian. But here again we are not in possession of their complete works,
which can only be restored by a similar process and with more or less
uncertainty from the quotations from them found in the writings of the
Apologists.[114] The books of those Christian Churches which were
isolated from the main church will also be valuable. Even a verse of
Scripture carved upon a stone in an old ruin may have something to tell
us.
Brief quotations were usually made from memory. It was not so convenient
to turn up the passage in an old manuscript as it is now in our handy
printed editions.[115] In the case of longer passages and verbal
quotations generally, indolent copyists were sometimes content with
simply adding καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς. In the _Apostolic Constitutions_, ii. 22, for
example, where the entire prayer of Manasses was meant to be given, the
copyist of a certain manuscript,[116] after writing the opening words
from Κύριε down to δικαίου, omitted all the rest, amounting to
thirty-one lines of print, substituting simply καὶ τὰ ἑξῆς τῆς εὐχῆς ἃ
ὑμεῖς οὐκ ἀγνοεῖτε. (See further, _Apost. Const._, i. 7, Lagarde, p. 8,
23; ii. 14, p. 28, 7. 11; 29, 2). This, however, is not without its
parallel in modern times. As late as 1872, an Oxford editor, in bringing
out Cyril of Alexandria’s Commentary on the Gospel according to St.
John, wrote down only the initial and final words of the quotations in
his manuscript, and allowed the compositor to set up the rest from a
printed edition of the Textus Receptus. Another editor in Vienna, in
preparing an edition of Cyprian’s Works, preferred those very
manuscripts in which the Scriptural quotations had been accommodated to
the current text of later times. Only when a quotation is given by an
author several times in exactly the same form is it safe to depend on
the actual wording, or when in a Commentary, _e.g._, the context agrees
with the quoted text. Collections of Scriptural passages like the
_Testimonia_ of Cyprian and the so-called _Speculum_ of Augustine are
also taken directly from manuscripts of the Bible.
Francis Lucas of Brügge was the first to explore the writings of the
Church Fathers for the express purposes of textual criticism. They are
referred to in four notes found in the Complutensian Polyglot. In his
edition of 1516, Erasmus cites a whole series of Patristic
witnesses—Ambrosius, Athanasius, Augustine, Cyprian, Gregory of
Nazianzen, Origen, and Theodoret. Since that time all judicious critics
have paid attention to them. Valuable service has been rendered for
Tertullian by Rönsch, and for Origen by Griesbach. For Augustine,
Lagarde is specially to be mentioned. Most of the Fathers were thus
cared for by Burgon, who indexed the New Testament quotations in sixteen
large volumes, which were deposited in the British Museum after his
death. The only pity is that the works of those very Fathers that are of
most importance are not yet satisfactorily edited. All the more welcome,
therefore, is the appearance of the Vienna Academy’s _Corpus Scriptorum
Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum_, of which forty volumes have been issued
since 1867, and of the Berlin Academy’s edition of the Ante-Nicene Greek
Fathers, of which one volume of Hippolytus and two of Origen have made
their appearance.[117]
The earliest Fathers are valuable chiefly for the history of the
_Canon_. That is to say, their evidence must be taken simply as showing
what New Testament writings they were acquainted with, and here the
_argumentum ex silentio_ is to be applied with caution. This is the case
with _Barnabas_ and _Clement_[118] in the first century, and _Ignatius_
and _Hermas_ in the first half of the second. Even with the much more
extensive writings of _Justin_, there is still considerable
dispute—_e.g._, as to what Gospels he made use of.[119] _Irenæus_ of
Lyons is valuable on account of his extreme carefulness, and would be
particularly so if it could be proved that he brought his New Testament
with him from Smyrna[120] and if his writings were extant in Greek, and
not, as is the case with most of them, in Latin only. In Egypt _Clement
of Alexandria_ holds a prominent place, but by far the most
distinguished of all is the great Biblical scholar of antiquity,
_Origen_ (d. 248). Already we find these writers appealing to
manuscripts, and distinguishing them by such epithets as “good,” “old,”
“emended,” “most,” or “few.” In the case of the Ante-Nicene Fathers
their locality is an important consideration, whether Antioch, Cæsarea
(_Eusebius_), Egypt, Constantinople (_Chrysostom_), or Cappadocia
(_Theodore_), etc. Their expositions of Scripture are preserved in the
so-called =Catenæ=, or continuous commentaries, in which the
interpretations of different Fathers are arranged continuously like the
links of a chain. It not unfrequently happens in these Catenæ that the
words of one writer are cited under the name of another. The evidence
afforded by the writings of the Heretics is no less valuable, if we
except those passages, which are not numerous, in which they are
understood to have altered the text of the Scriptures. The works of
_Marcion_ have been preserved for the most part in Latin by
_Tertullian_. They have recently been collected and restored by Zahn.
The Latin translator of Irenæus also belongs, in all probability, to the
time of Tertullian, and not to the fourth century. This unknown
translator seems to have preserved the Scriptural quotations of Irenæus
with greater fidelity than the later Church Fathers who cite them in the
Greek. Of Latin writers contemporary with or subsequent to Tertullian,
those of most importance for the text of the Old Latin Bible are
_Cyprian_, _Hilary of Poictiers_, _Ambrose of Milan_, _Augustine_ and
his opponent _Pelagius_, and for the Apocalypse, _Tyconius_ and
_Primasius_. From the works of Augustine Lagarde collected no fewer than
29540 quotations from the New Testament in addition to 13276 from the
Old.
Valuable testimony is also afforded by Syrian and Armenian writers. It
is only with their assistance, _e.g._, that it has been possible to
restore one of our oldest authorities—the Diatessaron of Tatian—which
dates from the second century.
(1) Further examples might be adduced of the unreliable nature of
manuscripts and printed editions.
We find, _e.g._, in the voluminous commentary of the so-called
Ambrosiaster,[121] the following note on the quotation in 1 Cor. ii.
9:—“Eye hath not seen, etc.”—“hoc est scriptum in Apocalypsi Heliae
in apocryphis.” In place of the last five words, two manuscripts and
all the printed editions previous to that of St. Maur—_i.e._ prior
to the year 1690—have “in Esaia propheta aliis verbis.”
Compare also what Zahn says in his _Einleitung_, ii. 314. “A
comparison of the quotations in Matthew with the LXX. is rendered
more difficult by the fact that in manuscripts of the latter written
by Christians, and especially in Cod. Alexandrinus, the text of the
O. T. has been accommodated to the form in which it is cited in the
N. T. _Cf._, also, p. 563 on the quotation from Zechariah xii. 10,
found in John xix. 37.” The same writer says (p. 465): “In the
Chronicle of Georgios Hamartolos (circa 860), all the manuscripts
save one assert the peaceful death of John (ἐν εἰρήνῃ ἀνεπαύσατο),
but this one says the very opposite, μαρτυρίου κατηξίωται, and goes
on to make certain other additions.” On the other hand, we must not
forget in this connection the testimony preserved by Eusebius to the
scrupulous care taken by Irenæus for the propagation of his writings
in the identical form in which he wrote them. According to that
historian, he wrote at the end of one of his works the following
note:—Ὁρκίζω σε τὸν μεταγραψόμενον τὸ βιβλίον τοῦτο κατὰ τοῦ Κυρίου
ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ καὶ κατὰ τῆς ἐνδόξου παρουσίας αὐτοῦ, ἧς ἔρχεται
κρῖναι ζῶντας καὶ νεκρούς, ἵνα ἀντιβάλλῃς ὃ μετεγράψω καὶ κατορθώσῃς
αὐτὸ πρὸς τὸ ἀντίγραφον τοῦτο ὅθεν μετεγράψω ἐπιμελῶς, καὶ τὸν ὅρκον
τοῦτον ὁμοίως μεταγράψῃς καὶ θήσεις ἐν τῷ ἀντιγράφῳ.[122]
(2) It was Lagarde who most clearly recognised and pointed out the
unsatisfactory way in which the Fathers had previously been edited.
How much care is necessary in the matter of the text is shown by the
discussions connected with the treatment of Scriptural quotations in
the new Vienna edition of Augustine (see _Urt._, 76, 94; Preuschen,
in the _ThLz._ for 1897, 24, col. 630). Even in the new Berlin
edition one cannot absolutely rely on the form of the Scriptural
quotations exhibited in the text, but must always verify it by means
of an independent examination of the apparatus. A few passages from
the first volume of Origen recently published will show this, and
prove at the same time how faulty the editions have been hitherto.
This first volume of Koetschau’s new edition of Origen opens with
the _Exhortation to Martyrdom_ (εἰς μαρτύριον προτρεπτικός), a work
which is to be assigned to the year 235. The text of previous
editions is grounded solely on a manuscript at Basel written in the
sixteenth century (No. 31, A. iii. 9), which is itself a copy, and a
not altogether correct copy, of a Parisian manuscript written in the
year 1339, not known to the first editors of Origen (P = suppl.
grec. 616). Moreover, the Basel manuscript was not transcribed with
sufficient accuracy, or the print was not superintended with
sufficient care by the scholar who prepared the first printed
edition of 1674. With the help of a fresh manuscript (M = Venetus
Marc. 45, of the fourteenth century) it is now established that the
writer of P arbitrarily altered the text in a great number of
passages, and, above all, abridged it mainly by the excision of
Scriptural quotations. Where Origen, _e.g._, in citing a passage
gives all three Synoptists, P quite calmly drops one of them. The
_Panegyric_ of Gregory Thaumaturgus is treated in the same way, this
manuscript omitting about 100 out of some 1200 lines of print. And
these were the texts to which till the present we were referred for
our Patristic quotations! To take an example:
On τοὺς ἐμοὺς λόγους, Luke ix. 26, Tischendorf, who in his seventh
edition gave τοὺς ἐμούς (= my followers) as the correct reading,
observed that this reading, without λόγους, was supported by Dael
Or., i. 298. But he added—and this is a proof of the carefulness
with which the quotation from Origen is employed here—sed præcedit
ουτε επαισχυντεον αυτον η τους λογους αυτου. But if we turn up this
passage in the new edition, we find that it now reads (i. 34, 9
ff.): ουτ’ επαισχυντεον αυτον η τους οικειους αυτου η τους λογους
αυτου, and then the three parallel passages are quoted in the order
frequently found in Origen—viz., Matthew x. 33 = Luke ix. 26 = Mark
viii. 38. Previous editions entirely omitted this last quotation, as
well as the words in the context, η τους οικειους αυτου. But now
everything is in order. The words ουτ’ επαισχυντεον αυτον refer to
οστις δ’ αν απαρνησηται με in Matt. x. 33; η τους οικειους αυτου to
ος γαρ αν επαισχυνθη με και τους εμους in Luke ix. 26; and η τους
λογους αυτου to ος γαρ αν επαισχυνθη με και τους εμους λογους, in
Mark viii. 38. So that whereas, on the ground of previous editions,
Tischendorf was obliged to point out a discrepancy between Origen’s
context and his peculiar quotation from Luke, the context of the new
edition serves to confirm this peculiar quotation, and shows at the
same time that we can accept it on the authority of this very
passage, as against a former passage (p. 296 = 31, 7), where the
verse in Luke is found in the newly-employed manuscript also with
the words τους εμους λογους. That the editor should have put λογους
in the first passage within brackets, or at least have pointed out
the discrepancy between it and the quotation further down, would
have been too much to expect, seeing that his manuscripts of Origen
gave no manner of ground for doing so; it is the duty of those who
investigate the Scriptural quotations in Origen to pay attention to
such things. But there are also passages where the editor has
actually gone in the face of his manuscripts, and wrongly altered
the text of his Scriptural quotations, having evidently allowed
himself to be influenced by the printed text of the N. T., and
paying too little respect to the manuscripts.
An attentive reader will have observed that the reading in Luke ix.
26, τους εμους = my followers, which is now established for Origen,
is at present supported by D alone of the Greek manuscripts and by
three Old Latin witnesses. (It is also found in the Curetonian
Syriac, but unfortunately the corresponding words in the
Sinai-Syriac could not be made out with certainty by Mrs. Lewis; see
_Some Pages_, p. 72 = p. 168 in the first edition). Now, look at the
passage in Origen’s work, i. 25, 26 ff. (p. 293 in De la Rue’s
edition): ο μεν γαρ Ματθαιος ανεγραφε λεγοντα τον κυριον ... ο δε
Λουκας ... ο δε Μαρκος· ἀββᾶ ὁ πατὴρ, δυνατά σοι πάντα· παρένεγκε
κ.τ.λ. The passage is printed thus by Koetschau, agreeing exactly
with the earlier printed editions and our texts of the N. T. in Mark
xiv. 36. But in this he is far wrong. Because, as his own apparatus
shows us, the Venetian manuscript, which he rightly follows
elsewhere, reads the words in the order δυνατὰ πάντα σοί, which is
exactly the order of the words (Mark xiv. 36) in D, but again in no
other Greek manuscript with the solitary exception of the cursive
473.[123] But there are even passages where Koetschau follows the
printed text of the N. T. in the scriptural quotations in despite of
both his manuscripts. In i. 29, 13 (i. 295 De la Rue), where Matt.
x. 17-23 is quoted, he inserts after πῶς ἢ τί λαλήσητε the clause
δοθήσεται γὰρ ὑμῖν ἐν ἐκείνῃ τῇ ὥρᾳ τί λαλήσητε from Matt. x. 19, on
the supposition that these words may have dropped out of the
archetype of M P on account of the homoioteleuton. But they are also
omitted in Cod. D of the N. T. And this, moreover, is not the only
point of agreement between this manuscript and the text given in
this quotation. There is, _e.g._, the omission of δέ in v. 17, the
reading παραδώσουσιν in v. 19, which Koetschau has altered to the
more grammatical παραδῶσιν, again without sufficient reason and in
defiance of both his manuscripts, and the omission of ὑμῶν in v. 20,
of which there is no mention in Tischendorf (see the Collation of D
in my _Supplementum_). Origen also agrees with D, though not
verbally, in reading κἂν ἐκ ταύτης διώκωσιν φεύγετε εἰς τὴν ἄλλην
further down (v. 23), where again Koetschau seems to me to have
unnecessarily inserted τὴν, which is omitted in his principal
manuscript and also in D. Compare, also, i. 22, 12, where Origen
agrees with D in reading φέρωσιν (Luke xii. 11) instead of
εἰσφέρωσιν, read by our critical editions on the authority of א B L
X, or προσφέρωσιν by the _textus receptus_ with A Q R, etc. Both
concur, also, in the omission of the first ἢ τί in the same verse.
What is here said as to the close affinity of Origen’s Bible with
Codex D is corroborated by the testimony of the Athos manuscript
discovered by von der Goltz (see above, p. 90). This manuscript
confirms what we knew before—viz. that Marcion’s text had χριστὸν
and not κύριον or θεὸν in 1 Cor. x. 9. But it also tells us what we
did not know—viz. that χριστὸν was the only reading known to Origen,
and that κύριον in the _Synodical Epistle_ addressed to Paul of
Samosata, published by Turrianus (in Routh’s _Reliquiæ Sacræ_,
iii.^2 299), is not the original reading but a later substitute for
χριστόν. This is made out by Zahn in the _ThLbl._, 1899, col. 180,
who concludes by saying that Clement, _Ecl. Proph._, 49, should not
be omitted in a proper apparatus, and that κύριον ought never again
to be printed in the text. Our most recent editors, Tischendorf,
Westcott and Hort, Weiss, and Baljon, put κύριον in their text
without so much as mentioning χριστόν in the margin, or among the
Noteworthy Rejected Readings, or in the list of Interchanged Words
(Weiss, p. 7). In the Stuttgart edition the text is determined by a
consensus of previous editions, and I was obliged to let κύριον
stand in the text, but I have put χριστόν in the margin, as
Tregelles also did. In this instance the _textus receptus_ is
actually better than our critical editions. The rejected reading is
again the Western, and Zahn, in commenting on the newly-discovered
testimony as to the text of 1 John iv. 3 (see below, p. 327),
pertinently remarks that “here again it is perfectly evident, as any
discerning person might have known, that many important readings
which were wont to be contemptuously dismissed as Western, were long
prevalent in the East as well, not only among the Syrians but also
among the Alexandrians, and were only discarded by the official
recensions of the text that were made subsequent to the time of
Origen.” These illustrations will serve to show that not only is the
editing of the Patristic texts no easy matter, but also that the
employment even of the best editions is not unaccompanied with
risks. See Koetschau, _Bibelcitate bei Origenes_, _ZfwTh._, 1900,
pp. 321-378.
(3) The Rev. Prebendary Ed. Miller is at present at work on a
_Textual Commentary upon the Holy Gospels_, on the ground of
Burgon’s Collection and his own researches. A specimen of this work
(Matthew v. 44) is given in his _Present State of the Textual
Controversy respecting the Holy Gospels_, which was printed for
private circulation, and may be had of the author.[124] In this
little pamphlet he takes up the question (p. 30) whether Origen in
the _De Oratione_ 1 (De la Rue, i. 198; Koetschau, ii. 299, 22)
quotes from Luke (vi. 28) or Matthew (v. 44), and decides for the
latter. Koetschau is of the opposite opinion, giving “Luke vi. 28
(Matthew v. 44).” In the case of Patristic quotations, it will be
seen that matters are frequently very complicated. It must be borne
in mind, too, that the various writers did not use the same copy of
the Scriptures all their life long. At different times and in
different localities they must necessarily have had different copies
before them.
(4) It is further to be observed that in the case of controversial
writings, such as those of Origen against Celsus, and Augustine
against the Manichæans, the question must always be considered
whether the Scriptural quotations found in them are quotations made
by Origen and Augustine themselves, or taken by them from the
writings they assail or refer to; and also whether the quotations
have been made directly from a manuscript of the Bible, or from the
works of a previous writer. Borrowing from an author without
acknowledgment may have been a much more common thing in olden times
than it is even at present.
In Clement of Rome (c. 13), in Clement of Alexandria (_Stromata_,
ii. p. 476), and partly also in the _Epistle of Polycarp_ (c. 2), we
find the following quotation:—“Be ye merciful that ye may obtain
mercy: forgive that ye may be forgiven: as ye do, so shall it be
done to you: as ye give, so shall it be given to you: as ye judge,
so shall ye be judged: as ye are kind, so shall kindness be shown to
you: with what measure ye mete, it shall be meted unto you.” We find
also in Clement of Rome (c. 46), and in Clement of Alexandria
(_Stromata_, iii. p. 561), the quotation: “Woe to that man: it were
good for him if he had never been born, rather than that he should
offend one of my elect: it were better for him that a millstone were
hanged about his neck and he be drowned in the depth of the sea,
than that he should offend one of my little ones.” Neither of these
quotations is found literally in our canonical Gospels. Accordingly,
Rendel Harris concludes from the testimony of these various
witnesses that they must have been taken from an Urevangelium, now
perished (_Contemporary Review_, Sept. 1897). This view is combated,
it seems to me rightly, by H. T. Andrews in the _Expository Times_
for November 1897, p. 94 f. He thinks it probable that Clement of
Alexandria and Polycarp are both dependent on Clement of Rome.[125]
(5) In spite of all these difficulties, a systematic examination of
the Patristic quotations remains one of the most important tasks for
the textual criticism of the N. T. We have most useful collections,
both ancient and modern, of passages from the Fathers to illustrate
the history of the Canon, and their use of the Scriptures has been
scrutinised in the interests of dogmatic history, but there are not
yet, so far as I know, any collections of Patristic quotations to
elucidate the history of the text. Two things are specially wanted
at present. One is a collection, arranged according to time and
locality, of all the passages in which the Fathers appeal to
ἀντίγραφα. In the new volumes of Origen, _e.g._, we find two such
references—κατά τινα τῶν ἀντιγράφων τοῦ κατὰ Μάρκον εὐαγγελίου (i.
113), and κατὰ τὰ κοινὰ τῶν ἀντιγράφων (ii. 52).[126] The other
desideratum is a collection of all the passages in the biographies
of the Saints where mention is made of the writing of Biblical
manuscripts. It is said of Evagrius, _e.g._, in the _Historia
Lausiaca_ (c. 28 in Preuschen, _Palladius_, p. 111), εὐφυῶς γὰρ
ἔγραφε τὸν ὀξύρυγχον χαρακτῆρα, and the preparation of Biblical
manuscripts is also referred to in the _Vita Epiphanii_ (ed. Petav.
ii.), and in Cassiodorus, _De Institutione Divinarum Literarum_ (see
above, p. 50). On the use hitherto made of Patristic testimony see
the section _De Scriptoribus Ecclesiasticis_ in _TiGr._, 1129-1230.
An abridged list of those mentioned there will be found in Baljon’s
_New Testament_, pp. xv.-xxiii. A catalogue of the names and dates
of the Patristic writers most frequently cited in critical editions
of the N. T. is given in Scrivener, ii. pp. 172-174.[127] See also
_Urt._, p. 22, 56 f., 94. On the Old Latin _Didascalia_, see Ed.
Hauler in the _W.S.B._, 1895, vol. cxxxiv. p. 40 ff., and the
_Mitteilungen_ of B. G. Teubner, 1897, ii. p. 52.[128] On the
Biblical text of Filastrius (_C.S.E._, vol. xxxviii., 1898), see
Kroll in the notice of Marx’s edition in the _Berlin. Phil.
Wochenschrift_, 1898, 27. On Jovinian, see _TU._, New Series, ii. 1,
etc. On the quotations from the Gospels in Novatian (Pseudo-Cyprian)
see Harnack in _TU._, xiii. 4.
Footnote 18:
Zahn, _Geschichte des N.T. Kanons_, i. 652; _Einleitung_, i. 153.
Footnote 19:
From the Cod. Monac. 255 and 551, published by Aug. Thenn in the
_Zeitschrift für wissenschaftliche Theologie_ 29 (1887), 453.
Footnote 20:
The most convenient survey of these is given in Vollert’s “Tabellen
zur neutestamentlichen Zeitgeschichte: mit einer Uebersicht über die
Codices in denen die N.T. Schriften bezeugt sind.” Leipzig, 1897.
Given in Sitterly (see above, p. 33).
Footnote 21:
See _e.g._ Plate I.
Footnote 22:
See _e.g._ Plate X.
Footnote 23:
See Scrivener, i. p. 160; Rahlfs, _Göttinger gelehrte Nachrichten_,
1898, i. 98-112.
Footnote 24:
_TiGr._, pp. 1233 ff.; Warfield, _Textual Criticism of the N.T._, p.
47.
Footnote 25:
To obviate confusion, it would be well to use the Latin name
Evangeliarium. Εὐαγγελιστάριον means a Table of Lections. (See
Brightman, in the _Journal of Theological Studies_, 1900, p. 448, and
now Gregory, _Textkritik_, i. p. 334 f.)
Footnote 26:
_Nat. Hist._, xiii. 11.
Footnote 27:
_Egitto_, 2nd ed., p. 125.
Footnote 28:
_Vide_ Th. Mommsen, _Das Diokletianische Edikt über die Warenpreise_
(Hermes, xxv. 17-36, 1890); on the fragments recently discovered in
Megalopolis, see W. Loring, _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, 1890, 299;
also, _Revue Archéologique_, Mars-Avril, 1891, 268.
Footnote 29:
Herodotus v. 58. On the connection of _litera_ and διφθέρα, see M.
Bréal, _Rev. des Et. grecques_, iii. 10, 1890, 121 ff., and _Rev.
Crit._, 1892, 13. In Cyprus the schoolmaster was called the
διφθεράλοιφος.
Footnote 30:
_Cf._ Codex D, Mark i. 6.
Footnote 31:
_Cf._ Victor Schultze, _Rolle und Codex_, in the Greifswalder Studien,
Gütersloh, 1895, p. 149 ff.
Footnote 32:
_Vide_ C. R. Gregory, _Sur les cahiers des manuscrits grecs_, Académie
des Inscriptions, Aug. 1885; Berliner Phil. Wochenschrift, 1886, v.
159 ff.
Footnote 33:
_E.g._ in Cod. Barocc. 1 in the Bodleian, and in several Syriac
manuscripts.
Footnote 34:
_Vide_ G. Ebers, _Kaiser Hadrian_: also _The Writing Material of
Antiquity_, by Ebers, in the Cosmopolitan Magazine, New York, Nov.
1893; and especially Dziatzko (see above, p. 33). On the papyrus plant
(Cyperus papyrus L., Papyrus Antiquorum Willd.), see Bernard de
Montfaucon, _Dissertation sur la plante appelée Papyrus, sur le papier
d’Égypte_, etc. Memoires de l’Académie Royale des Inscriptions et
Belles Lettres, T. vi. Paris, 1729, 4to., pp. 592-608; Franz Woenig,
_Die Pflanzen im alten Aegypten, ihre Heimat, Geschichte, Kultur_,
Leipzig, 1886, pp. 74-129. J. Hoskyns-Abrahall pointed out that it is
found in Europe, not only in the neighbourhood of Syracuse in Sicily,
but also on the shores of Lake Trasimene: see _The Papyrus in Europe_,
in the Academy, 19th Mar. 1887. Lagarde raised a question as to the
etymology of the word papyrus (which has not yet been explained),
whether it might not be derived from Bura on Lake Menzaleh, where it
was first manufactured, _pa_ being the article in Egyptian; see his
_Mitteilungen_, ii. 260. If this is so, there is the more reason for
pronouncing the _y_ long, as ancient writers did, and not short as the
modern fashion is—papýrus, not pápyrus. _Cf._ Juvenal, iv. 24; vii.
101; Mart. iii. 2; viii. 44; x. 97. Catull. xxxv. 2. Ovid, _Met._ xv.
753; _Trist._ iii. 10, 27.
Footnote 35:
See U. Wilcken, _Recto oder Verso_, Hermes, 1887, 487-492.
Footnote 36:
Apoc. v. 1 can no longer be cited in support of this practice, seeing
we must take καὶ ὄπισθεν with κατεσφραγισμένον, according to Grotius
and Zahn. On ὀπισθόγραφον, _cf._ Lucian, _Vitarum Auctio_, 9; Pliny,
3, 5; _a tergo_ Juvenal, 1, 6; _in aversa charta_, Martial, 8, 22.
Footnote 37:
Pausanias, ix. 31, 4.
Footnote 38:
Deissmann, _Bibelstudien_, 26-54.
Footnote 39:
Hiller von Gaertringen, _Berl. Sitz.-Ber._, 21st July 1898.
Footnote 40:
See Wilcken, _Verein von Alterstumsfreunden im Rheinland_. Heft
lxxxvi. p. 234; also the _Berl. Phil. Wochenschrift_, 1889, 26.
Footnote 41:
_Cf._ Livy, B. iv. c. 7; Pliny, xiii. 11, “postea publica monumenta
plumbeis voluminibus mox et privata linteis confici coepta sunt.”
Footnote 42:
_Jüdisches Literaturblatt_, 1889, 10.
Footnote 43:
_Cf._ the verses inscribed on a marble tablet discovered in Andros by
Ross in 1844:—
ἐγὼ χρυσόθρονος Ἶσις ...
ἀφαλέων Ἔρμανος ἀπόκρυφα σύμβολα δέλτων
εὑρόμενα γραφίδεσσιν ἅ τ’ ἔξυσε πᾶσι χαράξας
φρικαλέον μύσταις ἱερὸν λόγον....
Footnote 44:
See Nestle, _Bengel_, p. 105.
Footnote 45:
_Zeitschrift für das Humanistische Gymnasium_, 1896, p. 27.
Footnote 46:
O. Hoffmann, _Griechische Dialekte_, i. 107.
Footnote 47:
Probably pens of the first quality—μονογόνατοι.
Footnote 48:
Harris, _Last Words of Baruch_, vi. 17, p. 56.
Footnote 49:
_Vide_ Harnack, _T. und U._, ii. 5, p. 68.
Footnote 50:
Socin, _Arabic Grammar_, 2nd ed., p. 55, line 14; p. 56, line 12.
Footnote 51:
_ZdmG._, xliii. 547.
Footnote 52:
Konstantin Oikonomos, περὶ τῶν ό ἑρμηνευτῶν, Bk. iv. p. 975.
Footnote 53:
Hody, 1684, p. 254 ff.
Footnote 54:
_Vide_ Harnack in the _ThLz._, 1885, cols. 321, 324, n. 5.
Footnote 55:
Ed. Feige, p. 53.
Footnote 56:
_Divin. Lect._, c. xv.
Footnote 57:
_Sächs. Sitz.-Ber._ (1889), xi. 4, 369.
Footnote 58:
Balsamon, the Canonist (c. 1200), complains that τινὲς δι’
αἰσχροκέρδειαν βιβλίων τῶν θείων γραφῶν ἐμπορευόμενοι ἀπήλειφον, and
he requests σημείωσαι ταῦτα διὰ τοὺς βιβλιοκαπήλους τοὺς ἀπαλείφοντας
τῶν θείων γραφῶν.
Footnote 59:
On Constantine’s Bibles, see Westcott, _Canon_, c. ii. p. 426; _Bible
in the Church_, c. vi. p. 155 ff.; Zahn, _Geschichte des N. T.
Kanons_, i. 64. Zahn combats the supposition that the entire Bible was
contained in each Codex, pointing out quite rightly that in that case
the latter could not have been εὐμετακόμιστα, and moreover that
Constantine speaks of σωμάτια, which does not mean codices but
something much more indefinite. Nor does he believe that Eusebius
intended to specify the number of sheets in each quire of the Codex or
of the columns in which it was written. “The fifty Bibles might and
would be distributed in 200 to 400 volumes.” According to the view
taken above there would be from 150 to 200 of these. _Cf._ Scrivener,
i. p. 118, n. 2.
Footnote 60:
For the order of the books in א, see Westcott, _Bible in the Church_,
Appendix B, “Contents of the most ancient MSS. of the Bible (A, B, א,
D, Amiat.)”; _Hist. of the Canon_, Appendix D, “Catalogues of Books of
the Bible during the first eight Centuries.”
Footnote 61:
Six leaves are now wanting between Barnabas and Hermas. What did these
contain, shall we suppose? Perhaps the Didache. Schmiedel makes a
different conjecture in the _Literarisches Centralblatt_, 1897, n. 49
Footnote 62:
_Vide_ Wordsworth and White, _Epilogus_, p. 737, _De Sectionibus
Ammonianis in Evangeliis_.
Footnote 63:
Ἀντεβλήθη πρὸς παλαιότατον λίαν ἀντίγραφον δεδιορθωμένον χειρὶ τοῦ
ἁγίου μάρτυρος Παμφίλου· ὅπερ ἀντίγραφον πρὸς τῷ τέλει ὑποσημείωσίς
τις ἰδιόχειρος αὐτοῦ ὑπέκειτο ἔχουσα οὕτως· μετελήμφθη καὶ διορθώθη
πρὸς τὰ ἑξαπλᾶ Ὠριγένους· Ἀντωνῖνος ἀντέβαλεν· Πάμφιλος διόρθωσα.
Footnote 64:
This agrees with the last of the so-called Apostolic Canons (85),
which includes Κλήμεντος Ἐπιστολαὶ δύο among the Books of the New
Testament after the Epistles of James and Jude. See Westcott, _Canon_,
Appendix D. iii. a.
Footnote 65:
On the Alexandrian division of the Gospels into 68, 48, 83, and 18
sections respectively, see Kenyon in the _Journal of Theological
Studies_, i. 149.
Footnote 66:
For the Festal Letter, see Westcott, _Canon_, App. D. xiv., p. 554;
_Bible in the Church_, p. 159 ff.; Preuschen’s _Analecta_, pp. 144
ff.; Burgess, _Festal Letters of Athanasius translated from the
Syriac_, p. 137. Sahidic published by C. Schmidt in the _Nachrichten_
mentioned above, 1898, p. 167 ff. He holds it to be the original form
of the Letter.
Footnote 67:
_E.g._ ΑΠΕϹΤΑΛΚΕΝ, 122_b_, 4.
Footnote 68:
An Indiction is a cycle of fifteen years, computed by the Greeks from
1st September 312 A.D. Its introduction was ascribed to Constantine
the Great. See Scrivener, i., App. C, p. 380.
Footnote 69:
See Scrivener, 1. p. 160, under Λ. This minuscule seems to be omitted
from Scrivener’s list. See below, p. 185.
Footnote 70:
“To Rome to come, to Rome to come,
Much of trouble, little of profit,
The thing thou seekest here,
If thou bring not with thee, thou findest not”; etc., etc.
See Scrivener, i. 180.
Footnote 71:
Or Evagrius. The name is difficult to decipher. See below, pp. 188 ff.
Footnote 72:
Ἔγραψα καὶ ἐξεθέμην κατὰ δύναμιν στειχηρὸν τόδε τὸ τεῦχος Παύλου τοῦ
ἀποστόλου πρὸς ἐγγραμμὸν καὶ εὐκατάλημπτον ἀνάγνωσιν ... ἀντεβλήθη δὲ
ἡ βίβλος πρὸς τὸ ἐν Καισαρίᾳ ἀντίγραφον τῆς βιβλιοθήκης τοῦ ἁγίου
Παμφίλου χειρὶ γεγραμμένον αὐτοῦ.
Footnote 73:
Perhaps in Sardinia, see below. Cf. Scrivener, i. p. 63 n. 1.
Footnote 74:
See Scrivener (Miller), i. p. 397.
Footnote 75:
Compare the remarks of Grenfell-Hunt on the papyrus (and vellum) books
and their respective handwritings in Part II. of the _Oxyrhynchus
Papyri_, p. 2 f.
Footnote 76:
Facsimiles of 13, 69, 124, 346 are given in Abbott’s _Collation of
Four Important Manuscripts_ (Dublin, 1877); see Scrivener, i. 343,
Plate XIII, 40.
Footnote 77:
See Blass’s _Praefatio_ to his edition of Luke, pp. lxix f. (1897),
and compare Hastings’ _Dictionary of the Bible_, iii. p. 144; Hoskier,
above, p. 5; below, p. 211.
Footnote 78:
Zahn asserts that traces of a system of Lections are to be found as
early as in Irenaeus, and likewise in Codex D. _Einleitung_, ii. 355,
on Luke i. 26.
Footnote 79:
On Luke viii. 15 Tischendorf observes that in 49^{evl} (a Lectionary
of the tenth or eleventh century, now in Moscow, presented to the
Monastery of the Mother of God τοῦ βροντοχίου by Nicephorus,
Metropolitan of Crete, and Antistes of Lacedæmon, in 1312) the lection
εἰς τὰς ἔξω ἐκκλησίας ended with this verse (15) and the words
attached to it, “And so saying He cried, He that hath ears to hear,
let him hear,” and that the additional verses were not read εἰς τὴν
μεγάλην ἐκκλησίαν, but vv. 20, 21-25 followed immediately after the
words ἐν ὑπομονῇ (v. 15).
Footnote 80:
On the “Livre d’Évangiles réputé avoir appartenu à S. Jean
Chrysostome,” _cf._ Ch. Graux, in the _Revue de Philologie_, Avril
1887.
Footnote 81:
Cf. Eusebius, _Demons. Evan._, iii. 7, 15, βάρβαροι καὶ Ἕλληνες τὰς
περὶ τοῦ Ἰησοῦ γραφὰς πατρίοις χαρακτῆρσιν καὶ πατρίῳ φωνῇ
μετελάμβανον. Zahn, _GK._ i. 33; Theoph., v. 64; Laud. Const., xvii.
9.
Footnote 82:
The date of Tatian’s birth is uncertain. Zahn decides for the year
110. He was in the prime of manhood by the year 160. See Hastings,
_Bible Dictionary_, ii. p. 697.
Footnote 83:
See below, p. 213, n. 3.
Footnote 84:
The Peshitto, so indicated from the principal edition by Schaaf,
1708-9.
Footnote 85:
_The Dialogues of Athanasius and Zacchaeus, and of Timothy and
Aquila._ Edited with Prolegomena and Facsimiles by F. C. Conybeare
(Oxford, 1898; _Anecdota Oxoniensia, Classical Series, Part VIII._).
See Notice in the _Lit. Cbl._, 1899, No. 5, col. 154 f.
Footnote 86:
Dates are still reckoned in Syria according to the Greek era, counting
from the year 312 B.C.
Footnote 87:
Hierapolis, now Membidsch on the Euphrates.
Footnote 88:
I. H. Hall, _Syriac Manuscript Gospels of a Pre-Harklensian Version_,
1883.
Footnote 89:
The Gospels appeared in 1778, the Acts and Catholic Epistles in 1799,
and the Pauline Epistles in 1803.
Footnote 90:
In Tischendorf’s critical apparatus these fragments are indicated as
Syr^{p(osterior)} or as Syr^{whit(e)}. It would be better to use the
symbol Syr^{po(lycarp)} for the first version of 508 made by Polycarp
for Philoxenus, and Syr^{tho(mas)} for Thomas of Harkel’s recension of
616. Gebhardt’s notation is as follows:—Syr^a is the Curetonian; Syr^b
is the Peshitto; Syr^c is the Harklean, of which again Syr^{ct} is the
text, Syr^{cm} the margin, Syr^{c*} sub asterisco; Syr^d is the
Jerusalem Syriac; while Syr^{bodl} is the text of 2 Peter, 2 and 3
John, and Jude. Zahn proposes to indicate the Philoxenian
(Tischendorf’s Syr^{bodl}) by Syr^2, and the Harklean by Syr^3; for
the Gospels he would employ Syr^c, Syr^s, Syr^h; Syr^1, therefore, is
the Peshitto.
Footnote 91:
Land, in the _Anecdota Syriaca_, iv., 1875; Harris, _Biblical
Fragments from Mount Sinai_, 1890; Gwilliam, in the _Anecdota
Oxoniensia_, Semitic Series, i. 5, 1893; ix. 1896;
Lewis-Nestle-Gibson, _Studia Sinaitica_, vi.
Footnote 92:
See F. Bulié, _Wo lag Stridon, die Heimat des h. Hieronymus?_ in the
_Festschrift für Otto Benndorf_. Vienna, 1898. Also _La patrie de S.
Jerome_ in _Analecta Bollandiana_, xviii. 3.
Footnote 93:
_Einleitung_, ii. 195.
Footnote 94:
_Epilogus ad Evangelia_, p. 656.
Footnote 95:
No. 71; 164 in Jerome’s letters.
Footnote 96:
No. 56 (A.D. 394), 67 (397), 101 (402).
Footnote 97:
Burkitt’s view was expressed more than three-quarters of a century ago
by C. A. Breyther, in a dissertation entitled, _De vi quam
antiquissimae versiones quae extant latinae in crisin evangeliorum IV.
habent_ (Merseburg, 1824). See v. Dobschütz, _ThLz._, 1897, 135.
Footnote 98:
Photolithographed by Clédat from a MS. at Lyons.
Footnote 99:
J. Heidenreich, _Der neutestamentliche Text bei Cyprian verglichen mit
dem Vulgatatext. Eine textkritische Untersuchung zu den h. Schriften
des Neuen Testamentes._ Bamberg, 1900.
Footnote 100:
This is the view of Zahn. Others, however, have no doubt that
Tertullian made use of a Latin version. Hoppe, in his treatise, _De
sermone Tertullianeo Quaestiones Selectae_ (1897), p. 6 (_de
Graecismis Tertulliani_) says, “Permultas enim (constructiones) T.
mutuatus est vel ex scriptoribus graecis, quibus assidue studuit, vel
ex librorum sacrorum translatione latina graecismis abundante, qua
utebatur.” And to this he adds, “Quam multa vocabula graeca in
Tertullianeum sermonem ex Itala quae vocatur translatione
redundaverint, discas ex Roenschii libro cum impigritate conscripto,
qui inscribitur, _Itala und Vulgata_, ed. sec., p. 238.” The Itala is
cited for _sciant quia_ (p. 18), _absque_ (p. 44), and for the use of
the superlative for the positive (p. 49). On this last the writer
refers to Rönsch, p. 415, and adds, “ex Itala T. hunc usum aliquotiens
assumpsisse videtur, quamquam in universum vitat.” _Cf._ Westcott,
_Canon_, Part I., c. iii. p. 251 ff.
Footnote 101:
Thus we have, following the numbers given above, in verse 4 (1)
απορεισθαι and διαπορεισθαι (or διαπορειν), (2) περι τουτου and περι
αυτου, (3) ιδου and και ιδου, (4) ανδρες δυο and δυο ανδρες, (5)
επεστησαν and παρειστηκεισαν, (7) εν εσθητι αστραπτουση (or λαμπρα)
and εν εσθησεσιν αστραπτουσαις (or λευκαις), (8) εμφοβων (or εν φοβω)
δε γενομενων και κλινουσων and ενφοβοι δε γενομεναι εκλειναν, (9) τα
προσωπα and το προσωπον (αυτων); in verse 11, (10) ενωπιον αυτων and
its omission; in verse 13, (14) εξηκοντα and εκατον εξηκοντα, (15) ᾗ
ονομα and ονοματι, (16) Εμμαους and ουλαμμαους. Of these (8), (15),
and (16) are found only in D. In the case of (15) the very same
variation is found at Tob. vi. 10 in the two recensions represented by
_Codex Vaticanus_ and _Codex Sinaiticus_.
Footnote 102:
1889, 91, 93, 95, 98; cited in the sequel as W.-W.
Footnote 103:
On the _Epilogus_ to the first volume of their Oxford edition, see
especially S. Berger in the _Revue Critique_, 1889, pp. 141-144; and
on the whole, Burkitt, _The Vulgate Gospels and the Codex Brixianus_,
in the _Journal of Theological Studies_, I. i. (Oct. 1899) pp.
129-134.
Footnote 104:
Compare E. Maugenot, _Les manuscrits grecs des évangiles employés par
Saint Jerôme_, in the _Revue des sciences ecclésiastiques_, January
1900.
Footnote 105:
The New Testament is contained in vol. iii. The copy I use has the
date 1743 on the title-pages of three volumes, but there is a note at
the end, p. 1115, which says, “E prelo exiit hic tomus anno 1749.”
Romæ, 1713-19, in _TiGr._, p. 1350, is a misprint. The imprimaturs of
the first volume are dated 1737. The work was reprinted with new
title-pages at Paris by Fr. Didot, 1751. Copies now cost from £15 to
£25.
Footnote 106:
The word Coptic is not derived from the town in Upper Egypt called
Coptos, but is a modification of the Greek word Αἰγύπτιος.
Footnote 107:
The spelling Bahiric is due to a wrong vocalisation of the word.
Footnote 108:
On the Middle Egyptian, see W. E. Crum in the _Journal of Theological
Studies_, I. 3 (April 1900), pp. 416 ff.
Footnote 109:
Westcott, _Canon_, Part II., chapter ii., § 1 _sub finem_.
Footnote 110:
H. Hyvernat, _Un fragment inédit de la version sahidique du Nouveau
Testament_ (Ephes. i. 6-ii. 8_b_). _Revue Biblique_, April 1900, pp.
248-253. The fragment is of the eighth or ninth century.
Footnote 111:
See also the Greek and Middle Egyptian manuscript published by Crum
and Kenyon, referred to above, p. 70.
Footnote 112:
The dates of Ulfilas’ birth and death are uncertain. He certainly
lived till autumn 381 or 383. The date of his life is variously given
as 310-380 or 318-388. According to Kauffmann, the Synod at which
Ulfilas was consecrated Bishop was that of Antioch, _De Encaeniis_,
341.
Footnote 113:
Or 1115 according to the Armenian reckoning.
Footnote 114:
Celsus’s polemic against Christianity has perished, but considerable
fragments are embedded in Origen’s Reply. See _Ante-Nicene Christian
Library_, vol. xxiii., (Clark, Edin.).
Footnote 115:
Clement of Alexandria cites Matt. xviii. 3 in four different ways. He
quotes Matt. v. 45 six times, and only once accurately.
Footnote 116:
Petropol. gr. 254, formerly cited as Paris. coisl. 212, written in the
year 1111, the oldest manuscript that Lagarde was able to use for his
edition of the _Apostolic Constitutions_. Further examples of the
untrustworthiness of manuscripts and printed editions will be found in
the small print at the end of this section.
Footnote 117:
See extended note (2) at the end of the chapter, p. 149.
Footnote 118:
On the question whether Clement of Rome knew the second Epistle of
Paul to the Corinthians, see J. H. Kennedy, _The Second and Third
Epistles of St. Paul to the Corinthians_. London, 1900, p. 142 ff.
Footnote 119:
Westcott, _Canon_, Part I., c. ii. 7.
Footnote 120:
_Ibid._, Part II., c. i. 1.; c. ii. 4.
Footnote 121:
Ambrosiaster is the name given to the unknown writer of a Commentary
on the Pauline Epistles, which till the time of Erasmus was attributed
to Ambrose. In recent times Dom G. Morin has raised the question
whether the writer may not be one Isaac, who is known to have lived in
the papacy of Damasus. He was a Jewish convert to Christianity, and
afterwards returned to his former faith. See Dom G. Morin,
_L’Ambrosiaster et le juif converti Isaac, contemporain du pape
Damase_, in the _Revue d’Histoire et de Littérature religieuses_, iv.
2 (1899), 112. This writer informs us that a new edition of the whole
of Ambrosiaster will be brought out by A. Amelli on the basis of a
very old manuscript from Monte Cassino. Morin believes that the text
of this manuscript, in spite of its age, is “fortement retouché, dont
on a éliminé la plupart des traits vraiment intéressants” (_ibid._, p.
121).
Footnote 122:
This reminds us of how Luther used to entreat the printers to let his
writings stand as he wrote them.
Footnote 123:
Called 2^{pe} by Tischendorf, and numbered 81 in Westcott and Hort,
and 565 in _TiGr._ Mark of this manuscript was edited by Belsheim in
1885, with a collation of the other three Gospels. It is a valuable
cursive, as appears from what is said of it in W-H: “The most valuable
cursive for the preservation of Western readings in the Gospels is 81,
a St. Petersburg manuscript called 2^{pe} by Tischendorf, as standing
second in a list of documents collated by Muralt. It has a large
ancient element, in great measure Western, and in St. Mark its ancient
readings are numerous enough to be of real importance.” See above,
under Codex N, p. 68.
Footnote 124:
The First Part has been issued: _A Textual Commentary upon the Holy
Gospels_. Part I. St. Matthew, Division I., cc. i.-xiv. (London, Bell,
1899). See notice by Gwilliam in _The Critical Review_, May 1900. In
this work Origen is also cited for Matt. v. 44.
Footnote 125:
In the _Expository Times_ for October 1897, p. 13 ff., I have called
attention to another instance in which a Scriptural quotation (Isaiah
lii. 5) is given with remarkable similarity in the _Apostolic
Constitutions_, with its original (i. 10, iii. 5, vii. 204), in
Ignatius (_Ad Trallianos_, viii.), and in 2nd Clement (c. xiii.).
Similar things are to be observed even in the N.T., as, _e.g._, in
Mark i. 2, where a quotation from Malachi iii. 1 is inserted between
the heading, “In the prophet Isaiah,” and the words taken from that
book. But they are found also in the writings of Paul, which has led
to the view that he may possibly have used some sort of dogmatic
anthology of the O. T. Clement of Alexandria has a good many
quotations from Philo. On his quotations from the Gospels, see P. M.
Barnard, _The Biblical Text of Clement of Alexandria in the Four
Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles_. _Texts and Studies_, v. 5,
Cambridge, 1899.
Footnote 126:
See below, Appendix II., Ἀντίγραφα.
Footnote 127:
_Vide infra_, Appendix I.
Footnote 128:
Fasciculus i., edited by Hauler, 1900.
CHAPTER III.
THEORY AND PRAXIS OF THE TEXTUAL CRITICISM OF THE NEW TESTAMENT.[129]
There is no special theory of the textual criticism of the New
Testament. The task and the method are the same for all literary
productions. The task is to exhibit what the original writer intended to
communicate to his readers, and the method is simply that of tracing the
history of the document in question back to its beginning, if, and in so
far as, we have the means to do so at our command. Diversity of
treatment can only arise when the fortunes of one written work have been
more chequered and complicated than those of another, or when we have
more abundant means at our disposal to help us in the one case than in
the other. The task is very simple when we have only one completely
independent document to deal with, as in the case of several of the
recently discovered papyri, but this occurs very seldom with literary
texts. In this case all that we have to do is to see that we read the
existing text correctly, and then by means of the so-called internal
criticism to determine whether the text so received can be correct.
[Sidenote: Internal Criticism.] Even when several witnesses are at our
command, we cannot altogether dispense with this internal criticism in
the matter of sifting and weighing their testimony, only it would be
unfortunate were we left with such a subjective criterion alone. For not
only in such a case would different scholars come to very different
conclusions, but even one and the same scholar would not be able to
avoid a certain amount of uncertainty and inconsistency in most cases.
The principle laid down in the maxim, _lectio difficilior placet_, or,
as Bengel more correctly and more cautiously puts it, _proclivi
scriptioni praestat ardua_, is perfectly sound; that reading is correct,
is the original reading, from which the origin of another or of several
others can be most easily explained. But how seldom can this be
established with certainty! Take an illustration:—
[Sidenote: Conclusion of the Apocalypse.]
How does the Apocalypse, and the New Testament with it, conclude?
Leaving out of account additions like “Amen” or “Amen, Amen,” and
variations like “The grace of the Lord Jesus,” and “our Lord Jesus,” and
“the Lord Jesus Christ,” and “Christ” simply, we find that the following
forms are given:—
(1) μετὰ πάντων ὑμῶν
(2) μετὰ πάντων ἡμῶν
(3) μετὰ πάντων τῶν ἁγίων
(4) μετὰ πάντων
(5) μετὰ τῶν ἁγίων
How are we to decide without external evidence which is the correct
form? Even supposing we know that the first two are out of the question,
and why they are so, it is very difficult on internal grounds alone to
decide between the other three. Lachmann, who did not know of (5),
decided in favour of (4). But so does Tischendorf, Weizsäcker, and
Weiss, the latter giving as his reason for doing so that (5), τῶν ἁγίων,
is explanatory of (4), πάντων, which is manifestly too general, and that
(3) is the result of a combination of these two. On the other hand,
Tregelles and Westcott and Hort favour (5), without so much as
mentioning (4) in their margin; while Bousset, the latest expositor of
the Apocalypse, regards (3) as the correct reading, and thinks that in
all probability both (4) and (5) are due to a transcriptional error. Who
is to decide when doctors disagree? Manifestly one might argue on quite
as good if not better grounds than those of Weiss to the very opposite
conclusion—viz. that a later writer who wished the Apocalypse, and with
it the New Testament, to conclude with as comprehensive a benediction as
possible, substituted the words “Grace be with all” in place of the
restricted and somewhat strange expression “Grace be with the saints.” I
did not observe that Bousset still defends the third form when I said in
the first edition of this work that this reading does not fall to be
considered at all. But my reason for saying so was not “because this
form proves to be a combination of the other two,” or “because the
authorities for it are later,” but because it could be shown that its
supporters follow a corrected text in other places as well as this; and
I concluded with observing that the decision between (4) and (5) could
not be made to depend solely on internal criteria either, but depended
on the decision come to regarding the general relationship between the
witnesses that support each one, in this instance between A, as
supporting (4), and א, as supporting (5).
(1) It may be stated here, merely by way of comment, that the first
form of the benediction, “with you all,” was clearly translated into
Greek by Erasmus from his Latin Bible, without the authority of a
single Greek manuscript. But in spite of this, it is still
propagated in the _textus receptus_ by the English Bible Society,
and even in the last revision of Luther’s German Bible it was
allowed to stand without demur. The English Authorised Version had
it in this form, but the Revised Version adopts the fifth form “with
the saints,” and puts (4) in the margin, with a note to the effect
that “two ancient authorities read ‘with all.’”
The second form, “with us all,” which was adopted by Melanchthon in
his Greek Bible of 1545, published by Herwag, is just as arbitrary
an alteration. The third form, “with all the saints,” is read by the
Complutensian with Q, with more than forty minuscules, and the
Syriac, Coptic, and Armenian versions. The fourth, “with all,” is
found in A and Codex Amiatinus, while the fifth, “with the saints,”
is given by א and the Old Latin g. In the Syriac version of the
Apocalypse, edited by Gwynn in 1897, a sixth form seems to have been
brought to light, which Baljon, who himself decides for (5), cites
as μετὰ πάντων τῶν ἁγίων αὐτοῦ: Syr^{gwynn}. But the pronoun, which
in Syriac is indicated by a suffix only, is employed now and again
merely to represent the Greek definite article, so that this new
Syriac manuscript does not give us a sixth form but only another
witness to the third. On the other hand, Gwynn mentions the omission
of the entire verse in Primasius, a fact that neither Tischendorf
nor Weiss takes the least notice of, and he adduces lastly that a
manuscript of the Vulgate reads “cum omnibus _hominibus_.” One sees
from an illustration like this what an amount of pains is required
seriously to apply, even in a single point, Bengel’s principle that
the smallest particle of gold is gold, but that nothing must be
passed as gold that has not been proved to be such (_Introductio in
Crisin Novi Testamenti_, § 1, p. 572).
(2) LITERATURE.—See especially Gebhardt (_Urt._, p. 16). Ed. Reuss,
_Geschichte der h. Schriften des N. T._, Braunschweig, 1887, § 351
ff. S. P. Tregelles, _An Introduction to the Textual Criticism of
the N.T._ (= vol. iv. of Horne’s _Introduction_, 1877). F. H. A.
Scrivener (see above, p. 6); also _Adversaria Critica Sacra_, edited
by Miller, Cambr. 1893. B. F. Westcott, _The New Testament_ in
Smith’s _Dictionary of the Bible_, vol. ii., London, 1863. C. E.
Hammond, _Outlines of Textual Criticism_, Oxford, 1890.
Westcott-Hort, vol. ii. (see p. 21). B. B. Warfield, _Introduction
to the Textual Criticism of the N. T._, New York, 1887; London,
1893. J. W. Burgon, _Last Twelve Verses of the Gospel according to
St. Mark_, Oxford and London, 1871; also _The Traditional Text of
the Holy Gospels vindicated and established_, edited by Miller,
London, 1896; also, _The Causes of the Corruption of the Traditional
Text of the Holy Gospels_, edited by Miller, London and Cambridge,
1896. _The Oxford Debate on the Textual Criticism of the N. T. held
at New College on May 6, 1897_; with a preface (by Miller)
explanatory of the Rival Systems, 1897, pp. xvi. 43. Ed. Miller,
_The Present State of the Textual Controversy respecting the Holy
Gospels_ (see above, p. 152).
Martin (Abbé J. P.), _Introduction à la Critique textuelle du N.T._,
in five volumes, with plates and facsimiles: vol. i. pp. xxxvi. 327,
Paris, 1884, 25 fr.; vol. ii. pp. ix. 554, 1884, 40 fr.; vol. iii.
pp. vi. 512, 1885, 40 fr.; vol. iv. pp. vi. 549, 1886, 40 fr.; vol.
v. pp. xi. 248 and 50 pp. of facsimiles, 1886, 20 fr. Also by the
same author, _Description technique des manuscrits grecs relatifs au
N.T. conservés dans les Bibliothèques de Paris_. Supplement to the
foregoing, Paris, 1884, pp. xix. 205, with facsimiles, 20 fr.;
_Quatre manuscrits importants du N.T. auxquels on peut en ajouter un
cinquième_, Paris, 1886, pp. 62, 3 fr.; _Les plus anciens mss. grecs
du N.T., leur origine, leur véritable caractère_, in the _Revue des
Quest. Hist._, 1884, No. 71, pp. 62-109; _Origène et la Critique
textuelle du N.T._, Paris. Reprinted from the _Rev. des Quest.
Hist._ for Jan. 1885, No. 73, pp. 5-62.
Th. Zahn, _Geschichte des N.T. Kanons_: vol. i., _Das N.T. vor
Origenes_, Part 1, 1888; Part 2, 1889. Vol. ii., _Urkunden und
Belege zum ersten und dritten Band_, Part 1, 1890; Part 2, 1892. The
third vol. has not yet appeared. The order of the books of the N.T.
is discussed in vol. ii. p. 343 ff., and the conclusion of Mark’s
Gospel in the same vol., p. 910 ff.
Salmon (Geo.), _Some thoughts on the Textual Criticism of the N.T._,
London, 1897, pp. xv. 162. Blass, _Philology of the Gospels_,
London, 1898, pp. viii. 250. Ada Bryson, _Recent Literature on the
text of the N.T._ in the _Expository Times_ for April 1899, pp.
294-300. M. Vincent, _History of the Textual Criticism of the N.T._,
1900. G. L. Cary, _The Synoptic Gospels, with a chapter on the
Textual Criticism of the N.T._, New York, 1900. See also Prof.
Jannaris in the _Expositor_, vol. viii. of Series V. There is an
article in the _American Journal of Theology_, 1897, iv. p. 927 ff.,
entitled _Alexandria and the N.T._, which I have not been able to
consult.
In attempting to restore the text of the New Testament as nearly as
possible to its original form, it is essential to remember that the New
Testament, as we have it to-day, is not all of one piece, but consists
of twenty-seven separate documents now arranged in five groups, and that
every several document and every several group has had its own peculiar
history. Of these groups the most complicated, perhaps, is the one with
which the New Testament opens—viz. the Gospels.
[Sidenote: Gospels.]
It is quite uncertain when our four Gospels were first written together
in one volume and arranged in the order that is now common. The
Muratorian Fragment on the Canon[130] is defective at the beginning, but
seems to imply this arrangement. It was supposed that the Gospels were
written in the following order—viz. Matthew first and John last. The
order, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, which is found in nearly all the Greek
and Syriac manuscripts, was made popular by Eusebius and Jerome. The
former followed it in his _Canons_, which were afterwards adopted by
Jerome in his Latin Bible. According to Eusebius (_Eccl. Hist._, vi.
25),[131] Origen knew this order, though he very frequently cites the
Gospels in the order Matthew, Luke, Mark.
The following arrangements are also found:—
[Transcriber’s Note: The following list begins with (2).]
(2) Matthew, Mark, John, Luke, in the earlier (Curetonian) Syriac and in
the Canon Mommsenianus, a catalogue of the Books of the Bible and of the
works of Cyprian, originating in Latin Africa about the year 360, and
first published by Mommsen.[132]
(3) Matthew, Luke, Mark, John, in the so-called Ambrosiaster and in a
Catalogue of the Sixty Canonical Books.
(4) Matthew, John, Mark, Luke—_i.e._ the two Apostles put before the two
pupils of Apostles, in the Codex Claromontanus.[133] This order occurs
also in the Arabic writer Masudi’s _Meadows of Gold_.[134]
(5) Matthew, John, Luke, Mark, in Codd. D and X, in the _Apostolic
Constitutions_, in Ulfilas, and especially in the Old Latin Manuscripts;
see Corssen, _Monarchianische Prologe_, p. 65, in _TU._ xv. 1.[135]
(6) John, Luke, Mark, Matthew, in Codex k.
(7) John, Matthew, Mark, Luke, in the Vocabularies of the Egyptian
versions.
(8) John, Matthew, Luke, Mark, in Tertullian and cod. 19. See Arthur
Wright, _Some New Testament Problems_, p. 196 ff.[136]
This very variety shows that for a long time, perhaps till the third
century, at all events much longer than the Pauline Epistles, the
Gospels were propagated singly, perhaps on rolls, and only afterwards
incorporated in a codex. And this makes it probable that the text of our
manuscripts was not taken from a single copy of the first
Tetraevangelium. More than probable we cannot call it, seeing that a
copyist may have had any sort of reasons of his own for disarranging the
order of the books given in his exemplar, as may still be gathered
luckily from the position occupied by Hebrews in Codex B. The
probability is heightened, however, by the fact that our manuscripts
display a considerably greater amount of textual variation in the
Gospels than in the Pauline Epistles, though not in all to the same
extent as in D which contains an entirely peculiar recension, especially
in Luke. One of the most remarkable indications of this is afforded by
the discovery made by E. Lippelt, a pupil of Professor Blass. The order
of the books in D is Matthew, John, Luke, Mark, Acts, where it will be
seen that the two portions of the book inscribed to Theophilus are
separated by Mark. Now Lippelt observed that while the name Johannes is
regularly spelt with two ν’s (Ἰωάννης) in Matthew, John, and Mark, it is
just as regularly spelt with one (Ἰωάνης) in Luke and Acts, sundered
though these two books are by Mark, where the other spelling
prevails.[137] This shows an accuracy of tradition which is surprising,
but till now it has only been traced in this one manuscript. The others
write the name throughout with two _ν_’s and B as consistently with one.
In this connection the question naturally arises whether certain
liberties were not taken with the books on the occasion of their
collection and arrangement. Resch, _e.g._, thinks that it was then that
the second Gospel received the conclusion or appendix which is found in
most of our manuscripts, and Rohrbach holds a similar opinion.[138] I
have elsewhere expressed the idea that the peculiar opening of Mark is
to be accounted for in this way.[139] Zahn, however, doubts whether the
use of ἀρχή and τέλος for ἄρχεται and ἐτελέσθη, _incipit_ and
_explicit_, can be established for early times.[140] I have found it in
Greek Psalters, though not very early, I admit, where αρχη των ωδων
occurs instead of ωδαι as the superscription of the Hymns at the end of
the Psalter.[141] However, there is no need to dwell further on this
point. Zahn (p. 174) is quite right in his contention that the usual
titles κατὰ Μαθθαῖον, etc.,[142] imply a collection of the Gospels of
which Εὐαγγέλιον is the general title.
If, then, for the sake of simplicity, we take as our goal the first
manuscript of the Tetraevangelium, one would think it must be possible
with the means at our command gradually to work back to it. Even the
latest of our manuscripts is surely copied from an earlier one, and that
one from another, and so on always further and further back, so that all
we have to do is to establish their genealogy, pretty much as Reuss has
done for the printed editions of the New Testament; and seeing we have
manuscripts as old as the fourth and fifth century, that means that the
entire period of a thousand years prior to the invention of printing is
bridged over at once, so that the task would appear to be simply that of
throwing a bridge over the first few centuries of the Christian era. And
by going on comparing the witnesses and always eliminating those that
prove unreliable, it must be possible, one would suppose, in this way to
arrive at the original. But a little experience will shortly moderate
our expectations.
At the outset it is very much against us that we have no really
serviceable text for comparison. The text of our present critical
editions is a patchwork of many colours, more wonderful than the cloak
of Child Roland of old. In fact it is a text that never really existed
at all. In the preparation of my _Supplement_, which I undertook with
the object of making the text of Codex Bezae easily accessible to every
one, I compared the text of that manuscript with that of
Tischendorf-Gebhardt’s edition, and I saw clearly that my work would
necessarily present a very confused appearance indeed. I also issued an
interleaved edition of my Stuttgart New Testament with a similar
object—viz. to furnish a convenient means of comparing the text of
manuscripts and of Patristic quotations, but that, too, labours under
the same disadvantage. Whoever intends really to further the textual
criticism of the New Testament will have to issue a copy of a single
manuscript printed in such a way as will make it practically convenient
for the comparison of different texts, something like Tischendorf’s
edition of Codex Sinaiticus (_Novum Testamentum Sinaiticum_, 1863),
which, however, is of little use for other purposes, or like Schjøtt’s
edition of the New Testament (see above, p. 24). But as these are in the
hands of very few, there is nothing for it at present but to take one of
our most common texts, always bearing in mind its composite character.
This feature of the text appears at the very outset in the title. In א B
(D) it is κατα Μαθθαιον. Codex D is defective at the beginning down to
c. i. 20, but κατ Μαθθαιον is found regularly as the title at the top of
the pages, a fact which Tischendorf has overlooked. Most other
manuscripts, C E K M etc., have Ευαγγελιον κατα Ματθαιον. If this latter
is held as incorrect, then all these manuscripts should for the future
be dropped out of account and א B D alone be regarded as authoritative.
Again, in verse 2, א* has Ισακ twice, while the others have Ισαακ, so
that א too would drop out, leaving B standing alone. But then in verse 3
our editors forthwith reject B, which reads Ζαρε, and decide in favour
of the others which have Ζαρα. Whether this may not be a little
premature, seeing that there are other places where ε is found for final
ח,[143] and that one manuscript, 56, has deliberately corrected Ζαρα
into Ζαρε in Gen. xxxviii. 30, where a third has Ζαρε, we do not pause
to determine. The point is simply this, that in these first three verses
there is no manuscript that is always right in the judgment of our
editors. True, the cases we have been considering are trifling, the
differences being of an orthographical nature merely, and one must not
be too particular in such matters, though at the same time the
oft-quoted maxim, _minima non curat praetor_, is nowhere less applicable
than in textual criticism. But the same state of things reappears
immediately where we have differences involving important matters of
fact. What is the fact in verse 11? Did Josias beget Jechoniah, or did
he beget Joachim and Joachim Jechoniah? Verse 16 has already been
referred to: in this case our oldest Greek manuscripts would give no
occasion to mention the verse. But in verse 25 we have again to ask
which is correct, ἔτεκεν υἱόν or ἔτεκεν τὸν υἱὸν αὐτῆς τὸν πρωτότοκον?
[Sidenote: Dogmatic influence.] And when we hear Jerome say—Ex hoc loco
quidam perversissime suspicantur et alios filios habuisse Mariam,
dicentes primogenitum non dici nisi qui habeat et fratres, we learn
already how dogmatic motives may have some influence upon the form of
the text. And, moreover, when we call to mind the words of Luke ii. 7,
we are made aware of another thing that may exert a disturbing influence
in the Gospels—viz. the tendency to alter the text in conformity with
the parallel passage. [Sidenote: Parallel passages.] Apart from the
stylistic peculiarities of Codex D, we meet with no materially important
variants in our Greek manuscripts of Matthew till we come to the Sermon
on the Mount. The only thing is in iii. 15, where two Latin witnesses
have an addition which is evidently taken from a Greek source: et cum
baptizaretur, lumen ingens circumfulsit de aqua ita ut timerent omnes
qui advenerant (congregati erant). This interpolation, however, does not
concern the criticism of the text of the New Testament, seeing that it
is derived from some source outside the Canon.
On the other hand, there is a great question as to the order of the
first three Beatitudes in Matthew v. 3-5, whether they are to be read in
the order given in the common text, πτωχοί ... πενθοῦντες ... πραεῖς
..., or as our recent editors prefer πτωχοί ... πραεῖς ...
πενθοῦντες.[144] The latter arrangement is attested by only two Greek
manuscripts—D and 33. Now, if their evidence is accepted here in spite
of its apparent weakness, how can we justify the refusal to acknowledge
the authority of D in other similar cases? Verse 22, but a short way
down, is a case in point. Here D, with most authorities, exhibits the
sorely-contested εἰκῇ. But our modern critics will have nothing to do
with it, going by א B, Origen, Jerome, and Athanasius. Merx (_Die vier
kanonischen Evangelien_, pp. 231-237) has recently come forward as a
strong supporter of it, on the ground that Syr^{sin} also has it,[145]
but how is its omission, especially by Jerome, to be explained? The
Vulgate itself shows that it was easier to insert it than to omit it,
because out of twenty-four manuscripts collated in W.-W. three have it,
though it certainly does not belong to the text of the Vulgate.[146]
In view of these illustrations, which serve to show the somewhat
haphazard way in which the text of our editions hitherto has been
arrived at, the question becomes very important how the original text is
to be restored in disputed or doubtful cases.
[Sidenote: Conjectural emendation.]
The first case, or, if we like to call it, the last, but at all events
the one most easy of settlement, is when the correct reading is no
longer found in any of our witnesses, neither in Greek manuscript,
version, nor patristic quotation. Here we must simply have recourse to
=conjecture=. Not long ago philologists evinced such a fondness for
conjectural emendation that the question might not unreasonably be asked
why they did not rather themselves write the text that they took in hand
to explain. At the same time, the aversion to this method of criticism
which till recently prevailed and still to some extent prevails,
especially in the matter of the New Testament text, is just as
unreasonable. Tischendorf, _e.g._, did not admit a single emendation of
this nature into his text, while Westcott and Hort consider it to be
necessary in only a very few cases, such as Colossians ii. 18, though
they also decline to adopt any conjectural readings in their text. For
ΑΕΟΡΑΚΕΝΕΜΒΑΤΕΥΩΝ in this passage, which Weizsäcker renders “pluming
himself upon his visions,” they would read ΑΕΡΑ ΚΕΝΕΜΒΑΤΕΥΩΝ, which is
obtained by the omission of a single letter and a different division of
the words. In Holland conjectural criticism is freely indulged in,[147]
the example of Cobet and his school being followed by such critics as S.
A. Naber, W. C. van Manen, W. H. van de Sande-Bakhuyzen, van de Becke
Callenfels, D. Harting, S. S. de Koe, H. Franssen, J. M. S. Baljon, J.
H. A. Michelsen, and J. Cramer.[148] Baljon has adopted a great number
of such conjectural emendations in his edition of the text published in
1898 (see above, p. 24). In place of πολλοὶ διδάσκαλοι, _e.g._, in James
iii. 1, Lachmann would read πῶλοι δύσκολοι, Naber πλανοδιδάσκαλοι, while
Junius, de Hoop-Scheffer, and Bakhuyzen prefer πολυλάλοι on the ground
that m^{64} has _nolite multiloqui esse_.[149] So far, therefore, this
last is not pure conjecture. For κρινέτω in Col. ii. 16 Lagarde wished
to read κιρνάτω, because the verb דוד found in the Peshitto at this
place is elsewhere used to translate θροεῖν (Matt. xxiv. 6), ταράσσειν
(John xiv. 1, 27), ἐγκόπτειν (Gal. v. 7), and also διαστρέφειν (Eccl.
vii. 18; xii. 3). My proposal to read ἐπὶ πόντον in Apoc. xviii. 17, a
reading adopted by Baljon in his text, instead of ἐπὶ τόπον or ἐπὶ
πλοίων as given in our manuscripts, was a pure conjecture, but it has
the support of _super mare_ in Primasius.[150] There is therefore no
objection on principle to the method of conjecture, nor to the adoption
of conjectural readings in the text, though it is only to be resorted to
as the _ultima ratio regis_ and with due regard to all the
considerations involved, transcriptional, linguistic, and
otherwise.[151] There is no essential difficulty in supposing, _e.g._,
that κιρνάτω in Col. ii. 16 was first corrupted into κρινάτω and then
into κρινέτω. Such a transposition of the liquid is quite common in all
languages.[152] But we must see if κιρνάτω has the sense required in the
passage. There is no doubt a reference to drinking here, and so far,
therefore, the word seems to suit the context better. It is also true
that evidence is not wanting of the metaphorical use of the word
proposed to be inserted. Passow, _e.g._, gives τὸ τῆς φύσεως σκληρὸν
κιρνᾶν from Polybius iv. 21, 3, and τὴν πόλιν κιρνᾶν from Aristophanes
i. 1. In spite of this, however, I have considerable misgivings whether
this sense of the word is in harmony with Pauline usage and is suitable
to the context of the passage. If it is sought to justify a conjectural
reading on transcriptional grounds, then, as has been observed (p. 82),
a strict account must be taken of the manner of writing prevalent at the
time when the corruption is supposed to have originated. Luke’s
handwriting must have been very bad indeed if we are to suppose that the
scribe of D or the parent manuscript mistook ἠρνήσασθε for the
enigmatical ἐβαρύνατε in Acts iii. 14, though it is quite conceivable
how he came to write δόξῃ instead of δεξιᾷ in v. 31, or conversely wrote
ἐδέξαντο instead of ἐδόξασαν in xiii. 48, or that ΚΑΙΤΟΥΤΩΣΥΝΦΩΝΟΥΣΙΝ
was made into ΚΑΙΟΥΤΩΣΣΥΝΦΩΝΗΣΟΥΣΙΝ or _vice versa_.[153] A slight
experience in the reading of ancient manuscripts shows how easy it is to
make mistakes of this sort. And if we wish to see what mistakes of this
sort actually do occur in Codices Vaticanus, Alexandrinus, Sinaiticus,
and Ephraemi, we have only to look into Morrish’s _Handy Concordance of
the Septuagint_,[154] though of course the examples there are all from
the Old Testament. We have, _e.g._, ἀγαπάω for ἀπατάω; ἀγάπη for ἀπάτη;
ἁγιάζω for ἀγοράζω; ἅγιος for αἴγειος, ἀγγεῖον, ἀγρός, γῆ; ἀδιάλυτος for
διάλυτος; βάλλω and its compounds for λαμβάνω and its compounds; λαός
for ναός, etc.
[Sidenote: Eclectic method.]
It is more difficult to answer the question how the text is to be
restored in cases where there is no lack of external evidence. We have
already seen that critics have hitherto adopted an =eclectic= mode of
procedure. In general, whenever Vaticanus and Sinaiticus agree, editors,
Tischendorf as well as Westcott and Hort, give the preference to their
testimony. But if they do not agree, what is to be done? And what if a
third reading seems on internal grounds to be better than either? In his
_Thoughts on the Textual Criticism of the New Testament_, Salmon very
pungently, but not altogether incorrectly, describes Westcott and Hort’s
method on the lines of an anecdote told of Cato by Cicero: “To the
question what authorities should be followed, Hort answers, Follow B א.
But if B is not supported by א? Still follow B, if it has the support of
any other manuscript. But suppose B stands quite alone? Even then it is
not safe to reject B unless it is clearly a clerical error. But suppose
B is defective? Then follow א. And what about D? What about killing a
man!” Lagarde has said that the gag is the modern equivalent of the
stake. Codex D has not been gagged outright, to be sure, but it has been
shoved aside, and only now and then with remarkable inconsistency has
its evidence been accepted as trustworthy. For one must surely call it
inconsistent to follow one side as a rule and then all at once to take
sides with that which is diametrically opposed to the first. In his
_Introduction_, Hort, in the most brilliant manner one must admit, has
established the principle that the restoration of the text must be
grounded on the study of its history, and no one has studied that
history as carefully as Hort has done. But the question remains whether
he has not interpreted the history wrongly, whether what he calls the
Neutral text is really the original, and whether that which he rejects
as a Western Corruption is really to be regarded as such.
[Sidenote: History of transmission.]
I cannot presume to judge; but I have the feeling that the history of
the transmission of our New Testament text must be studied in quite
another way from that in which it has been done hitherto, and in a
twofold direction:—
(1) The manuscripts and their relation to each other must be subjected
to a still more searching investigation, and
(2) The works of the ecclesiastical writers, especially the Commentaries
and the Catenæ, must be thoroughly explored for any information they may
have to give regarding the history of the text of the New Testament, and
these two results must then be set in relation with each other.
With regard to the former task, it might not be essential to make such a
minute collation of the manuscripts as Ferrar, Hoskier, and other
investigators deemed necessary, and as is certainly the right thing to
do in the case of the oldest documents. With such a mode of procedure,
the task could not be accomplished in any conceivable time. But suppose
the work was organised the way that Reuss did with the printed editions,
by selecting say a thousand passages for comparison, it would be
possible, and in a very short time we should be much better informed
than we are at present as to the state of the text in our manuscripts,
and especially in the minuscules.
Such a task, moreover, must be preceded by a fresh scientific statement
of the way in which the text was propagated previous to the invention of
printing, on the lines laid down by Hort in the first fourteen
paragraphs of his _Introduction_.[155] A necessary preliminary to this
is the study of genealogy, in which we have an excellent guide in
Ottokar Lorenz’s _Lehrbuch der gesamten wissenschaftlichen Genealogie_
(Berlin, 1898). See especially the first chapter of Part I. on the
distinction between Genealogical Tree (Table of genealogy) and Table of
Ancestors, and the third chapter of Part II. on the problem of Loss of
Ancestors.
All the ideas pertaining to the genealogy of living creatures, such as
crossing, heredity, and so forth, fall to be considered also in the
genealogy of manuscripts, the only difference being that in the latter
case new features make their appearance. It has been asserted somewhere
that if an Englishman, a Dutchman, a German, a Frenchman, and an
American meet in a company, the nationality of each is at once
recognisable, but it is impossible to determine their exact genealogical
relationships, and that the same impossibility exists in the case of the
manuscripts of the New Testament. That is perhaps an exaggeration, but
it is certainly a surprising fact that so few even of our latest
manuscripts can be proved with certainty to be copies of manuscripts
still in existence, or at least to be derived from a common original.
[Sidenote: Analogous works.]
It will be a very great help, particularly to those beginning work in
this field, to compare the method and results of investigations pursued
in similar and perhaps easier departments of study. Apart from the works
of classical philologists, or works like the new edition of Luther’s
writings, a great deal of most valuable research has been carried on of
late years in the matter of textual criticism, some of it very
extensive, some of it less so. Ed. Wölfflin, _e.g._, devoted his
attention to the Rule of St. Benedict of Nursia, who died some time
after the year 542. [Sidenote: Rule of Benedict.] His Rule, which
extends only to eighty-five pages of the Teubner size, is extant in
manuscripts dating as far back as the seventh and eighth centuries. By a
comparison of these, Wölfflin was convinced that we still possess the
Rule essentially in the identical wording of the original vulgar Latin,
that Benedict himself had afterwards made certain alterations and
additions, and that we have therefore to distinguish several (fortasse
tres) editions.[156] Wölfflin purported to give the text of that
recension which he took to be the earliest. But we had no more than time
to congratulate ourselves on the satisfactory result arrived at by this
experienced philologist, when behold, another totally different
conclusion was announced by a younger worker in the same field. Wölfflin
had done little more than compare the manuscripts, but Lud. Traube
applied also the external evidence afforded by the history of the text,
and discovered that certain manuscripts that Wölfflin had thrown aside
possessed a greater claim to originality.[157]
[Sidenote: De Viris Illustribus.]
Similarly, E. C. Richardson gave several years to an examination of all
the accessible manuscripts of the _De Viris Illustribus_ of Jerome and
Gennadius, a work not much larger than the Rule of Benedict. These
manuscripts, about 120 in number, he grouped, and then framed his text
in accordance with them.[158] While his work was in the press, an
edition was published by C. A. Bernoulli, based on some of the
manuscripts that Richardson also had used.[159] But from the very first
sentence onwards, the two editors follow contradictory authorities, so
that while one gives _parvam_ as the correct reading, the other reads
_non parvam_. But more than that, the same Part of _Texte und
Untersuchungen_ that gave us Richardson’s laborious work contained a
second piece of work on the same material—viz., O. v. Gebhardt’s edition
of the so-called Greek Sophronius, which is an old version of Jerome’s
book. And the last chapter of this version, which is autobiographical,
contains indications, according to v. Gebhardt’s Introduction, that
Jerome issued two editions of his book, so that, if this be so, an
entirely new grouping of the manuscripts becomes necessary.
[Sidenote: Julian’s Letters.]
In the case of Holl’s researches on the _Sacra Parallela_ of John
Damascene, published in the same Collection,[160] matters are too
complicated for beginners in textual criticism, but of non-biblical
texts mention may be made of the _Recherches sur la tradition manuscrite
des lettres de l’Empereur Julien_ by S. Bidez and Fr. Cumont (Brussels,
1898), as showing how much can be attained by combining the internal and
external history of the transmission of literary texts.[161] [Sidenote:
Latin New Testament.] In the field of Biblical texts, and particularly
of the New Testament, the study of Wordsworth and White’s _Epilogus_ to
the first volume of their _Novum Testamentum Latine_ is to be specially
recommended, particularly c. iv. _De Patria et Indole Codicum
nostrorum_, c. v. _De Textus Historia_, and c. vi. _De Regulis a nobis
in Textu constituendo adhibitis_. As was said before, Jerome undertook
his revision of the Gospels in the year 383; his work was of an entirely
uniform texture, apart from a few passages where a correction may have
occurred even in the original manuscript; and there is a sufficiency of
manuscripts extant, some of them going back to the sixth century. One of
these, which formerly belonged to the Church of St. Willibrord at
Echternach, contains a note dated 558, and copied into it from the
parent manuscript, to the effect: proemendavi ut potui secundum codicem
in bibliotheca Eugipi presbyteri, quem ferunt fuisse sancti Hieronymi.
(See above, p. 122.) In these circumstances it must surely be possible,
one would think, to arrive at some satisfactory conclusion. And yet, in
spite of all this, and in spite of long years of labour, many a problem
remains to perplex the editor of the Vulgate. To begin with, there is
one striking circumstance. Jerome executed his work at Rome, in
obedience to the commission of Pope Damasus. One would therefore expect
to find the best manuscripts in Rome, or at least originating from Rome.
But that is by no means the case: “praeter expectationem accidit ut
pauci vel nulli ex codicibus optimis et antiquissimis originem Romanam
clare ostendant.” The manuscript that editors consider the best—viz.
Codex Amiatinus, now at Florence—was certainly at Rome for a long time,
but it was sent there as a present from beyond the Alps; indeed, it came
from England. And on the other hand it was not from Rome that the Latin
Bible came to England, or to Canterbury in particular, although
Augustine was sent thither by Pope Gregory the Great, but from the South
of Italy; in fact, it was from Naples. Codex Fuldensis, which may have
been brought to Fulda by Boniface, formerly belonged to Bishop Victor of
Capua; the Echternach manuscript referred to above came from the
Lucullan Monastery at Naples, while the manuscript from which Codex
Amiatinus was copied was written by Cassiodorus of Vivarium, and
therefore came from Calabria. The history of the transmission of the
Latin Bible reveals many other facts as strange as these in connection
with the locality to which manuscripts belong. We must be prepared,
therefore, for similar surprises in the case of Greek manuscripts also,
and need not be astonished to hear that the Greek-Latin Codex Bezae, so
much decried as “Western,” takes us back to Smyrna or Ephesus by way of
Lyons and by means of Irenæus.[162]
It is also very instructive to observe that after long years of the most
thorough study of their manuscripts, Wordsworth and White refrain from
constructing =stemmata= or genealogies of these. All they venture to do
is to distinguish certain large classes or =families=, and within these
again to bring certain manuscripts into somewhat closer relationship
with each other. They distinguish two main classes. In the first they
reckon five, or it may be four, Italian-Northumbrian manuscripts, A Δ H*
S Y, two Canterbury O X, three Italian J M P, the two mentioned already
from Capua-Fulda F and Lucullan-Echternach EP, and the Harleian Z, so
called from a former possessor and now in the British Museum. To the
second class belong five Celtic D E L Q R, three French B BF G, and two
Spanish C T. After these come the witnesses to the history of the text
in the stricter sense of the term, the recensions made by Theodulf (H^c
Θ) and Alcuin (KV M̅), and, for the form which the text assumed in the
later manuscripts and in the printed editions, the Salisbury Codex W. We
should have great reason to congratulate ourselves, could we arrive at
like certain results in the region of the far older and more diversified
history of the transmission of the Greek text, but there too we shall
encounter the same general features—viz., a form of the text in the
printed editions, in the later manuscripts, in the Recensions, the dates
of which are still to be determined (Lucian, Hesychius?, Pamphilus), and
in the families, which are only to be classified in a general way.
It is also instructive to find that in the case of several manuscripts,
Wordsworth and White are obliged to observe that they seem to have been
corrected from the Greek, H* (p. 709), M (p. 711), EP* (p. 712), D R L
(pp. 714, 716), which suggests the possibility of Greek manuscripts also
having been influenced by one of the versions, be it Latin or Syriac.
Finally, when we enquire as to the relationship between Jerome and the
Greek manuscript or manuscripts used by him, we find that that
manuscript must have been most nearly related to the Sinaiticus, while
it had no sort of connection with Codex D. Whether this result tells in
favour of א or the reverse, we will not pronounce at present: Jerome
certainly avers that he made use of a Graecorum codicum emendata
conlatione ... sed veterum (p. 108), only _veterum_ is a comparative
term, and it might quite well happen that to Jerome that form of text
appeared to be the best which was most recent or most widely circulated
in his neighbourhood, and that he would have nothing to do with such a
singular form of text as D exhibits, even supposing he was acquainted
with it, a point we cannot decide. The intimate connection in various
passages between his text and that of the cursive 473 (2^{pe}) is
remarkable, and especially the many points of resemblance between the
Irish manuscripts (D L R) and the members of the Ferrar Group.
And this brings us back from our survey of the history of the Latin text
to that of the Greek, where we seem to have got at least one fixed point
to begin with in this perplexing chaos, for that is the first impression
we gain on glancing at the mass of Greek manuscripts before us. But here
again our too sanguine hopes are likely to be disappointed, and we shall
learn only too soon that even this is no Archimedean point from which we
are able to regulate this world of disorder.
[Sidenote: Ferrar Group.]
If we find that in a certain number of manuscripts the passage usually
indicated as John vii. 53-viii. 11 occurs in Luke, and in exactly the
same place in each one—viz. after Luke xxi. 38—we must needs conclude
that the manuscripts exhibiting this common peculiarity are intimately
connected with each other. This is the case with the cursives 13, 69,
124, 346, 624, 626. Whether the others that are reckoned in this group
have this same peculiarity, I am not perfectly sure. Now one would
naturally expect that these manuscripts would also coincide in the other
peculiarities characteristic of this group. [Sidenote: Variation.] But
on the contrary, they part company over the very first and most
conspicuous of these—viz. Matthew i. 16. Here, unfortunately, 13 and 69
are defective, but we can compare 124 and 346. And we find that whereas
the former has the usual text, the latter, with the support of 556, 624,
626, exhibits in place of τὸν ἄνδρα ... Χριστός, the reading already
mentioned, ᾧ μνηστευθεῖσα παρθένος Μαριὰμ ἐγέννησεν Ἰησοῦν τὸν λεγόμενον
Χριστόν. Which of these readings is right, or whether both of them may
not be wrong, we need not enquire at present. It is sufficient to point
out that one and the same mother may give birth to very different
children. The specific difference will be inherited from the other of
the two parents, in this case represented by the copyist, and will
depend on whether he is painstaking, careless, violent, arbitrary,
well-informed, or the reverse. But the mother herself has a great number
of hereditary or acquired peculiarities which, the latter no less than
the former, may be transmitted to the children in a variety of ways.
There is perhaps no manuscript in existence which is entirely free from
corrections, while, on the other hand, there are many so overlaid with
corrections that the original writing is scarcely now recognisable.
Codex B, on the whole, is in a very good state of preservation, but it
was supposed lately (see _ThLz._, 1899, col. 176) that its first hand
wrote in John viii. 57, “and Abraham saw thee” instead of “and hast thou
seen Abraham,” as all our editors read in that passage.[163] The
supposition proved to be incorrect, but if that could possibly happen
with B, what must have happened in the case of manuscripts that are so
full of corrections as א and D, if they came to be copied in later
times? Suppose that one scribe took the trouble to copy the text of the
first hand, while another thought it his duty to follow the corrections,
the result would be two manuscripts whose common origin would be
scarcely recognisable. And in the course of centuries how often may not
this process have been repeated. No wonder, therefore, that so few
manuscripts have as yet been clearly made out to be the descendants of
our oldest codices, so as to permit of their being removed from the
board with one sweep, as having no independent testimony to contribute,
as is the case with E_{3} which is merely a bad copy of D_{2} (p. 77),
or that scholars cannot agree as to the relationship existing between
two manuscripts like F_{2} and G_{3} (p. 77).[164] Nor need we be
surprised to find that some of our most peculiar witnesses seem to have
remained absolutely childless, while a less valuable race is perpetuated
in many copies. The words of Homer—οἵη περ φύλλων γενεή, τοίη δὲ καὶ
ἀνδρῶν—may be applied conversely to the leaves to which we entrust our
immortality: habent sua fata libelli. The only unfortunate thing is that
we are so little able to follow the course of these fates by means of
external testimony.
[Sidenote: External testimony.]
When the Emperor Constantine _e.g._ asks Eusebius to supply him with
fifty copies of the Scriptures at once, we cannot but suppose that these
became authoritative over a large area. But in which of the classes into
which our manuscripts have hitherto been divided are we to look for
these now?[165] And conversely if, in another locality, heathen
persecution was directed specially against the Bibles of the Christians,
this cannot have been without some effect. According to C. Hülsen
(_Bilder aus der Geschichte des Kapitols_, Rome, 1899), even the Roman
Bishop Marcellinus, with his deacons Strabo and Cassianus, in the year
304, burned, in front of the temple of Juno Moneta, those Gospels which
ten years later were made the law of Christian Rome by the Emperor
Constantine. These scattered notices must be much more carefully
collected and considered than hitherto, and combined with the results
obtained from the collation of the manuscripts.
[Sidenote: Recensions.]
Most of our information with respect to the =recensions= of the Bible
comes from the Syrian Church, and is concerned rather with the Old
Testament than with the New; but the recensions of the former may throw
some light on those of the latter.
[Sidenote: Lucian.]
(_a_) As the result of their researches, Westcott and Hort have made it
very probable, on internal grounds, that a recension of an official
nature was undertaken in Syria, perhaps at Antioch, about the fourth
century, and that to this recension are due the origin and propagation
of that form of the text of the New Testament which was widely
disseminated in the Byzantine Empire, now represented in our later
minuscules, and made the _textus receptus_ by means of the first printed
editions.
=Lucian=, the celebrated founder of the Antiochean school of exegesis,
suffered martyrdom in the year 311 or 312, most probably the latter. Of
all the names that we know, none has a better claim than his to be
associated with such a recension, and the conjecture derives some
support from the passage of Jerome cited above (p. 85).[166] It is,
perhaps, even better supported by what we know of Lucian’s recension of
the Old Testament. In his preface to the Chronicles, Jerome wrote:
“Alexandria et Aegyptus in Septuaginta suis Hesychium laudat auctorem,
Constantinopolis usque Antiochiam Luciani martyris exemplaria probat,
mediae inter has provinciae Palaestinae (_v.l._ Palaestinos) codices
legunt, quos ab Origene elaboratos Eusebius et Pamphilus vulgaverunt;
totusque orbis hac inter se trifaria varietate compugnat.” Now it is
true that the words of a man like Jerome must not be pressed too far,
and what may have been true in his day might be quite different in a
comparatively short time—think _e.g._ of the fifty copies of the Bible
that Eusebius Pamphili had sent to Constantine, or the Bible or Bibles
sent by Athanasius to Constans[167]—at the same time it has been
established beyond all doubt by Field and Lagarde, that it is to Lucian
we must refer a peculiar recension of the Greek Old Testament preserved
in a good many manuscripts, the one found in the unfortunately small
remnant of the Gothic Old Testament and especially in the numerous
Biblical quotations of the famous theologian John of Antioch, better
known as Chrysostom of Constantinople, who was a pupil of Lucian. The
probability, therefore, is very great that the same thing will hold good
of the New Testament portion of the Bible of Ulfilas and Chrysostom. As
regards the former, Kauffmann has expressed a decided opinion to this
effect in his work on the Gothic Bible cited above (p. 139). The
supposition would be converted into something like certainty if it could
be proved on palæographic grounds that this or that New Testament
manuscript belongs to this or that Old Testament manuscript of Lucianic
derivation as part of what was originally one and the same complete
Bible. This is a point which I am not in a position personally to
investigate, and I must therefore content myself with throwing out this
suggestion, and with adding in support of it that we have the express
testimony of the Menologies for saying that Lucian bequeathed to his
pupils a copy of the Old _and New_ Testaments written in three columns
with his own hand.
There is a statement in the Pseudo-Athanasian Synopsis,[168] which
seems, however, to refer only to the Old Testament portion, to the
effect that it was discovered in a concealed cupboard (πυργίσκος) in the
house of a Jew at Nicomedia in the time of Constantine. Long ago Hug and
Eichhorn attributed the “Asiatic” or “Byzantine” recension to Lucian,
and no decided objection can be established to the view of Hort, which
Gregory also is inclined to accept (_TiGr._, p. 814).[169]
[Sidenote: Hesychius.]
(_b_) It is, on the other hand, somewhat difficult to make out how
matters stand with regard to the recension of =Hesychius=. Jerome
commends it with that of Lucian for the Old Testament, but
contemptuously rejects it for the New; and accordingly, in the decree of
Pope Gelasius, we hear of Gospels “quae falsavit Lucianus, apocrypha,
evangelia quae falsavit Hesychius, apocrypha” (c. vi. 14, 15).
Considering the important position of Alexandria and Egypt, and the vast
number of manuscripts referred with more or less certainty to that
locality, it is the more remarkable that so few unmistakable traces have
as yet been discovered of the recension of which “Alexandria et Aegyptus
... Hesychium laudat auctorem,” and that till the present moment the
most divergent views have been held with regard to it. And this is true
of the Old Testament no less than of the New. One view, for which a good
deal can be said, has already been referred to (p. 61 f.)—viz. that we
have the recension of Hesychius in Codex B. [Sidenote: Codex B.] Rahlfs,
who was the first to connect B with the Canon of Athanasius, says (_lib.
cit._, p. 78, note 7); “If we care to trust ourselves to pure
hypothesis, we might hazard the conjecture that our superb Codex,
manifestly written for one of the principal churches of Egypt, was
prepared at the instigation of St. Athanasius himself. The locality in
which the manuscript was produced supports this conjecture, while the
time is not inconsistent with it.” I am not aware if Rahlfs knew that
Athanasius had executed πυκτία τῶν θείων γραφῶν for Constans, and I am
not sufficiently acquainted with the minutiæ of the ecclesiastical
history of that time, and with the life of Athanasius in particular, to
hazard the assertion that Codex B was prepared by Athanasius for the
Emperor Constans. It is certainly the case, as every Church History
records, that Constans was Prefect of Illyricum and Italy, and that
Athanasius fled to Rome to Julius II., which would help to explain how
Codex B comes to be in that city.[170] I cannot ascertain however from
the books at my command, whether any particular resemblance has been
observed between the text of this manuscript and the Biblical quotations
found in those writings of Athanasius that belong to this period of his
life, that is, prior to the year 350. And, besides, one has always to
take into consideration how very little reliance can be placed as yet on
the text of the Biblical quotations in our editions of the Fathers. In
the Book of Judges B certainly exhibits quite a peculiar form of text
which is not used by the earlier Egyptian teachers, Clement and Origen,
nor even by Didymus (d. 394 or 399), but was employed first by Cyril of
Alexandria, and which is the basis of the Sahidic version. This fact may
have an important bearing on the question as to the text of the New
Testament as well.[171] As early as 1705 Grabe expressed the opinion
that the Sahidic version was the work of Hesychius, but we have very
little information indeed regarding that Church Father, and in
particular as to his connection with the lexicographer of that name.
Here also, the evidence afforded by palæography would need to be
examined with a view to ascertaining whether or not any of the
manuscripts agreeing with B in the Book of Judges—viz. G (Brit. Mus.,
20,002), 16, 30, 52, 53, 58, 63, 77, 85, 131, 144, 209, 236, 237, Catena
Nicephori—has a counterpart in some manuscript of the New Testament. On
Codex G see Rahlfs (p. 35, n. 2), and compare v. Dobschütz (_ThLz._,
1899, 3, 74) on the two New Testament manuscripts Λ and 566^{evv.}
(Greg).[172] According to the latter, the difference in size precludes
the supposition that Λ and 566 are the New Testament portion of the
manuscript described by Rahlfs (_loc. cit._). But if they are not
written by the same scribe, they both undoubtedly come from the same
school of copyists. At most, however, Λ-566 would only possess
importance for the recension of Hesychius if the text they, or rather
it, follows were different from that with which it was collated. Its
subscription shows that it belongs to those exemplars which were
collated with the Codex of Pamphilus. This fact has an important bearing
on the Gospel of the Hebrews. See Zahn, _GK._ ii. 648.
[Sidenote: Eusebius-Pamphilus.]
(_c_) We have nearly as little certain information regarding the third,
and perhaps most important, of the recensions mentioned by Jerome in
connection with the Old Testament, that of =Eusebius= and =Pamphilus=,
which goes back to Origen.[173] [Sidenote: Origen.] So far as I know,
the references which Origen makes in his extant writings to his own
labours in the field of textual criticism, relate only to the Old
Testament. At the same time his complaint as to the evil condition of
the manuscripts of his day refers to the New Testament, and to the
Gospels in particular. Νυνὶ δὲ δηλονότι, he says, in his _Commentary on
Matthew_, Bk. xv. 14, πολλὴ γέγονεν ἡ τῶν ἀντιγράφων διαφορά, εἴτε ἀπὸ
ῥᾳθυμίας τινῶν γραφέων, εἴτε ἀπὸ τόλμης τινῶν μοχθηρᾶς τῆς διορθώσεως
τῶν γραφομένων, εἴτε καὶ ἀπὸ τῶν τὰ ἑαυτοῖς δοκοῦντα ἐν τῇ διορθώσει
προστιθέντων ἢ ἀφαιρούντων.[174] He tells us in the same place how, θεοῦ
διδόντος, he found ways and means of remedying the evil by the
employment of the critical symbols of Homeric commentators, the obelus
and asterisk, τὴν μὲν οὖν ἐν τοῖς ἀντιγράφοις τῆς παλαιᾶς διαθήκης
διαφωνίαν, θεοῦ διδόντος, εὕρομεν ἰάσασθαι. According to his own express
declaration, supposing it to have been correctly preserved, for it is
only extant in Latin, his work in textual criticism at that time at
least was confined to the Old Testament: in exemplaribus autem Novi
Testamenti hoc ipsum me posse facere sine periculo non putavi. Von
Gebhardt consequently says (_Urt._, 25) that this statement from
Origen’s own mouth should have kept anyone from ascribing a formal
recension of the New Testament text to him, alluding to Hug’s system of
recensions; but at the same time he will not deny that the works of
Origen, who was a man of conspicuous critical accuracy, are of the
highest importance for the criticism of the text of the New Testament.
As a matter of fact, later church teachers appeal chiefly to Origen’s
manuscripts of the Old Testament, but several references are also found
to his New Testament manuscripts. On Gal. iii. 1, Jerome remarks (ii.
418): legitur in quibusdam codicibus, Quis vos fascinavit non credere
veritati? Sed hoc (meaning, of course, the last three words only) quia
in exemplaribus Adamantii non habetur, omisimus. The words are a gloss
interpolated from ch. v. 7, but they are also found in Origen, though
only in the Latin translation of Rufinus, and they appear, among our
Greek manuscripts, in C D^c E K L P, and likewise in most codices of the
Vulgate (see Wordsworth and White, p. 659). The same writer says on
Matthew xxiv. 36 (ii. 199): in quibusdam latinis exemplaribus additum
est “neque filius,” quum in Graecis et maxime Adamantii et Pierii
exemplaribus hoc non habeatur additum; sed quia in nonnullis legitur,
disserendum videtur (W. and W., p. 658). Pierius is no doubt the
Presbyter of Alexandria who lived at Rome after the Diocletian
persecution. He was styled “the younger Origen” on account of his
learning, and was perhaps the teacher of Pamphilus (Jerome, _Viri Ill._,
76; Eusebius, _Eccl. Hist._, vii. 32). Adamantius, like Chalkenteros, is
a surname of honour given to Origen. Here again, it is a strange fact
that the words which Jerome says were omitted in Origen’s exemplar are
found in a certain passage of his works also extant only in Latin, and
there expounded so fully that there cannot be the slightest doubt that
he had them in his text, and, moreover, had no conception of their
omission in other copies. What explanation, if any, can be given of this
fact we need not pause to enquire. Nor need we take up the question
where Jerome obtained access to the exemplars of Pierius. I suppose it
would be in Caesarea, where he also saw the (Bible?) volumes of Origen
transcribed by Pamphilus with his own hand, and actually obtained
possession of his copy of the commentary on the Minor Prophets.[175]
Even supposing that what is meant by _exemplaria Adamantii_ is not
really a recension of the text of the Bible but simply the copy that
Origen used most or used last, that copy might have been authoritative
for Pamphilus if not for Eusebius, and so far, therefore, it becomes
necessary for us to try and discover the Origenic text in the New
Testament as well as in the Old. At all events a good many of our
manuscripts go back to Pamphilus, and particularly H of the Pauline
Epistles. In addition to a very practical suggestion as to the lending
of books,[176] and a notice of its preparation and of the original
writer, this manuscript has also the following note: ἀντεβλήθη δὲ ἡ
βίβλος πρὸς τὸ ἐν Καισαρίᾳ ἀντίγραφον τῆς βιβλιοθήκης τοῦ ἁγίου Παμφίλου
χειρὶ γεγραμμένον (αὐτοῦ). From this subscription Field (_Hexapla_, i.
p. xcix) has concluded that the library of Pamphilus was still in
existence in the sixth century, but it is doubtful whether the
subscription may not have been found in the original of H and copied
into it along with the text, as is the case with a similar note copied
into the minuscules 15, 83, 173. [Sidenote: Euthalius.] In any case this
manuscript is our principal witness for the recension of Pamphilus, or,
as it used to be called, the recension of =Euthalius=.[177] I have no
intention of discussing the question whether it should be Euthalius or
Evagrius: Von Dobschütz (_Euthaliusstudien_, p. 152 n. 1) has promised
to give us further particulars as to the Syriac texts relating to the
subject. I would merely call attention to two facts, viz.—
[Sidenote: Harklean.]
(1) That the subscription testifying to a collation with the exemplar of
Pamphilus is found also at the end of the Harklean Syriac published by
Bensly (see above, pp. 79, 106).
[Sidenote: Evagrius.]
(2) That the name =Evagrius=, which Ehrhard proposes to read in place of
Euthalius in Codex H, is actually found associated with the library of
Pamphilus in another manuscript of the Old Testament. In his _Notitia
editionis codicis Bibliorum Sinaitici_ (Lipsiæ, 1860), pp. 73-122,
Tischendorf published “Ex Codicibus Insulae Patmi, Ineditum Diodori
Siculi; Origenis Scholia in Proverbia Salomonis.” The latter he took
from a manuscript which, according to H. O. Coxe’s _Report ... on the
Greek MSS. yet remaining in the Levant_ (1858, p. 61), professed to
contain “Origenis Hexapla cum Scholiis” after the Philocalia. In reality
they are Origen’s Scholia on the Proverbs which Angelo Mai had published
in a different form from the Vatican Catena 1802, in the _Nova Patrum
Bibliotheca_, 1854. In the Patmos manuscript the scholia proper are
prefaced by two (or three) explanatory notes on the use of the obelus
and the asterisk, and on the different arrangement of the chapters in
the Hebrew and Greek texts, followed by another explanation of the same
sort under the title Εὐαγρίου σχόλιον.[178] Who they are that are
referred to in the scholion as having collated the book (τῶν
ἀντιβεβληκότων τὸ βιβλίον) we learn from the subscription, which says:
μετελήφθησαν ἀφ’ ὧν εὕρομεν ἑξαπλῶν καὶ πάλιν αὐτὰ χειρὶ (_leg._
αὐτόχειρι) Πάμφιλος καὶ Εὐσέβιος διορθώσαντο. This subscription, which
Oikonomos published fully fifty years ago from that Patmos
manuscript,[179] should be added to those usually cited—viz. those
appended to Ezra and Esther in א, to Isaiah and Ezekiel in Codex
Marchalianus, to 3 and 4 Kings in the Syriac Hexapla, and to Ezekiel in
Codex Chisianus 88.
With what has been said the student should compare what Von der Goltz
tells us of a critical work upon the text of the New Testament belonging
partly to the tenth and partly to the sixth century.[180] This, too,
goes back to Origen, and in a scholion on James ii. 3, the greater part
of which is unfortunately erased, the work mentions “a manuscript
written by the hand of St. Eusebius.” As Zahn elsewhere shows, the
writer of the Athos manuscript did not base his own work on this Codex
of Eusebius, and in one passage he expressly contrasts it with the text
of Origen which he follows. In spite of this, however, this Athos
manuscript must be taken into account in dealing with the recension of
Pamphilus. Still more so must the Armenian and Syriac texts, according
to Conybeare and von Dobschütz.[181] Even the Latin manuscripts may
contain traces of this recension. E. Riggenbach has shown that the table
of chapters in Hebrews given in Codex Fuldensis and in a manuscript
indicated as Cod. Vat. Reg. 9, is nothing but a translation of the
corresponding part of “Euthalius.”[182] Unfortunately the relics of the
literary activity of Pamphilus, that devoted student of the
Scriptures,[183] are exceedingly scanty, and what little is left is
extant only in a Latin translation. In these circumstances the attempt
to specify more closely than hitherto his manuscripts of the Bible by
means of his quotations does seem rather hopeless.
[Sidenote: Later revisers.]
(_d_) As we are now dealing with the question how to arrive at the
oldest form of the Greek text, it is unnecessary to take account of the
labours of any later individuals in the formation of the Greek New
Testament. Among these were Emperors and Empresses like Constantine and
Constans, who exerted themselves in the dissemination of the Scriptures,
and perhaps even made copies of them with their own hands, but these we
may disregard.[184] The work of _Andreas_ and _Arethas_ on the
Apocalypse will be noticed when we come to speak of that book. One
naturally turns here to Krumbacher’s _History of Byzantine Literature_,
but the index to the first edition of that work contains only two
references to the New Testament, neither of them bearing on our present
subject. The matter is one which may be commended to those who have the
time and the opportunity and the willingness to investigate it, and
considering the ardour with which the study of Byzantine antiquities is
being prosecuted at present, it may suffice merely to throw out this
hint.
[Sidenote: Pre-Origenic texts.]
(_e_) So far as we have gone, therefore, it appears that much
uncertainty prevails regarding the text formations we have already
considered—those of Lucian, Hesychius, Pamphilus, and the Ferrar Group.
Considering the amount of evidence at our command—how the external
testimony points in the same direction as the manuscripts themselves,
and, indeed, how probable is the whole nature of the operation in
question—one would expect these to be the most easily distinguishable of
all. Indeed, even so cautious an enquirer as Zahn speaks without any
hesitation of “the official recensions originating subsequent to the
time of Origen” (_ThLbl._, 1899, 180). The vagueness of our conclusions
with respect to these recensions does not look very promising for the
result of our investigation of the text prior to the time of Origen,
when activity in this field was more disconnected and might be said to
run wild and unrestrained. And there is this further difficulty that
some of the writers who fall to be considered in this period came in
later times more or less justly under the imputation of heresy, with the
consequence that the results of their labours were less widely
disseminated, if not deliberately suppressed. In circumstances like
these any attempted revision of the text must have been equally
mischievous, whether it proceeded from the orthodox side or from the
opposite. That there were διορθωταί who were supposed to correct the
text in the interests of orthodoxy we have already learned from
Epiphanius. Indeed, from our point of view the action of the orthodox
correctors must be thought the more regrettable of the two, since the
books without a doubt parted at their hands with many vivid, strange,
and even fantastic traits of language. Even in the matter of style it
seems to me incontestable that it was at their hands that the Gospels
received that reserved and solemn tone which we would not now willingly
part with, and which can be compared to nothing so much as to those
solemn pictures of Christ that we see painted on a golden background in
Byzantine churches. For myself, at least, I have not the slightest doubt
that the Gospel, and the Gospel particularly, was originally narrated in
a much more vivacious style. Just consider this, for example. In all our
present authorities—Greek manuscripts, ancient versions, Syriac,
Egyptian, and so forth, and in all the Church Fathers without exception,
so far as I am aware—we read the beautiful words: “your Father knoweth
what things ye have need of before ye ask Him,” πρὸ τοῦ ὑμᾶς αἰτῆσαι
αὐτόν (Matt. vi. 8). Compare with this what we find singly and solely in
Codex D and the Old Latin h, πρὸ τοῦ ἀνοῖξαι τὸ στόμα, antequam os
aperiatis, “before ever you open your mouth.” To me it is a striking
indication to what an extent the instinctive sense of originality is
wanting, that a reading like this is not inserted by Westcott and Hort
among their Noteworthy Rejected Readings, nor even cited by Baljon in
his critical apparatus, and that our commentators have not a single
syllable about it, so that our students and preachers know nothing
whatever of this form of the words of Jesus. If my edition of the New
Testament did no more than bring such things to the notice of those who
previously were unacquainted with them, I should consider it had done no
small service. But take another illustration from the parable of the
Barren Fig Tree. “Cut it down, why cumbereth it the ground,”—that is how
our ordinary texts give the commandment of the justly indignant
husbandman in Luke xiii. 7: ἔκκοψον αὐτήν· ἱνατί καὶ τὴν γῆν καταργεῖ.
Here again, the great majority of our witnesses of every sort exhibit no
variation worth mentioning, except that a good many (A L T etc.) insert
a very prosy οὖν after the imperative, while B 80 read τὸν τόπον for τὴν
γῆν. And in the answer of the vine-dresser (verse 8), “till I shall dig
about it and dung it,” there is again no various reading in our ordinary
witnesses of all kinds except the insignificant interchange of (βάλω)
κόπρια, κοπρίαν, and κόπρον. What a difference do we find here also in
the text of D: “bring the axe,” φέρε τὴν ἀξίνην, adfers securem; and, “I
will throw in a basket of dung,” βάλω κόφινον κοπρίων, mittam qualum (=
squalum) stercoris d, or cophinum stercoris a b c f ff^2 i l q, from
which it was taken into the Codex of Marmoutier, a copy of the Alcuinian
recension of the Vulgate written in gold.[185] Here again, our editors
and commentators for the most part take no notice. “Bring the axe” is
omitted by Weiss, father and son, Westcott-Hort, Tregelles, and also by
Baljon, while Holtzmann ignores both variants. It stands to reason, of
course, that greater vivacity of style is not of itself an actual proof
of greater originality. But the whole question is raised as to the
principles by which we are to be guided in estimating the comparative
value of the witnesses. One might be inclined to regard such
peculiarities as due to the caprice of some scribe by whom D or its
parent manuscript was written. As a matter of fact, Westcott and Hort,
and most recent editors with them, do so regard them, seeing they cite
the reading of D neither in Matt. vi. 8 nor in Luke xiii. 7. In the
latter passage one might be inclined to take that view of the case,
because as yet we have no other testimony to φέρε τὴν ἀξίνην than D d.
But it is not so likely in the case of Matt. vi. 8, seeing that here the
testimony of D is supported by that of h. To justify our neglect of
these witnesses, we should require to prove either that h is derived
from D or D from h.[186] So far as my knowledge goes, no one has yet
maintained the latter view. The derivation of h from D is an
impossibility, for this reason alone that h belongs either to the
fourth, or, what is perhaps more likely, to the fifth century (see p.
113).[187] The truth is, rather, that we have in h a second and
independent witness to the fact that at a very early date the text of
Matt. vi. 8 read, “before you open your mouth.” But it is quite
impossible to ignore the evidence of D in Luke xiii. 8 (κόφινον
κοπρίων). Here too, of course, one might take exception and say that as
D is bilingual, its Greek text might be derived from the Latin.
Fortunately, however, it happens that the Latin of D, that is, d,
differs from all the other eight Latin witnesses in reading not
_cophinus_ but _qualus_, and it is _cophinus_ that is a loan word from
the Greek[188]; so that this objection, actually raised against D in the
case of other readings, does not apply to this one. There is this to be
observed, moreover—a point not given in Tischendorf, but noticed in
Westcott and Hort—viz., that Origen also seems to have read “basket.”
The passage is again one that is extant only in the Latin translation of
Rufinus, and Tischendorf cites Or. 3, 452 among the witnesses supporting
κόπρια; but Westcott and Hort expressly mention that Origen’s context
appears to support the reading κόφινον (“Lev. lat. Ruf., 190, apparently
with context”).
Here, then, we have these three stages:—
(1) D d alone, φέρε τὴν ἀξίνην—_i.e._ one solitary Greek manuscript.
(2) D supported by h, ἀνοῖξαι τὸ στόμα—_i.e._ the same solitary
Greek manuscript with the addition of one representative of a
version.
(3) D supported by eight Latin manuscripts and Origen, κόφινον
κοπρίων—_i.e._ the same solitary Greek manuscript with the addition
of eight representatives of one version and one not absolutely
certain quotation.
What then? Can it be allowable to judge a reading’s claim to be
mentioned and considered from the number of the witnesses supporting it,
and like Westcott and Hort and Baljon to mention the third only, and
take no notice of the other two? I think not. For just as in certain
circumstances the correct reading may no longer appear in any
manuscript, but must be determined by conjecture, so in another case the
truth may have only one solitary representative left to support it
against a whole world of adversaries (Heb. xii. 3), and this solitary
witness either a manuscript, a version, or a quotation. On the other
hand, it may have a whole cloud of witnesses accompanying it and
supporting it. In matters of this kind numbers have nothing to do with
the case whatever. To speak of majorities is nonsense. The true man is
willing and able to stand alone, and to many a witness of this sort we
must apply the words of Socrates: ἃ μὲν συνῆκα γενναῖα· οἶμαι δὲ καὶ ἃ
μὴ συνῆκα. If we have been able to verify the word of a witness once,
several times, frequently, then we shall be willing to trust him even in
cases where we cannot check his evidence. Of course we must make
allowance for human fallibility—quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus; least
of all in matters of this kind must we look for inerrancy. A manuscript
whose testimony was decisive on every point would be even a greater
miracle than a book printed without a single error at the time of the
Incunabula, which the printers of that age would have regarded as an
eighth wonder of the world. But how to estimate the character of such a
witness, seeing that the subjective feeling, the instinctive perception
of what is original, is as little to be trusted as the number of the
witnesses—that is the difficulty. And what is the point that our
discussion has brought us to? From the “official recensions of the text”
made in the later centuries, we sought to get back to similar works of
earlier times, and we found that the original text may have suffered as
much at the hands of orthodox revisers and correctors, who toned down
and obscured the fresh colouring of the ancient records, as at the hands
of heretics who inserted foreign and extraneous elements.[189]
Unfortunately very little definite information has come down to us from
those early times, and as that relates more to the history of the canon
than of the text, reference must be made here to the monumental work of
Zahn.[190] Two figures, however, emerge from this chaos who have left
their traces on the history of the text as well, =Tatian= and =Marcion=,
the former chiefly in connection with the Gospels, the latter with the
Pauline Epistles. Both have been already referred to more than once in
the chapter on the “Materials” (Tatian, p. 97 f.; Marcion, pp. 76, 87),
and both will require careful consideration here in our treatment of the
principles involved in the reconstruction of the text. How much would be
achieved could we but restore the original work of Tatian upon the
Gospels, or the _Gospel_ and the _Apostle_ of Marcion!
[Sidenote: Heretics.]
(_f_) Before speaking of their work, however, there are still a few less
important notices to be gleaned from their own and the preceding time.
Nearly all the =heretics= were in turn accused of falsifying the
Scriptures. In this sense, also, the Dutch proverb is true, “jedere
ketter heeft zijn letter” (every heretic has his letter, his text of the
Scriptures). In early times Justin charged the Jews with such
falsification in the Old Testament, and Lagarde was sometimes inclined
to suspect that the Massoretic numbers in Genesis had been manipulated
by the opponents of Christianity. Such complaints were most frequently
made against the Gnostics, particularly the Valentinians, and when we
glance over the long lists of apocryphal and pseudepigraphical
writings,[191] it is abundantly evident that at various times there was
a good deal of falsification—_i.e._, a good deal written under false
names. At the same time it cannot be denied that alterations were also
made on early Christian works and the books of Scripture in the
interests of dogma. These alterations are of all sorts, ranging from
quite harmless changes made in all innocence to supposed corrections,
and, it may be, even wilful corruptions.[192] But most assuredly the
heretics are not alone in being chargeable with this offence: Iliacos
intra muros peccatur et extra.
As Jülicher (_Einl._, 378) points out, the orthodox Church teachers were
very fond of making this charge against the heretics: παραλλάσσειν,
παραχαράσσειν, ῥᾳδιουργεῖν, διαφθείρειν, ἐξαιρεῖν, ἀφανίζειν, κατορθοῦν
(ironically), ἀποκόπτειν, παρακόπτειν, περικόπτειν, μετατιθέναι,
προστιθέναι, interpolare, adulterare, violare, corrodere, dissecare,
auferre, delere, emendare (ironically), eradere, subvertere, extinguere,
these are some of the expressions we hear in this connection. Marcion
gave occasion to the reproach by his edition of the Gospel of Luke and
the Epistles of Paul, but against the rest of the Gnostics, especially
the Valentinians, against the Artemonites, Novatians, Arians, and
Donatists, and against the Nestorians, the same accusation is made as
was formerly brought against the Jews. Even within the pale of the
Church one party attributed such practices to the other. Ambrosiaster,
_e.g._, believed that in the case of important discrepancies between the
Greek and Latin manuscripts, the variations were due to the presumption
of the Greek writers who had interpolated spurious matter. Jerome was
afraid this would be said of him if he ventured to make the slightest
alteration: quis doctus pariter vel indoctus non statim erumpat in
vocem, me falsarium, me, clamans, esse sacrilegum qui audeam aliquid in
veteribus libris addere, mutare, corrigere! The curse in Apoc. xxii. 18
f. was also referred to the “falsifiers,” who thought it more convincing
and more reverent to observe the rules of grammar and logic than to
abide by all the peculiar expressions in the Scriptures. At a meeting of
Cyprian bishops, about the year 350, when one of them, in quoting the
verse John v. 8, substituted for κράβαττος the better Greek word
σκίμπους, another shouted to him in the hearing of all the multitude,
“Art thou better than he who said κράβαττος that thou art ashamed to use
his words?”[193] And it is a well-known fact that in the time of
Augustine there was very nearly an uproar in an African congregation
over Jonah’s “gourd” (cucurbita) or Jonah’s “ivy” (hedera). A few
references at least may be collected here:—
(1) On a certain Sunday[194] in the year 170 or thereabouts,
Dionysius, Bishop of Corinth, wrote a letter to the Church at Rome
through their Bishop Soter, of which Eusebius has preserved the
following among other passages (_Eccl. Hist._, iv. 23):—Ἐπιστολὰς
γὰρ ἀδελφῶν ἀξιωσάντων με γράψαι ἔγραψα. Καὶ ταύτας οἱ τοῦ διαβόλου
ἀπόστολοι[195] ζιζανίων γεγέμικαν, ἃ μὲν ἐξαιροῦντες, ἃ δὲ
προστιθέντες. Οἷς τὸ οὐαὶ κεῖται.[196] Οὐ θαυμαστὸν ἄρα,[197] εἰ καὶ
τῶν Κυριακῶν ῥᾳδιουργῆσαί τινες ἐπιβέβληνται γραφῶν, ὁπότε καὶ ταῖς
οὐ τοιαύταις ἐπιβεβουλεύκασι. The κυριακαὶ γραφαὶ are in all
likelihood the Gospels (the Syriac renders “the writings of our
Lord”), but may also include the Pauline Epistles and the O.T. If we
are to take the words of Dionysius in their strict sense, it would
appear that these writings, like his own letters, had been corrupted
by means of “additions” and “omissions.” The last sentence, if it is
put correctly, and if it has been faithfully transmitted, leads us
to infer that in his letter to Corinth Soter had expressed his
surprise that the writings of the Lord should have been falsified.
To which Dionysius replies that certain letters of his own had been
falsified also, and that it was therefore no wonder if they did the
same to the writings of the Lord, seeing they tampered also (or,
_even_) with those that were inferior to them. The simplest
explanation of the words is, undoubtedly, that Dionysius sought to
console himself over the fate that had befallen his letters, by
reflecting that it was not surprising that they had falsified his
letters of less importance, seeing they had presumed to do the same
_even_ to the writings of the Lord. On the first interpretation, one
would certainly expect Dionysius to use a stronger expression to
describe his feelings at the manipulation of the sacred writings
than the mere οὐ θαυμαστόν. Who are meant by τινές? One most
naturally thinks of Marcion. According to a later account, Soter,
whom Jerome does not mention among the writers, composed a book
against the Montanists.
[Sidenote: Artemonites.]
(2) In the last chapter of the Fifth Book of his Ecclesiastical
History (c. xxviii.), entitled Περὶ τῶν τὴν Ἀρτέμωνος αἵρεσιν
ἐξαρχῆς προβεβλημένων· οἷοί τε τὸν τρόπον γεγόνασι καὶ ὅπως τὰς
ἁγίας γραφὰς διαφθεῖραι τετολμήκασιν, Eusebius quotes the following
complaint from an earlier source, entitled the _Little Labyrinth_ (±
235):—Γραφὰς μὲν θείας ἀφόβως ῥερᾳδιουργήκασιν, πίστεως δὲ ἀρχαίας
κανόνα ἠθετήκασι, Χριστὸν δὲ ἠγνοήκασιν, οὐ τί αἱ θεῖαι λέγουσι
γραφαὶ ζητοῦντες, but occupying themselves with Logic, Geometry,
Euclid, Aristotle, Theophrastus, and Galen, ταῖς τῶν ἀπίστων
τέχναις, τὴν ἁπλῆν τῶν θείων γραφῶν πίστιν καπηλεύοντες ... διὰ
τοῦτο ταῖς θείαις γραφαῖς ἀφόβως ἐπέβαλον τὰς χεῖρας, _λέγοντες
αὐτὰς διωρθωκέναι_. Καὶ ὅτι τοῦτο μὴ καταψευδόμενος αὐτῶν λέγω, ὁ
βουλόμενος δύναται μαθεῖν. Εἰ γάρ τις θελήσει συγκομίσας αὐτῶν
ἑκάστου _τὰ ἀντίγραφα_ ἐξετάζειν πρὸς ἄλληλα, κατὰ πολὺ ἂν εὕροι
διαφωνοῦντα. Ἀσύμφωνα γοῦν ἔσται τὰ Ἀσκληπιάδου τοῖς Θεοδότου·
Πολλῶν δὲ ἔστιν εὐπορῆσαι διὰ τὸ φιλοτίμως ἐγγεγράφθαι τοὺς μαθητὰς
αὐτῶν τὰ ὑφ’ ἑκάστου αὐτῶν, ὡς αὐτοὶ καλοῦσι _κατωρθωμένα_ τουτέστιν
ἠφανισμένα. Πάλιν δὲ τούτοις τὰ Ἑρμοφίλου οὐ συνᾴδει. Τὰ γὰρ
Ἀπολλωνίδου οὐδὲ αὐτὰ ἑαυτοῖς ἐστι σύμφωνα. Ἔνεστι γὰρ συγκρῖναι τὰ
πρότερον ὑπ’ αὐτῶν[198] κατασκευασθέντα τοῖς ὕστερον πάλιν
ἐπιδιαστραφεῖσι, καὶ εὑρεῖν κατὰ πολὺ ἀπᾴδοντα. Ὅσης δὲ τόλμης ἐστὶ
τοῦτο τὸ ἁμάρτημα, εἰκὸς μηδὲ ἐκείνους ἀγνοεῖν. Ἢ γὰρ οὐ πιστεύουσιν
Ἁγίῳ Πνεύματι λελέχθαι τὰς θείας γραφὰς, καί εἰσιν ἄπιστοι· ἢ
ἑαυτοὺς ἡγοῦνται σοφωτέρους τοῦ Ἁγίου Πνεύματος ὑπάρχειν, καὶ τί
ἕτερον ἢ δαιμονῶσιν; Οὐδὲ γὰρ ἀρνήσασθαι δύνανται ἑαυτῶν εἶναι τὸ
τόλμημα, ὁπόταν καὶ τῇ αὐτῶν χειρὶ ᾖ γεγραμμένα, καὶ παρ’ ὧν
κατηχήθησαν μὴ τοιαύτας παρέλαβον τὰς γραφάς· καὶ δεῖξαι ἀντίγραφα,
ὅθεν αὐτὰ μετεγράψαντο, μὴ ἔχωσιν. Ἔνιοι δὲ αὐτῶν οὐδὲ παραχαράσσειν
ἠξίωσαν αὐτὰς, ἀλλ’ ἁπλῶς ἀρνησάμενοι τόν τε νόμον καὶ τοὺς προφήτας
ἀνόμου καὶ ἀθέου διδασκαλίας προφάσει χάριτος, εἰς ἔσχατον ἀπωλείας
ὄλεθρον κατωλίσθησαν.
The passage is very instructive. We learn that copies of the
writings of these heretics were to be found in abundance, because
their disciples eagerly inserted their emendations in their texts,
“each one’s emendations, as they style them, but in reality they are
corruptions,” as the Syriac has it. At the same time, it is not
quite certain that κατωρθωμένα really means corrected manuscripts of
the Bible, and not the heretics’ own works—_i.e._, whether we should
understand ἀντίγραφα τῶν θείων γραφῶν after τὰ Ἀσκληπιάδου, τὰ
Θεοδότου, τὰ Ἑρμοφίλου, τὰ Ἀπολλωνίδου and not rather γράμματα or
συντάγματα. In the former case we shall have to search for a
recension of Asclepiades, of Theodotus, of Hermophilus, and in the
case of Apollonides for a double recension, an earlier and a later.
This interpretation of the words does certainly receive support from
the positive way in which the historian argues from the conduct of
these heretics, that they either did not believe in any inspiration
of the holy Scriptures, or thought they could write better
themselves, and also from his remark that they did not receive τὰς
γραφάς in that form (τοιαύτας) from their (Christian) instructors,
and were not able to show any older copies from which their own were
transcribed. From the mention of the Law and the Prophets, we may
conclude that the reference is mainly to the O. T. Epiphanius
mentions the Theodotians as appealing to Deut. xviii. 15, Jer. xvii.
9, Isa. liii. 3, Matt. xii. 31, Luke i. 35, John viii. 40, Acts ii.
22, 1 Tim. ii. 5; while Hippolytus argues against them on the ground
that in John i. 14, it is not τὸ πνεῦμα but ὁ λόγος σάρξ ἐγένετο. No
sure traces, however, can be discovered in any of these N. T.
passages of their supposed trenchant criticism of the text. The most
probable instance is Luke i. 35. “If we may trust the statement of
Epiphanius,” says Harnack (_Monarchianismus_, PRE^3, x. 188),
“Theodotus wished to separate the second half of the sentence from
the first (διὸ καὶ τὸ γεννώμενον ἐκ σοῦ ἅγιον κληθήσεται, υἱὸς
Θεοῦ),[199] as if the words διὸ καὶ were wanting, which makes the
sentence imply that the divine Sonship of Christ rests on his
approving himself. But perhaps Theodotus omitted διὸ καὶ altogether,
just as he seems to have read πνεῦμα κυρίου instead of πνεῦμα ἅγιον,
in order to obviate all ambiguity.” The latter reading is not
mentioned in Tischendorf, and the remark of Epiphanius in my opinion
amounts to this, that whereas he understood ἅγιον to be the subject
of the sentence, Theodotus made it the predicate and separated it
from γεννώμενον.[200]
[Sidenote: Marcosians.]
(3) Speaking of the Marcosians,[201] Irenæus says (92):—Ἔνια δὲ καὶ
τῶν ἐν Εὐαγγελίῳ κειμένων εἰς τοῦτον τὸν χαρακτῆρα μεθαρμόζουσιν ...
ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐν τῷ εἰρηκέναι· πολλάκις ἐπεθύμησα ἀκοῦσαι ἕνα τῶν λόγων
καὶ οὐκ ἔσχον τὸν ἐροῦντα, ἐμφαίνοντός φασι δεῖν διὰ τοῦ ἑνὸς τὸν
ἀληθῶς ἕνα Θεόν. This seems to contain a reference to Matt. xiii.
17, but what is complained of is a false interpretation of the words
of Scripture rather than an actual alteration of the text
itself.[202] The still earlier passage, Polycarp vii. 1, is also to
be taken as referring to this practice, ὃς ἂν μεθοδεύῃ τὰ λόγια τοῦ
Κυρίου πρὸς τὰς ἰδίας ἐπιθυμίας καὶ λέγῃ μήτε ἀνάστασιν μήτε κρίσιν
[εἶναι], οὗτος πρωτότοκός ἐστι τοῦ Σατανᾶ. For the exposition of the
passage see Zahn, _GK._ i. 842.
[Sidenote: Basilides.]
(4) That Basilides[203] altered the text of the Gospels as received
by the Church in accordance with his own religious and ethical
views, and incorporated them in their altered form in his
_Evangelium_, is shown by Zahn on Matt. xix. 10-12 (_GK._ i. 771).
He shows also that the form into which Basilides cast the Synoptic
narrative may have prepared the way for the belief that Simon the
Cyrenian was crucified instead of Jesus, if this was really his
doctrine.
[Sidenote: Noëtus.]
(5) Hippolytus says of Noëtus (Lagarde’s edition, 45, 19): ὁπόταν
γὰρ θελήσωσιν πανουργεύεσθαι, _περικόπτουσι_ τὰς γραφάς. He means by
this, according to Zahn, that the Noetians garbled their quotations,
and made selections of Scriptural sayings without paying regard to
the context. But compare _ibid._, line 7 ff., αἱ μὲν γὰρ γραφαὶ
ὀρθῶς λέγουσιν, ἀλλὰ ἂν καὶ Νόητος νοῇ· οὐκ ἤδη δὲ εἰ Νόητος μὴ
νοεῖ, παρὰ τοῦτο _ἔκβλητοι_ αἱ γραφαί.
[Sidenote: Valentinians.]
(6) Heracleon,[204] the Valentinian, is said to have read πέντε
instead of ἕξ in John ii. 20, but whether he made the alteration
himself or found the former reading in his exemplar is not clearly
made out. There is no notice of the variant in Tischendorf, Baljon,
or in our commentaries. It is mentioned by Scrivener, _Introd._, ii.
260, n. 3, where reference is made to Lightfoot’s _Colossians_, p.
336, n. 1. Origen, commenting on John i. 28, cites Heracleon in
support of the reading “Bethany,” which, he says, “is found in
almost all the manuscripts.”
In contrast to the Marcionites and their practice of mutilating the
Scriptures, Irenæus says of the Valentinians (iii. 12, 12):
scripturas quidem confitentur, interpretationes vero convertunt,
quemadmodum ostendimus in primo libro. There we read (i. 3, 6): καὶ
οὐ μόνον ἐκ τῶν εὐαγγελικῶν καὶ τῶν ἀποστολικῶν πειρῶνται τὰς
ἀποδείξεις ποιεῖσθαι παρατρέποντες τὰς ἑρμηνείας καὶ ῥᾳδιουργοῦντες
τὰς ἐξηγήσεις, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἐκ νόμου καὶ προφητῶν. But in i. 11, 9 he
says of them: Illi vero qui sunt a Valentino ... suas conscriptiones
proferentes, plura habere gloriantur quam sint ipsa evangelia,
siquidem in tantum processerunt audaciae, uti quod ab his non olim
scriptum est, “veritatis evangelium” titulent, in nihilo conveniens
apostolorum evangeliis, ut nec evangelium sit apud eos sine
blasphemia. For the continuation and discussion of the passage, see
Zahn, _GK._ ii. 748. See also Westcott, _Canon_, p. 298 ff.
Zahn (_GK._ ii. 755) endeavours to show that they corrected the text
of the manuscripts, by the omission of ὑπὲρ αὐτῶν, _e.g._, in 1 Cor.
xv. 29, and the insertion of θεότητες in Col. i. 16.
In i. 8, 1, Irenæus accuses them of ἐξ ἀγράφων ἀναγινώσκοντες καὶ τὸ
δὴ λεγόμενον ἐξ ἄμμου σχοίνια πλέκεις ἐπιτηδεύοντες. The proverb is
from Ahikar.
The well-known charge made by Celsus (_Orig. con. Cels._, 2, 27;
Koetschau, i. 156) and the answer of Origen refer partly to the
re-writing of manuscripts and partly to their alteration: Μετὰ ταῦτά
τινας τῶν πιστευόντων φησὶν (Celsus) ὡς ἐκ μέθης ἥκοντας εἰς τὸ
ἐφεστάναι αὑτοῖς _μεταχαράττειν_ ἐκ τῆς πρώτης γραφῆς τὸ εὐαγγέλιον
τριχῇ καὶ τετραχῇ καὶ πολλαχῇ, ἵν’ ἔχοιεν πρὸς τοὺς ἐλέγχους
ἀρνεῖσθαι. Μεταχαράξαντας δὲ τὸ εὐαγγέλιον ἄλλους οὐκ οἶδα ἢ τοὺς
ἀπὸ Μαρκίωνος καὶ τοὺς ἀπὸ Οὐαλεντίνου οἶμαι δὲ καὶ τοὺς ἀπὸ
Λουκιάνου. Τοῦτο δὲ λεγόμενον οὐ τοῦ λόγου ἐστὶν ἔγκλημα ἀλλὰ τῶν
τολμησάντων ῥᾳδιουργῆσαι τὰ εὐαγγέλια. Καὶ ὥσπερ οὐ φιλοσοφίας
ἔγκλημά εἰσιν οἱ σοφισταὶ ἢ οἱ Ἐπικούρειοι ἢ οἱ Περιπατητικοὶ ἢ
οἵτινές ποτ’ ἂν ὦσιν οἱ ψευδοδοξοῦντες, οὕτως οὐ τοῦ ἀληθινοῦ
χριστιανισμοῦ ἔγκλημα οἱ μεταχαράττοντες τὰ εὐαγγέλια καὶ αἱρέσεις
ξένας ἐπεισάγοντες τῷ βουλήματι τῆς Ἰησοῦ διδασκαλίας.
[Sidenote: Gnostics.]
(7) Clement (_Strom._, iii. 39) complains that the Gnostics
corrupted the sense of the Scriptures both by arbitrarily misplacing
the emphasis (in oral delivery) and by altering the punctuation (in
copying manuscripts?); see Zahn, _GK._ i. 424. On Tertullian’s
complaint as to the way in which Marcion construed Luke xx. 35, see
below, p. 276.
(8) Clement (_Strom._, iv. 41) quotes Matt. v. 10_a_, to which he
annexes the reason found in verse 9_b_, and then goes on to say, ἢ
ὥς τινες τῶν μετατιθέντων τὰ εὐαγγέλια, Μακάριοι, φησίν, οἱ
δεδιωγμένοι ὑπὲρ τῆς δικαιοσύνης, ὅτι αὐτοὶ ἔσονται τέλειοι. Zahn
(_GK._ i. p. 411) makes the surmise that when Clement spoke of
certain persons who “transposed” or altered the Gospels—_i.e._, took
liberties with the text, he may have been thinking of Tatian, whose
personal intercourse he may have enjoyed for a length of time, and
with whose Greek writings he shows himself to be familiar.
[Sidenote: Simon Magus and the Marcionites.]
(9) In an Arabic Introduction to a collection of alleged Nicene
Canons particular stress is laid upon the falsification of the
Scriptures by heretics. The Emperor Constantine is represented as
addressing the Fathers at Nicæa, and enjoining them, in dealing with
heretics, to distinguish between those who reject and falsify the
holy Scriptures and those who merely interpret them falsely. The
arch-heretic Simon Magus already appears as a fabricator of spurious
Scripture. His sect possessed an Evangelium in four books, to which
they gave the title “Liber quatuor angulorum et cardinum mundi.” The
Phocalites (Kukiani) retained the Old Testament, but in place of the
Church’s New Testament they had one manufactured by themselves, in
which the twelve Apostles bore barbaric names. It is said of the
Marcionites: Sacras scripturas quibusdam in locis commutarunt
addideruntque Evangelio et Epistolis Pauli apostoli quibusdam in
locis, quaedam vero loca mutilarunt. Apostolorum Actus e medio
omnino sustulerunt, alium substituentes Actorum librum, qui faveret
opinionibus ac dogmatibus, illumque nuncuparunt “Librum propositi
finis.” See Zahn, _GK._ ii. 448, where reference is made to Mansi,
_Conc. Coll._, ii. (Flor., 1759), 947-1082; Hefele,
_Conciliengeschichte_, 2nd. ed., i. 361-368, 282 f.; Harnack, _Der
Ketzer-Katalog des Bischofs Maruta von Maipherkat_, _TU._ (New
Series), iv., 1899; _ThLz._, 1899, 2.
[Sidenote: Arians.]
(10) Ambrose says on John iii. 6 (_De Spiritu_, iii. 10): Quem locum
ita expresse, Ariani, testificamini esse de Spiritu, ut eum de
vestris codicibus auferatis. Atque utinam de vestris et non etiam de
Ecclesiae codicibus tolleretis. Eo enim tempore quo impiae
infidelitatis Auxentius Mediolanensem Ecclesiam armis exercituque
occupaverat, vel a Valente atque Ursatis nutantibus sacerdotibus
suis incursabatur Ecclesia Sirmiensis, falsum hoc et sacrilegium
vestrum in Ecclesiasticis codicibus deprehensum est. Et fortasse hoc
etiam in oriente fecistis.
[Sidenote: Greeks.]
(11) Ambrosiaster has the following note on Rom. v. 14 (Migne, xvii.
100 f.): Et tamen sic (_i.e._ μὴ ἁμαρτήσαντες) praescribitur nobis
de graecis codicibus, quasi non ipsi ab invicem discrepent, quod
facit studium contentionis. Quia enim propria quis auctoritate uti
non potest ad victoriam, verba legis adulterat, ut sensum suis quasi
verba legis asserat, ut non ratio sed auctoritas praescribere
videatur. Constat autem porro olim quosdam latinos de veteribus
graecis translatos (esse) codicibus, quos incorruptos simplicitas
temporum servavit et probat: postquam autem a concordia animis
discedentibus et haereticis perturbantibus torqueri quaestionibus
coeperunt, multa immutata sunt ad sensum humanum, ut hoc
contineretur in litteris quod homini videretur, unde etiam ipsi
Graeci diversos codices habent. Hoc autem verum arbitror, quando et
ratio et historia et auctoritas observatur: nam hodie quae in
latinis reprehenduntur codicibus, sic inveniuntur a veteribus
posita, Tertulliano, Victorino, et Cypriano. The correction “hodie
quae” for “hodieque” in the last sentence is due to Haussleiter,
_Forschungen_, iv. 32. The passage is also interesting as being the
earliest instance known to me of the collocation of _ratio_ and
_auctoritas_ as the two arbiters in theological disputes. Compare
the frequent combination of the two by Luther in his earlier
polemics—_e.g._ against Prierias, and also later in his protest at
Worms.
Again, Ambrosiaster says on Gal. ii. 1, with reference to Acts xv.
20, 29: Quae sophistae Graecorum non intelligentes, scientes tamen a
sanguine abstinendum _adulterant_ scripturam, quartum mandatum
addentes “et a suffocatis observandum,” quod puto nec ne Dei nutu
intellecturi sunt, quia iam supra dictum est, quod addiderunt.
[Sidenote: Marcion.]
(_g_) =Marcion.=—We have more exact information in regard to Marcion’s
great undertaking than to these slender attempts at textual criticism.
Here there is a fuller stream of testimony both in the Greek and Latin
Fathers. It must be confessed, however, that hitherto attention has been
directed more to his position in the matter of the Canon generally than
to his work on the text of the New Testament. Here again, the works of
Zahn throw most light upon the subject; in other works, like the PRE
_e.g._, this side of Marcion’s activity is very superficially treated.
Several points have already been referred to here and there in the
previous part of this work, but the question must now be treated as a
whole.[205]
In the opening sentence of his examination of Marcion’s New Testament,
Zahn avers that no church teacher of the second century occupies such an
important position in the history of the ecclesiastical canon as does
that early writer. If this is really so, it becomes all the more
important for us to inquire whether traces of his influence may not be
discoverable also in our witnesses to the text of the New Testament.
[Sidenote: His New Testament.]
Marcion’s New Testament, which was at the same time his entire Bible,
consisted of two books of moderate compass—viz. a _Gospel-Book_, which
he seems to have called Εὐαγγέλιον simply, and a collection of _ten
Pauline Epistles_ called, probably by himself, τὸ Ἀποστολικὸν (_sc._
βιβλίον). The Epistles were arranged in an order which was evidently
thought to correspond to that of their composition—viz., Gal., 1 and 2
Cor., Rom., 1 and 2 Thess., Laodicenos (= Ephes.), Col., Phil., Phm. He
was unanimously accused by the Church teachers of having mutilated the
ecclesiastical Bible in the manufacture of his own, and also of having
corrupted the text here and there by means of interpolations,
particularly in the case of Luke, which was the only Gospel he admitted.
They complained that he used not the pen but the knife (only he used it
for a purpose the opposite of that for which the scissors are employed
nowadays), and the sponge, and also that he deleted not words merely but
whole pages. They compared his work upon the manuscripts to that of a
mouse.[206] And as for his disciples! Every day they were improving
their Gospel. Seeing that he himself had not gone so far as to erase the
writings of Paul altogether, his disciples continued his work, and
removed whatever did not concur with their views.[207] But according to
testimony extending over a long stretch of time, their text of the
Scriptures seems to have undergone fewer alterations during that period
than that of the Catholic Church (Zahn, _GK._ i. 613). In comparing the
text of these two collections “it should be clearly understood that the
Church’s text, whose treatment by Marcion is in question, is not to be
identified with that of our Bible Societies, or of Tischendorf, or of
Epiphanius, but was such a text as Marcion found in the Catholic Church
or in the Roman community about the year 150. The text of the
ecclesiastical exemplar on which Marcion based his labours can no longer
be restored in every word, but sufficient means are at our command to
give us a general idea of the form which the text of the Pauline
Epistles presented in the second century, and at the same time to
ascertain in many separate instances what text Marcion had before him.
It turns out in many cases that what seems strange in Marcion’s text to
one who compares it with the _textus receptus_, or with one of our
modern critical editions, without knowing much about the history of the
text, is by no means peculiar to Marcion, but was pretty common in the
West in early times. Now it is quite inconceivable, in view of the
implacable hostility of the Church to Marcion, that his text, condemned
as it was unceasingly as being heretical and spurious, should have
exerted any positive influence on that of the Church.[208] It follows,
accordingly, that all those things in Marcion’s Bible that seem to the
uninitiated to be peculiar to it alone, but which are attested by
Catholic manuscripts, versions, and Patristic writers, were not invented
by Marcion, but taken by him from the Church’s Bible of that time, or
from one such Bible at all events, and were only gradually ousted from
the text used by the Church.”[209] All this, which is taken word for
word, with the exception of a slight change in the last sentence, from
Zahn’s dissertation of the year 1889 (p. 636), should even at that time
have been self-evident, but, like Zahn’s further statements in the same
place, has not yet been sufficiently attended to, especially in our
commentaries on Luke and the Pauline Epistles. He points out, _e.g._,
that Tertullian, in speaking of the change of the address “ad Ephesios”
to “Laodicenos,” credits Marcion with the intention of being “et in isto
diligentissimus explorator,” so that it is possible that he compared
several manuscripts in order to discover the original wording.[210] In
such cases, therefore, the question may be asked whether Marcion may not
really have preserved the original text, and whether his text, so far as
it is corroborated by any independent tradition, should not be estimated
much higher than it is by the textual critics of the present.[211] Zahn
deserves all the more credit for giving such careful attention to
questions relating to the text, seeing that the subject of his
investigation was merely the history of the canon. He has dealt chiefly
with those passages in which Marcion’s intentional alterations have been
preserved. [Sidenote: His “Emendations.”] Reference may be made, _e.g._,
to the pages in the first volume of his History, entitled _Minor
Emendations_, wherein it is shown how Marcion, in his hostility to the
Old Testament with its God of Righteousness, omitted the quotations from
the Old Testament altogether, or dropped the introductory formula of
quotation in Rom. i. 17, xii. 19, 2 Cor. iv. 13; excluded all the
references to Abraham in Galatians except in iv. 22; altered ἀγνοοῦντες
τὴν τοῦ θεοῦ δικαιοσύνην in Rom. x. 3 to ἀγνοοῦντες τὸν θεόν; removed
the words γενόμενον ἐκ γυναικὸς, γενόμενον ὑπὸ νόμον from Gal. iv. 4;
changed the active construction into the passive in 1 Cor. iii. 17; and
elsewhere strove after greater condensation, lucidity, and brevity of
expression. Marcion, says Zahn, had good grounds for believing that the
text of the Scriptures had not remained unchanged during the century
that had elapsed since their composition, though that might be said with
more truth of the Gospels and the Acts than of the Epistles; but to
attempt to rid the Apostle’s text of all supposed corruptions with no
regard to any sort of critical material whatever, but depending simply
and solely on his own instinctive sense of what was genuinely Christian
and apostolic, was the undertaking of a giant, as Irenæus calls Marcion.
And his disciples, in a blind veneration of his authority, seem to have
exceeded the intention of the master and editor, “just as many Lutherans
at the present day look upon Luther’s translation, with all its faults,
as the very word of God, and hardly capable of improvement.”
In the Appendices to his second volume Zahn has gone still more
carefully into the questions relating to the criticism of the text.[212]
His main conclusions will hardly be contested. Among these are the
following:—
[Sidenote: Marcion and the Western Text.]
1. That Marcion based his Gospel on that of Luke, although his text
displays various elements belonging to Matthew and Mark;
2. That this mixture is found in those passages wherein the
ecclesiastical texts, and especially the Western, exhibit the same or
similar features;
3. That Marcion’s text shows[213] none of those small “apocryphal
additions” which we find combined with the contents of our Gospels in
Justin and Tatian.
Zahn also calls attention frequently to the different manuscripts which
still exhibit a text agreeing with that credited to Marcion, and which
are precisely the Western witnesses, the Old Latin manuscripts, and D of
the Greek.[214] Compare, _e.g._, on Luke v. 14, 34, 39; vi. 25 f., 31,
37; viii. 45; ix. 6, 16, 22; x. 22, 25; xi. 20, 41; xii. 14, 31, 58 f.;
xviii. 35; xx. 36; xxi. 27, 30; xxiv. 6, 26, 37. But there are also
passages where Marcion parts company with D and its associates—_e.g._,
vi. 22, 26, 29; xi. 4. In Paul, too, the number of passages displaying
agreement between Marcion and D_{2} G_{2} preponderates: Gal. ii. 5;
iii. 14_b_; v. 1, 14, 24; 1 Cor. i. 18; 2 Cor. v. 4; 1 Thess. iv. 16;
Eph. i. 9, 13; iii. 10; iv. 6; v. 28 ff. The agreement between Marcion’s
text and that of the minuscule 157 was previously emphasised by
Zahn—_e.g._, in Luke xvi. 12, where the reading τὸ ἐμόν instead of τὸ
ὑμέτερον (ἡμέτερον B L) is supported as yet by this Greek manuscript
alone and three old Latin (e i l), and in xxi. 30, where only one other
of the minuscules collated by Scrivener supports D 157 in reading
προβάλωσιν τὸν καρπὸν αὐτῶν.[215] In Luke xxiv. 26, D and Marcion are
our only witnesses for the reading ὅτι instead of οὐχί. How is this to
be explained? Zahn, _e.g._, holds that it is a mere coincidence that
Marcion’s reading, “prophetas suos,”[216] in 1 Thess. ii. 15 agrees with
τοὺς ἰδίους προφήτας read by D_{2} E_{2} K_{2} L_{2}, _i.e._, the
representatives of the Antiochean recension, with which Marcion
elsewhere very seldom agrees, seeing he founds throughout upon a Western
text. In the great majority of cases the explanation seems to be simple
enough. Marcion began his career at Rome, so that we may naturally
expect him to give us a Western text. So far, therefore, one might be
tempted simply to ignore that text as hitherto, although a text attested
by Marcion and the Church in common is surely entitled, even in respect
of its antiquity, to much more consideration than has been paid to it
heretofore. The importance, and at the same time the difficulty, of the
problem is increased by the fact that we find the same text as his, or
at all events one of a similar sort, represented in a totally different
quarter—viz. in Tatian.[217]
[Sidenote: Tatian.]
(_h_) =Tatian=[218] has already been referred to in a general way above
(p. 97 ff.): we shall now give the testimony of the early church
regarding him verbatim. If we leave out of account the somewhat doubtful
reference in Hegesippus (p. 96), and an equally uncertain allusion to
the title of his Harmony in Origen,[219] the testimony from purely Greek
sources is confined to a few sentences in Eusebius,[220] a notice in
Epiphanius,[221] and a scholion in a manuscript of the Gospels.[222]
For more exact information we are indebted solely to the Syrian church.
The Greek writer Theodoret gives us most details.[223] The notices
contained in Syriac and Arabic sources are more numerous than the Greek,
but they are shorter and must be omitted here.[224] It becomes
necessary, therefore, to consider very carefully whether any vestiges of
Tatian’s work are preserved in our witnesses for the text, and how these
may, and indeed must, be used in its criticism. I assume as having been
demonstrated by Zahn, that Tatian’s Diatessaron was a Syriac work, and I
take it as very probable that the Curetonian Syriac and the Lewis Syriac
present us with two works based on, or at least influenced by, that of
Tatian. To what extent the same is true of the Peshitto as well need not
be considered here, the main problem being to elucidate the connection
between Tatian and the _Western_ witnesses. And here we are at once
confronted with a matter of great uncertainty—viz., whether there might
not also have been a _Greek_ Harmony of the Gospels either antecedent to
the Diatessaron or contemporary with it, which Tatian himself made or
employed. Zahn thinks not, mainly because from the side of the Greek
Church we have almost no notice whatever of the existence of anything of
this sort, nor of Tatian’s own work either. Harnack seems not to be
convinced of the correctness of Zahn’s position.[225] He even declares
that Harris’s _Preliminary Study_[226] has only confirmed his
“conviction that Tatian composed a Greek Harmony of the Gospels.”[227]
That treatise is accompanied by a facsimile of the fragment of Mark in
Codex W^d, “the contents of which display an affinity with the text of
the Diatessaron (with the original text?).”[228] At all events Harnack
is of opinion that Harris’s conclusions with regard to a Pre-Tatian and
a very early Harmony of the narrative of the Passion are very premature,
and in his judgment should either not have been put forward at all in a
_Preliminary Study_ or suggested with more deliberation. G. Krüger also
puts “this Combined Gospel written in Syriac (Greek?)” in his _History
of Early Christian Literature_, § 37. On the other hand, Hogg in § 12 of
his Introduction,[229] _Non-Syriac Texts of the Diatessaron_, says
nothing of a Greek text, and in § 19, where he raises the question, “In
what language was it written?”, he speaks only of the “view favoured by
an increasing majority of scholars, that it was written in Syriac,” and
then asks, on this view, “was it a translation or simply a compilation?”
and lastly, which is the main question, “what precisely is its relation
to ... the Western text generally?”
In his first work, written prior to the publication of the Arabic text,
Zahn very frequently pointed to the fact that the so-called =Western=
witnesses—_i.e._, Codex D and the Old Latin manuscripts, agree so often
with Tatian.[230] His explanation of this phenomenon is very
simple—viz., that Tatian returned from Rome to his old home in Syria
about the year 172, and took with him from the West his text, which was
just the Western text. [Sidenote: Tatian and the Western Text.] This
view would present no difficulty if it were only the case that the
Diatessaron shared the peculiarities of the Western text, but is the
fact not rather the converse of this—viz., that D, the leading
representative of that text, shares the peculiarities of a Harmony of
the Gospels, might we say, in short, of the Diatessaron? Not only are
certain readings the same in both texts, but the Western text seems
actually to exhibit features which can scarcely be regarded otherwise
than as the outcome of a Harmony. I have given expression to this
opinion ere now; it struck me forcibly when I was collating the Codex
Bezae for my _Supplementum Novi Testamenti Graeci_. In order to afford a
more convenient survey of the vast number of variants, I followed the
paragraphing of Westcott and Hort’s edition. Now look at the variants
there. Whereas the majority consist of quite separate and disconnected
readings, I was obliged at the beginning of the pericopæ regularly to
copy half a line or even a whole line from D, its text differed so much
from that of our present editions at the beginnings of the pericopæ, and
there only to the same extent. See, _e.g._, Luke v. 17, 27; vii. 1, 18;
ix. 37; x. 1, 25; xi. 14; xii. 1 to the end; xxiv. 13. It is true this
phenomenon is most frequently observed in Luke, where I had previously
explained its appearance in another way by supposing like Blass that it
was due to the author having issued two editions of that Gospel. But
neither is it altogether absent from the other Gospels. It occurs most
seldom, as might be expected, in Matthew, but examples may be seen in
xvii. 22, 24; xx. 29. In Mark see iii. 19; iv. 1; vi. 7. There are other
features besides this which are difficult of explanation on any other
grounds. For these I may briefly refer to the second of the works
relating to this part of the subject, _The Syro-Latin Text of the
Gospels_, by F. H. Chase,[231] in which a special chapter is devoted to
the question of “Harmonistic Influence” (pp. 76-100). The writer calls
attention there to three points, viz.:—
1. “The text of Codex Bezae shows constant indications of harmonistic
influence.” This, however, is nothing new. Jerome, _e.g._, complains of
amalgamations of this sort. But then,
2. “In such harmonized passages readings occur which we are justified by
other evidence in considering as Tatianic readings.”
3. “There are other signs of the influence of Syriac phraseology in, or
in the neighbourhood of, such readings due to harmonistic influence.”
I waive consideration of this last point, but as regards the second it
is noteworthy, and bears out what I have said above, that Chase in this
connection goes almost entirely by passages from Luke with the exception
of Matt. xxi. 18; xxiv. 31 f.; xxvi. 59 ff.; and Mark viii. 10; xiii. 2;
x. 25 ff. From Luke he instances iii. 23-38; iv. 31; v. 10 f., 14 f.;
vi. 42; viii. 35; xi. 2; xx. 20; xxi. 7; xxiii. 45 ff.; xxiv. 1.
I should like, however, to call attention here to one passage to which
Chase refers in another connection—viz., the extensive interpolation
after Matt. xx. 28 (Chase, pp. 9-14). It is true, as Zahn expressly
points out,[232] that neither Ephraem nor Aphraates, who were our only
sources for the Diatessaron prior to 1881, “shows any traces of this
long and in part apocryphal interpolation, nor yet of Luke xiv. 7-10,
from which the most of it is taken.” But in the Arabic Tatian,[233] Luke
xiv. 1-6 and xiv. 7-11, 12-15 are found after Matt. xx. 1-16 at the end
of § 29 and the beginning of § 30 respectively. The verse Matt. xx. 28,
regarding which Zahn was uncertain whether it was in Tatian or not,
seeing that neither Ephraem nor Aphraates mentions it, is found in § 31,
5 between Mark x. 44 and Luke xiii. 22, while Matt. xx, 29_a_ (+ Mark x.
46_a_) follows a little further down in § 31, 25. So far, indeed, this
result is not favourable to our theory. But I ask myself in vain how
else this interpolation is to be explained except as an attempt at
harmonising. Now, seeing that its text is found in one Syriac, two
Greek, and half a dozen Latin witnesses (the particulars are given in
the critical note, p. 255), the further question arises, Whence comes
it? The most ready answer will be, “it comes from the Greek, whence it
passed to the Latin on the one side and to the Syriac on the other.” As
for the Latin, it is certain that the majority, perhaps even all, of the
Latin forms are derived from the Greek. But are the Syriac as well? Or
is not rather the converse true, however strange it may seem at the
first glance, that the Greek is a translation of the Syriac? There is
the word δειπνοκλήτωρ, _e.g._, which strikes me as it did Chase, as
being particularly strange. I admit that I should not care to build a
hypothesis of this magnitude on this one word and this one passage
alone. I would merely submit it generally as a question to be kept in
view in further investigations. And I would supplement it by another
question whether, in the case of the first being negatived, it may not
be true after all, _pace_ Zahn, that there was a Greek Harmony alongside
the Syriac and probably going back to the same author. May not the close
resemblances traceable between Tatian and the Western text be also
accounted for on the supposition that instead of Tatian being influenced
by the latter, it really goes back to Tatian?
I would ask this question specially in regard to the Western text of the
_Pauline Epistles_. What is meant by the statement of Eusebius cited
above as to Tatian’s treatment of these Epistles? Μεταφράσαι may
certainly mean to translate, but then one translates an entire text and
not φωνάς τινας merely, and, moreover, one does not translate ὡς
ἐπιδιορθούμενος αὐτῶν τὴν τῆς φράσεως σύνταξιν “with a view to improving
the phraseology and syntax.” Do not our Western witnesses present us
with a work of this description? I am well aware that such hypotheses
are like that regarding the author of the _Nibelungenlied_ where there
was a great poem without a name and one or two great names without
poems, and so various combinations were made, for each of which
something could be said, while none of them could be said to be proved.
That may be the case here too. But at present I feel disposed to
attribute a considerable share in this peculiar “Western” text to
Tatian. [Sidenote: Syro-Latin.] And as this name “Western,” the
inappropriateness of which has long been recognised, becomes on this
supposition more inappropriate still, I am inclined to recommend the
freer adoption of the nomenclature familiarised by the work of Chase, I
mean that of “Syro-Latin.” In his preface Chase puts in a plea for its
use, citing a sentence from the _Dublin Review_ of July 1894, p. 52, in
which H. Lucas says: “The time is, we hope, not far distant, when the
term Western will give place to the term Syro-Latin, the only one which
truly represents, in our opinion, the facts of the case.” Just as when
we wish to indicate those languages and tribes that extend from the
Indian to the German and Keltic we say Indo-Germanic, or Indo-Keltic, if
we wish to be more exact and avoid wounding the sensibilities of the
French, so the term Syro-Latin would be the best designation for a form
of text whose characteristics are as distinctly traceable among the
Syrians in the East as among the Greeks in the centre and the Latins in
the West. But be that as it may, one thing is clear, that many problems
here await solution. But they will not for ever defy methodical
investigation.
The foregoing was all written before I saw the analysis given by
Zahn in his _Geschichte des Kanons_, i. 383 ff. Reading it, I am
surprised that his conclusions have not been followed up by a
thorough investigation of the subject long ere now. Personally, I am
precluded at this moment from even making an attempt in this
direction. Zahn says: “The quotations of Aphraates frequently
presuppose a different Greek text (of the Pauline Epistles) than
that lying at the foundation of the Peshitto. The repeated
resemblances to Western texts, Claromontanus, Boernerianus (D G),
Tertullian, and other Latin witnesses are particularly striking. In
the earliest Syriac Gospel the same phenomenon appears even more
conspicuously. How is it to be explained? Shall we suppose that this
type of text was dispersed equally throughout _all_ parts of the
Church during the second century? In that case we should have to
regard it as the earliest form at which we can arrive, on the
principle laid down by Tertullian: quod apud multos unum invenitur,
non est erratum sed traditum. But,” says Zahn, “even those who
venerate the Western tradition of the text—_i.e._ those who, like
myself, are of opinion that it does not get nearly its due share of
attention from present-day critics—will decline to assent to this
proposition. Because the result of this view would be to establish
the rule that the so-called Western tradition _invariably_ deserves
the preference over those others, even over our oldest Greek
manuscripts themselves. Even if we limited it to those elements of
the text in which the furthest East agrees with the furthest West,
the result would still be a text to which no cautious critic would
pin his faith. A more natural explanation of this striking condition
of things is required.” Zahn finds this in the supposition that
there was formerly a close intimacy between the Syrian Church and
Rome. “Just as the Princes of Edessa had much direct intercourse
with Rome, so to all appearance had the Church there.” In proof of
this, he points to the early intrusion of Marcion’s doctrines and
Bible into Mesopotamia, to the participation of the Church of Edessa
in the Easter controversy and its agreement in that matter with
Victor of Rome, and to the Abgar Legend which connects Edessa with
Zephyrinus of Rome (199-216) by way of Antioch, and represents Peter
as sending the Epistles of Paul from Rome to Edessa. “Considering
the anachronisms that legends usually exhibit, may we not take this
to be the expression of an historical fact, viz. that a text written
in the West formed the basis of the earliest Syriac version of the
Pauline Epistles? This supposition is confirmed by the earliest
history of the Gospel among the Syrians—viz. by the
Diatessaron.”[234] After a most thorough discussion of all the
questions relating to that book (pp. 387-422), Zahn discovers in
this part also (the Gospels) an intimate connection between the text
on which it is based, and the form assumed by the text of the
Gospels in the West during the second century. And he believes that
it will be difficult to find a more feasible explanation of the
remarkable agreement evidenced by these two texts in the very matter
of their textual corruption and licence than this, that this text
came from Rome to Syria. And so the final question arises, “whether
a connection does not exist between the first Gospel and the first
text of Paul and the Acts in the Syriac, and whether the _entire_ N.
T., as the _Doctrine of Addai_ says, was not a present which Tatian
brought with him from Rome to his countrymen, and adapted for their
use by means of a free translation and revision?” Zahn thinks that a
positive answer cannot be given, but he refers pointedly to what
Eusebius says regarding Tatian’s treatment of the Pauline Epistles,
and is led to suppose that those changes were introduced on the
occasion and in the form of a translation from the Greek into
Syriac, and that the reason why Eusebius had such hazy notions
regarding it as well as the Diatessaron, is most likely that both
the books were in Syriac, and used only in the Syrian Church. A
closer investigation of the Pauline Epistles in the Syriac is needed
to decide these questions.
To these propositions of Zahn I have but the one objection stated
above, that the expressions used by Eusebius point far too plainly
to a revision of the phraseology of the Pauline Epistles, which
could have been done only on the original Greek.[235] Zahn himself
points out that the words of Eusebius remind us of what is elsewhere
said of the Theodotians (_Eccl. Hist._, v. 28, 15. 18; see above, p.
200).[236]
[Sidenote: Western Text.]
(_i_) =The Western Text.=—We thus find ourselves face to face with what
has been called the only burning question of the textual criticism of
the New Testament—the question, namely, of the place to be assigned to
the so-called Western text. Our treatment of the external testimony has
led us back through Lucian, Pamphilus, Hesychius, and Origen, to Marcion
and Tatian, that is, into the middle of the second century. But the
question is now whether we must stop here, or whether it is not possible
to ascend with certainty even somewhat higher by means of an
investigation of the material afforded by the manuscripts themselves.
The “Higher Criticism,” _e.g._, seeks to get behind the Synoptic Gospels
to the documents which the authors or editors used in their composition;
is it not possible for the “Lower Criticism” to recover with certainty
at least the primitive text of the New Testament books? And is that not
most readily found in the so-called Western text? We have been obliged
to make frequent reference to it already; the question for us now is,
“What is the value of Codex Bezae and its associates?”
It was observed by Theodore Beza himself, the scholar whose name the
Codex justly bears, that the text of this manuscript differed in so many
respects from that of others, especially in Luke and Acts, that he could
give no explanation of it satisfactory to himself. He was not led to
suppose that the alterations were due to heretics; nevertheless, like a
cautious man, he thought it more advisable to preserve the Codex than to
publish it. Eight hundred years before, Bede was similarly impressed by
the Codex which we now know by the name of Laudianus, E_{2}. He
indicated “quaedam quae in Graeco sive aliter seu plus aut minus posita
vidimus.” He was uncertain “utrum negligentia interpretis omissa vel
aliter dicta, an incuria librariorum sint depravata sive relicta ...
namque graecum exemplar fuisse falsatum suspicari non audeo.” When the
manuscripts began to be more systematically collated, Bengel declared
that the criticism of the text would be much simplified if one were not
bound to trouble himself with these codices, which, as being written in
Greek and Latin, he called _vere bilingues_. Old students of the
Maulbronn College have told me that Ephorus Bäumlein the most
distinguished philologist of our Institute in this century, and editor
of _Disquisitions on the Greek Particles_ and similar works, was always
referring to the Codex Cantabrigiensis, though they themselves never
rightly understood about this Codex, or indeed about such things at all.
I do not know who it was from whom I myself first heard of it; certainly
there was no particular importance attributed to it in my student days
or at the college where I was. On the other hand, Tischendorf admitted
its claims in opposition to all the other Greek manuscripts in several
passages, such as Mark ii. 22; xi. 6; Luke xxiv. 52, 53, etc. In other
places he did so at first, but changed his opinion afterwards—_e.g._, in
Acts xi. 12, while in others again, like Acts xiii. 45, he was inclined
to accept its testimony, asserting expressly: Ceterum D quantopere
passim inter omnes testes excellat constat. One of the things for which
Westcott and Hort deserve credit is the attention they have directed to
Codex Bezae and its associates. Some of their remarks upon it will be
found in the note below.[237]
[Sidenote: Lagarde.]
That peerless scholar, P. de Lagarde, has even greater claims to
honourable mention in this connection, though but little regard was paid
to his representations during his lifetime. As early as 1857, he said of
Codex Cantabrigiensis: facile patet, quum similibus libris careamus et
ultra Evangelia et Actus nondum cogitem, totius editionis meae quasi
fundamentum futurum esse hunc codicem Cantabrigiensem, sed eum eis
librarii vitiis purgatum quae vitia esse agnita fuerint (_Gesam. Abh._,
p. 98). His chief merit, however, lies not in his having estimated
Cantabrigiensis so highly, but in having assigned a lower value to the
other manuscripts. By comparing D with the earlier versions, and
particularly by relying on the testimony of Epiphanius, he recognised in
it a representative of an “editio emendatorum orthodoxorum temeritate
corrupta” (_ibid._, p. 96). Compare also his _Übersicht über die Bildung
der Nomina_, p. 213, where he instances ἔταξαν ἀναβαίνειν of the
“emendati” for παρήγγειλαν ἀναβαίνειν of D.[238]
[Sidenote: Blass.]
General attention was first directed to the question of the Western
text, when Blass came forward with his view that it was quite wrong to
present the problem in the shape of an alternative between D and A B,
because both groups were right, D and its associates representing a
first edition of the Acts and a second of Luke, and the other group
conversely. I hailed this solution of the difficulty at once as a
veritable Columbus Egg, and to this day I am firmly persuaded that
Blass’s theory is nearer the mark than the previous estimate of the
Western text. [Sidenote: Zahn.] Readers may, perhaps, be struck by the
fact, which Zahn has since made public (_Einl._, ii. 348), that in his
practical class at Erlangen, in the winter of 1885-6, he set as the
subject of the prize essay an “Investigation of the materially important
peculiarities of Codex D in the Acts,” and made a note at the time of
the result which he hoped to see the investigation arrive at—viz.,
“either the author’s first draft before publication or his hand copy
with his own marginal notes inserted afterwards.” Zahn himself got no
further, but he was not surprised when Blass came forward with his
clearly-defined and thoroughly-elaborated hypothesis. In one point,
certainly, Zahn does not agree with Blass, and that is in the
application of the hypothesis to Luke. He holds that the text which
Blass restored as the Roman form or second edition of Luke is
essentially nothing but a bold attempt to restore what is called the
Western text; that the question to which such different answers have
been made as to the value of this type of text—for it is not to be
spoken of as a recension in the proper sense of that term—is by no means
confined to the Third Gospel, but touches the others as well and the
Pauline Epistles also; that the reason why the divergence of the Western
text from that exhibited in the oldest manuscripts and the great
majority of Greek witnesses is more conspicuous in Luke, is simply that
we have the additional testimony of Marcion for that Gospel, but the
question is essentially the same in all the cases; that whereas in Acts
we have two parallel texts both possessing equal authority, in Luke the
case is different, where in determining what the evangelist actually
wrote, we have to choose one or the other of two mutually exclusive
propositions; that this verdict on the text of Luke, however, in no way
invalidates the conclusion come to as regards the text of the Acts. But
further, Zahn, who even before this had avowed himself an “admirer of
the Western text,” stands up determinedly for the view that this same
Western text, which I shall, like Zahn and Blass, indicate henceforward
as β, contains much that is original. He says that just as we must
beware of a superstitious idolatry of what are styled the best
manuscripts,[239] which goes hand in hand with a disparagement of much
older tradition (Marcion, Irenæus), so we have equally to be on our
guard against a morbid preference for every interesting and fanciful
excrescence of the riotous tradition of the second and third centuries.
Such a preference would logically imply that the scholars who took in
hand to revise the text about the beginning of the fourth century simply
corrupted it, somewhat after the fashion of those who set themselves to
“improve” our Church hymns in the age of Rationalism. More than twenty
years ago, when I was a Tutor at Tübingen, I had the impression to which
I frequently enough gave utterance in debate with my colleagues, that
modern textual criticism is going altogether on the wrong tack. The
textual study of the New Testament was out of my province at that time,
and is really so still, were it not that, as Augustine says, it is
necessary for everyone who devotes himself to the holy Scriptures to
take up such studies. Nor am I inclined thus far to fall foul of the
system to which Westcott and Hort devoted the labours of a lifetime, and
in the building up of which they had at their command such an apparatus
as is far beyond the reach of a German, especially of one who is not
attached to any University. And as for the results of Zahn’s researches,
I prefer to look upon myself here as a mere learner and admirer. In the
presence of such doughty warriors I feel like a spectator upon the
battlefield of New Testament textual criticism, and I would beg that
what follows, as well as what has been already said, be regarded as but
suggestions, the acceptance or rejection of which by others may
perchance serve to bring a younger generation nearer to the goal. In
this spirit I have in my _Philologica Sacra_ (1-15th March 1896) taken
as a starting-point the reading in Luke xxii. 52, λαοῦ = ναοῦ = ἱεροῦ,
which is not mentioned at all by Tischendorf, and have sought by means
of one or two analogous cases to show “how frequently D preserves the
correct reading.” I have instanced ἑπταπλασίονα, Luke xviii. 30;
φάντασμα, xxiv. 37; δέρριν καμήλου, Mark i. 6 ; ἠνοιγμένους, i. 10,
which might, however, be inserted from Matt. iii. 16, Luke iii. 21 ;
ὀργισθείς, Mark i. 40; ὁμοιάζει, Matt. xxvi. 73.
In the first sketch of this Introduction, written in the year 1895, I
referred to the addition found in Matt. xxvii. 49, which is manifestly
taken from John xix. 34, and is read by many authorities, among these
being א B C.[240] I said then: “Only two possibilities are conceivable.
Either the passage stood here originally, and was removed at an early
date on account of its variance with John xix. 34, or it is an
interpolation. In the latter case, it must have been inserted at a very
early date, and all the witnesses containing it, which elsewhere are so
frequently and so widely divergent, must then go back to one and the
same exemplar. Because the third possibility—viz. that the same sentence
was inserted in different copies in the same place quite independently
of each other, no one will consider to be at all likely. But if the
second supposition is to be held as correct, then we see just what
amount of importance is to be attached to the concurrence of our oldest
witnesses, particularly our chief manuscripts א B C L. They are not
streams flowing independently from the same fountain of Paradise: they
flowed together for a good part of their course, and were considerably
polluted before they parted company.”
[Sidenote: Salmon.]
Two years later, when the first edition was issued, I added: “This too
must now be asserted with far greater emphasis, that the concurrence of
B א, on which so much stress has been laid hitherto by almost all
textual critics, proves nothing at all. In Sirach the common archetype
of B א was younger than the origin of the Latin version, manifestly a
good deal younger, because it already contained errors that had not yet
made their appearance in our other manuscripts (or in their sources).
Salmon (p. 52) is of opinion that the text which Westcott and Hort have
restored is one that was most in favour in Alexandria in the third
century, and that came there, perhaps, in the century previous. This is
not far from Bousset’s view that B perhaps contains the recension of
Hesychius. Salmon calls the results of Westcott and Hort ‘an elaborate
locking of the stable door after the horse has been stolen.’ Burgon’s
paradox, that the reason why B and א have survived is that they were the
worst, seemed to Salmon at first to be a joke, but he now thinks it not
improbable that they were set aside on account of their divergence from
the form of text that acquired ascendancy _at a later time_. If that be
so, then they met the same fate that they themselves prepared for the
primitive form they supplanted; and just as they, with the help of
Tischendorf and Westcott and Hort, dislodged the _Textus Receptus_ of
the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries from the hands of theologians,
and made themselves the _Textus Receptus_ of the end of the nineteenth
century, so perchance will Codex D, which the builders despised, become
the foundation-stone of a new structure. In _Urtext_, p. 54, Oscar v.
Gebhardt alludes to the objections raised partly against the entire
method of Westcott and Hort, partly against their particular estimate of
Codex Vaticanus, and partly also against the position they have assigned
to what they call the Western text, and he too says: ‘If these
objections are valid, then the sure foundation which they seemed at last
to have secured for the text of the New Testament begins once more to
totter.’”
Since this was written, my impressions have been greatly confirmed,
particularly by Zahn’s _Einleitung_; only I must admit that I am now
less in a position than ever to make any definite proposals as to the
way in which the goal of the textual criticism of the New Testament is
to be reached. To follow one witness or one group of witnesses through
thick and thin, which would really be the only consistent course, will
seemingly not do.[241] And the “eclectic method” to which Bousset was
led in his work on the Apocalypse as the only possible one, is surely
the opposite of the genealogical, which we must acknowledge to be in
theory the only correct method. But first of all, a fresh application of
it would require to be made. And as the task is too great for any single
worker, might it not be well if, in the exegetical classes of our
Theological Faculties, the separate witnesses were either examined anew,
or, conversely, selected passages of the text, quite small passages—a
single chapter, or a single epistle like 2 or 3 John or Philemon—were
given out to different students to examine thoroughly all the witnesses
for each passage, and the results then compared with one another?
Furthermore, the critical apparatus would require at once to be
lightened of all those manuscripts which are unmistakably recognised to
be the representatives of a definite recension, and the Lucianic
recension printed separately with or without an apparatus, just as was
done by Lagarde himself for half of the Old Testament. Finally, the
Western text would require to be much more thoroughly examined than has
hitherto been the case. It is true that Weiss has given a special part
of _Texte und Untersuchungen_ to an examination of Codex D in Acts, but
without prejudice one may be quite sure that a solution of the problem
is not to be found in the way in which Weiss seeks it. No doubt he
establishes among other things the fact, that in the Speeches of Peter β
displays almost no variation, but then he makes no attempt to explain
this fact or make any use of it. It is an indication of considerable
progress to find Zahn going so carefully into matters of the text in an
Introduction to the New Testament, and his appreciation of the Western
text is most gratifying. [Sidenote: Luke and Acts in D.] At the same
time the reader will naturally ask whether Zahn’s verdict on the β text
in Luke is not fatal to his own conclusions with regard to Acts. Is it
not true in this connection that “he who says A must also say B”? If you
admit that there were two editions of Acts, you must make the same
admission in the case of Luke. And conversely, if there was no second
edition of the Gospel, must you not then look for some other explanation
of the variations in Acts? For it seems quite certain that the variants
in Luke xxiv. are most closely related to the text of Acts i. Or how
else are the readings in Luke xxiv. 51-53 to be explained? Westcott and
Hort have one way of explaining them. They say that καὶ ἀνεφέρετο εἰς
τὸν οὐρανόν “was evidently inserted from an assumption that a separation
from the disciples at the close of a Gospel must be the Ascension. The
Ascension apparently did not lie within the proper scope of the Gospels,
as seen in their genuine texts; its true place was at the head of the
Acts of the Apostles as the preparation for the Day of Pentecost, and
thus the beginning of the history of the Church.” That is all very well,
and it may also be the case that προσκυνήσαντες αὐτόν in v. 52 is the
natural result of the insertion of καὶ ἀνεφέρετο εἰς τὸν οὐρανόν. But
how then are we to account for the interchange of εὐλογοῦντες and
αἰνοῦντες in the next verse, which is found in precisely the same groups
of witnesses?[242]
If this explanation then is insufficient on account of verse 53, it may
be confidently asserted that the omission of the Ascension and the
Worship of the Exalted Lord by any later scribe is all but inconceivable
from the moment that Luke was separated from Acts and placed among the
Gospels. If such a thing were possible at all, it would be in the case
of προσκυνήσαντες αὐτόν, as there is no express mention in Acts i. of
the disciples worshipping. On the other hand, the omission becomes quite
conceivable as soon as the author added a δεύτερος λόγος to the πρῶτος.
So far these variants appear to me to fit in very well with Blass’s
theory and with no other. Zahn, as far as I can see, has nowhere
expressed any opinion regarding them, certainly he says nothing of the
variation between αἰνοῦντες and εὐλογοῦντες, which is the one of most
importance critically, though it is of least consequence materially.
Graefe, following on the lines of Birt and Rüegg, supposes that the
shorter form was due to want of space, that Luke was glad to get the
shorter form all into his roll at the foot the first time he wrote it
out, and sent off the book to Theophilus in that form, hoping to deal
with the Ascension in the second of his books. In the second edition he
had sufficient space to admit of the insertion of καὶ ἀνεφέρετο εἰς τὸν
οὐρανόν, then of προσκυνήσαντες αὐτόν, and finally of εὐλογοῦντες.[243]
These additions he made, feeling, rightly enough, that there could be no
more fitting conclusion to his Life of Jesus than a brief allusion to
the Ascension, which he had already described more particularly in the
Acts. At the same time he substituted ἕως εἰς for ἔξω πρὸς. Graefe
thinks that all these changes are connected with the alterations made
also in the introduction to the Acts, though he omits to say what the
connection is.
Weiss, father and son, omit the words καὶ ἀνεφέρετο εἰς τὸν οὐρανόν as
“a gloss derived from Acts i.,” and “likewise” the words προσκυνήσαντες
αὐτόν in verse 52 (is this also a gloss from Acts i.?). Which text they
hold to be correct in verse 53 they do not say.[244]
Αἰνεῖν[245] is the specifically Lucan word for “to praise,” while
εὐλογεῖν in this sense does not occur in Acts at all, and only in the
first two chapters of Luke. Further, as any concordance will show,
αἰνεῖν is the regular equivalent of הלל and εὐλογεῖν of ברך, while
αἰνεῖν is rarely used for ברך or εὐλογεῖν for הלל. This confirms the
supposition that αἰνοῦντες, which is preferred by Tischendorf but
rejected by Westcott and Hort, is the original reading.
In order to show the full extent of the difficulty of the problem, we
shall take along with this passage from the end of the Gospel a single
instance from the Acts. How does the Apostolic Decree read in ch. xv.?
“To judge any matter before knowing the facts of the case is
inadmissible.” So Hilgenfeld says in his magazine, adding that the
matter of the Apostolic Council, as it is called, and the Decree have
been so judged. He himself restores the whole text in this passage to
the form that Blass has adopted as the _Forma Romana_—_i.e._, to confine
ourselves to this point of main importance, he omits “things
strangled.”[246] On the other hand, Harnack, in the article to which
reference will be made below, comes to the conclusion that the Eastern,
_i.e._ the common, text is the original, and the Western a later
correction made subsequent to the _Didache_, and not earlier than the
first decade of the second century.[247] The same conclusion is reached
by Zahn in his extremely careful discussion of the question (_Einl._,
ii. 344 ff.): “The two texts are here mutually exclusive, and therefore
cannot both be derived from the same author (xv. 20, 29, xxi. 25).” But
he immediately adds: “The fact that Blass, in this important point, as
in many another of less consequence, declares a certain thing to be an
original element of the text which turns out to be simply an early
corruption in no wise detracts from the correctness of his hypothesis.”
That is quite true and must be borne in mind in connection with the
objection raised by Wendt, that “manifest clerical errors are found in
the actual β text.” The passages are also used by Corssen as an argument
against Blass. The remarks of the latter in reply to the strictures of
Corssen (_Evang. sec. Lucam_, p. xxvi) seem to me to be not without
reason, but in any case it is strange that alterations should have been
made in an official document like the Decree in Acts xv., no matter
whether these were due to the writer himself or a later intermediary.
That there was some method in the alteration is shown by its recurrence
in three places. But again I must emphasise the superiority of Codex D.
Whereas in ch. xv. 20, 29 the shorter text is represented by other
witnesses as well, in ch. xxi. 25 it is supported by D with the sole
addition of Gigas Holmiensis.[248] I have not to decide the question
here; I simply commend it to a searching investigation, in which
attention must be paid to the apparently meaningless differences in the
use of particles and synonyms, of simple and compound words, and
such-like seeming minutiæ. I can only repeat how frequently the thought
occurred to me when I was comparing Scrivener’s edition with that of v.
Gebhardt for my _Supplement_, that here was no alteration of a later
scribe, and what then? The simplest explanation was that both readings
were due to the author himself, who on the one occasion purposely set
down the one reading and on the other the other.
There is another question in connection with the Western text which has
been even more neglected than the former—viz. the amount of importance
to be attached to it in the case of the Pauline Epistles. What about
Eusebius’s reference to Tatian’s work on these Epistles? I frankly
confess that not till the printing of this work was begun did I become
aware, mainly from Zahn’s _Einleitung_, how many problems are here
waiting to be solved, and for this reason as well as others I must for
the present forbear making any attempt in this direction.
Here I can only indicate a few of the most general rules of textual
criticism, and thereafter adduce a number of New Testament passages
which are of interest from a critical point of view.
[Sidenote: Rules of criticism.]
(_k_) =General Rules of Textual Criticism.=—In its essence the task of
the textual critic resembles that of the physician, who must first of
all make a correct diagnosis of the disease before attempting its cure.
Manifestly the first thing to do is to observe the injuries and the
dangers to which a text transmitted by handwriting is liable to be
exposed. A correct treatment must be preceded by a correct diagnosis.
The injuries which a text receives will vary according as it is
multiplied by =Dictation= or by =Copying=. The fifty Bibles which
Eusebius prepared at once for Constantine would be written to dictation.
In the early times of the Church, copying, as has been already
mentioned, would doubtless be the more usual method of multiplication.
Here, however, we must make a single exception in the case of Paul, who
for the most part did not write his Epistles with his own hand. He
evidently dictated them. He certainly did not have them simply written
out from his own rough draft.
[Sidenote: Illegibility.]
(1) In the case of copying, errors originate first of all, though not
most frequently, in a word or group of letters being =illegible=, or in
their being read for some psychological reason otherwise than as they
were intended. However attentive the copyist may be, he may still be in
doubt as to the way in which a word or passage should be read, and may
decide wrongly. Proper names, _e.g._, are often very doubtful.[249] More
frequently however the mistake will be due to inattention. The context
may lead the copyist to expect a certain word; he sees one like it, and
inserts the former in its place.
[Sidenote: Homoioteleuton.]
(2) It frequently happens, particularly in copying the old _scriptio
continua_, that the eye of the scribe jumps from one word or group of
letters to another the same or similar to it, either before or after it.
In the former case the intervening words will be repeated, in the latter
they will be omitted. Scholars designate these errors as =dittography=
and =elision= respectively; printers know them under the name of a
marriage and a funeral. The former mistake is not so serious, because it
is at once detected on reading over the copy. A peep into any manuscript
will show how frequently this error occurs, the repeated words being
enclosed in brackets or surmounted with dots.[250] In Codex B such
passages give us an opportunity of observing the beauty of the original
writing, because the painstaking man who retraced the old writing with
fresh ink in the eighth, or tenth, or eleventh century, or whenever it
was, adding at the same time accents and punctuation marks, left these
untouched. This kind of mistake very often happens in passages where a
group of characters catches the eye for any reason, such as the
occurrence of the abbreviation mark, Θ̅Σ̅, Ι̅Λ̅Η̅Μ̅, Α̅Ν̅Ο̅Σ̅, etc., and
at the transition to a new page or leaf. The omission of a piece of the
text of various length by homoioteleuton is as common, and is more
serious.[251] Any critical apparatus will show the frequency of its
occurrence. We often find there the note “a voce alterutra ... ad
alterutram desunt” or “a voce 1^o ad vocem 2^o (3^o) transilit,” or “vox
... alterutra et intermedia desunt.” Compare, _e.g._, Codex D, Matt.
xviii. 18 from γῆς to γῆς; x. 23; xxiii. 14-16. The result is worst when
the mistake is not discovered till afterwards and the two fragments are
patched together in some way with more or less success. Lacunæ that have
not been doctored are very helpful in determining the relationship
between different texts.[252]
[Sidenote: Confusion.]
(3) As errors of the tongue and the memory[253] rather than of the eye
may be reckoned the =Transposition= and =Confusion= of particular
combinations of letters or entire words. The former occurs so frequently
in connection with a liquid, that in some cases it ceases to be a
mistake. Thus we have on the one hand the confusion of κορκοδειλος with
κροκοδειλος, Καρχηδων with Carthago, and on the other, εβαλον with
ελαβον, βηθαραβα with βηθαβαρα, John i. 28; κιρνατω with κρινετω, ποντον
with τοπον, בכרין, _talent_, Matt. xxv. 14-30, with כרכין, _cities_,
Luke xix. 17, 19. Akin to this is the confusion of vowels with a similar
sound, to which are to be ascribed all cases of =itacism=, as it is
called—ἔγειρε and ἔγειραι, —εσθε and —εσθαι, ἑταίροις and ἑτέροις,
χρηστὸς ὁ κύριος and χριστὸς ὁ κύριος, 2 Cor. xii. 1; φορέσωμεν and
φορέσομεν, ἔχωμεν and ἔχομεν, Rom. v. 1; μετὰ διωγμῶν and μετὰ διωγμόν.
Manifestly mistakes of this sort would occur more readily in dictation
than in copying.
A third class of errors of a more conscious or semi-conscious
description is due to the =substitution= of words or forms of similar
meaning. Thus, for λέγει we may have εἶπε or ἔφη or ἀπεκρίνατο, or the
simple form may be replaced by the compound or _vice versa_, or one
preposition may be substituted for another.[254] Separate words are very
frequently transposed without seriously affecting the sense. Thus, in
Acts iv. 12, we find nearly all the possible permutations of the three
words ονομα εστιν ετερον actually represented—viz., in addition to this
(2) ονομα ετερον εστιν; (3) ετερον ονομα εστιν; (4) εστιν ετερον ονομα;
(5) εστιν ονομα ετερον.[255] On Luke xvii. 10, Merx says (_Die vier
kanonischen Evangelien_, p. 246): “Let it be observed that the position
of ἀχρεῖοι fluctuates between (1) δοῦλοι ἀχρεῖοί ἐσμεν; (2) δοῦλοί ἐσμεν
ἀχρεῖοι D, and (3) ἀχρεῖοι δοῦλοί ἐσμεν. Such fluctuations are due to
the different arrangement of a word that did not originally belong to
the text, but was appended as a note and afterwards incorporated with
the text. Such fluctuations point to the interpolation of the
fluctuating word.” This judgment has to be accepted with caution. For
one thing, it is not at all clear which word it is that fluctuates. In
this particular case, one might say that δοῦλοι fluctuates as much as
ἀχρεῖοι, and the copula still more. Moreover such an interpolation
becomes at once an integral part of the text, and its insertion is no
longer visible. Only if several copies were made of that exemplar in
which the interpolation was first introduced could fluctuation of this
sort originate. Such transpositions are much more frequently of a
harmless order, as each one may perceive for himself. The writer’s
thoughts fly faster than his pen and anticipate a word that should not
come in till later. One of the most frequent cases of transposition is
that of Ἰησοῦς Χριστός and Χριστὸς Ἰησοῦς in the Pauline Epistles.
[Sidenote: Additions.]
(4) Akin to this last is a class of mistakes originating in the border
region between the unconscious and the conscious or intentional—viz.
that of =Additions=. One can readily understand how easy it was to
insert a κύριος or ὁ κύριος ἡμῶν, a μου after πατήρ on the lips of
Jesus, the subject at the beginning of a sentence, especially of the
first sentence of a pericope, or the object in the form of a pronoun.
Bengel proposed to omit the name of Jesus in some twenty-five places,
for which he was ridiculed by Wettstein, as may be learned from my work
on Bengel, p. 74. Now, everyone admits that Bengel was right. Under the
head of “Interpolationes breviores,” Wordsworth and White first give
examples “de nomine Jesus,” then of “Christus, Dominus, Deus,” and then
of “Pronomina.” It is evident that in this way the wrong word may be
supplied now and again. Perhaps one of the most interesting cases is
Luke i. 46. All our present Greek witnesses make Mary the composer of
the Magnificat, but Elisabeth’s name is attached to it in three Old
Latin manuscripts, in the Latin version of Irenæus, according to the
best manuscripts, and in some manuscripts known to Origen (or to his
translator, Jerome: the passage, unfortunately, is found as yet only in
the Latin).[256]
[Sidenote: Corrections.]
(5) To the category of conscious alterations belong first of all
=grammatical corrections=, then =assimilations= to parallel passages,
=liturgical changes= introduced from the Evangeliaria, as, _e.g._, the
addition at the close of a pericope of the words ὁ ἔχων ὦτα ἀκουέτω
which occurs in all sorts of manuscripts in the most diverse passages,
or indications of time, such as ἐν τῷ καιρῷ ἐκείνῳ at the beginning of a
pericope,[257] and lastly, alterations made for =dogmatic= reasons, if
any such can be established. It is impossible to deny that dogmatic
conceptions had some influence on the propagation of certain readings if
not on their origin—as, _e.g._, on the form assumed by the words in
Matt. xix. 17, τί με λέγεις ἀγαθόν, or on the omission of the words οὐδὲ
ὁ υἱός in Mark xiii. 22; compare also above, p. 106. On the whole,
however, there is no real ground for the scepticism that was for a time
entertained with respect to our texts in this connection. A sober
criticism will be able in most cases to restore the correct form. Its
conditions will be apparent from what has been said in the foregoing.
[Sidenote: Canons of Criticism.]
Gerhard von Maestricht laid down forty-three Critical Canons, and
Wettstein set forth in his New Testament his _Animadversiones et
Cautiones ad examen variarum lectionum Novi Testamenti necessariae_
(vol. ii. 851-874). In 1755 J. D. Michaelis added to his _Curae in
versionem Syriacam Act. Apost._ his _Consectaria critica de ... usu
versionis Syriacae tabularum Novi Foederis_.[258] Bengel reduced all the
rules to a single one. Quite recently Wordsworth and White comprehended
the rules they followed in the preparation of the text of their Latin
New Testament in four sentences. Of these the first two apply to a
version only, and therefore do not concern us here;[259] while the
fourth (_brevior lectio probabilior_) is but another form of Bengel’s
canon. The third alone may be regarded as new and deserving of
attention—viz., _vera lectio ad finem victoriam reportat_. That is to
say, if a phrase is repeated in several passages in the same or similar
terms, and displays variants in the earlier passages, the reading of the
later passage will, as a rule, be the correct one, the reason being that
copyists are apt to consider a certain reading to be an error the first
time it occurs, and therefore to alter it, but come in the end to admit
it as correct.
I would once more briefly emphasize the following propositions:—
(1) The text of our manuscripts must not be regarded as homogeneous,
but must be examined separately for each part of the New Testament.
A manuscript that exhibits a very good text in one book does not
necessarily do the same in the others. The same thing holds good of
versions and quotations.
(2) The text is preserved with less alteration in the versions than
in the manuscripts.[260]
(3) In the Gospels that reading is the more probable which differs
from that of the parallel passages.
(4) The influence of the ecclesiastical use of the Scriptures on the
text must be more carefully attended to than heretofore.
(5) One of the most valuable aids in estimating the importance of
the witnesses is the proper names, particularly those of less
frequent occurrence.
(6) “Proclivi scriptioni praestat ardua.”
[Sidenote: Proper names.]
Of these propositions only the last two need be illustrated further,
particularly the second last. For it is really remarkable to what extent
this consideration has been neglected hitherto. To the best of my
knowledge there is as yet no monograph in which the =proper names= are
treated from a critical point of view. And yet these are for the critic
frequently the only points of light in vast regions of darkness. They
are to him what the lighthouse is to the mariner or the fossil to the
geologist. This makes their neglect all the more strange. Had there been
a systematic examination of the proper names of the New Testament,
Lippelt’s important discovery with regard to the spellings Ἰωάνης and
Ἰωάννης might have been made long ere now (see above, p. 162 f.).
Weiss’s critical studies in Acts deserve honourable mention in this
connection. But Westcott and Hort, who have paid attention to these
things with their usual exactitude, were simply on the wrong tack in
this case when they asked whether the various persons who bore this name
might not have spelt it differently, as in the case of Smith, Smyth,
Smythe, etc. Similarly the genealogies give rise to a whole host of
problems of which no account has been taken hitherto. See above, p. 165,
for the reading Ζαρέ exhibited by B in Matt. i. 3; and compare Sela,
given by Syr^{sin} in verses 4 and 5, with Σαλά in Luke iii. 32.
Tischendorf omits the testimony in Matt. i. 5, while Baljon passes over
both the variants, though they are certainly of more importance than the
variation in the spelling of Βοές, Βοός, Βοόζ. In Luke iii. 27 the word
רֵאשָׁא is converted into a proper name Ῥησά. From this fact some very
interesting conclusions might be drawn with regard to the sources of
Luke’s Gospel, but this is a matter lying outside the scope of this
chapter. On the other hand, the fact that in the fourth Gospel the
traitor is called not Ἰσκαριώτης, or anything like it, but ἀπὸ Καρυώτου
by א in ch. vi. 71, where his name first occurs, and by D in every other
place in that Gospel (xii. 4; xiii. 2, 26; xiv. 22), raises a very
strong presumption in favour of these two manuscripts and indeed of the
fourth Gospel. On this see my _Philologica Sacra_, p. 14, and my notes,
with Chase’s unconvincing replies, in the _Expository Times_ for
December 1897, and January, February, and March 1898. I am very glad to
see that Zahn now inclines to the same view (_Einl._, ii. 561).
Considerable weight is given to it by the fact that these two
manuscripts seem to be the only ones that have preserved the correct
reading in the case of other names as well.
What is Apollos called in Acts? He is mentioned by D only in ch. xviii.
24, where he is called Ἀπολλώνιος. א* calls him Ἀπελλῆς in xviii. 24 and
xix. 1. This reading is supported in the former passage by the
minuscules 15 and 180, and in the latter by 180 alone. Wendt now agrees
with Blass in thinking it probable that the original form in Acts was
Ἀπελλῆς, which was altered in the main body of manuscripts in conformity
with 1 Corinthians, just as ἀπὸ Καρυώτου in John was accommodated to
Ἰσκαριώτης given by the Synoptics. But what about D? I must ask with
Salmon. Even Weiss says in this connection (_Codex D_, p. 18): “The most
that can be said for Ἀπολλώνιος is that this form, differing as it does
from that prevailing in the Pauline Epistles, has the presumption of
originality, seeing that there was always a temptation for the scribes
to accommodate it to the latter.”[261] In his earlier work on the text
(p. 9) he seems not to have considered this point.
I cannot understand how Weiss could at first explain Ἰωνάθας, which is
found in D (Acts iv. 6) in place of Ἰωάν(ν)ης read by the other
witnesses, as a “clerical error,” whereas now (_Cod. D_, p. 108) he
deems it more natural to suppose that a corrector inserted the name of
the son of Annas and the successor of Caiaphas mentioned by Josephus
(_Antiq._ xviii. 4, 3) in place of that of the entirely unknown John,
than that the name of Jonathan, even supposing it was unknown to the
copyist, which applies equally to that of Alexander mentioned along with
him, was replaced by John, which was a very common name, the name of the
Apostle so frequently mentioned before. It could, therefore, be only a
purely accidental clerical error. Headlam, in his article on John
(Hastings’ _Dictionary of the Bible_, ii. 676) seems to know nothing of
all this. But perhaps Weiss sees on the same page of the aforesaid book
that the mistake of Johanan and Jonathan occurred elsewhere also, and
remembering Bengel’s principle, considers that Ἰωνάθας is the _scriptio
ardua_, and, therefore, the _praestantior_.[262]
In 2 Peter ii. 15 the father of Balaam is called Βοσόρ, which is quite
peculiar. Westcott and Hort and Weiss, in their fondness for B, write
Βεώρ. But this is most certainly a correction which is combined with the
original to form βεωρσόρ in א. The only thorough discussion of the
passage that I know is in Zahn’s _Einleitung_, ii. 109. The only thing
that might be added to his data in the LXX. is that, according to
Holmes-Parsons, the Georgian version has υἱὸν τοῦ βοσόρ in Jos. xiii.
22. Σεπφώρ, as the name of Beor, has crept into various manuscripts in
several places from Jos. xxiv. 9—_e.g._ into the Armenian in Gen. xxxvi.
32, Codex 18 in Num. xxii. 5, Codex 53 in Num. xxiv. 15, where Cod. 75
has Σεβεώρ, and into Lucian in 1 Chr. i. 43. There seems to me to be a
confusion between Gen. xxxvi. 32 (= 1 Chr. i. 43) and the following
verse, in which Bosra occurs. In Gen. xxxvi. 33 one manuscript observes,
ἡ βοσὸρ πόλις τῆς Ἀραβίας ἡ νῦν καλουμένη βόσρα. Jerome also renders “ex
Bosor.”[263] Βοσόρ also occurs as the name of a place in Deut. iv. 43; 1
Sam. xxx. 9; 1 Macc. v. 26. On this last passage see _ZdPV._, 12, 51;
13, 41. For other interpretations (Hebrew pronunciation of the Aramaic
פתורה)[264] see Pole’s _Synopsis_ on 2 Peter ii. 15.
It is worth observing that minuscule 81 displays a close agreement with
B in other places as well as this.
On the names in the catalogue of the Apostles, see Zahn, _Einl._, ii.
263; on Ἱερουσαλήμ and Ἱεροσόλυμα, ii. 310; on Jesus Barabbas, ii. 294;
on Barachias in Matt. xxiii. 35, i. 454, ii. 308. On the confusion
between Isaiah and Asaph in Matt. xiii. 35, and between Jeremiah,
Zechariah, and Isaiah in other passages, compare Ambrosiaster’s note on
1 Cor. ii. 9 cited above, p. 148.
“He who seeks in the wild fir wood, will still find many a cudgel
good.”
[Sidenote: Textus brevior.]
The rule that the =shorter text= is the more original is a subdivision
of Bengel’s canon. It is specially the case when two longer forms are
opposed to it which are mutually exclusive and whose origin can be
explained from the shorter. As examples of this Zahn adduces, in
addition to the double conclusion of Mark’s Gospel, the following:—
John vi. 47: πιστεύων, א B L T, + “in God,” Syr^{cu. sin}, + εἰς ἐμέ A C
D Γ Δ Λ Π....
John vii. 39: πνεῦμα, א K T Π, + ἅγιον L X Γ Δ Λ, + δεδομένον it
vg^{cle}, + ἅγιον ἐπ’ αὐτοῖς, D f goth, + ἅγιον δεδομένον, B 254
Syr^{sin. hark}....
James v. 7: πρόϊμον, B 31, pr. ὑετὸν A K L P, pr. καρπὸν א 9 ff etc.
It is equally clear that a reading is incorrect which proves to be a
mixture of two others (=conflate readings=). The respective claims of
these others must be adjudged on other considerations. Thus we have—
Luke xxiv. 53: αἰνοῦντες, D a b e.
εὐλογοῦντες, א B C* L.
αἰνοῦντες καὶ εὐλογοῦντες, A C^2 X Γ Δ Λ Π.
εὐλογοῦντες καὶ αἰνοῦντες, Ethiop.
Acts vi. 8: πλήρης χάριτος, א A B D.
πλήρης πίστεως, H P.
πλήρης χάριτος καὶ πίστεως, E.
In general that reading will have the best claim to originality which
stands first in the combination. Further illustrations are unnecessary.
In order to fulfil the promise of the title of this chapter, the
foregoing exposition of the Theory of New Testament criticism should be
succeeded by a further part dealing with its Praxis. Such a part would
contain particular illustrations of the way in which the criticism of
the text has been handled by our authorities hitherto and the way in
which it must be treated in accordance with the foregoing principles.
The following notes do not and cannot claim to be a complete fulfilment
of this great task, more especially as in the preceding part we were
unable to arrive at a finished system of textual criticism. I have
therefore contented myself with bringing together a series of passages
of interest from a critical point of view. In doing so I have freely
drawn upon Zahn’s Introduction. For this I feel sure the reader will
thank me, while at the same time I trust that the author will pardon the
liberty I have taken. I have made use, as far as possible, of the
additional material afforded by editions later than those of Tischendorf
and Westcott and Hort, particularly of the Sinai-Syriac. This collection
may therefore serve in some degree to supplement our commentaries,
which, though their merits in other directions are to be freely
conceded, still leave much to be desired in the matter of textual
criticism. A purely critical commentary on the New Testament is a great
desideratum. The following notes are to be regarded not as the
commencement of such a work, but simply as a stimulus thereto. I myself
felt it to be a defect in the small Stuttgart edition of the New
Testament that want of space obliged me to omit all references to the
origin and significance of the various readings selected from
manuscripts. For many of these an Annotatio Critica in an Appendix like
that in the larger edition of v. Gebhardt would scarcely have been
sufficient. What information, _e.g._, would it have imparted to a reader
to have given the numbers of the two minuscules 346, 556 after the
reading in Matt. i. 16? What he needs is an Apparatus Criticus or a
Commentarius Criticus such as Bengel appended to his edition, or like
that which Burk published separately in his second issue. Ed. Miller has
promised to give us one for the Gospels, only it will proceed on
principles which very few of us will be able to accept.
Footnote 129:
I could desire no better motto for this third section than the words
of Augustine: Codicibus emendandis primitus debet invigilare sollertia
eorum qui scripturas nosse desiderant, ut emendatis non emendati
cedant (_De Doctrina Christiana_, ii. 14, 21, where the saying about
the interpretum numerositas, cited on page 108, is also found). Or if
not these words, then those of our Lord himself, γίνεσθε δόκιμοι
τραπεζῖται, which Origen applied to the verification of the canon, but
which, taken in the sense of 1 Thess. v. 21, are equally applicable to
the work of the “lower” criticism. Apollos, the pupil of Marcion, also
vindicated the right of Biblical criticism with these same words.
Epiphanius, _Haeres._, xliv. 2 (Zahn, GK., i. 175).
Footnote 130:
The fragment was edited by Tregelles with a facsimile in 1867. It is
given in Westcott’s _Canon of the N. T._, Appendix C, where also see
the section on the Muratorian Canon, Part i. c. ii. It will be found
also in Preuschen’s _Analecta, Kürzere Texte ..._ pp. 129-137 (the
eighth number of G. Krüger’s _Sammlung ausgewählter kirchen- und
dogmengeschichtlicher Quellenschriften_, Freib. and Leipzig, 1893).
Footnote 131:
Quoted in Westcott, _Canon_, part ii. c. ii. § 1, and in Zahn’s
_Einleitung_, ii. 179.
Footnote 132:
Given in Preuschen. In the manuscripts it is entitled “Indiculum
Veteris et Novi Testamenti et Caecili Cipriani.” It was first made
known from a MS. at Cheltenham in 1886. As it is mostly assigned to
the year 365 (see also Jülicher, _Einleitung_, p. 336) the words of
W.-W. may be repeated here: “S. Berger tamen aliter sentit, rationibus
commotus quarum una certe nobis satis vera videtur. Concordant enim
numeri in Veteri Testamento cum codicibus Hieronymianis, e.g. in
libris Regum quattuor, Esaiae, Jeremiae, et duodecim Prophetarum,
Tobiae, et Macchabeorum secundo. Indiculus tamen sine dubio antiquus
est” (p. 736).
Footnote 133:
Catalogus Claramontanus given in Westcott, _Canon_, Appendix D, p.
563.
Footnote 134:
Translated into French, _Prairies d’or_, i. 123: one volume into
English by Sprenger, 1841; Sayous, _Jésus Christ d’après Mohammed_, p.
34.
Footnote 135:
See Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 176; _GK._, ii. 364-375, 1014.
Footnote 136:
See _Addenda_, p. xvi.
Footnote 137:
The numbers are as follows:—
-ν- -νν-
Matthew, 2 24
John, 7 17
Luke, 27 1
Mark, 2 24
Acts, 21 2
See Blass, _Lucae ad Theophilum liber prior_, p. vi. f., _Philology of
the Gospels_, p. 75 f., where three of Lippelt’s numbers are corrected
with the help of Harris. See also _Expository Times_, Nov. 1897, p. 92
f. I cannot understand why Wendt, in the new edition of his Commentary
on the Acts, should take not the slightest notice of this far-reaching
discovery. On the spelling in the Latin manuscripts, see W.-W.,
_Epilogus_, 776.
Footnote 138:
_Der Schluss des Markus-Evangeliums, der Vier-Evangelien-Kanon, und
die kleinasiastischen Presbyter_ (Berlin, 1894).
Footnote 139:
_Expositor_, Dec. 1894.
Footnote 140:
_Einleitung_, ii. 221.
Footnote 141:
See Coxe’s _Catalogue of Greek MSS. in the Bodleian Library_, 1854.
Footnote 142:
On _cata_ or _kata_ in the subscriptions, titles, prefaces, etc., of
Latin manuscripts, see the index in W.-W., to which add the remarkable
phrase _cata tempus_, which codex e gives in John v. 4, in place of
_secundum tempus_ in the other manuscripts.
Footnote 143:
See Field, _Hexapla_, i. p. lxxii.
Footnote 144:
The order, πραεῖς ... πτωχοί ... πενθοῦντες, in Baljon is due to a
strange oversight which is not corrected in the Addenda et Corrigenda.
Footnote 145:
To the passages which may be adduced in support of the reading, add
Clement, _Hom._ η 32 (Lagarde, 92, 35), ια 32 (118, 31).
Footnote 146:
Codex D and Syr^{sin} also agree in omitting v. 30, but this is
probably no more than a remarkable coincidence.
Footnote 147:
See _Urt._, 55 ff., where works on this subject are cited.
Footnote 148:
See also Linwood, _Remarks on Conjectural Emendations as applied to
the New Testament_, 1873.
Footnote 149:
On the symbol m, see above, p. 114.
Footnote 150:
The converse occurs in Eusebius, _Eccl. Hist._, iv. 15, in the address
of Polycarp’s _Martyrium_. There the reading κατὰ Πόντον, which is
also found in the Syriac, should, according to Harnack’s _Chronologie
der altchristl. Lit._, i. 341, be replaced by κατὰ πάντα τόπον, or
rather by κατὰ τόπον which is found in 1 Macc. xii. 4; 2 Macc. xii. 2.
Compare also the variation found in the manuscripts in 2 Cor. x. 15
between κοποις, πονοις, and τοποις, and between ποτος and τοπος in
Judith vi. 21. See also Eusebius, _Eccl. Hist._, v. 15, 23.
Footnote 151:
The opposite view is expressed in Scrivener, ii. 244: “It is now
agreed among competent judges that Conjectural Emendation must never
be resorted to, even in passages of acknowledged difficulty”; and he
quotes from Roberts (_Words of the New Testament_): “conjectural
criticism is entirely banished from the field ... simply because there
is no need for it.” With this, however, he does not quite agree. He
admits that there are passages respecting which we cannot help framing
a shrewd suspicion that the original reading differed from any form in
which they are now presented to us. He notes as passages for which we
should be glad of more light, Acts vii. 46, xiii. 32, xix. 40, xxvi.
28; Rom. viii. 2; 1 Cor. xii. 2, where Ephes. ii. 11 might suggest ὅτι
ποτέ; 1 Tim. vi. 7; 2 Pet. iii. 10, 12; Jude 5, 22, 23. G. Krüger
expresses himself to the same effect. He would have no conjecture,
however well founded, received into the text. See his notice of
Koetschau’s Origen in the _L. Cbl._, No. 39, 1899. I find that Swete
has had no objection to adopt a conjecture of mine in his second
edition of the last volume of the Cambridge Septuagint (Enoch xiv. 3).
If such a thing is permissible in the case of Enoch, why should it not
be allowable in the New Testament? As clever suggestions maybe noted
ἐκολάφισαν for the hapax legomenon ἐκεφαλίωσαν, Mark xii. 4 (Linwood,
Van de Sande-Bakhuyzen) and λανθάνουσι for μανθάνουσι, 1 Tim. v. 13
(Hitzig). Lagrange (_Revue Biblique_, 1900, p. 206) cautions us
against “prêter de l’esprit à l’Esprit Saint.”
Footnote 152:
Compare my conjecture of מִפַתְרֹם for מִתְרַפֵם, Ps. lxviii. 31, and
see below, p. 236.
Footnote 153:
Meyer-Wendt^8, p. 51. For an example of Σ repeated by mistake, _cf._
ΕΙΣΣΤΕΛΟΣ in B, Mark xiii. 13. Its erroneous omission is quite common.
Footnote 154:
Bagster, London, 1887.
Footnote 155:
See Isaac Taylor’s _History of the Transmission of Ancient Books to
Modern Times_ (1827); and compare also the text-books on
Hermeneutics, _e.g._ in I. v. Müller’s _Handbuch der klassischen
Altertumswissenschaft_.
Footnote 156:
_Benedicti regula monachorum. Recensuit Ed. Wölfflin_, Lipsiae,
Teubner, 1895, pp. xv. 85, 8vo. See also his article on the Latinity
of Benedict in the _Arch. f. Lat. Lexikogr._ ix. 4, 1896, pp. 493-521.
Footnote 157:
_Textgeschichte der Regula S. Benedicti_ (_Abh. d. 3 Cl. d. k. Ak. d.
Wiss._, vol. xxi., Munich, 1898). Compare also _The Text of St.
Benedict’s Rule_ by Dom C. Butler, O.S.B. Reprinted from the _Downside
Review_, December 1899, 12 pp.
Footnote 158:
_TU._ xiv. 1, 1896.
Footnote 159:
Krüger’s _Sammlung_, Heft xi., Freiburg and Leipzig, 1895.
Footnote 160:
_TU._, New Series, i. 1, 1897.
Footnote 161:
Compare also the differences between the editions of Josephus,
published by Niese and Naber.
Footnote 162:
See, however, the two articles by Lake and Brightman, _On the Italian
Origin of Codex Bezae_ in the _Journal of Theological Studies_, i. 441
ff.
Footnote 163:
See below on John viii. 57, p. 289.
Footnote 164:
An instructive discussion of the relationship between D_{2} and E_{3}
is given in Hort’s _Introduction_, §§ 335-337. It is possible that one
copyist in Rom. xv. 31-33 took ἵνα ἡ διακονία μου ἡ εἰς Ἱερουσαλὴμ ...
διὰ θελήματος Θεοῦ, and the other καὶ ἡ δωροφορία μου ἡ ἐν Ἱερ ... διὰ
θελήματος Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ—_i.e._ two entirely different recensions.
Footnote 165:
Zahn very properly remarks (_Th. Lbl._, 1899, 16, 179): “One must not,
at least as regards the N. T., confound Eusebius with Pamphilus, or,
if I might say so, with the firm of Pamphilus and Eusebius. If the
fifty Bibles that Eusebius provided at the bidding of the Emperor for
the use of the churches of the capital had contained a text of the N.
T. prepared on the basis of the previous works and commentaries of
Origen, the entire subsequent history of the text of the N. T. in the
region of Constantinople, revealing as it does the extensive
propagation of the Antiochean text, would be perfectly
incomprehensible. As in the matter of the canon so also of the text of
the N. T., Eusebius emancipated himself from the school of Origen, and
attached himself to that of Antioch, at least in this particular
instance fraught with such important consequences for the history of
the Bible.”
Footnote 166:
See Hort, _Introduction_, §§ 188, 189.
Footnote 167:
Athanasius, writing to Constans, says in his first Apology: τῷ ἀδελφῷ
σου οὐκ ἔγραψα ἢ μόνον ὅτε ... καὶ ὅτε πυκτία τῶν θείων γραφῶν
κελεύσαντος αὐτοῦ μοι κατασκευάσαι, ταῦτα ποιήσας ἀπέστειλα.
Footnote 168:
It is given in Syriac in Abbé Martin’s _Introduction à la critique
textuelle du N. T._, Plate XX. No. 35 (1883), from the MS. de Paris,
27, f 88 b, and also in Lagarde’s _Bibliotheca Syriaca_, 259, 22-27.
From the Greek πυργίσκος, which becomes פרדוסקא in the Semitic, the
Syriac forms another diminutive פרדסקזנא, which is still omitted in
the _Thesaurus Syriacus_, 3240; _cf._ Bar Bahlul, 1606, 9 (App. p.
64). In place of πυργίσκῳ, Oikonomos would read the genitive πυργίσκου
(περι των ὀ ερμηνευτων, iv. 500).
Footnote 169:
Not only does the Old Testament promise to shed some light upon an
obscure problem in the New, but the converse may also be true—viz.
that the history of the text of the New Testament may contribute to a
better understanding of that of the Old. It was long observed that
many peculiarities of the Lucianic revision of the Septuagint occur
also in the witnesses to the Old Latin version (see especially Driver,
_Notes on Samuel_, p. li; _Urt._, 78). No proper explanation of this
phenomenon could be given so long as the Old Latin version of the Old
Testament was looked upon as homogeneous and of great antiquity. But
the New Testament, for which we have far more Old Latin manuscripts
than for the Old, shows that the Old Latin pre-Jeromic version had a
chequered history, and in particular that at a certain time a revision
was undertaken, the result of which is found especially in Codex
Brixianus (f, see p. 112), and which “non solum interpretationem
veterem stilo elegantiori emendabat, sed etiam lectiones novas
protulit. Notatu certe dignum est, in ista emendatione Itala eminere
lectiones quae in maiori parte codicum Graecorum apparent, _quas
Recensioni Syrae vel Antiochenae adiudicant Westcott et Hort_.” So say
Wordsworth and White, p. 654. If the same thing holds good of the Old
Testament, then the relationship between the Old Latin and Lucian at
once becomes evident, and the supposition is not so absurd that the
marginal glosses of Codex Legionensis (called Codex Gothicus in
Hastings’ _Bible Dictionary_, iii. p. 50_b_.) which are particularly
striking on this view of the case, may have been translated into Latin
from Lucian. These considerations, moreover, may possibly throw fresh
light on the question that I have raised elsewhere (_Urt._, p. 78),
whether Lucian may not also have used the Peshitto in his recension of
the Old Testament. I see that it has been taken up by J. Méritan, in
his little book, entitled, _La Version grecque des Livres de Samuel,
précédée d’une Introduction sur la critique textuelle_ (Paris, 1898).
On pp. 96-113 he discusses the same question—whether Lucian knew and
used the Peshitto. He answers the question in the affirmative: “It is
therefore probable that as regards certain passages of the Books of
Samuel, in his work of revision, or rather of correction, Lucian did
not follow the Hebrew text as his sole and infallible guide, but
availed himself of others also, and that one of those principal
authorities was the Syriac version.” We often enough find ὁ Σύρος
cited as an authority in the Greek Commentaries on the Old Testament.
Whether it is also mentioned for the New Testament is a point that
seems not yet to be looked into.
I may add that Bickel concludes his short article in the _Zeitschrift
für kath. Theol._, iii. 467-469, entitled, “Die Lucianische
Septuagintabearbeitung nachgewiesen,” by saying: “In establishing the
recensions of Lucian and Hesychius for the Septuagint, we may be held
as settling the question whether traces of these may not also be found
in the New Testament.”
In his _Einleitung_, ii. 240, Zahn says: “Without a doubt many
readings which had a considerable circulation in the second and third
centuries, some of them being of no small importance and extent, were
gradually ousted from their place in the text from the fourth century
onwards, and some of them dropped out of the later tradition
altogether. And it is equally true that many interpolations were
current in these later centuries which were unknown in the second. But
whatever our judgment be in doubtful cases, we are still always in a
position to support it with extant documents.”
Footnote 170:
Rahlfs cannot, of course, assent to this supposition, seeing that he
regards Codex B as depending on the Festal Letter containing the Canon
of Athanasius, which was not written till the year 367.
Footnote 171:
See especially Lagarde, _Sept.-Studien_, 1892, and Moore’s _Commentary
on Judges_, 1895, p. xlvi.
Footnote 172:
See above under Λ, p. 72.
Footnote 173:
There is no need to discuss here the other expressions used by Jerome
in his letter of the year 403 to the Gothic priests Sunnia and
Fretela, seeing that these relate only to the Old Testament. But the
words themselves may be quoted: “Breviter admoneo ut sciatis, aliam
esse editionem, quam Origenes et Caesariensis Eusebius omnesque
Graeciae tractatores κοινήν, id est communem appellant, atque
vulgatam, et a plerisque nunc Λουκιανός dicitur, aliam septuaginta
interpretum quae in ἑξαπλοῖς codicibus reperitur, et a nobis in
latinum sermonem fideliter versa est, et Jerosolymae atque in orientis
ecclesiae (so Lagarde, _Librorum V. T. can. pars prior_, p. xiii. from
_Vallarsi_, i. 635?) decantatur ... κοινή autem ista, hoc est
communis, editio ipsa est quae et septuaginta, sed hoc interest inter
utramque quod κοινή pro locis et temporibus et pro voluntate
scriptorum vetus corrupta editio est, ea autem quae habetur in
ἑξαπλοῖς et quam nos vertimus, ipsa est quae in eruditorum libris
incorrupta et immaculata septuaginta interpretum translatio
reservatur” (_ibid._, 637). For Λουκιανός Oikonomos (iv. 499) would
read Λουκιανίς.
Footnote 174:
A. D. Loman would emend this passage by reading εἴτε ἀπὸ μοχθηρίας τῆς
διορθώσεως τῶν γραφομένων εἴτε καὶ ἀπὸ τόλμης τινῶν τῶν τὰ ἑαυτοῖς
δοκοῦντα (_Leiden. Theol. Tijdschr._, vii., 1873, 233).
Footnote 175:
What he says is (_Viri Illust._, c. 75): Pamphilus presbyter, Eusebii
Caesariensis episcopi necessarius, tanto bibliothecae divinae amore
flagravit, ut maximam partem Origenis voluminum sua manu descripserit,
quae usque hodie in Caesariensi bibliotheca habetur. Sed et in
duodecim prophetas vigintiquinque ἐξηγήσεων Origenis volumina manu
eius (_i.e._ Pamphili) exarata repperi, quae tanto amplector et servo
gaudio, ut Croesi opes habere me credam. Si enim laetitia est unam
epistulam habere martyris, quanto magis tot milia versuum, quae mihi
videntur suis sanguinis signasse vestigiis. The above is Richardson’s
text. Bernoulli (Krüger’s _Sammlung_, Heft xi. 1895) reads _habentur_,
_Sed in_, and _videtur_, and also omits _volumina_.
Footnote 176:
Προσφώνησις· κορωνίς εἰμι δογμάτων θείων διδάσκαλος· ἄν τινί με χρήσῃς
ἀντίβιβλον λάμβανε, οἱ γὰρ ἀποδόται κακοί· Ἀντίφρασις· θησαυρὸν ἔχων
σε πνευματικῶν ἀγαθῶν καὶ πᾶσιν ἀνθρώποις ποθητὸν ἁρμονίαις τε καὶ
ποικίλαις γραμμαῖς κεκοσμημένον—νὴ τὴν ἀλήθειαν—οὐ δώσω σε προχείρως
τινὶ οὐδ’ αὖ φθονέσω τῆς ὠφελείας, χρήσω δὲ τοῖς φίλοις ἀντίβιβλον
λαμβάνων. The last seven words, which are erased in H, are supplied by
the minuscule 93^{paul} and the Armenian version. On ἀντίβιβλον =
“borrowing-receipt” or “voucher,” see _ThLz._, 1895, 283, 407. See
also Robinson, _Euthaliana_, _Texts and Studies_, iii. 3.
Footnote 177:
To the literature referred to on p. 79 should be added the second
section of Bousset’s _Textkritische Studien_ (_TU._ xi. 4, 1894),
entitled, _Der Codex Pamphili_, pp. 45-73. Bousset affirms the close
connection between the Corrector of Sinaiticus indicated by
Tischendorf as ^c and Codex H. I have established the connection of
this corrector in the Psalter with Eusebius by means of the latter’s
Commentary on the Psalms (see above, p. 58). As yet no one appears to
have examined the New Testament quotations in Eusebius. _Cf._ however
Bousset, _ThLz._, 1900, 22, 611 ff.
Footnote 178:
It runs: Εἰσὶν ὅσα προτεταγμένον ἔχουσι τὸν ἀριθμὸν ὧδε, ὅσα Ὠριγένην
ἐπιγεγραμμένον ἔχει τούτῳ τῷ μονοσυλλάβῳ Ρ/Ω· εἰσὶ δὲ μάλιστα ἐν τῷ
Ἰώβ· ὅσα δὲ περὶ διαφωνίας ῥητῶν τινῶν τῶν ἐν τῷ ἐδαφίῳ ἢ ἐκδόσεών
ἐστιν σχόλια, ἅπερ καὶ κάτω νενευκυῖαν περιεστιγμένην ἔχει
προτεταγμένην, τῶν ἀντιβεβληκότων τὸ βιβλίον ἐστίν· ὅσα δὲ ἀμφιβόλως
ἔξω κείμενα ῥητὰ ἔξω νενευκυῖαν περιεστιγμένην ἔχει προτεταγμένην, διὰ
τὰ σχόλια προσετέθησαν κατ’ αὐτὰ τοῦ μεγάλου εἰρηκότος διδασκάλου ἵνα
μὴ δόξῃ κατὰ κενοῦ τὸ σχόλιον φέρεσθαι, ἐν πολλοῖς μὲν τῶν ἀντιγράφων
τῶν ῥητῶν οὕτως ἐχόντων, ἐν τούτῳ δὲ μὴ οὕτως κειμένων ἢ μηδ’ ὅλως
φερομένων καὶ διὰ τοῦτο προστεθέντων.
Footnote 179:
Περι των ὀ ερμηνευτων, iv. 904. Athens, 1844-1849.
Footnote 180:
_Texte und Untersuchungen_, xvii. (N. F. ii.) 4. See above, p. 90.
Footnote 181:
_Euthaliusstudien_, pp. 111-115; 115 ff.
Footnote 182:
_Neue Jahrbücher für deutsche Theologie_, ii. 3, 3 (1894), pp.
360-363. Compare also von Dobschütz, _lib. cit._, 111.
Footnote 183:
μάλιστα δὲ παρὰ τοὺς καθ’ ἡμᾶς πάντας διέπρεπε τῇ περὶ τὰ θεῖα λόγια
γνησιωτάτῃ σπουδῇ. Euseb., _Eccl. Hist._, viii. 11.
Footnote 184:
See above, p. 87 ff., on Evan. 473, Act. 246, 419, Evl. 286, and
compare Zahn, _ThLbl._, 1899, 181: Would that some one with the time
and opportunity to work in the Monasteries of Mount Athos applied
himself to the Codex written in the year 800 by the unhappy Empress
Maria (Lambros 129, S. Pauli 2). Since the above was written the
manuscript has been collated by Von der Goltz.
Footnote 185:
On κόφινον κοπρίων, see Chase, _Syro-Latin Text_, p. 135 f. It may be
observed in passing how variously καταργεῖ is rendered in the
different Latin manuscripts—viz. by _evacuat_ in b ff^2 l q, by
_detinet_ in ff^{2c} i r, by _intricat_ in e, and by _occupat_ in d
and the Vulgate.
Footnote 186:
The evidence of d in this passage cannot be had, unfortunately, as
eight leaves (a quaternio) containing the Greek of Matt. vi. 20-ix. 2,
and the Latin of vi. 8-viii. 27, have gone amissing.
Footnote 187:
Unfortunately h exhibits only the text of Matthew, otherwise I might
simply have referred to the list of variants on p. 120. I am not aware
if what Wordsworth and White (vol. i. p. xxxii) say of this manuscript
is still true: Codex hodie, ut fertur, in bibliotheca Vaticana
inveniri non potest.
Footnote 188:
See Index in Wordsworth and White, p. 751.
Footnote 189:
At the same time it must be pointed out here that not only in Luke and
Acts, but in all the books of the N. T., it is wrong in principle to
present the alternative “original or later alteration” or even
forgery. The dilemma can be wrongly stated. Blass was not the first to
express the opinion, “Lucam bis edidisse Actus.” De Dieu did so before
him, and by an examination of those passages of the Gospels in which
the original text has been preserved in purely “Western” witnesses
Hort (§ 241) was led to suppose that the Western and non-Western texts
may have “started respectively from a first and a second edition of
the Gospels, both conceivably apostolic.” Similarly Wordsworth and
White are unable to explain the origin and propagation of several
readings in the manuscripts of the Vulgate otherwise than by supposing
that the primitive document itself contained certain variants
(corrections) in the passages in question.
Footnote 190:
_Geschichte des neutestamentlichen Kanons_ (Erlangen): I. Band, _Das
N. T. vor Origenes_, 1 and 2 Hälfte, 1888-89; II. Band, _Urkunden und
Belege zum ersten und dritten Band_, 1890-92. It is to be hoped that
the third volume will not be long in making its appearance. Along with
this we must take his _Forschungen zur Geschichte des
neutestamentlichen Kanons und der altkirchlichen Literatur_, of which
six volumes have been published (1881-1900). Meanwhile Zahn’s
_Einleitung in das Neue Testament_ (Leipzig, I., 1898; II., 1899, 2nd
ed., 1900) cannot be too strongly recommended. It contains a great
deal of valuable material for the criticism of the text. Needless to
say, textual criticism is the basis on which all sound exegesis rests.
Footnote 191:
A small selection will be found in Preuschen, _Analecta_, pp. 152-157.
Footnote 192:
Here again, unfortunately, we have no collection of notices referring
to the history of the text as distinguished from that of the canon.
Footnote 193:
Jülicher, _loc. cit._, from Sozomen, _Hist. Eccl._, i. 11. On the
Latin form _grabattum_, see W.-W., Index, p. 756, σκίμπους occurs as
early as Clem. Al. _Paed._, 1, 2, 6. In the parallels to Mark ii. 6,
Matthew has κλίνη (ix. 6), and Luke κλινίδιον (v. 24). _Cf._ the
passage cited by Lagarde (_De Novo Test._, 20 = _Ges. Abh._, 118) from
Lucian’s _Philopseudes_, 11; ὁ Μίδας αὐτὸς ἀράμενος τὸν σκίμποδα ἐφ’
οὗ ἐκεκόμιστο ᾤχετο εἰς ἀγρὸν ἀπιών.
Footnote 194:
Τὴν σήμερον οὖν Κυριακὴν ἡμέραν διηγάγομεν, ἐν ᾗ ἀνέγνωμεν ὑμῶν τὴν
ἐπιστολήν· ἣν ἕξομεν ἀεί ποτε ἀναγινώσκοντες νουθετεῖσθαι, ὡς καὶ τὴν
προτέραν ἡμῖν διὰ Κλήμεντος γραφεῖσαν.
Footnote 195:
_Cf._ Matt. xiii. 27, δοῦλοι τοῦ οἰκοδεσπότου, and also the
superscriptions of the N. T. Epistles, particularly those of Paul,
where δοῦλος Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ is varied by ἀπόστολος Ἰ. Χ.
Footnote 196:
“is reserved”—Syr.
Footnote 197:
“but”—Syr.
Footnote 198:
This reading is confirmed by the Syriac as against ὑπ’ αὐτοῦ read by
Christophorson and Savil.
Footnote 199:
The passage is a conspicuous example of the importance of punctuation.
Bengel punctuates ἅγιον, κληθήσεται υἱὸς Θεοῦ, and Westcott and Hort
ἅγιον κληθήσεται, υἱὸς Θεοῦ. Weiss is accordingly not quite right in
citing Bengel along with Bleek and Hoffman as supporting the view of
Tertullian (see Bengel’s _Gnomon_). It will be difficult to prove that
Tertullian’s construction is impossible “on account of the position of
κληθήσεται.” Westcott and Hort surely know Greek, and Tertullian knew
it better than any of us.
Footnote 200:
It seems worth while to quote here Harnack’s words on these notices of
the earliest attempts at textual criticism. He says (_ibid._, p. 189):
“The charge preferred against the disciples of that erudite Tanner
(Theodotus) by the author of the Little Labyrinth is threefold. He
complains of their formal and grammatical exegesis of Scripture, of
their arbitrary system of textual criticism, and of the extent to
which they were engrossed in Logic, Mathematics, and empirical
Science. At the first glance, therefore, it would appear that these
people had no interest to spare for Theology. But the very opposite is
the case. The complainant himself has to confess that they employed
the method of grammatical exegesis ‘with the object of establishing
their godless conclusions,’ and textual criticism in order to correct
the manuscripts of the holy Scriptures. In place of the allegorical
method of exposition, the grammatical is the only right one, and we
have here an attempt to discover a text more nearly resembling the
original instead of simply accepting the traditional form. How
inimitable and charming really are these notices!... These scholars
had to be generals without an army, because their grammar and textual
criticism and logic might only discredit in the eyes of the churches
that christological method which long tradition had invested with
admiration and respect.... As ‘genuine’ scholars—this is an
exceedingly characteristic description that is given of them—they also
took a jealous care that none of them lost the credit of his
conjectures and emendations. No remnants have been preserved of the
works of these the first scholarly exegetes of the Christian Church
(the Syntagma knows of the existence of such; _cf._ Epiph. lv. c. 1).”
So writes Harnack. Nothing, however, is said in the text of Eusebius
of a jealous watch over the priority of the conjectures. In the
sentence which Harnack renders “for their disciples have with an
ambitious zeal recorded what each one has corrected as they call it,
that is corrupted (deleted?),” φιλοτίμως ἐγγεγράφθαι is to be
understood simply of a diligent record of “corrections” undertaken
solely out of an interest in their contents. According to the Syriac
ἠφανισμένα is not to be rendered by “deleted,” but as Harnack
translates it: _cf._ the various Syriac versions in Matthew vi. verse
16 (Syr^p), verses 19 and 20 (Syr^{pc}). On the validity of the charge
of inventing false Scriptures, see Zahn, _GK._ 1, 296 f.
Footnote 201:
Westcott, _Canon_, Pt. I. c. iv. § 8, p. 308 ff.
Footnote 202:
Westcott, _Canon_, Pt. I. c. iv. p. 310.
Footnote 203:
_Ibid._, p. 291.
Footnote 204:
_Ibid._, p. 303 ff. Cf. _Texts and Studies_, vol. i. 4: _The Fragments
of Heracleon_, by A. E. Brooke, M.A.
Footnote 205:
On the literature of the subject, _cf._ Zahn, _GK._ i. 585-718, _Das
N. T. Marcions_; ii. 409-529, _Marcions N. T._ All other works are
superseded by this, but mention may still be made of A. Hahn, _Das
Evangelium Marcions in seiner ursprünglichen Gestalt_ (1823); Thilo,
_Codex Apocryphus Novi Testamenti_ (1832: for this work Hahn attempted
to restore the text of Marcion, pp. 401-486); A. Ritschl, _Das
Evangelium Marcions und das kanonische Evangelium des Lucas_ (1846);
Hilgenfeld, in the _Z. f. hist. Theol._, 1855, pp. 426-484; Sanday,
_The Gospels in the Second Century_, c. viii.
Footnote 206:
The proof passages will be found in Zahn, _GK._ i. 620, 626, 663:
machaera non stilo: erubescat spongia Marcionis (Tert., v. 4, p. 282.
Is it permissible to infer from this that minium was already used in
manuscripts of the Bible at that time?—_cf._ Augustine, _Con. Jul._,
iii. 13: ipsum libri tui argumentum erubescendo convertatur in
minium): non miror si syllabas subtrahit, quum paginas totas plerumque
subducet. Quis tam comesor mus Ponticus quam qui evangelia corrosit
(_con. Marc._, i. 1): tuum apostoli codicem licet sit undique
circumrosus (Adamantius).
Footnote 207:
See the passage from Tertullian (cotidie reformant illud (_sc._
evangelium), prout a nobis cotidie revincuntur), and from Adamantius
(_Pseudo-Origenes_, de la Rue, i. 887 = Lat. in _Caspari Anecdota_, i.
57) in Zahn, _GK._ i. 613.
Footnote 208:
_Cf._ also _GK._ p. 681.
Footnote 209:
_Cf._ Westcott, _Canon_, Pt. I. c. iv. § 9, Marcion: “Some of the
omissions can be explained at once by his peculiar doctrines, but
others are unlike arbitrary corrections, and must be considered as
various readings of the greatest interest, dating as they do to a time
anterior to all other authorities in our possession” (p. 315). See
also note at the end of the paragraph, where certain readings peculiar
to Marcion are cited.
Footnote 210:
_Cf._ also _ibid._, p. 684, and see below, p. 313.
Footnote 211:
_Cf._ also _ibid._, p. 682: “I repeat that readings which are proved
to be earlier than Marcion by their simultaneous occurrence in his
text and that of the several Catholic witnesses deserve greater
consideration both in the Gospels and Epistles than has generally been
accorded them. It is much more important to ascertain whether a
certain reading has the support of Marcion than to observe that it
occurs in this or that uncial manuscript. In spite of this, however,
the critical notes in our commentaries hardly ever refer to Marcion,
not to speak of their doing so systematically.”
Footnote 212:
Pp. 409-449, on the criticism of the sources; pp. 449-529, the
restoration of the text. On p. 449 f. he gives his verdict on the
earlier works of Hilgenfeld, Volkmar, and van Manen in this direction.
Footnote 213:
Zahn interjects “as yet.”
Footnote 214:
We have not yet discovered a manuscript containing exactly Marcion’s
text. The chances of our still doing so are very small in view of the
hatred with which Marcion was pursued. But when the libelli of certain
libellatici have been found, and also a great part of the Gospel of
Peter, we need not despair of finding other lost works as well. Codex
604 is interesting as exhibiting the Marcionite reading, ἐλθέτω τὸ
πνεῦμά σου ἐφ’ ἡμᾶς καὶ καθαρισάτω ἡμᾶς, in the Lord’s Prayer, Luke
xi. 2. The same manuscript omits με λέγετε εἶναι in Luke ix. 20, and
λέγουσα in verse 35. Compare also Jülicher, _Gleichnisreden Jesu_, ii.
5: “Marcion, who perhaps created the Roman text of Luke xxi. 30.”
Footnote 215:
On this passage W.-W. observe: “D ex Latinis forsan correctus.”
Footnote 216:
“Licet _suos_ adiectio sit haeretici.” Tertullian.
Footnote 217:
In the critical notes at the end of this chapter I have cited a number
of Marcion’s readings from Zahn’s work, with the hope that these will
now earn a fuller recognition in our theological commentaries. See
_e.g._ on Luke xviii. 20; xxiii. 2; xxiv. 37; 1 Cor. vi. 20; xiv. 19.
Footnote 218:
See Literature on p. 105 f., to which add Westcott, _Canon_, Part I.
c. iv. § 10.
Footnote 219:
Defending the plurality of the canonical Gospels against the
Marcionites, he says: τὸ ἀληθῶς διὰ τεσσάρων ἕν ἐστιν εὐαγγέλιον
(_Philocalia_, ed. Robinson, 47; Zahn, _GK._ i. 412; PRE^3, v. 654).
From what Origen says, _Contra Celsum_, vi. 51, it would seem that he
himself heard Tatian.
Footnote 220:
Euseb., _Hist. Eccl._, iv. 29, with reference to the Encratites:
Χρῶνται μὲν οὖν οὗτοι Νόμῳ καὶ Προφήταις καὶ Εὐαγγελίοις (Syriac has
אונגליון), ἰδίως ἑρμηνεύοντες τῶν ἱερῶν τὰ νοήματα γραφῶν ...
βλασφημοῦντες δὲ Παῦλον τὸν ἀπόστολον ἀθετοῦσιν αὐτοῦ τὰς Ἐπιστολὰς,
μηδὲ τὰς Πράξεις τῶν ἀποστόλων καταδεχόμενοι. ὁ μέντοι γε πρότερος
αὐτῶν ἀρχηγὸς ὁ Τατιανὸς συνάφειάν τινα καὶ συναγωγὴν οὐκ οἶδ’ ὅπως
τῶν Εὐαγγελίων συνθεὶς Τὸ Διὰ Τεσσάρων τοῦτο προσωνόμασεν· ὃ καὶ παρά
τισιν εἰσέτι φέρεται. Τοῦ δὲ Ἀποστόλου φασὶ τολμῆσαί τινας αὐτὸν
μεταφράσαι φωνὰς ὡς ἐπιδιορθούμενον αὐτῶν τὴν τῆς φράσεως σύνταξιν.
Καταλέλοιπε δὲ οὗτος πολύ τι πλῆθος γραμμάτων κ.τ.λ. In the Syriac
version it runs: But this Tatian, their first head, collected and
combined and framed a (_or_, the) אונגליון and called it דיטסרון, that
is “the combined,” which is in the possession of many till this day.
And it is said of him that he ventured to alter certain phrases of the
Apostle (the plural points in the Syriac are to be omitted) as with
the object of amending the composition of the phrases. And he has left
many writings, etc.
Footnote 221:
Epiphan., _Haeret._, 46, 1 (Pet. 391): λέγουσι δὲ τὸ διὰ τεσσάρων
Εὐαγγέλιον ὑπ’ αὐτοῦ γεγενῆσθαι, ὅπερ κατὰ Ἑβραίους τινὲς καλοῦσι.
Footnote 222:
Minuscule Evan. 72 (Harleianus 5647 of the eleventh century) on Matt.
xxvii. 48: ση[μείωσαι] ὅτι εἰς τὸ καθ’ ἱστορίαν εὐαγγέλιον Διοδώρου
καὶ Τατιανοῦ καὶ ἄλλων διαφόρων ἁγίων πατέρων τοῦτο προσκεῖται.
Instead of Διοδώρου, Harnack-Preuschen (i. 493), read Διαδώρου,
whether rightly or not I do not know. Nothing being known of the
historical Gospel of one Diodorus, it is natural enough to conjecture
(Zahn, _Forsch._, i. 28) that the reading should be διὰ δ’, but what
becomes then of ωρου καὶ? Harnack suggests διὰ δ’ Σύρου Τατιανοῦ, but
see Zahn, _Forsch._, ii. 298. The omission of the article before διὰ
δ’ is a difficulty.
Footnote 223:
In his Ἐπιτομὴ αἱρετικῆς κακομυθίας (i. 20; vol. iv. 312), written in
the year 453, he says at the end of the chapter on Tatian:—οὗτος καὶ
τὸ διὰ τεσσάρων καλούμενον συντέθεικεν εὐαγγέλιον, τάς τε γενεαλογίας
περικόψας καὶ τὰ ἄλλα ὅσα ἐκ σπέρματος Δαβὶδ κατὰ σάρκα γεγεννημένον
τὸν κύριον δείκνυσιν, ἐχρήσαντο δὲ τούτῳ οὐ μόνοι οἱ τῆς ἐκείνου
συμμορίας, ἀλλὰ καὶ οἱ τοῖς ἀποστολικοῖς ἑπόμενοι δόγμασι, τὴν τῆς
συνθήκης κακουργίαν οὐκ ἐγνωκότες, ἀλλ’ ἁπλούστερον ὡς συντόμῳ τῷ
βιβλίῳ χρησάμενοι. Εὗρον δὲ κἀγὼ πλείους ἢ διακοσίας βίβλους τοιαύτας
ἐν ταῖς παρ’ ἡμῖν ἐκκλησίαις τετιμημένας, καὶ πάσας συναγαγὼν ἀπεθέμην
καὶ τὰ τῶν τεττάρων εὐαγγελιστῶν ἀντεισήγαγον.
Footnote 224:
See Hamlyn Hill, _Earliest Life of Christ_, etc., p. 324; Hope W.
Hogg, Ante-Nicene Library, Additional Volume.
Footnote 225:
See _Die Ueberlieferung der griechischen Apologeten_, 1882, pp.
196-218, and, on the other side, Zahn, _Forschungen_, ii. 292 ff.
Footnote 226:
_The Diatessaron of Tatian: a Preliminary Study_, 1890.
Footnote 227:
See _ThLz._, 1891, col. 356.
Footnote 228:
It is not clear whether Harnack gives this as his own opinion or not.
For a reading of cod. W^d, akin to that of Tatian, see below on Mark
vii. 33, p. 264.
Footnote 229:
Ante-Nicene Christian Library, Additional Volume, p. 38.
Footnote 230:
See _Forschungen_, i. 130, 140, 216, 228 f., 237, 248, 263.
Footnote 231:
London, Macmillan, 1895.
Footnote 232:
_Forschungen_, i. 179.
Footnote 233:
This will be found most conveniently in Hogg’s translation—Ante-Nicene
Library, Additional Volume.
Footnote 234:
_Cf._ p. 393: “To judge from Ephraem’s Commentary, the Diatessaron
contains scarcely as much apocryphal matter as Codex Cantabrigiensis
of the Gospels and Acts.”
Footnote 235:
In his _N. T. um 200_, p. 108, Harnack treats Zahn’s interpretation of
the words of Eusebius as a bad blunder. The latter defends himself by
saying among other things that it is not quite clear whether Eusebius
himself was aware of the double meaning of the word _μεταφράσαι_ which
was employed in the tradition (he says _φασι_) reported to him. He
thinks that Rufinus might be said to have “paraphrased” certain
commentaries of Origen, correcting his thought and phraseology in many
places. True, but in Eusebius it is _φωνάς τινας τοῦ ἀποστόλου_, not
whole epistles, that Tatian is said to have “metaphrased.”
Footnote 236:
On the words of Jerome (_ad Tit. praef._, vii. 686), “Sed Tatianus
Encratitarum patriarches, qui et ipse nonnullas Pauli epistolas
repudiavit, hanc vel maxime, hoc est ad Titum, apostoli pronuntiandam
credidit, parvipendens Marcionis et aliorum qui cum eo in hac parte
consentiunt assertionem,” compare Zahn, _Forsch._, i. 6, _GK._ i. 426.
Footnote 237:
_Introd._, ii. § 170, p. 120. On all accounts the Western text claims
our attention first. The earliest readings which can be fixed
chronologically belong to it. As far as we can judge from extant
evidence, it was the most widely-spread text of Ante-Nicene times; and
sooner or later every version directly or indirectly felt its
influence. But any prepossessions in its favour that might be created
by this imposing early ascendancy are for the most part soon
dissipated by continuous study of its internal character. The
eccentric Whiston’s translation of the Gospels and Acts from the Codex
Bezae, and of the Pauline Epistles from the Codex Claromontanus, and
Bornemann’s edition of the Acts, in which the Codex Bezae was taken as
the standard authority, are probably the only attempts which have ever
been made in modern times to set up an exclusively, or even
predominantly, Western Greek text as the purest reproduction of what
the Apostles wrote. This all but universal rejection is doubtless
partly owing to the persistent influence of a whimsical theory of the
last century, which, ignoring all non-Latin Western documentary
evidence except the handful of extant bilingual uncials, maintained
that the Western Greek text owed its peculiarities to translation from
the Latin; partly to an imperfect apprehension of the antiquity and
extension of the Western text as revealed by Patristic quotations and
by versions. Yet even with the aid of a true perception of the facts
of Ante-Nicene textual history, it would have been strange if this
text, as a whole, had found much favour. A few scattered Western
readings have long been approved by good textual critics on
transcriptional and to a great extent insufficient grounds; and in
Tischendorf’s last edition their number has been augmented, owing to
the misinterpreted accession of the Sinai MS. to the attesting
documents. To one small and peculiar class of Western readings,
exclusively omissions, we shall ourselves have to call attention as
having exceptional claims to adoption.
§ 202 (p. 149). In spite of the prodigious amount of error which D
contains, these readings, in which it sustains and is sustained by
other documents derived from very ancient texts of other types, render
it often invaluable for the secure recovery of the true text; and,
apart from this direct applicability, no other single source of
evidence, except the quotations of Origen, surpasses it in value on
the equally important ground of historical or indirect
instructiveness. To what extent its unique readings are due to licence
on the part of the scribe rather than to faithful reproduction of an
antecedent text now otherwise lost, it is impossible to say; but it is
remarkable how frequently the discovery of fresh evidence, especially
Old-Latin evidence, supplies a second authority for readings in which
D had hitherto stood alone.
§ 240 (p. 175). On the other hand there remain, as has been before
intimated (§ 170), a few other Western readings of similar form, which
we cannot doubt to be genuine in spite of the exclusively Western
character of their attestation. They are all omissions, or, to speak
more correctly, non-interpolations of various length, that is to say,
the original record has here, to the best of our belief, suffered
interpolation in all the extant non-Western texts.... With a single
peculiar exception (Matt. xxvii. 49), in which the extraneous words
are omitted by the Syrian as well as by the Western text, the Western
non-interpolations are confined to the last three chapters of St.
Luke.
§ 241. These exceptional instances of the preservation of the original
text in exclusively Western readings are likely to have had an
exceptional origin.
In the edition of 1896, the surviving editor (Westcott) appends an
Additional Note which contains a further exceedingly valuable
admission in the same direction. It is as follows:—
Note to p. 121, § 170 (p. 328): “The Essays of Dr. Chase on _The
Syriac Element in Codex Bezae_, Cambridge, 1893, and _The Syro-Latin
Text of the Gospels_, Cambridge, 1895, are a most important
contribution to the solution of a fundamental problem in the history
of the text of the N.T. The discovery of the Sinaitic MS. of the Old
Syriac raises the question whether the combination of the oldest types
of the Syriac and Latin texts can outweigh the combination of the
primary Greek texts. A careful examination of the passages in which
Syr^{sin} and k are arrayed against א B, would point to the
conclusion.” [The proper title of Chase’s Essays is The Old Syriac,
under which shorter (outside) title Zahn also quotes them (_Einl._,
ii. 348).] This statement by Westcott sounds strange after the remark
made in the Preface. “For the rest,” he says there, “I may perhaps be
allowed to say that no arguments have been advanced against the
general principles maintained in the Introduction and illustrated in
the Notes since the publication of the First Edition, which were not
fully considered by Dr. Hort and myself in the long course of our
work, and in our judgment dealt with accurately.—Auckland Castle,
March 27, 1896. B. F. D.”
Footnote 238:
See my _Philologica Sacra_, p. 3, where I have cited this passage of
Lagarde. His book may not be very accessible to textual critics.
Footnote 239:
“Thou shalt worship no manuscripts” was one of the ten commandments
that Lehrs gave philologists.
Footnote 240:
This passage was the subject of a heated discussion between Severus
and Macedonius at Constantinople in the year 510. On this occasion the
superb copy of Matthew’s Gospel, which had been discovered in the
grave of Barnabas in the reign of the Emperor Zeno, was brought upon
the scene.
Footnote 241:
Compare what Westcott and Hort say of Whiston and Bornemann, cited
above, p. 222, and particularly the section on the twofold recension
of the Acts in Zahn’s _Einleitung_, ii. § 59, pp. 338-359. See also
Burkitt’s Introduction to Barnard’s _Biblical Text of Clement of
Alexandria_ (_Texts and Studies_, v. 5), especially p. xviii: “Let us
come out of the land of Egypt, which speaks, as Clement’s quotations
show, with such doubtful authority, and let us see whether the
agreement of East and West, of Edessa and Carthage, will not give us a
surer basis upon which to establish our text of the Gospels.”
Footnote 242:
Attention may be directed in passing to the interesting way in which
the witnesses are distributed. Thus we have in verse 51, for the
omission of καὶ ἀνεφερ. εἰς τ. οὐρ. א* D Syr^{sin} a b d e ff l*, Aug.
½; verse 52, omit προσκυν· αὐτόν, D Syr^{sin} a b d e ff l, Aug. 1/1;
verse 53, αἰνοῦντες for εὐλογοῦντες D a b d e ff l r (Aug.);
(Syr^{sin} here has מברכין, not משבחין which represents αἰνοῦντες in
Luke ii. 13, 20, xix. 37, and, therefore, must have read εὐλογοῦντες
in this passage). Now I ask, is it right to accept the testimony of D
and its associates in verse 52, only to reject it in verse 53? And
what amount of weight is added to the testimony of D by the addition
of that of א*? Schiller says in _Tell_: “The strong is mightiest
alone: united e’en the weak are strong”—how far are both these notions
true in textual criticism?
Footnote 243:
So Graefe, but it is not apparent whether the καὶ that belongs to this
reading is to be supplied before it or after. Evidently he intends to
read αἰν. καὶ εὐλογ. with the great majority of witnesses, and not
εὐλογ. καὶ αἰν. with the Ethiopic version. See _Th. St. Kr._, 1898, i.
136 f. The passage is regarded by Westcott and Hort as a good example
of “conflation,” § 146.
Footnote 244:
See now _Textkritik der vier Evangelien_, pp. 48, 181.
Footnote 245:
Αἰνεῖν is not given in Cremer’s _Dictionary_ among the synonyms of
εὐλογεῖν, and is only cited on p. 610 with the reading αἰνοῦντες καὶ
εὐλογοῦντες from this passage.
Footnote 246:
See Hilgenfeld, _Das Apostel-Concil nach seinem ursprünglichen
Wortlaute_ in the _ZfwTh._, 42 (1899), 1, 138-149.
Footnote 247:
Harnack, _Das Aposteldecret_ (Acta xv. 29) _und die Blass’sche
Hypothese_, Berlin, 1899. From the _Sitzungsberichte der preuss. Akad.
der Wiss._ Noticed in the _Expository Times_ for June 1899, p. 395 f.
See also the _Berliner philologische Wochenschrift_ of the 13th May
1899.
Footnote 248:
See critical note in the _Expositor’s Greek Testament_ (Knowling), _in
loco_.
Footnote 249:
_Cf._ the passage of Hermas cited above, p. 47.
Footnote 250:
A good example is seen in Ezek. xvi. 3. In the Sixtine edition of 1586
a new page (692) occurs in the middle of the sentence διαμαρτυρον τη
Ιερουσαλημ τας ανομιας αυτης ταδε λεγει κυριος τη Ιερουσαλημ, with the
result that the eight words from the first Ιερουσαλημ to the second
are printed twice by a recessive homoioteleuton, while in Codex 62
they have dropped out altogether owing to a forward error of the same
sort. The former mistake is tacitly corrected in all reprints, but the
latter could not be detected from the context alone without other
testimony. Compare also Mark ix. 10 in codex T of the Vulgate and ff
of the Old Latin. In the former the passage from _resurrexit_ to
_resurrexit_ is repeated, in the latter it is omitted.
Footnote 251:
I had a teacher once who invariably tried to get over any difficulty
in the Greek classics by saying that the text was corrupted by
homoioteleuton. We did not always agree with him; he was perhaps a
little too ready with this way out of a difficulty, but any one with
experience knows how very apt this mistake is to occur.
Footnote 252:
This applies to printed editions as well as to manuscripts. Van Ess’s
reprint of the Sixtine Septuagint (1824) is very carefully done, yet
five words have dropped out in Joel iii. 9. These are omitted in all
the later editions of 1835, 1855 (novis curis correcta), 1868, and
1879, and were only supplied by myself in 1887 on the occasion of the
third centenary of the Sixtine edition. They are omitted in
Tischendorf’s first edition of 1850, and also in the second of 1856.
Footnote 253:
In ancient times people always read aloud, even when reading by
themselves.
Footnote 254:
Scrivener would explain the “remarkable confusion” of the two
prepositions προ and προσ, when compounded with verbs, which we meet
_e.g._ in Matt. xxvi. 39; Mark xiv. 35; Acts xii. 6; xvii. 5, 26; xx.
5, 13; xxii. 25, by saying that the symbol [Symbol: an abbreviation
made of a rho character written on top of a block with three lines.]
is used indifferently for προ and προσ in the Herculanean rolls, and
here and there in Codex Sinaiticus. Seeing that it has become a bad
habit in Hebrew Grammars to speak of Aleph _prostheticum_ instead of
_protheticum_, and that the practice is still defended
(Gesenius-Kautzsch^{26}, p. 64, n. 3, “rightly so”) after my notice of
it (_Marginalien_, p. 67), I have given some little attention to this
confusion, and could cite dozens of examples. Others, of course, have
noticed it as well as myself. In his _N.T._, i. 20, B. Weiss says:
“The compounds with προ and προσ are interchanged quite heedlessly,”
and he cites in proof of this eight passages from the Acts. He writes
similarly in ii. 34. I shall instance only one or two cases in
connection with this same word πρόθεσις. Pitra on _Apost. Const._, 5,
17 (p. 325): πρόθεσιν restituimus cum Vatican. 2, 3, 4, 5, vulgo
πρόσθεσιν; Excerpta Περὶ Παθῶν, ed. R. Schneider (_Programme of
Duisburg_, 1895), where the manuscripts deviate in five passages, pp.
5, 14. 20; 6, 5; 13, 7. 13, and we read in § 10, ἀντίκειται δὲ
πρόσθεσις μὲν ἀφαιρέσει, etc., and in § 11, πρόσθεσις μὲν οὖν ἐστὶ
προσθήκη στοιχείου κατ’ ἀρχήν, οἷον σταφίς, ἀσταφίς καὶ ὀσταφίς. Both
times, of course, it should be πρόθεσις, as the better manuscripts
have it. Wherever mention is made of the “shewbread,” D invariably
turns it into “extra bread,” by reading προσθέσεως instead of
προθέσεως. Tischendorf first called attention to this in Luke vi. 4,
but it occurs also in Matt. xii. 4. I have no doubt myself that in the
case of verbal forms, the σ was inserted in order to avoid the hiatus
before the augment. Compare προσέθηκεν for προέθηκεν, Ex. xxiv. 23;
προσέθηκας, Ps. lxxxix. 8, Symmachus; προανεθέμην or προσανεθέμην,
Gal. i. 16. In Wisdom, vii. 27, the first hand of Sinaiticus even
writes προσφήτας for prophets. It is disputed whether the title of one
of Philo’s books is προπαιδεύματα or πρὸς [τὰ] παιδεύματα. Etc. etc.
_Sapienti sat._
Footnote 255:
We find all the possible permutations of the words αὐτοῖς ἐλάλησεν ὁ
Ἰησοῦς in John viii. 12. See my note on Codex Purpureus Petropolitanus
(N) in Hilgenfeld’s _Zeitschrift für wissenschaftliche Theologie_, 42
(1899), p. 623.
Footnote 256:
See Harnack, _Das Magnificat der Elisabeth_ (Lukas i. 46-55) in the
_Berliner Sitzungsberichte_ of the 17th May 1900, p. 538 ff. A good
example of how glosses may creep into the text is afforded by Philo
“Quod det.” 11 (Cohn, 1, 266).
Footnote 257:
On the influence of a system of pericopæ on the text of Codex D, see
Scrivener’s Introduction to his edition of the manuscript, p. li, and
Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 355.
Footnote 258:
See Semler’s edition of _J. J. Wetsteinii libelli ad crisin atque
interpretationem N.T._, Halae, 1766.
Footnote 259:
(1) Lectio quae in veteribus latinis non apparet probabilior est. (2)
Codices qui cum graecis א B L concordant plerumque textum
Hieronymianum ostendunt.
Footnote 260:
In view of the frequency with which the witnesses fluctuate between
ἡμῶν and ὑμῶν, ἡμῖν and ὑμῖν, etc., it is impossible to adjust their
claims on any mere arithmetical principle. Zahn (_Einl._, ii. 61)
calls attention to an important consideration in support of the
reading ὑμῖν in 2 Peter i. 4, which applies to other passages as
well—viz., “that when the New Testament epistles were read at divine
service, ἡμεῖς would very readily and very frequently be substituted
for ὑμεῖς, which excluded the reader or preacher.” Compare Acts iv.
12: ἐν ᾧ δεῖ σωθῆναι—, ἡμᾶς or ὑμᾶς?
It might be laid down as a second rule in this connection, that
particular importance attaches to those versions in which the
distinction of the persons does not depend simply on a single letter
but on a separate word (_nobis_: _vobis_, etc.). In versions of this
sort the original reading is preserved from the first; in the case of
the others, the change could be made at any point of the transmission,
especially when it was helped by the nature of the writing, which must
also, of course, be taken into account.
A glance over the verse enumeration in the margin of one of the modern
editions of the text will reveal, perhaps, most clearly how strong is
the tendency to interpolation. Of the verses into which Stephen
divided the Greek N.T. (1551), the Stuttgart edition omits entirely
the following from the Synoptic Gospels—viz., Matt. xviii. 11 (xxi.
44, Tischen.), xxiii. 14; Mark vii. 16; ix. 44, 46; xi. 26; xv. 28;
Luke xvii. 36 (xxi. 18, W-H margin); xxiii. 17 (xxiv. 12, 40, Tisch.).
Compare also Matt. xx. 28; xxvii. 35, 38, 49; Mark vi. 11; xiii. 2;
Luke vi. 5; ix. 55; xii. 21; xix. 45; xxi. 38; xxii. 19 f., 43 f., 47;
xxiii. 2, 5, 34, 48, 53; xxiv. 5, 36, 51, 52. In the case of several
verses this or that part had to be omitted. Luke xx. 30, _e.g._, is
reduced to the three words, καὶ ὁ δεύτερος, with the result that it
becomes the shortest verse in the N.T.
Footnote 261:
The best discussion of the form Ἀπελλῆς will again be found in Zahn,
_Einl._, i. 193.
Footnote 262:
See my note in the _Expository Times_ for July 1900, p. 478, where I
have brought forward a new witness for the reading Jonatha—viz.,
Jerome’s _Liber interpretationis Hebraicorum nominum_. He explains the
word as “_columba dans_ vel _columba veniens_.”
Footnote 263:
Volck has an article of four and a half pages on Balaam in the PRE^3,
iii. 227 ff., but he says not a syllable about the form βοσόρ, which
is too bad. In Hastings’ _Dictionary of the Bible_ it is at least
mentioned though not explained.
Footnote 264:
בער is explained as the Hebrew form of the Aramaic בעור by C. B.
Michaelis (_De Paronomasia_, § 30); Hiller, _Onomasticum_, 1706, p.
536; and Bernardus (in Marck, _In praecipuas quasdam partes
Pentateuchi Commentarius_, Leyden, 1713, 366). Marck himself makes it
the equivalent of פתור. M. M. Kalish, _Bible Studies_, i. _The
prophecies of Bileam_, London, 1877, contributes nothing to the
solution of the question.
CRITICAL NOTES ON VARIOUS PASSAGES OF THE NEW TESTAMENT.
THE GOSPEL.
Matthew.
With regard to the title, Westcott and Hort say (_Introduction_, §
423, p. 321): “In prefixing the name ΕΥΑΓΓΕΛΙΟΝ in the singular to the
quaternion of ‘the Gospels,’ we have wished to supply the antecedent
which alone gives an adequate sense to the preposition ΚΑΤΑ in the
several titles. The idea, if not the name, of a collective ‘Gospel’ is
implied throughout the well-known passage in the third book of
Irenæus, who doubtless received it from earlier generations. It
evidently preceded and produced the commoner usage by which the term
Gospel denotes a single written representation of the one fundamental
Gospel.” Compare Zahn, _GK._, i. 106 ff.; _Einleitung_, ii. 172 ff.,
178 f.: “Of recent editors, Westcott and Hort have most faithfully
interpreted the original idea by setting Εὐαγγέλιον on the fly-leaf,
and κατὰ Μαθθαῖον, etc., over the separate books.” I have followed the
same principle in the Table of Contents prefixed to the Stuttgart
edition of the New Testament. Compare above, pp. 164, 165. On the
spelling Μαθθαῖος, instead of Ματθαῖος, compare on the one hand the
LXX. manuscripts, which exhibit the forms Μαθανιά, Μαθθανιά, Ματθανιά;
Ματταθίας, Ματθαθίας, Μαθθαθίας (see Supplement I. to Hatch and
Redpath’s _Concordance to the Septuagint_), and on the other, Blass’s
_Grammatik des neutestamentlichen Griechisch_, § 3, 11 (English Trans.
by Thackeray, 1898, p. 11).
i. 16. There are three forms of the text here—
(1) Ἰωσὴφ τὸν ἄνδρα Μαρίας, ἐξ ἧς ἐγεννήθη Ἰησοῦς ὁ λεγόμενος Χριστός:
all our Greek uncials and almost all the minuscules.
(2) Ἰωσήφ, ᾧ μνηστευθεῖσα παρθένος Μαρία ἐγέννησεν τὸν Ἰησοῦν (τὸν
λεγόμενον) Χριστόν: most of the Old Latin (a d g_{1} k q, with b c
similarly), Curetonian Syriac, Armenian, and four minuscules—viz., 346,
556, 624, 626, with slight divergencies.
(3) Ἰωσήφ· Ἰωσὴφ δὲ, ᾧ μνηστευθεῖσα (or μεμνηστευμένη?) ἦν παρθένος
Μαρία, ἐγέννησεν τὸν Ἰησοῦν Χριστόν: the form underlying the
newly-discovered Sinai-Syriac.[265]
These readings are discussed in the “Additional Note” to _Notes on
Select Readings_, Westcott and Hort, _Introduction_ (1896), p. 140 ff.
Reading (2) is dismissed on external grounds as displaying the
characteristic features of the “Western” type of text. Reading (3) is
regarded as independent of (2), neither confirming it nor confirmed by
it. Taken therefore on its own merits, it must yield to the received
text (1), as it is easier to suppose that (3) is derived from (1) than
_vice versa_.
Zahn goes fully into these various forms (_Einleitung_, ii. 291-293). He
begins by saying that it is impossible, except on a very loose view of
the facts, to conclude that the Sinai-Syriac here preserves the original
text, which was gradually displaced for dogmatic reasons by the modified
form presented in (2), and ultimately by that given in (1). On the
contrary, the Curetonian-Syriac preserves an early form of text, and one
that had a pretty wide circulation, so that it cannot be due to an
orthodox alteration of the Sinai-Syriac. “If it be the case that the
latter, like the former, is derived from a Greek original, and that
these two earliest versions of the ‘Distinct’ Gospel are not independent
of each other but are two recensions of a single version, then it
follows that the recension which agrees exactly with a demonstrably old
Greek text (in this case the Curetonian Syriac) preserves the original
form of the Syriac version; while, on the other hand, the one which
deviates from all the Greek, Latin, and other forms of the transmitted
text (in this case the Sinai-Syriac) is derived from the other by a
process of intentional alteration.” There would be nothing to object to
this reasoning were it not that, as it seems to me, there is a flaw in
the second of the premises stated above, which of course vitiates the
conclusion. In the main, it is true that the Sinai-Syriac and the
Curetonian are not independent, but two recensions of a single version,
but their common original was, as Zahn himself was the first to suggest,
Tatian’s Diatessaron, which did not contain the first chapter of
Matthew’s Gospel. So that the Sinai-Syriac may also go back to a Greek
text (such as has been discovered in the _Dialogue of Timothy and
Aquila_, see above, p. 99), and be earlier than the Curetonian.
Zahn concludes his examination of this passage by saying: “We may give
up all hope of finding in early manuscripts and versions any indication
that Joseph was regarded as the natural father of Jesus by the writers
of lost Gospels which may have been employed in the composition of the
canonical Matthew and Luke. A writer like Matthew, whose purpose was to
silence the calumnies raised against the miraculous birth of the
Messiah, and who knew how to utilise the smallest details of an
intractable genealogy to this end, cannot at the same time have accepted
in his narrative statements directly contradicting his view of that
occurrence. Any text of Matthew’s Gospel containing such features would
be pre-condemned as one that had been tampered with in a manner contrary
to the conception of the author.”
i. 18. The reading γένεσις is now supported by the newly-discovered
Oxyrhynchus Papyrus. It was adopted in the text by Vignon (Geneva,
1574). Origen knew no other reading than γέννησις, which is also
attested by L (Codex D is defective here). Westcott and Hort have
accordingly given it a place in their Appendix. Weiss explains it as an
alteration made in conformity with the verbal forms ἐγέννησε, ἐγεννήθη,
occurring in the previous part of the chapter. Zahn (_Einleitung_, ii.
270, 289) thinks it is probably original. The two oldest and the latest
Syriac have a different word here from that in i. 1. These agree with
Irenæus in the omission of Ἰησοῦ. Zahn thinks this is probably correct.
i. 25. On πρωτότοκον, see above, p. 166, and the _Oxford Debate_, p. 4
ff.
v. 25. On ἀντίδικος = בעלדינא, see Lagarde, _De Novo_, 20 (_Ges.
Abhdl._, 188); quem Matthaei locum quum imitaretur et rideret Lucianus
in Navigio 35, ἀντίδικος non ferebat: ἕως ἔτι καθ’ ὁδόν εἰσιν οἱ
πολέμιοι, ἐπιχειρῶμεν αὐτοῖς.
vi. 1. δικαιοσύνην, א* B D Syr^{sin}: ἐλεημοσύνην, most authorities:
δόσιν א^a: “your gifts,” Syr^{cu}. Zahn (_Einl._, ii. 311) asks whether
these variants may not go back to a time when the Aramaic Gospel was
interpreted orally in these different ways? The agreement exhibited
between א^a and Syr^{cu} is particularly strange.
vi. 13. There is a considerable amount of unanimity now with regard to
the doxology which used to be so much discussed. Among the witnesses
supporting its insertion are Syr^{cu}, which, however, omits καὶ ἡ
δύναμις, and the Sahidic, which omits καὶ ἡ δόξα. Syr^{sin} is
unfortunately lost here. In addition to the testimony previously known
for the insertion of the Doxology, there is now that of the _Teaching of
the Apostles_, one of the earliest Church writings. But the very fact
that the _Teaching_ is a Church work reveals the source of the
Doxology—viz. liturgical use. The Conclusion was early added in Church
worship from Old Testament analogies; in the First Gospel it is out of
place. The Greek manuscripts from which Jerome made his version knew
nothing of it, and accordingly the Catholic Church omits it to this day.
Luther also passed it over in his Catechism, in which the exposition of
the Conclusion is limited to the word “Amen,” and says, “it is added
that I may have the assurance that my prayer will be heard.” In the
Greek Church the Amen was explained as equivalent to γένοιτο, “so may it
be.”
viii. 7. Fritzsche (1826) took this verse as a question of surprise.
This view has been renewed by Zahn (_Einl._, ii. 307).
viii. 24. The words “erat enim ventus contrarius eis,” which are found
in one manuscript of the Vulgate in W-W after “mari,” and in four after
“fluctibus,” are an interpolation from Mark vi. 48. Tischendorf cites
two Greek minuscules in support of it. Lagarde’s Vienna Arabic
manuscript (see p. 143) mentions it as an addition of the “Roman”
version.
xi. 19. Schlottman and Lagarde explain the variation between ἔργα and
τέκνα as a confusion of the Aramaic עַבְדָּא (_servant_: παῖς) and
עְַבָדָא (_work_). See Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 311 f., and compare also
Salmon, _Some Thoughts etc._, p. 121 f. It is still to be shown,
however, that τέκνα is ever used as the equivalent of עַבְדָּא.
Hilgenfeld (_ZfwTh._, 42. 4, p. 629) refers to 4 Esdras vii. 64 (134),
where the Latin and the first Arabic version read “quasi suis
_operibus_,” the Ethiopic “quasi _filiis_ suis,” and the Syriac “quia
_servi_ eius sumus.”
xii. 36. See on xviii. 7.
xiii. 35. διὰ Ἠσαΐου τοῦ προφήτου is now attested only by א*, two
members of the Ferrar group, and some other minuscules, but Eusebius and
Jerome found it in several manuscripts, and it was used still earlier by
Porphyrius as a proof of Matthew’s ignorance. It is certainly,
therefore, genuine, although it is omitted by Syr^{sin}, Syr^{cu}, by
the “accurate” manuscripts according to Eusebius,[266] and by the
“vulgata editio” according to Jerome. The conjecture of the latter, that
Ἀσάφ was the original reading, which was changed to Ἠσαΐου by some
unintelligent copyist and then dropped as incorrect, only serves to show
what sort of ideas he had with regard to textual criticism. The
assertion of the _Breviarium in Psalmos_, p. 59 f., that all the old
manuscripts read “in Asaph propheta” is pure fiction. Compare Ἰερεμίου
in Matt. xxvii. 9, where one would expect Ζαχαρίου, and where we find
that Ἰερεμίου is omitted by some witnesses and replaced in others by
Ζαχαρίου or “Esaiam.” “Esaiam” has also crept into the Vulgate
manuscript rus (W-W’s R). On the insertion, omission, and interchange of
such names, see W-H’s discussion of this passage, and the “Supplementary
Note” by Burkitt on Syr^{sin} in the edition of 1896, p. 143. For an
interesting exchange of names (Jonah and Nahum), see Tobit, xiv. 8.
Asaph is called ὁ προφήτης in 2 Chron. xxix. 30. Compare Zahn, _Einl._,
ii. 313 f. Weiss^9 would omit the word on the ground of insufficient
testimony as being simply introduced from iii. 3, iv. 14, viii. 17, and
xii. 17.
xiv. 3. Zahn (_Einl._, ii. 309) thinks it extremely improbable that D
and certain important Latin witnesses should have removed the (wrong)
name, Philip, from this passage on the ground of their better knowledge,
while allowing it to stand without exception in Mark vi. 17. He believes
rather that they have preserved the original text, and that Φιλίππου is
here an interpolation from the passage in Mark. Weiss^9, on the other
hand, sees no reason why it should be either bracketed or omitted. The
possibility of its being inserted is shown by the fact that it also
crept into six or seven manuscripts of Jerome, collated by W-W. This is
one of the passages where Tischendorf in his seventh edition frankly
preferred Codex D to all the other Greek witnesses.
xv. 4_b_. For θανάτῳ τελευτάτω, Syr^{cu} has נתקטל, evidently in
accordance with Exod. xxi. 17. In the Arabic Diatessaron (§ 20, 23) the
second half of this verse seems to be replaced by Mark vii. 10_b_. After
“morte moriatur” in this passage, Ephraem adds “et qui blasphemat Deum
_crucifigatur_,” which Zahn (_Forsch._, i. 157) thinks he must have
found in his original. This apocryphal addition, which has no other
testimony than that of Ephraem, does not seem to Zahn like a passage
that had been afterwards removed from the text of the New Testament with
complete success (_Forsch._, i. 241). The correct explanation of the
words is given by Harris: they are the Peshitto rendering of Deut. xxi.
23. Compare Driver’s _Deuteronomy_ on the passage, and the reference
there made to Lightfoot’s _Galatians_ (Extended Note on iii. 13, ninth
edition, p. 152 f.). Symmachus also renders the words: “propter
blasphemiam Dei suspensus est,” while Onkelos says על דחב קרם יי אצטליב,
and Siphre מביגי שקלל את השם. This should be noted in connection with
Matt. xxvi. 65, and still more so with John xix. 7. The only passage
usually cited there is Levit. xxiv. 16, according to which Jesus should
have been _stoned_. Our commentators pass too hastily over the question
why the Jews insisted on crucifixion instead of stoning.
xvi. 18_b_, 19. So far as the criticism of the text is concerned, there
is no occasion for entering on the discussion whether this passage, like
the one resembling it in xviii. 15-18, is original or not. There may,
however, be cases in which one cannot overlook the fact that where the
“lower” criticism ends the “higher” begins. Compare, on the one side,
Zahn, _Forsch._, i. 244 ff., and on the other, Resch, _Logia_, p. 55;
_Paralleltexte_, ii. 187-196, 441.
xvi. 22. The peculiar reading, “compatiens,” which is found in the
Arabic Tatian (J. H. Hill, p. 137, § 23. 42: Zahn, _GK._, ii. 546), and
which Sellin has also traced in Ephraem, is now explained by the
Syr^{sin} of Mark viii. 32: see my note in Lewis, _Some Pages_, p. xiii.
The very same play upon the words חוס, “to pity,” and חס, “to be far
from,” is found as late as in the _Histoire de Mar-Jabalaha, de trois
autres patriarches_, ed. Bedjan, 1895, p. 407, line 14; p. 408, line 4.
For a moment I thought of ὀργισθεὶς and σπλαγχνισθείς in Mark i. 41.
xviii. 7. The Dictum Agraphum τὰ ἀγαθὰ ἐλθεῖν δεῖ, μακάριος δὲ δι’ οὗ
ἔρχεται, which, according to the _Clementine Homilies_ (xii. 29), ὁ τῆς
ἀληθείας προφήτης ἔφη, was known also to Ephraem (_cf._ Zahn, _Forsch._,
i. 241 f. on § 50. 4). An exact parallel to this “harmless expansion of
the canonical text” is seen in the form which Matt. xii. 36 assumed in
Codex C of the Palestinian Syriac Evangeliarium: that “for every _good_
word that men do _not_ speak they shall give account” (see Lewis, _In
the Shadow of Sinai_ (1898), pp. 256-261; and thereon, _ThLz._, 1899,
col. 177).
xviii. 20. On the form in which this saying is found in the Oxyrhynchus
Logia, compare Ephraem (Moesinger 165), “ubi unus est ibi et ego sum.”
Zahn believes that Ephraem found this in his text, but that Aphraates,
who also has it, arrived at it by way of a “spiritual interpretation” of
the canonical words. After quoting the comments of Aphraates on these
words, Zahn says: “It appears certain, therefore, that Aphraates did not
find in his text the apocryphal sentence given in Ephraem, but by way of
interpretation reached the same thought that Ephraem found in his text
as a word of comfort spoken by Jesus to the lonely. (Ephraem introduces
the saying with the words: ‘He comforted them in His saying.’) The
interpretation, which may not have been original in Aphraates, became
first a gloss and then part of the text of Tatian’s Harmony.” This
should be noticed in connection with the Oxyrhynchus Logion. See Burkitt
in the Introduction to Barnard’s _Biblical Text of Clement_ (_Texts and
Studies_, v. 5, p. xiv).
xx. 13. The peculiar form of the householder’s reply given in Syr^{cu},
μὴ ἀδίκει με (Baethgen, μή μοι κόπους πάρεχε) is ignored by Tischendorf.
Our commentators also err in not taking note of the variant συνεφώνησά
σοι for συνεφώνησάς μοι. Compare the similar variation in John viii. 57;
also Luke xviii. 20, τὰς ἐντολὰς οἶδα, read by the Marcionites instead
of οἶδας; and Ephes. v. 14, ἐπιψαύσεις τοῦ Χριστοῦ, derived through a
presupposed reading, ἐπιψαύσει σοι ὁ Χριστός. Συνεφώνησά σοι in Matt.
xx. 13 is also attested by Syr^{sin}, which agrees with the common text
in the first member of the verse. It is also found in the
newly-discovered purple manuscript in Paris. The Arabic Tatian agrees
with the usual text in both members. On the strange mixture of this
verse and Luke xvi. 25 in Petrus Siculus (ἑταῖρε, οὐκ ἀδικῶ σε· ἀπέλαβες
τὰ σὰ ἐν τῇ ζωῇ σου· νῦν ἆρον τὸ σὸν καὶ ὕπαγε) see Zahn, _GK._, ii.
445.
xx. 16. The concluding member of this verse is now rightly omitted with
א B L Z and the Egyptian versions. All the Syriac versions have it,
including the newly-discovered Syr^{sin}. It is worth observing that the
verse with this addition forms the close of a lection in Syr^{hier}.
xx. 28. Westcott and Hort devote one of their “Notes on Select Readings”
to the addition to this verse, and in the edition of 1896 Burkitt adds
that it cannot have stood in Syr^{sin}, because there was not room for
it on the leaf that is missing between Matt. xx. 24 and xxi. 20.
According to W-H the passage is Western, being attested by D Φ among the
Greek manuscripts and by the Latin and Syriac versions. “The first part
only, ὑμεῖς—εἶναι, is preserved in m, ger, and apparently Leo, who
quotes no more; the second part only, εἰσερχόμενοι—χρήσιμον, in ger_{2}
and apparently Hilary. The first part must come from an independent
source, written or oral; the second probably comes from the same, but it
is in substance identical with Luke xiv. 8-10.” Tischendorf states that
of the Old Latin, four (f g_{2} l q) omit the section, which, however,
is found in c d e ff_{1, 2} g_{1} h (m) n, two manuscripts of the
Vulgate (and. emm.), the Old German, and the Saxon. To these W-W add
also the Old Latin r, two manuscripts of the Vulgate not usually
employed by them, and, of those forming the basis of their edition,
H^{mg} Θ O—_i.e._ the Theodulfian Recension. A hand of the tenth century
has written on the margin of O, “mirum unde istud additum: cum Lucas
parabolam de invitatis ad nuptias et primos accubitus eligentibus decimo
canone, ubi M(atthaeu)s sua non communia dicit referat.” This resembles
the marginal note attached to the passage by Thomas of Heraclea (not
given by Jos. White, but by Adler, from _Cod. Assem._, 1): Haec quidem
in exemplis antiquis in Luca tantum leguntur capite 53: inveniuntur
autem in exemplis graecis[267] hoc loco: quapropter hic etiam a nobis
adiecta sunt.
The word δειπνοκλήτωρ, which Resch took from this passage into the text
of his _Logia Jesu_, for ὁ σὲ καὶ αὐτὸν καλέσας, found in Luke xiv. 9,
should itself have provoked investigation. The only Latin witnesses
which render it in a substantive form are d, which has _coenae
invitator_ both times, and m, which has _invitator_ the first time. The
others give it as a relative clause (_qui vocavit, invitavit_), so that
they may have read it in the form in which it stands in our present text
of Luke.[268] It is impossible not to believe that some connection
exists between these substantive expressions and the Syriac מרא אהשמיתא,
“master of the feast,” which is found in Syr^{cu} and Syr^{sin}, and is
also given by Aphraates, for τῷ κεκληκότι αὐτόν in Luke xiv. 12 (Aphr.
388, 12-19; Zahn, _Forsch._, i. 85, note). Syr^{cu} has it both times in
this passage of Matthew.[269]
Bengel, like our modern expositors, says nothing of the interpolation in
his _Gnomon_, and his view with respect to it has, therefore, to be
gathered from his apparatus. “Interjicit cod. Lat. vetustissimus Vos
autem, etc. ... Vid. Rich. Simon, _Obs. Nouv._, p. 31. Et sic fere Cant.
(_i.e._, D) cuius lectio passim exstat. Idem vero Codex Graeca sua ad
Latina haec, quae modo exscripsimus, confecit: Latina autem sua, sub
manu, vehementius interpolavit, magno argumento licentiae suae. Eandem
periocham legit Juvencus, Hilarius: habentque praeterea codd. Lat.
aliquot, et inde Sax. Ex. Luc. xiv. 8 f., interveniente forsan Evangelio
Nazaraeorum ... Priorem duntaxat partem, ‘Vos autem ... minui’ habet
alius cod. Lat. antiquiss. ut si Librarius, cum describere coepisset,
non scribendum agnosceret: eandemque Leo M. sic exhibet. Et tamen ...
porro ab hoc loco ad Luc. xxii. 28, verbum _crescendi_ protulit Cant.
_coenaeque invitator_ ei dicitur δειπνοκλήτωρ.”
The truth is, of course, the very opposite of this, as is shown by the
indicative _quaeritis_ and the imperative of the Syriac, which are both
derived from the ambiguous ζητεῖτε. There cannot be the slightest doubt
of this, seeing that the discovery of Codex Beratinus (Φ) has added a
second Greek witness in support of the interpolation. It reads ἐλάττων
(_cf._ _minor_, c), omits the καὶ before ἐπέλθῃ just as m does with
_et_, has ἄγε in place of σύναγε (_accede_: d, _collige_), and the
comparative χρησιμώτερον (_utilius_) for the positive read by D d. The
word δειπνοκλήτωρ also occurs in Φ.[270] It is not found in Bekker’s
_Pollux_ or in Schmid’s _Hesychius_, and the only instance that ancient
lexicons are able to cite for its usage is that of Athenæus, who
observes (4. 171 B) that Artemidorus calls the ἐλέατρος by that name.
The note appended in Hase-Dindorf’s _Stephanus_ was not correct at the
time of its publication: Quidam codices Matt. xx. 27, Hesych., Wakef.
Eust. _Od._, p. 1413, 3; nor the quotation from Ducange: Δ. in Lex. MS.
Cyrilli exp. ἑστιάτωρ. In the same work δειπνοκλητόριον is cited from
Eust., _Il._, 766, 58, and as an explanation of ἑστιατόριον from the
Lex. MS. Cyrilli. The word therefore belongs to the later popular
language. The question is whether it may not also belong to the
vocabulary of Tatian. Moreover, it reminds us of the equally rare word
κτήτωρ in Acts iv. 34.
On the occurrence of the passage in Tatian, see Zahn, _Forsch._, i. 85,
179. On the questions connected with its interpolation see Chase and p.
216 above.
xxii. 23. We have in this verse an illustration of the difference caused
by the insertion or omission of the article. If we read οἱ λέγοντες with
א^c E F G etc., then the words introduce the creed of the Sadducees
(“who say,” Weizsäcker: “members of that sect who deny the
resurrection,” Stage); if we omit οἱ with א* B D and Syr^{sin}, we have
then what they actually said to Jesus. But as this would be the only
place where Matthew gave an explanation of this sort regarding Jewish
affairs, the article should be omitted. See note _in loco_, _Expositor’s
Greek Testament_, and compare the margin of the Revised English Version.
xxiii. 35. א^1 omits υἱοῦ βαραχίου, which is replaced in the Gospels of
the Hebrews by “filium Joiadae.” Zahn (_Einl._, ii. 308) refers to the
view of Hug, adopted by Eichhorn and many others, that the author, or
redactor, or translator of Matthew made this Zechariah, who is rightly
called the son of Jehoiada in the Gospel of the Hebrews, the son of
Barachiah in order to identify him with the Zechariah, son of Baruch,
who was murdered by the Zealots (Josephus, _Bell._, iv. 5. 4). He points
out that this would involve a prediction on the part of Jesus, and that,
moreover, the scene of the murder is different in the two cases: that
the locality in Matt. points to 2 Chron. xxiv. 21, and that Matthew’s
mistake in calling him the son of Barachiah is due to a confusion with
the Zechariah mentioned in Isa. viii. 2, or that in Zech. i. 1. It
should be observed, however, that Lucian alone calls the murdered person
in Chronicles by the name of Zechariah; the LXX calls him Azariah.
xxv. 41. See on Luke xx. 35.
xxvi. 73. Ὁμοιάζει was formerly attested by D alone, but has now the
further support of Syr^{sin}. The clause καὶ ἡ λαλιά σου ὁμοιάζει has
crept into a great number of manuscripts, including even A, in Mark xiv.
70. There Tischendorf remarks, “Omnino e Mt. fluxit,” in which he is
quite right. But he is wrong when he says “ipsum ὁμοιάζει glossatoris
est.” Because the glossator must then have been earlier than Tatian
(Ciasca, p. 87), and the parent of all those manuscripts. The converse
is the truth—viz., that D alone preserves the original reading, and that
δῆλόν σε ποιεῖ is the voice of the διορθωτής.
xxvii. 9. The name of the prophet, which was omitted in some
manuscripts, according to Augustine, is now omitted only by a b and the
two minuscules 33 and 157. Augustine also observes that Matthew himself
would have noticed his mistake or had his attention called to it by
others. On this compare my notes on ἐβαρύνατε in Acts iii. 14, which I
have explained by supposing that the author read כברתם or כבדתם instead
of כפרתם (_Philologica Sacra_, p. 40; above, p. 170). Origen, Eusebius,
and Jerome evidently still found Ἰερεμίου in all the manuscripts.
Ζαχαρίου is supplied only by 22 and _Esaiam_ by 1. See on Matt. xiii.
35, and compare _Expository Times_, November 1900, p. 62.
xxvii. 16. Zahn (_Einl._, ii. 294) points out that Origen also found
_Jesus_ given as the prenomen of Barabbas “in very ancient manuscripts,”
but that in all probability Tatian did not have it, seeing that
Bar-Bahlul cites it expressly as the reading of the “Distinct” (_i.e._,
not harmonised) Gospel. Jerome says that in the Gospel of the Hebrews he
was called by a name meaning “filius magistri eorum,” so that he must
have been thinking not of _Bar-’abbam_ but of _Bar-rabbam_.
xxvii. 49. See above, p. 227, and compare Burkitt, _Texts and Studies_,
v. 5, p. xix.
xxviii. 18. Compare Dan. vii. 14_b_ (LXX), καὶ ἐδόθη αὐτῷ ἐξουσία, and
also Dan. vii. 13 (= Matt. xxvi. 64), vii. 14 f. (= Matt. xxviii. 18).
See the _English Revised Version with marginal References_ (Oxford,
1899).
According to the subscriptions found in various minuscules, the Hebrew
Matthew was translated into Greek “by John,” or “by James,” to which
some add “the Brother of the Lord,” or “by Bartholomew, the celebrated
Apostle (πανευφήμου), but as others say by John the Theologian, οἳ καὶ
ἀληθῶς εἰρήκασιν.” See Tischendorf, and Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 267.
Mark.
As if to enforce the desire to which I have given expression above (p.
246), there has come into my hands Blass’s _Textkritische Bemerkungen zu
Markus_. If the statements contained in the introductory remarks are
correct, and scarcely any other view is possible in the circumstances
described, then the textual criticism of the first and second Gospels is
a hopeless matter. “An evangelist or teacher who obtained possession of
the originally anonymous Commentarius could not feel bound to respect
the external form, but considered himself justified in correcting it if
it seemed to him to be defective, and even felt called to correct or
complete its subject matter.” Blass reminds us that we have whole
classes of documents, legends of saints _e.g._, which were treated with
the utmost possible freedom by the copyists, who in fact were in this
case editors and revisers. But he says that no one has treated Mark
quite so drastically as all this. His summing up of the matter is, that
the critic can often do no more than recognise and admit the early
multiplicity, and that in such a case it were best to print the text in
parallel columns. At the same time he is able to distinguish some of the
variants as later falsifications or corruptions. Universally trustworthy
authorities there are none; here one group is right, there another, and
we no sooner give them credence than they mislead us with some fresh
error.
We are far removed, truly, from the confidence displayed by Tischendorf
in the treatise he published shortly before his death in 1873 in answer
to the question, “Have we the genuine text of the Evangelical and
Apostolical writings?” All the more urgently, therefore, do we need
fresh studies in textual criticism, and their appearance in Germany is
the more gratifying on that account. The _Markus-Studien_ of Dr. H. P.
Chajes (Berlin, 1899), however, are quite beside the point. They are
purely imaginary, having neither substance nor method.
i. 1. On the title, see above; Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 220 ff., 235; Swete,
_in loco_; and on this last, S. D. F. Salmond, in the _Critical Review_,
April 1899, 206 f.: “We do not see, however, why Professor Swete should
regard the opening verses as probably not a part of the original work.
One might say the same of the whole paragraph with which the Gospel
opens, or, for that matter, the whole chapter. The documentary evidence
is substantially the same in each case, and the internal considerations
are much too indeterminate.” It may be pointed out, as remotely
analogous to this, that before Matt. i. 18 the margin of harl (Z in W-W)
contains a note in a hand of the ninth or tenth century to the effect,
“genealogia hucusque: incipit evangelium secundum Matthaeum,” while Y
has the words “incipit evangelium secundum Matthaeum” in the text, and
eight manuscripts begin verse 18 with capital or red letters. Compare
Scrivener, I. c. iii., on the divisions of the text in B and other
manuscripts.
For the way in which the opening sentences are to be construed,
reference must be made to the commentaries. It may be said here,
however, that parallels may be cited from the New Testament for each of
the three possible constructions. These are (1) Ἀρχὴ ..., καθὼς ...
αὐτοῦ, ἐγένετο; (2) Ἀρχὴ ... Καθὼς ... αὐτοῦ. Ἐγένετο; (3) Ἀρχὴ ...
Καθὼς ... αὐτοῦ, ἐγένετο. For (1) and (2) compare Luke iii. 1 ff., and
for (3) 1 Tim. i. 1 ff. Origen favours the first construction (_Contra
Celsum_, ii. 4; vol. i. p. 131). As regards the text it need only be
said that καὶ is read before ἐγένετο (v. 4) by א^1, and that δὲ is found
after it, not only in the Coptic, but also in Syr^{hier}.
i. 2. Origen here read ἐγὼ and ἔμπροσθέν σου (i. 131). But the former
should be omitted with B D etc., and the latter with all the good
authorities. It follows that Matt. xi. 10 is not taken from Mark i. 2
(Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 316, 332). One can see how important the so-called
“lower” criticism may be for the “higher.”
i. 11; ix. 7. See on “Punctuation” above, p. 52.
i. 29. “B here has ἐξελθὼν ἦλθεν, and D b c e q Pesh. have substantially
the same. This is not an improvement, because it excludes Peter and
Andrew. The reading of Syr^{sin} is peculiar, ‘and He went out of the
synagogue and came into the house of Simon Cephas (Andrew and James and
John were with him), and the mother-in-law etc.’” See Zahn, _Einl._, ii.
252, and below on ix. 14.
i. 41. The remarkable “Western reading” ὀργισθείς is dismissed by Swete
with a reference to W-H, who call it “a singular reading, perhaps
suggested by v. 43 (ἐμβριμησάμενος), perhaps derived from an extraneous
source.” In my _Philologica Sacra_, p. 26, I have expressed the opinion
that it is impossible to suppose a copyist altered σπλαγχνισθείς to
ὀργισθείς, even though ἐμβριμησάμενος does follow two verses further
down.[271] Either ὀργή, ὀργίζεσθαι has another meaning in Biblical
Greek, which is quite possible, or we have here an instance of a
difference in translation. The confusion of the gutturals, _e.g._, is
very common. Compare Ps. xii. 6, יפיח, Gr. יפיע; Ps. xiv. 6, עני = liii.
6, חנך; וישמח in Isa. xxxix. 2 for וישמע in 2 Kings xx. 13; Ps. xxii.
25, ענות, where Gr. has δέησις = תחנות; Ps. xcvii. 11, זרע, Gr.
ἀνέτειλεν = זרח; and especially Mark ix. 19 in the recently-published
Evangeliarium Hierosolymitanum of Lewis-Gibson, where Cod. B has מרחית
for מרעת found in A B. Compare also חד, Matt. vii. 11 (p. 68), and עד
(p. 135). A glance at the _Thesaurus Syriacus_ 3953 shows that רעם is
used, not only for βροντᾶν, but also for σπλαγχνίζεσθαι, στέργειν, and
συμπαθεῖν, while אתרעם stands for χαλεπαίνειν, ἀγανακτεῖν, and
γογγύζειν. Payne-Smith gives no instance of ὀργίζεσθαι. The usual Syriac
word for it even in Syr^{sin} and Syr^{hier} is רנז or אתחמת; both verbs
are found together in 1 Macc. vi. 59 for the simple ὠργίσθησαν (אתחמתו
ורגזו). It is worth noting that in Col. iii. 13, ὀργήν is read by F G,
where D* has μέμψιν, and the other authorities μομφήν.
On the reading in Mark i. 41, see Harris, _Fragments etc._ (1895), p. 6.
He shows that Ephraem had ὀργισθείς in his text alongside of
σπλαγχνισθείς. The Arabic Diatessaron, in which the pericope does not
come till § 22, follows the usual text, and so, too, does Syr^{sin}.
ii. 14. Zahn (_Einl._, ii. 263) holds that “Levi son of Alphaeus” is the
original reading here and not “James,” and that it was taken from Mark
into the Gospel of Peter. The reading “Jacobum” was also taken into the
first hand of the Vulgate manuscript G from D 13, 69, 124, a b c d e
ff_{2} r. In Koetschau’s new edition of Origen, the name is no longer
spelt Λεβής but Λευής (i. 113, 19; Cod. P: Λευίς).
iii. 17. Our expositors might tell us where Luther got his “Bnehargem,”
which is retained in the German Revised Version. On Daniel ii. 7 Jerome
has “Benereem.” I have looked in vain in Lyra, Pole’s _Synopsis_, Calov,
and Wolf.
iii. 31. We have here to choose between καλοῦντες (א B C L etc.),
φωνοῦντες (D etc.), and ζητοῦντες (A): Δ leaves a space. I am inclined
to think that φωνοῦντες is the original reading, which was improved by
the substitution of the more usual word καλοῦντες, just as οὐ φωνεῦντος
ἀκούω was altered to λαλέοντος in the Delphic Oracle in Herodotus i. 47.
Compare a similar variation in Heb. xi. 13, where the original reading
κομισάμενοι (א* P) was thought to be improved by the substitution of
λαβόντες (א^c D E K) or προσδεξάμενοι (A). Here, too, A stands alone.
Was it never copied?
vi. 16. There is a discrepancy in the Eusebian Canons in this verse
which has not been explained. Both Tischendorf and Wordsworth and White
number this verse 58/2. But according to the table in _TiGr._, p. 152,
W-W, p. 10, pericope 58 belongs to the _tenth_ Canon as being one that
is peculiar to Mark. As a matter of fact it is not so, unless Eusebius
meant ἀκούσας δέ at the beginning of the verse. It is remarkable that
Eusebius did not make the whole of verses 14-20 one pericope of the
second canon, but numbered 14, 15 as 57/2 and 17-20 as 59/2. He must
therefore have found something peculiar in verse 16 to make it 58.
vi. 20. This passage is very instructive from a textual point of view.
Most authorities read that “Herod had put John in prison, heard him and
did much,” or “heard much of what he did,” ἀκούσας αὐτοῦ πολλὰ (ἃ)
ἐποίει. But in place of this last word א B L and the Bohairic version
alone read ἠπόρει, “was much perplexed when he heard him.” The great
majority of expositors decide at once in favour of the latter reading,
setting aside ἐποίει as the _scriptio proclivior_. But in that case
should it not have been ἠπορεῖτο? In classical Greek it should
undoubtedly, but in Biblical Greek we find ἠπόρει in _Wisd._ xi. 5, 17,
for example, and what is specially worth noting, διηπόρει in the
parallel passage Luke ix. 7, for which D, it is true, has ἠπορεῖτο. The
passage may therefore be taken as showing that the correct reading has
been preserved in a very few witnesses. Strict logic, moreover, would
lead us to infer that not one of our 1300 manuscripts is derived from
any one of these three, but that א B L continued childless. Is that
likely? Field, it may be added, decides in favour of ἐποίει (_Otium
Norvicense_; see _Expository Times_, August 1899, p. 483), and so, too,
does Burkitt (_Texts and Studies_, v. 5, p. xix). In Philo, i. 264, line
8 (ed. Cohn), the manuscripts vary between μετεωροπολειν, —πορειν,
—ποιειν, and —λογειν.
vii. 33. Codex W^d, published by Harris in facsimile (1896), here
exhibits a very peculiar reading which Harnack (_ThLz._, 1891, p. 356)
thinks has affinity with Tatian. It reads: ἔπτυσεν εἰς τοὺς δακτύλους
αὐτοῦ καὶ ἔβαλεν εἰς τὰ ὦτα τοῦ κωφοῦ καὶ ἥψατο τῆς γλώσσης τοῦ
μογιλάλου. This gives us quite another view of the occurrence than most
of the authorities do. It seems much more natural certainly to moisten
the fingers before putting them in the ears than before touching the
tongue. It reads somewhat similarly in Syr^{sin}, which says that “he
put his fingers and spat in his ears, and touched his tongue.”[272] This
manuscript exhibits other noteworthy readings, which will be found most
conveniently in Swete.
ix. 14. The singular, ἐλθὼν ... εἶδεν, has the support of D, while
Syr^{sin} takes the side of the plural, ἐλθόντες ... εἶδον. Zahn decides
for the latter. He explains the plural by saying that the original
narrator was evidently one of the three disciples who were with Jesus on
the Mount, in all probability Peter, as tradition has it. Peter, of
course, in telling the story, used the first person and the plural
number, “When we came down from the mountain we saw, etc.” Mark,
reporting the words of Peter, turned the first person into the third,
retaining the plural number. Zahn explains in the same way the somewhat
peculiar expressions in Mark i. 29. Here Peter said, “_we_ (_i.e._
Jesus, Andrew, and himself) came into _our_ house with James and John.”
In reporting Peter’s words Mark paraphrases “we” and “our,” and says,
“they came into the house of Simon and Andrew with James and John.” See
Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 245 f.
x. 30. Neither Tischendorf nor Swete observes that in addition to the
readings διωγμῶν and διωγμόν the singular διωγμοῦ is exhibited by D. Has
the mysterious reading εἰς που in Clem. Alex. (_Quis Dives_) anything to
do with this? It is worth remarking that the Vienna Arabic manuscript
(Lagarde: Storr) has a note after “post persecutionem” to the effect
that this is the “Roman” reading.
xiv. 51. καὶ νεανίσκος τις, א B C L; νεανίσκος δέ τις, D; καὶ εἷς τις
νεανίσκος, A E etc. This last is rejected by Zahn on the ground that the
text has evidently been accommodated to verse 47, under the false
impression that another of the disciples is referred to. It is adopted,
however, by Tischendorf^8, and supported by Brandt, _Die Evangelische
Geschichte_ etc., Leipzig, 1893, p. 23 ff.
xiv. 65. ἔλαβον, א A B and most authorities: ἐλάμβανον, D G, 1, 13, 69,
2^{pe}, al^{10}: ἔβαλλον, H....: ἔβαλον, E M U etc. The simplest
explanation of this variety of readings is that ἐλάμβανον was first, and
that it was changed into the more common aorist ἔλαβον, which then
became ἔβαλον or ἔβαλλον. The converse is not so likely, viz. that
ἔβαλλον or ἔβαλον became first ἔλαβον and then ἐλάμβανον, or that ἔλαβον
gave rise directly both to ἐλάμβανον and ἔβαλον or ἔβαλλον. On these and
also on internal grounds the reading of D G is to be preferred: “they
began to spit upon him, and continued to buffet him.”
xv. 28. Syr^{sin} is now to be added to the authorities that omit the
interpolation. On the interesting names, Zoatham and Chammatha, Dysmas
and Gestas, Titus and Dumachus (_i.e._ Θεομάχος), see Berger in the
notice of Wordsworth, and White’s _Epilogus_ mentioned above, and also
J. R. Harris in the _Expositor_, March 1900, p. 162 ff., April, p. 304.
xv. 34. It is extraordinary that no reference is made in Swete’s edition
to the very singular reading of Codex D, ὠνίδισας instead of
ἐγκατέλιπες. In addition to the testimony of the Old Latin manuscripts c
(exprobrasti me), i (me in opprobrium dedisti), k* (maledixisti: see
Burkitt in the _Journal of Theological Studies_, i. p. 278), this
reading is attested in Greek by Macarius Magnes. No explanation of it
has yet been given that is in all respects satisfactory. See _Expository
Times_, August 1898, and February, March, and April 1900.
xvi. 9-20. The English Revisers had not the courage to omit the
conclusion. They print it quite like the rest of the text, only they
separate it from the foregoing by a somewhat wider space than usual, and
give a note in the margin to the following effect—viz. “The two oldest
Greek manuscripts and some other authorities omit from verse 9 to the
end. Some other authorities have a different ending to the Gospel.” The
German Revised Version has no remark to offer, which is easily accounted
for on the principles on which that version is made. The most careful
discussion of the passage is now that of Swete, pp. xcvi-cv. See also
Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 227-235, 237, 240, and compare the Appendix in
Chase’s _Old Syriac Element_, pp. 150-157, “Note on Mark xvi. 9-20,” and
Arthur Wright, _The Gospel according to St. Luke_, p. xv.
The subscription of several minuscules bears that Mark’s Gospel was
written at Rome ten years after the Ascension, and delivered to the
brethren there by Peter, the πρωτοκορυφαῖος of the Apostles. Others give
Egypt as the place of origin. It is of more importance to observe that Λ
20, 262, 300 contain the note: ἀντεβλήθη ὁμοίως ἐκ τῶν ἐσπουδασμένων.
This refers to the subscription to Matthew found in these manuscripts:
ἐγράφη καὶ ἀντεβλήθη ἐκ τῶν ἐν Ἱεροσολύμοις παλαιῶν ἀντιγράφων τῶν ἐν τῷ
ἁγίῳ ὄρει ἀποκειμένων. A similar subscription occurs in 2^{pe}, a
minuscule of considerable importance for Mark (473 in Scrivener; see
above, p. 151, n.).
Luke.
Apart altogether from the question how the numerous and decided
peculiarities of Codex D are to be explained, we find a great many
problems connected with the text of Luke’s Gospel.
On the supposed title see Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 383.
i. 26. In place of the definite indication of time, Blass follows
certain Latin authorities, especially the Latin Irenæus, in giving: in
ipso (or, eodem) autem tempore, ἐν αὐτῷ δὲ τῷ καιρῷ. Zahn points out
(_Einl._, ii. 354) that this is the customary formula for the beginning
of a pericope in the Lectionaries, and that while no doubt in the later
Greek system the pericope of the Annunciation began with verse 24, 26 is
the more appropriate beginning. He adds that in any case the origin of
this formula is evident, and that Cod. D, which here parts company with
the Latin witnesses, gives other indications besides this of the
influence of a pericope-system. See the Introduction to Scrivener’s
edition of the Codex, p. li.
i. 46. On the reading _Elisabeth_, see above, p. 238.
i. 63. The β text inserted the words ἐλύθη ἡ γλῶσσα αὐτοῦ before καὶ
ἐθαύμασαν πάντες, by way of explaining the astonishment of the people.
Zahn thinks this an absurd misplacement, seeing that the mention of
Zechariah’s speaking does not come till the following verse, and the
people could not know that his tongue was loosed till they heard him
speak. Syr^{sin} accordingly corrects this by putting the mention of the
astonishment after that of the speaking, in which it is followed by
Blass.
ii. 4, 5. In the β text Blass adopts the reading αὐτοὺς, and transposes
the clause διὰ τὸ εἶναι αὐτοὺς ἐξ οἴκου καὶ πατριᾶς Δαυείδ to the end of
verse 5. This arrangement is also exhibited by D. Syr^{sin} reads
“both.” One Old Latin manuscript has _essent_, but as it exhibits the
clause in the usual place, Zahn thinks that _essent_ is manifestly a
clerical error for _esset_. The Syriac, he points out, is derived from
Tatian. See _Einl._, ii. 355; _Forsch._, i. 118; _GK._, ii. 561; Vetter,
_Der dritte Korintherbrief_ (1894), 25.
ii. 7. One Latin manuscript (e) has _obvolverunt_ and _collocaverunt_,
which may be compared with _essent_ in verse 4. Zahn thinks that the
plural here is due to the reflection that the mother does not usually
herself attend to a new-born infant.
ii. 14. How does the Christmas song of the angels run exactly? Is it ἐν
ἀνθρώποις εὐδοκίας, or ἐν ἀνθ. εὐδοκία? The question belongs more to
exegesis than textual criticism. The whole matter turns upon a single
letter, but it divides Western Christendom in two parts. The Latin
Church reads it as in _hominibus bonae voluntatis_, “among men of
goodwill,” or, as modern critics understand it, “among men of God’s good
pleasure.” The second reading makes it “goodwill to men.” Which should
it be? The former reading, the genitive, is supported by א* A B* D, the
Latin, and the Gothic, whereas nearly all the other witnesses, including
the Bohairic, the three Syriac, and A itself in the Hymns at the end of
the Old Testament Psalter, have the nominative. One thing seems to me
decisive in favour of the nominative. Scarcely any part of the New
Testament is so steeped in the Hebrew spirit as the first two chapters
of Luke’s Gospel. As Field points out in the third part of his _Otium
Norvicense_, the Greek ἄνθρωποι corresponds to the Hebrew expression
“son of Adam,” which cannot take another genitive after it—“sons of Adam
of goodwill.” On the other hand, the word _goodwill_ in Hebrew is always
followed by the preposition corresponding to the Greek ἐν. So that, till
we have further testimony, I would retain the nominative and the
tripartite division, notwithstanding the authority of Tischendorf,
Westcott and Hort, Weizsäcker, Stage, and Blass, who, by the way,
mentions no variants in the β text.
ii. 40. D here reads ἐν αὐτῷ in place of ἐπ’ αὐτό. The difference is
slight, but not unimportant from a theological point of view. It is not
accidental, as is shown by the corresponding change of ἐπ’ into εἰς in
ch. iii. 22.
iii. 22. Zahn regards this as one of the passages wherein D and its
associates have preserved the original reading. They exhibit here ἐγὼ
σήμερον γεγέννηκά σε in place of ἐν σοὶ εὐδόκησα. He says, moreover,
that “those who hold the former as original need not lament its
disappearance from tradition subsequent to the year 300” (_Einl._, ii.
240, 356). See Burkitt in Barnard’s _Biblical Text of Clement_, pp.
xiii. 38.
iii. 23 ff. May not the peculiar form of the genealogy in D be explained
by the Diatessaron, which originally had no genealogy? The index of the
Latin edition shows that there was none originally, but we find in the
text one compiled from Matt. i. 1-16, Luke iii. 34-37, Matt. i. 17. The
first-known manuscript of the Arabic Diatessaron had Matt. i. 1-17 in §
2, and Luke iii. 24-38 in § 9. The better manuscript, discovered later,
has no genealogy in the text, but it contains one compiled from Matt.
and Luke, inserted between the close of the work and the subscription by
way of appendix. See Zahn, _GK._, ii. 539; J. H. Hill, _Earliest Life of
Christ_ etc., p. 3 f.
iii. 27. The correct explanation of Ῥησά is that given by Plummer in his
_Commentary_ on Luke, and quoted by Bacon in Hastings’ _Dictionary of
the Bible_, ii. 140. “Rhesa, who appears in Luke, but neither in Matt.
nor in 1 Chron., is probably not a name at all, but a title which some
Jewish copyist mistook for a name. Zerubbabel Rhesa or Zerubbabel the
Prince (רֵאשָׁא) has been made into ‘Zerubbabel (begat) Rhesa.’” The
interpretation of Rhesa as “prince” is, however, not new. See Pole’s
_Synopsis_: it was not safe to use the proper name Zerubbabel in
Babylon, seeing that it meant “ventilatio Babelis,” and the name
Sheshbazzar was therefore substituted for it. Sic filii eius Meshullam
et Hanania, quia vix ibi tuto aut proprie dici potuerunt Abiud, _i.e._
patris mei est gloria, et Rhesa princeps (Lightfoot, _Horae Hebraicae_).
Reuchlin (_Rudimenta_, p. 18) gives the explanation רֶשָׁע (_sic_) qui
cognominatur Mesollam. This interpretation, however, lends no real
support to Sellin’s theory.
iv. 34. The exclamation ἔα, which Zahn (_GK._, i. 682) says is unknown
in the New Testament, is omitted by D, eleven Old Latin manuscripts, and
also by Marcion. It is supported by a considerable number of witnesses
in Mark i. 24. According to Zahn, these witnesses took it from Luke, but
of this I am by no means certain. Syr^{sin} omits it in both places. In
Luke it is also omitted by four manuscripts of the Vulgate mentioned by
Wordsworth and White.
iv. 34. Marcion invariably omits Ναζαρηνέ. There is, however, no other
authority for its omission. See Zahn, _GK._, i. 685; ii. 456.
iv. 44. Ἰουδαίας is the better attested reading, and on account of the
improbability of its being invented, should be regarded as the original.
See Zahn, _Einleitung_, ii. 373.
v. 5. Ἐπιστάτα in the New Testament is peculiar to Luke. In place of it
D has διδάσκαλε here, and κύριε in viii. 24. It retains ἐπιστάτα,
however, in viii. 45, ix. 33, ix. 49, and xvii. 13.
v. 14. The long interpolation at the end of the verse found in D d is
derived from Mark i. 45 and ii. 1, though there are slight differences.
It is introduced here for harmonistic reasons. Was it taken from Tatian?
v. 27. After the name of Levi, D inserts τὸν τοῦ Ἀλφαίου, which,
according to Zahn, is not original. See _Einl._, ii. 263.
v. 39. Marcion agrees with D in the omission of this verse. Syr^{sin}
and Syr^{cu} are, unfortunately, both defective here. To the authorities
for its omission should be added r, which Weiss does not mention. On the
reasons for the omission of the verse, see Zahn, _GK._, i. 681.
vi. 5. Zahn is of opinion that the narrative of the man working on the
Sabbath is taken from the same source as Mark xvi. 9 ff., and the
pericope adulteræ, John vii. 53-viii. 11—viz. from Papias, and that it
may be historically true. See his _Einleitung_, ii. 355. Westcott and
Hort insert it among their “Noteworthy Rejected Readings,” and Resch
puts it among the “Logia Jesu.” The Sinai-Syriac is defective here. For
a long time it was thought that D and Stephen’s β were different
manuscripts, and they are here cited by Mill as “duo codices
vetustissimi.” This was shown to be a mistake by Bengel. Grotius also
speaks of “nonnulli codices,” and, according to Mill, thought the words
were “adjecta ab aliquo Marcionita.” The narrative seems to have
remained quite unknown during the thousand years that elapsed between
its relation by D and its publication by Stephen in 1550. According to
Scrivener’s edition of Codex Bezae, p. 435, none of the ten or twelve
later hands that worked upon the manuscript down to the twelfth century
and even later, seem to have touched the page on which this narrative
stands (205_b_). It would seem, therefore, that no copy was ever made of
this manuscript either. How much would have been lost had it also
disappeared entirely?
vi. 10. Whether ὡς καὶ ἡ ἄλλη is genuine or not is of no material
consequence so far as the exposition of the passage is concerned, but it
is important in connection with the question of the relationship of Luke
to the other Synoptics. The words are wanting in Mark iii. 5, but occur
in Matt. xii. 13. See Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 420.
vi. 31. Zahn is not sure if Marcion’s text contained the Golden Rule in
this passage in the negative form. _GK._, i. 680; ii. 462.
vii. 27. Zahn thinks that ἔμπροσθέν σου should perhaps be omitted here
(_Einl._, ii. 316).
viii. 43. The words ἰατροῖς προσαναλώσασα ὅλον τὸν βίον are omitted in B
D. Zahn holds it to be an “unworthy insinuation” to suppose that Luke,
being himself a physician, toned down the expressions used by Mark as
reflecting on the credit of his profession. The words are more likely to
be a gloss from Mark. See _Einleitung_, ii. 437.
ix. 1. This verse is written three times over in codex Ξ. This cannot be
a mistake. It might have been written twice by inadvertence, but not
three times. The reason lies in the fact related—viz., the conferring of
the power over evil spirits.
ix. 16. The reading εὐλόγησεν ἐπ’ αὐτοὺς crept into the Vulgate
manuscript called G by Wordsworth and White from the Old Latin. It is
now attested also by Syr^{sin}. See Lewis, _Some Pages_, _in loco_. Zahn
thinks it is deserving of special attention (_GK._, i. 682). In this he
is quite right.
ix. 18. Marcion here had τὸν υἱὸν τοῦ ἀνθρώπου. See Zahn, _GK._, i. 686.
ix. 52-56. “It is impossible to suppose that the shorter form of the
text is the original, and the longer due to a later interpolation, as
this would imply what is incredible—viz., that one of Marcion’s most
antinomian readings found its way into a large number of Catholic
manuscripts (D, the Peshitto, Harklean Syriac, most Latin witnesses,
Chrysostom, etc.). The only probable explanation is that the Catholic
writers objected to 54_b_ and 55_b_ on account of the use made of them
by the Marcionites, and the apparently Marcionitic character of their
contents. They were particularly offensive when taken together.
Accordingly, some manuscripts like e and Syr^{cu} omitted only 54_b_,
others, like A C, only 55_b_, while others again, like B L Syr^{sin},
boldly omitted both.... The words were written by Luke and not invented
by Marcion.” Zahn, _GK._, i. 681, ii. 468; _Einl._, ii. 357.
x. 1. Instead of 70, B D, Tatian, the Syriac, and the Latin give 72.
According to Zahn, the number has nothing to do with the Jewish
enumeration of 70 Gentile nations, languages, or angels, nor the 70
members of the Sanhedrim, the 70 translators of the Old Testament, or
with any other number 70. These 70 were not sent to the Gentiles, and
Luke gives no hint of the allegorical significance of their number. Any
such allegorizing was foreign both to himself and Theophilus, neither of
whom was a Jew. See _Einl._, ii. 392.
xi. 2. On βαττολογεῖν ὡς οἱ λοιποί in D, see my _Philologica Sacra_, pp.
27-36.
xi. 3. There is a certain amount of probability in Zahn’s view that
Marcion was led to insert σοῦ after ἄρτος ἐπιούσιος by thinking of John
vi. 33 f., a passage which suggested itself to Origen also in this
connection. See Zahn (_GK._, i. 677, ii. 471), who thinks it probable
that Marcion interpreted the words in a spiritual sense (=
_supersubstantialis_).
xi. 53. The text of D here displays several marked variations, which,
however, do not affect the sense of the passage. Zahn sees in them the
arbitrary alterations of a later time; but Weiss thinks that in some
particulars they may preserve the original.
xii. 1. Marcion, seemingly, and Jerome omit πρῶτον, which is attested by
most of the Old Latin witnesses, with the exception of b. See Zahn,
_GK._, i. 692, ii. 474.
xii. 14. The words ἢ μεριστὴν were omitted by Marcion (Zahn, _GK._, i.
682). They are also wanting in the Sinai-Syriac (see Lewis, _Some
Pages_).
xii. 38. The mention of the ἑσπερινὴ φυλακὴ by Marcion and other
authorities is due, according to Zahn (_GK._, ii. 683; _Einl._, ii.
356), to the “magisterial consideration” that an orderly householder
would not come home from the festivities after midnight or in the early
hours of the morning, but at the latest in the first watch of the night,
which was still called the evening. The reading is also found in
Irenæus, but not in the Sinai-Syriac.
xii. 51. βαλεῖν (אַרְמֵא) is found here in Syr^{sin} in place of ποιῆσαι
(D e Syr^{cu}), mittere (b l), δοῦναι (usual text). This is interesting
in view of Marcion. See Zahn, _GK._, i. 604, ii. 476. Tertullian seems
to have been mistaken in thinking that μάχαιραν was read in place of
διαμερισμόν in this connection (machaeram quidem scriptum est. Sed
Marcion emendat, quasi non et separatio opus sit machaerae).
xiii. 8. See above, p. 193 ff. Chase cites this passage as an indication
of the laxity of transcription of which D was guilty in introducing what
appears to be a common agricultural phrase. In Columella (_De Re
Rustica_, xi. 3) we find “confecta bruma stercoratam terram inditam
cophinis obserat.” Chase also cites from the manuscript notes of Hort
the reference to Plutarch, _Vita Pompeii_, 48, αὐτοῦ δέ τις κοπρίων
κόφινον κατὰ κεφαλῆς τοῦ Βύβλου κατεσκέδασε. Better than any words of
mine are those of Zahn, _Einleitung_, ii. 346:—No one with any
perception of the difference between naïve originality and a regularity
due to liturgical, dogmatic, and stylistic considerations can fail to
assent to the following propositions—viz., (1) as regards contents and
form of expression β (_i.e._ the text of D and its associates) has
preserved much original matter, which from the very first was peculiarly
liable to alteration, and which was set aside by the learned revisers
from the end of the third century onwards (Lucian, Hesychius,
Pamphilus), etc.
xvi. 12. While the common text with Syr^{sin} reads ὑμέτερον, for which
B L have ἡμέτερον, Marcion alone supports 157 e i l in reading ἐμόν. How
is this to be explained? Compare above, p. 211, and Zahn, _GK._, i. 682.
xvi. 19. Zahn denominates the introductory words found in D, εἶπεν δὲ
καὶ ἑτέραν παραβολήν, “a liturgical gloss at the beginning of a
pericope.” Blass, too, omits them from the β text.
xvi. 22, 23. א*, most Old Latin witnesses, and the Vulgate omit καί at
the beginning of verse 23, and read ἐτάφη ἐν τῷ ᾅδῃ. This conjunction of
the words is attested by Tatian and Marcion. The Sinai-Syriac
presupposes the form “was buried. And being in Hades he lifted up his
eyes.” Attention may be drawn to the detailed notice of the different
readings by Wordsworth and White. They say: Asyndeton in Johanne
tolerabile, in Luca vix ferendum videtur.... Vix dubium est quin Lucas
ipse scripserit καὶ ἐτάφη· καὶ ἐν τῷ ᾅδῃ, sed καί secundum in
antiquissimis codicibus ut nunc in א* casu omissum, ex conjectura tribus
modis restitutum videtur, _sc._ καὶ ἐν τῷ ᾅδῃ, et ἐν δὲ τῷ ᾅδῃ et ἐν τῷ
ᾅδῃ καὶ; quae lectiones omnes in codicibus Latinis referuntur, et
tertiam ab Hieronymo ex traditione codicum suorum servatam magis quam ex
ratione praelatam credimus. See Zahn, _GK._, i. 682, ii. 480.
xvii. 11. “In all likelihood μέσον, without the preposition, as given by
D, is the original form. This was variously replaced by ἀναμέσον (Ferrar
Group), which is not amiss, by διὰ μέσου (A X, etc.), which is not so
good, and by διὰ μέσον (א B L), which is very bad.” Zahn, _Einleitung_,
ii. 391. Compare, also (for μέσον), Jülicher, _Gleichnisreden Jesu_, ii.
516.
xvii. 21. Marcion inserts ἰδοὺ before ἐκεῖ, which Zahn holds to be
original. Syr^{sin} reads “here it is, or there it is,” and therefore
apparently omits the first ἰδοὺ as well. See Lewis, _Some Pages_.
Wordsworth and White omit Tischendorf’s g^{1. 2} from the authorities
given by him in support of the omission of the second _ecce_.
xviii. 20. On the alterations made on the text here by the followers of
Marcion, see Zahn, _GK._, i. 616, ii. 484.
xviii. 25. The evidence in support of the readings τρήματος and βελόνης
is very strong (א B D L). The choice of the terms τρῆμα for τρύπημα or
τρυμαλιά, and βελόνη for ῥαφίς, betrays the language of the physician.
See _The Expositor’s Greek Testament_, _Acts of the Apostles_,
Introduction, pp. 9-11; Zahn, _Einleitung_, ii. 427 f., 435 f.
xx. 35. With reference to this verse, Tertullian makes the following
charge against the Marcionites: Nacti enim scripturae textum ita in
legendo decurrerunt: “quos autem dignatus est deus illius aevi”; “illius
aevi” “deo” adjungunt ... cum sic legi oporteat, “quos autem dignatus
est,” ut facta hic distinctione post “deum” ad sequentia pertineat
“illius aevi,” etc. Zahn insists, as against Ritschl, Hilgenfeld, and
Volkmar, that this requires not only the insertion of ὑπὸ τοῦ Θεοῦ after
καταξιωθέντες, but also the active voice instead of the passive, as
though the Marcionites had read οὓς δὲ κατηξίωσεν ὁ Θεὸς τοῦ αἰῶνος
ἐκείνου, τυχεῖν καὶ τῆς ἀναστάσεως. A similar change of construction
occurs in Matt. xxv. 41, where it is quite certain that τὸ ἡτοιμασμένον
is a correction of the stronger expression ὃ ἡτοίμασεν ὁ πατήρ μου,
found in D, 1, 22, ten Old Latin manuscripts, and the earliest Fathers.
xxi. 30. The insertion of τὸν καρπὸν αὐτῶν may be but a trifling
addition, intended to facilitate the sense (Zahn, _GK._, i. 682), at the
same time it is an interesting question how it comes to be in D, 157,
572 (see above, p. 211). Wordsworth and White say that D here is “ex
Latinis forsan correctus.” Syr^{sin} agrees with Syr^{cu} in inserting
the words.
xxii. 16. For πληρωθῇ D reads καινὸν βρωθῇ. On this see my _Philologica
Sacra_, p. 38, where it is suggested that these two readings are due to
the confusion of כלה and אכל. This occurs several times in the Old
Testament—_e.g._ 2 Chron. xxx. 22, where ויאבלו is represented in the
LXX by συνετέλεσαν. But even apart from the question of a Hebrew
foundation for the variant, I am inclined to regard καινὸν βρωθῇ as the
original, and πληρωθῇ as the correction.
xxii. 16-21. The narrative of the Last Supper is extant in three forms.
There is (1) the common text, (2) that exhibited by the two most
important of the Old Latin witnesses (b, e), in which verse 16 is
followed by 19_a_, after which come 17, 18, 21, so that 19_b_ and 20 are
wanting altogether. The text of Syr^{sin} and Syr^{cu} resembles this.
There is further (3) the form exhibited by D and four Old Latins, which
has the same order as (1), but omits verses 19_b_, 20. Zahn decides in
favour of (2). See his _Einleitung_, ii. 357 ff. It is to be observed
that the last discovered Syriac omits the nominatival clause τὸ ὑπὲρ
ὑμῶν ἐκχυνόμενον after τῷ αἵματί μου, which is the only member that
seems to be derived, not from 1 Cor. xi. 24 f., but from Matthew and
Mark, and that does not agree in construction with the rest. This
confirms the supposition that these two verses are not part of the
original text. See Westcott and Hort, _Notes on Select Readings_, p. 63
f.; Plummer, _Commentary on St. Luke_ in the International Series (T. &
T. Clark). Compare also the article by the latter in Hastings’
_Dictionary of the Bible_ (Lord’s Supper).
xxii. 36. On ἀράτω Basil the Great (d. 379) remarks: ἀράτω ἤτοι ἀρεῖ·
οὕτω γὰρ καὶ _τὰ πολλὰ_ τῶν ἀντιγράφων ἔχει ... ὡς μὴ εἶναι πρόσταγμα
ἀλλὰ προφητείαν προλέγοντος τοῦ Κυρίου. At present D is quite alone in
exhibiting the reading ἀρεῖ, which is worth noting in view of τὰ πολλὰ
above.
xxii. 43, 44. These verses, with their mention of the Bloody Sweat and
the Strengthening Angel, are omitted in A B R T, one Old Latin (f), the
Bohairic, Sahidic, and Armenian versions, and the Sinai-Syriac. On the
other hand, they are read by the Curetonian Syriac and the Peshitto, by
the first and third hands of א (the second hand enclosed them in
brackets and cancelled them by means of dots), by D, as also by most of
the Old Latin witnesses and the Vulgate. In the Greek Lectionaries they
are omitted at the place where one would naturally expect them, but are
found in the text of Matthew xxvi., together with portions of John
xiii., in the Liturgy for Holy Thursday. This explains their insertion
after Matt. xxvi. 39 in the Ferrar Group, at least in 13, 69, 124. The
first of these, moreover, repeats the first two words of verse 43 (ὤφθη
δὲ) in Luke, but no more. The necessary inference is that these verses
are no part of the original text of Luke. They go back, however, to a
time when extra-canonical traditions from the Life and Passion of Jesus
were in circulation either orally or in writing. Zahn holds that D here
has preserved what Luke wrote.
xxiii. 2. Zahn (_GK._, i. 668) expressly points out that Marcion did not
invent the additional words καὶ καταλύοντα τὸν νόμον καὶ τοὺς προφήτας,
but found them in his exemplar. They occur in eight Old Latin and at
least five Vulgate manuscripts, among which are four of the early
codices collated by Wordsworth and White. One of them omits _et
prophetas_, while some others have _nostram_ after _legem_. Weiss takes
no notice of this addition, nor of the further addition in verse 5 of
the words ἀποστρέφοντα τὰς γυναῖκας καὶ τὰ τέκνα, supported by at least
two Old Latin manuscripts, both of which add _non enim baptizantur sicut
et nos_, while one of them exhibits the still further extension _nec se
mundant_. If the addition were really made by Marcion, it would be all
the more deserving of attention. The omission of the additional words in
verse 2 is conceivably due to homoioteleuton, the eye of the scribe
passing from καταλύοντα to κωλύοντα, In the case of verse 5, the mention
of the women and children is quite consistent with what is said
elsewhere in the narrative of the Passion, but the reference to baptism
and purification is not so clear. Codex c has the singular _baptizatur_,
but this is merely a clerical error.
xxiii. 34. The case of the First Word from the Cross is remarkable. This
verse, containing the words, “Father, forgive them, for they know not
what they do,” is bracketed in א by an early corrector, and then
restored; it is omitted by B without being replaced; it is inserted in D
by a hand not earlier than the ninth century, and omitted by two Old
Latin manuscripts, by two Bohairic codices, by the Sahidic version, and
by the newly-discovered Sinai-Syriac. Is it possible to suppose that a
Christian would have cancelled these words in a Bible manuscript like א,
unless he had valid reasons for doing so in the tradition of the Gospel
text? Zahn thinks they were omitted from D by mistake. On the Order of
the Seven Words see my note in the _Expository Times_ for June 1900, p.
423 f.
xxiii. 38. The notice of the three languages in which the Inscription on
the Cross was written is taken from the text of John, and is read by all
the Latin authorities with the single exception of codex Vercellensis
(a). Syr^{sin} is now to be added to the witnesses supporting the
omission of the clause. Its use of the word בטקא reveals the ultimate
affinity of this version with the Curetonian Syriac. The interpolation,
as Zahn rightly asserts (_GK._, i. 675), points to the estimation in
which John’s Gospel was held at an early date. Its insertion in Luke is
undoubtedly erroneous.
xxiii. 43. The insertion of τῷ ἐπιπλήσσοντι in D, as well as the other
variants found in this manuscript, viz. ἔλευσις, which is also read by D
in Luke xxi. 7, and θάρσει, which is inserted by others in Luke viii.
48, is attributed by Zahn (_Einleitung_, ii. 356) to some preacher who
sought in this way to contrast the penitent thief with his comrade. With
the substantival expression ἔλευσις, compare δειπνοκλήτωρ exhibited by D
in Matt. xx. 28. On the somewhat rare verb ἐπιπλήσσειν, compare the new
edition of Origen, i. 5,8; also Clement Alex, (ed. Dindorf), i. 186,
188.
xxiii. 53. After κείμενος U, with a few minuscules, reads καὶ
προσεκύλισεν λίθον μέγαν ἐπὶ τὴν θύραν τοῦ μνημείου, while three Vulgate
manuscripts have a similar addition _et inposito eo inposuit monumento
lapidem magnum_. On the other hand D, with its Latin, reads καὶ θέντος
(_leg._ τεθέντος) αὐτοῦ ἐπέθηκεν τῷ μνημείῳ λίθον ὃν μόγις εἴκοσι
ἐκύλιον. The same thing is found in the Old Latin manuscript c, _et cum
positus esset in monumento, posuerunt lapidem quem vix viginti
volvebant_. The Sahidic and T^i exhibit a similar expansion of the text.
In this addition, which Scrivener thought was “conceived somewhat in the
Homeric spirit,” Harris detects a Latin hexameter which the scribe of
Codex Bezae “deliberately incorporated into his text and then turned
into Greek.” See his _Study of Codex Bezae_ in _Texts and Studies_, ii.
1, 47-52. Chase, on the other hand, adduces Josephus, _Bell. Jud._, vi.
5, 3 (_Syro-Latin Text_, p. 62 ff.). Compare my _Philologica Sacra_, pp.
39, 58.
xxiv. 6. The reading ὅσα (D, c, Marcion, etc.) in place of ὡς is now
attested also by the Sinai-Syriac.
xxiv. 32. In place of καιομένη (α text) and κεκαλυμμένη (D), Blass
inserts βεβαρημένη in the β text on the authority of the old Syriac
versions, the Armenian, and the Sahidic. But in the Syriac this last
reading is due to a transcriptional error of יקיר for יקיד (see Blass
himself, p. 120, and compare the variants מוקר and מוקד in Rahmani’s
_Testamentum D. N. Jesu Christi_, p. 112, 6); and as the Armenian is
derived from the Syriac, the only question becomes whether the Sahidic
reading is due to the same error. Κεκαλυμμένη in D, which has hitherto
baffled explanation, is shown to be a purely clerical error by
comparison with Heb. xii. 18, where also κεκαυμένῳ becomes κεκαλυμμένῳ
in the Greek of D and in Pseudo-Athan. 57.
xxiv. 34. For λέγοντας D reads λέγοντες, which is simply a clerical
error arising easily from the influence of the Latin, which would be the
same in either case. For the conclusions drawn from this reading by
Resch, see his _Aussercanonische Paralleltexte_, iii. 779 f. Other
examples of the same mistake (—ες for —ας) occur in Matt. xxii. 16; Acts
vi. 11, xvi. 35; Rom. vi. 13. It is interesting to observe that Origen
had Σίμωνος καὶ Κλεόπα (i. 184, ed. Koetschau).
xxiv. 37. Zahn (_GK._, i. 681) rejects the supposition that the reading
φάντασμα for πνεῦμα was coined by Marcion and taken from a Marcionite
Bible into D. That he is right in doing so appears from Chase, who shows
that φάντασμα here is the same as δαιμόνιον ἀσώματον in Ignatius (_Ad
Smyrnaeos_, iii. 2). See my _Philologica Sacra_, p. 25. The Semitic
equivalent of φάντασμα as well as of δαιμόνιον is שֵׁאד, שִׁאדָא,[273]
which is used in both the earlier Syriac versions, the Curetonian and
the Lewis, to represent φάντασμα in Matt. xiv. 26 and Mark vi. 49. I
find that שאדא is used for πνεῦμα in the translation of Eusebius
(_Eccles. Hist._, v. 16, ed. Wright-Maclean, p. 289).
xxiv. 39. All the authorities agree in saying that Marcion omitted the
words ψηλαφήσατέ με καὶ ἴδετε, while Tertullian and Epiphanius state
that he also omitted σάρκας καὶ. See Zahn, _GK._, ii. 495, who adds that
“the longer clause—_i.e._ ψηλαφήσατέ με καὶ ἴδετε—is also omitted by D,
it (with the exception of Colbertinus), vg, but not Syr^{cu}, as
Tischendorf wrongly states.” This however is a misapprehension. The _om_
in Tischendorf refers only to με after ψηλαφήσατε. This is omitted by
Syr^{cu} as well as by D and also by Syr^{sin}. It would be more exact
to say, however, that the καὶ before ἴδετε is also omitted by Syr^{cu}.
Moreover, Syr^{sin} agrees with Syr^{cu} in reading ὅτι ἐγώ εἰμι αὐτός
after ἴδετε.
The subscription of certain minuscules states that Luke’s Gospel was
written fifteen years after the Ascension. Some say εἰς Ἀλεξανδρείαν τὴν
μεγάλην, others ἐv Ῥώμῃ, while one says very strangely, ἐv τῇ Ἀττικῇ τῆς
Βοιωταίας, “for Theophilus, who became bishop after divine baptism.” Λ,
262, 300 also contain here the notice of careful collation. The chapter
enumeration in these manuscripts is not the same, being 342, 349, and
345 respectively.
John.
In this Gospel the attention of textual critics was long confined to the
passage vii. 53-viii. 11. They failed to observe that in other places
there are clauses and whole verses whose omission or interpolation has
to be investigated in connection with vii. 53 ff., as, for example, iv.
9, v. 3, 4, and that interesting questions of textual criticism are
raised in other parts of the book as well.
Chapter xxi., which the last two verses of the preceding chapter clearly
show to be an Appendix, is equally well attested by all the authorities,
while the omission of xx. 31 by the first hand of G is just one of those
unaccountable phenomena which make their appearance so frequently in the
domain of textual criticism. The same thing is probably to be said of
the omission in א of the last verse of chapter xxi. Tischendorf was of
opinion that this last verse in א, together with the concluding ornament
and subscription, was not by the same hand (A) as had written the Gospel
of John, but by another (D) who had acted as corrector, and had written
part of the Apocrypha and six leaves of the New Testament. Tregelles, on
the other hand, who examined the passage in Tischendorf’s presence,
thought the difference was due simply to the scribe having taken a fresh
dip of the ink: that at all events the scribe who wrote the Gospel (A)
did not intend it to conclude with verse 24, otherwise he would have
added a concluding ornament and subscription as in the case of Matthew
and Luke. The verse is found in all the other manuscripts and versions
with which we are acquainted, and the question with regard to א is
interesting only from the fact that a few manuscripts do contain a
scholium to the effect that the verse is an addition (προσθήκη) inserted
in the margin (ἔξωθεν) by one of the scholars (τινὸς τῶν
φιλοπόνων),[274] and afterwards incorporated in the text by another
without the knowledge of the former (καταγέντος (?) δὲ ἔσωθεν ἀγνοίᾳ
τυχὸν τοῦ πρώτου γραφέως ὑπό τινος τῶν παλαιῶν μέν, οὐκ ἀκριβῶν δέ, καὶ
μέρος τῆς τοῦ εὐαγγελίου γραφῆς γενόμενον). This entire note, however,
is evidently no more than an inference drawn from the contents of the
verse, as the Syriac Commentary of Theodore shows. See further, Zahn,
_Einleitung_, ii. 495, and the reference to the Commentary of Ishodad in
Sachau’s _Verzeichnis der syrischen Handschriften in Berlin_, p. 307.
With respect to the pericope adulteræ, on the other hand, we may be
quite certain that it did not originally stand in the position it now
occupies (vii. 53-viii. 11), nor indeed in John’s Gospel at all,
although the decision of the Holy Office of the 13th February 1897,
which was confirmed by the Pope two days later, obliges Catholic
exegetes to hold it as genuine. It is omitted in a great many
manuscripts and versions—_e.g._ in א B L T. A and C are defective here,
but the amount of space shows that they could not have contained it. It
is omitted in the Syriac and Egyptian versions, in the Armenian and the
Gothic, in some Old Latin codices, and in the earliest of the Greek and
Latin Fathers. On the other hand it is found in all the manuscripts of
Jerome and in Codex D, which is the only one of the earlier Greek
manuscripts to contain it. In some minuscules and later Armenian
manuscripts it stands at the end of the fourth Gospel, where now
Westcott and Hort put it. In minuscule 225, written in the year 1192, it
follows vii. 36; in the Georgian version it comes after vii. 44; while
in the Ferrar Group—_i.e._ in minuscules 13, 69, 124, 346, 556—it is
inserted after Luke xxi. 38. Its insertion after vii. 36 is probably the
result of an accidental error. In the Greek Lectionaries the liturgy for
Whitsunday begins at verse 37 and extends to verse 52, followed by viii.
12, so that the pericope was, by mistake, inserted before instead of
after this lection. Its position in the Georgian version is the more
remarkable, seeing that in the Old Latin Codex b, which contained the
pericope by the first hand, the entire passage from vii. 44-viii. 12 has
been _erased_. As a probable explanation of its position in the Ferrar
Group after Luke xxi. 38, it has been suggested that the scribe inserted
it there owing to the resemblance between Luke xxi. 37 and John viii. 1,
and also between Luke xxi. 38 (ὤρθριζε) and John viii. 2 (ὄρθρου).
Harris thinks that its proper place is in John between chapters v. and
vi., because reference is made in v. 45, 46 to the Mosaic Law, which is
also mentioned in viii. 5.
But the remarkable thing is that here again the text of D differs in a
conspicuous manner from that of the other witnesses. In viii. 2 the
words καὶ καθίσας ἐδίδασκεν αὐτούς are wanting: in verse 4 we meet the
sentence ἐκπειράζοντες αὐτὸν οἱ ἱερεῖς ἵνα ἔχωσιν κατηγορίαν αὐτοῦ,
which does not come till after verse 5 in the other text: for μοιχείᾳ D
has ἁμαρτίᾳ: in verse 5 it reads, Μωυσῆς δὲ ἐν τῷ νόμῳ _ἐκέλευσεν_ τὰς
τοιαύτας _λιθάζειν_, for which the other text has ἐν δὲ τῷ νόμῳ Μωσῆς
_ἐνετείλατο_ τὰς τοιαύτας _λιθοβολεῖσθαι_: in verse 11, D has ὕπαγε
where the other text has πορεύου. Now, if two persons got such an easy
sentence as “Moses in the Law commanded to stone such” to translate from
Latin, Hebrew, or any other language into Greek, one of them might quite
well use κελεύειν and λιθάζειν, and the other ἐντέλλεσθαι and
λιθοβολεῖν. And so the question is suggested whether the two forms in
which the text exists were not derived from different sources, that of
D, _e.g._, from its Latin. But on closer examination the latter
supposition is seen to be impossible. For the Latin corresponding to
ἔχωσιν κατηγορίαν αὐτοῦ is “haberent accusare eum,” showing that the
Latin translator read κατηγορεῖν in his original,[275] and for ὥστε
πάντας ἐξελθεῖν he has “uti omnes exire,” where again the infinitive
speaks for the priority of the Greek. On the other hand, it is to be
observed that, according to Eusebius (_Eccles. Hist._, iii. c. 39, _sub
fin._), Papias knew and recorded an incident περὶ γυναικὸς ἐπὶ πολλαῖς
ἁμαρτίαις διαβληθείσης ἐπὶ τοῦ Κυρίου, ἣν τὸ καθ’ Ἑβραίους εὐαγγέλιον
περιέχει. So that the Gospel according to the Hebrews (_i.e._ the
Palestinian Jewish Christians) contained a narrative similar to this, we
may say quite confidently, contained this narrative. From that Gospel it
was taken and inserted in some manuscripts after Luke xxi., in others
after John vii. By the time of Augustine it was so widely propagated in
the Latin that he thought it had been removed from certain manuscripts
by people of weak faith, or rather by enemies of the true faith, “credo
metuentes peccandi immunitatem dari mulieribus suis.” The pericope is no
part of John’s Gospel, though it belongs to the oldest stock of
evangelic tradition. On the question whether it may not originally have
stood between Mark xii. 17 and xii. 18, and so between Luke xx. 26 and
xx. 27, see Holtzmann in the _ThLz._, 1898, col. 536 f. _Vide supra_, p.
66.
i. 5. Zahn raises the question what word Ephraem found in his copy of
the Diatessaron corresponding to κατέλαβε, seeing he gives _vicit_. In
this connection I might (with the proviso that the reading may be more
easily explained from the Armenian) point out that the Syriac word תשתלט
corresponds to καταλαβέτωσαν in Sirach xxiii. 6. This stands elsewhere
for ἄρχω, δεσπόζω, ἐξουσιάζω, κατακυριεύω, κυριεύω, κρατῶ. כבשׁ also
frequently represents the Greek καταλαμβάνειν. The Sinai-Syriac for John
i. 5 is unfortunately lost.
i. 13. The reading ὃς ... ἐγεννήθη is, so far as is known at present,
attested by Latin witnesses only, “qui natus est.” But as Zahn is
careful to point out (_Einl._, ii. 518), it did not originate on Latin
soil, for Justin presupposes it, and, moreover, Irenæus constantly
applies the passage to the Incarnation, while the Valentinians, who had
the usual text, were accused by Tertullian of falsification. And it is
not proved that the two last-mentioned used anything but a Greek Bible.
i. 17. According to early testimony, this verse, so frequently quoted
since the time of Ritschl, once ran: “The Law was given by Moses, but
_its_ truth came by Jesus.” See Zahn, _Forsch._, i. 121, 248.
i. 18. Zahn agrees with Hort in holding that the originality of the
reading μονογενὴς θεὸς (without the article) is established. See
Westcott and Hort, _Notes on Select Readings_; Zahn, _Einleitung_, ii.
544, 557; Westcott, _Commentary on John_, _in loco_. It may be mentioned
here that Codex Monacensis of Origen’s Commentary on the Gospel of John
has ὁ/μονογενὴς υἱός/θεός with ὁ and υἱός both written above the line in
a later hand. This gave rise in the Codex Regius to the reading ὁ
μονογενὴς υἱὸς θεός.
i. 28. Is it βηθαβαρά or βηθανίᾳ? The former is exhibited by the
Sinai-Syriac, the Curetonian, and the margin of the Harklean, and the
latter by the other three Syriac, and the Arabic Diatessaron. With
regard to the former, is it the case, as is supposed by many, that it is
due simply to a conjecture of Origen, and that Syr^{cu} and Syr^{sin}
took it from him? According to Zahn (_GK._, i. 406), Hilgenfeld pointed
in this direction in the _ZfwTh._, 1883, 119. See also Lagrange,
_Origène, la critique textuelle et la tradition topographique_ (_Revue
Biblique_, iv., 1895, pp. 501-524). Origen explains βηθανία as οἶκος
ὑπακοῆς, and the Syriac as “place of praise.” Compare on this the
much-discussed passage in the Gospel of Peter (ὑπακοὴ ἠκούετο, c. xi.).
Βηθαβαρά, on the other hand, he interprets as οἶκος κατασκευῆς, so that
he must either have spelt it Bethbara, בית ברא, as in Jud. vii. 24, or
taken it as Beth-ha-bara. It is spelt βηθααβαρά in Lagarde’s _Onomastica
Sacra_, 240, 12, and Bethabara in 108, 6 (Bethbaara, Codex B). Jerome
(see _Onomastica Sacra_) interpreted the name as “domus humilis (= ?)
vel vesperae” in Joshua xv. 6, as “domus multa vel gravis” in xv. 59,
and as ἀοίκητος in xv. 61, following Symmachus. Luther had Betharaba,
but in three impressions of the New Testament and in three of the
Postils he had Bethabara (according to Bindseil-Niemeyer), and in the
margin Bethbara, with a note in which reference is rightly made to Jud.
vii. 24, “ut mysterium consonet.” See my German or Greek-German New
Testament. It may be asked if “Ainon” in John iii. 23 has any connection
with Bethania. Compare בֵית עְַנות in Jos. xv. 59. For ἐν Αἰνών e has
_in eremo_ and f has _in deserto_. How is this to be explained? Compare
Zahn, _Einleitung_, ii. 561.
i. 34. For υἱὸς א*, Syr^{cu}, Syr^{sin}, and e read ἐκλεκτός. D is here
defective. Zahn thinks the latter reading is original, and the former an
example of an early and widely current alteration. Westcott and Hort
insert ἐκλεκτός among their _Noteworthy Rejected Readings_. The two
readings are combined in some manuscripts “electus filius Dei.” See
Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 515, 544, 557.
i. 41. Zahn here decides for the nominative πρῶτος. Both the disciples
of John who attached themselves to Jesus found their brother, but Andrew
was the first to do so. See _Einleitung_, ii. 477 f.
ii. 2. In his Commentary on the Gospels, extant in the Armenian only, we
find Ephraem saying, “Graecus scribit _recubuit et defecit vinum_” (§
53), which shows that he had a Greek exemplar before him containing the
itacism ἐκλίθη for ἐκλήθη. See Zahn, _Forsch._, i. 62, 127, and compare
Luke xiv. 8, where Antiochus, _Homil._, iii., has κατακλιθῇς for κληθῇς.
ii. 3. Zahn is perhaps right when he says that no critic need doubt for
a moment that the original reading is the longer, genuinely Semitic text
exhibited by א*, the Harklean Syriac, and the best Latin manuscripts. D
is defective, as also Syr^{cu} and Syr^{sin}.
iii. 5. βασιλείαν τῶν οὐρανῶν is attested only by א*, a few minuscules,
by c m, and certain early Fathers, in place of βασιλείαν τοῦ θεοῦ, which
has now the support of the Sinai-Syriac. Zahn thinks the former reading
to be correct (_Einleitung_, ii. 294). If that is so, this will be the
only place where the expression is found in the New Testament outside
the Gospel according to Matthew, where it occurs some thirty-three or
thirty-four times. See note on “The Kingdom of Heaven” in the
_Expository Times_ for February 1896, p. 236 ff.
iii. 24. Zahn (_Einl._, ii. 515) thinks that the omission of the article
before φυλακὴν shows that there was some uncertainty regarding the fact
mentioned by John. This, however, is open to question. That the
insertion or omission of the article may be of importance is shown by
such examples as John v. 1; Matthew xxii. 23; Acts xvi. 6; James ii. 2.
iii. 34. Our knowledge of the text of the Sinai-Syriac here rests solely
on the last reading of Mrs. Lewis: “Not according to his measure gave
(or, gives) God the Father.” This rendering, as well as the insertion of
ὁ Θεός in many Greek texts, is due to the fact that πνεῦμα was not taken
as the subject of the sentence.
iv. 1. For ὁ κύριος Tischendorf reads ὁ Ἰησοῦς, which is probably
correct. Ὁ κύριος is elsewhere found only three times in John—viz., vi.
23, xi. 2, xx. 20. According to Zahn (_Einl._, ii. 391) the first two
passages are explanations outside the Gospel narrative interjected by
the evangelist, while the words in the last passage are spoken from the
point of view of the disciples.
iv. 9. The words οὐ γὰρ συγχρῶνται Ἰουδαῖοι Σαμαρείταις were retained by
Lachmann and by Tischendorf in his seventh edition, because the only
authorities known at that time for their omission were D a b e. But when
the first hand of א appeared in confirmation of the testimony of these
witnesses, the words were dropped by Tischendorf and bracketed by
Westcott and Hort. Syr^{cu} and Syr^{sin} insert them, and perhaps
Tatian. Zahn is inclined to admit them. “The classic brevity of the
interjected explanation speaks for its genuineness.” See his
_Einleitung_, ii. 549.
v. 1. ἡ ἑορτή is supported by א C etc., and ἑορτή by A B D etc. On the
chronology, see Zahn, _Einleitung_, ii. 516.
v. 3b, 4. After ξηρῶν D alone inserts παραλυτικῶν, and then adds, with
A^2 C^3 I Γ Δ Λ Π (this last, however, with asterisks), the clause
ἐκδεχομένων τὴν τοῦ ὕδατος κίνησιν. The shorter text is given by א A* B
C* L. The whole of the fourth verse is omitted by א B C* D, 33, 157,
314. In this case D and A change sides. Within the limits of the verse
there are a great many variations, which show that it is a very early
addition. Some of the words are hapax legomena, like δήποτε, ταραχή,
νόσημα. Zahn thinks the gloss may have been one of the “expositions” of
Papias. According to the Commentary of Ishodad, Theodore of Mopsuestia
did not consider this verse as part of the Gospel of John (Sachau,
_Verzeichnis der syrischen Handschriften_, p. 308). See Zahn,
_Einleitung_, ii. 557. Cyril says the incident occurred at Pentecost.
v. 36. Zahn (_Einl._, ii. 557) calls μείζων a difficult reading, and one
that could not have been invented: “I, as a Greater than John, have the
witness of God.”
vii. 8. οὔπω has taken the place of οὐκ in all the uncials except א D K
M P, a fact which reveals its antiquity. Οὐκ is retained also by
Syr^{cu} and Syr^{sin}. The change was introduced to obviate the
inconsistency between vii. 8 and vii. 10. Porphyry (apud Jerome, _Contra
Pelagium_, ii. 17) on the ground of οὐκ, accused Jesus of “inconstantia
et mutatio,” and Schopenhauer (_Grundprobleme der Ethik_, 2nd edition,
p. 225) cited this passage as justifying an occasional falsehood, saying
that “Jesus Christ himself on one occasion uttered an intentional
untruth.” See Zahn, _Einleitung_, ii. 547.
vii. 15. See _Addenda_, p. xvi.
viii. 57. According to the authority cited in the _ThLz._, 1899, p. 176,
the first hand of Codex B is supposed to have written εορακεσε: “the
final ε has been erased, and the ε preceding it changed into α.” I have
examined the photograph of B in the Stuttgart Library, and can find no
trace of an ε ever having stood after σ. The blank space of the size of
two letters is meant to divide the sentences. It is the case, however,
though neither Tischendorf, Fabiani, nor the pamphlet of 1881 mentions
it, that the first hand wrote εορακες, which was then made into εωρακας
by means of a stroke drawn through the ο. The matter is not
insignificant in view of what is said in Westcott and Hort’s _Notes on
Orthography_, Appendix, p. 168. Burkitt supposes that εορακεσε was the
reading of the ancestor of א B (_Texts and Studies_, vol. v. 5. p.
ix).[276]
xii. 7. τετήρηκεν, without ἵνα, has the support of a comparatively large
number of manuscripts. Peerlkamp and De Koe read ἵνα τί ... τετήρηκεν;
Zahn (_Einl._, ii. 518) has no doubt that the correct reading is ἵνα ...
τηρήσῃ, and that it was replaced by τετήρηκεv (without ἵνα) on the
ground that this Mary was not among the women who came to the sepulchre
to anoint the body of Jesus. He says that the true text presupposes that
Mary would like to use the remainder of the ointment to anoint the body
of Jesus after his death, and that the words of Jesus were intended to
prevent Mary and the disciples afterwards following the suggestion of
Judas.
xiii. 2. The change of a single letter here is important from a
harmonistic point of view. א* B L read δείπνου γινομένου, _i.e._,
“during supper,” but א^c A D have δείπνου γενομένου, which means “after
supper.” Compare Zahn, _Einleitung_, ii. 520.
xiii. 34. On the form in which this saying was cited by the Marcionites,
see Zahn, _GK._ i. 678.
xviii. 12 ff. The Sinai-Syriac, probably following Tatian, gives the
following arrangement of the verses—viz., 12, 13, 24, 14, 15, 19-23,
16-18, 25-28. On this see Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 521. Spitta would arrange
the verses, 12, 13, 19-23, 24, 14, 15-18, 25_b_, 27, 28. See Zahn,
_Einl._, ii. 558. It does sometimes happen that a leaf of a manuscript
is misplaced, but it is hard to account for such transpositions as
these. Compare the _Journal of Theological Studies_, October 1900, p.
141 f.
xix. 5. Though not properly connected with the criticism of the text,
the question may be asked here, by way of a contribution to a subject
much discussed of late, whether the expression ἰδοὺ ὁ ἄνθρωπος may not
be connected with בר נשא. Compare ὁ ἄνθρωπος and ὁ υἱὸς τοῦ ἀνθρώπου in
Mark ii. 27, 28. In this passage of John, B omits the article before
ἄνθρωπος, reading ἰδοὺ ἄνθρωπος simply. See the _Expository Times_,
November 1899, p. 62 ff., “The Name Son of Man and the Messianic
Consciousness of Jesus,” where Schmiedel’s article with the same title
in the _Protestantische Monatshefte_ is noticed.
xix. 37. The quotation, according to Zahn, is made from the Hebrew. The
LXX has ἐπιβλέψονται πρὸς μὲ ἀνθ’ ὧν κατωρχήσαντο. The later Greek
versions all seem to have kept the first three words as in the LXX but
to have variously corrected the second clause, for which Aquila gives
σὺν ᾧ ἐξεκέντησαν, Theodotion εἰς ὃν ἐξεκέντησαν, Symmachus ἔμπροσθεν
ἐπεξεκέντησαν. Compare with this Apoc. i. 7, οἵτινες αὐτὸν ἐξεκέντησαν;
Barnabas vii. 9, ὄψονται αὐτὸν ... κατακεντήσαντες; Justin, Dial. 32,
ἐπιγνώσεσθε εἰς ὃν ἐξεκεντήσατε. It has accordingly been supposed that
John in the Gospel and Apocalypse followed some unknown Greek version
which exhibited the characteristic forms ὄψονται (found only in John and
Barnabas) and εἰς ὃν ἐξεκέντησαν (given by John, Justin, Theodotion, and
partly by Aquila). But this supposition is simply a proof of
unwillingness to admit a palpable fact—viz., that in the Gospel and
Apocalypse John gives an independent rendering of the original text of
Zechariah xii. 10, and that Barnabas and Justin follow John. See Zahn,
_Einleitung_, ii. 563.
The subscriptions state that the fourth Gospel was written thirty or
thirty-two years after the Ascension, at Ephesus, in the reign of Nero,
or, as some say, of Domitian. It is also said to have been published by
Gaius, the host of the Apostles (διὰ Γάϊον τὸν ξενοδόχον τῶν ἀποστόλων).
Others say that it was dictated to Papias of Hierapolis the disciple of
the Apostle. On the alleged autograph (ἰδιόχειρον) preserved at Ephesus,
see above, p. 30.
ACTS.
It would unduly enlarge the extent of this work were I to go on
mentioning all the passages in the Acts that are more or less striking
from the textual point of view. This book has already been more
frequently referred to than the others. I would again refer the student
to Zahn’s _Introduction_. I agree with that writer in thinking it
impossible in many cases to suppose that a scholiast manufactured the
text we now find in Codex D with no other material before him save the
usual text and his inkhorn. At the same time there is undoubtedly room
for much diversity of opinion with respect to many matters of detail. Ι
would instance such a simple narrative as that of Acts iii. 1-5, and ask
what reasonable ground a copyist could have had for altering ὃς into
οὗτος, ἀτενίσας into ἐμβλέψας, βλέψον into ἀτένισον, ἐπεῖχεν into
ἀτενίσας or _vice versa_, or for omitting or inserting ὑπάρχων or
λαβεῖν.[277] Such changes might, however, be introduced by an author who
writes a passage twice over. Without himself being fully conscious of
his reasons for doing so, he might substitute a final construction for a
participle, introduce or remove an asyndeton, replace one word by its
synonym, and make all the striking linguistic changes which a comparison
of the two texts reveals.
Time will show whether I am right in my conjecture that ἐβαρύνατε in
iii. 14 is due to an error in translation. In illustration of the
interchange of λαοῦ and κόσμου in ii. 47, I have cited in _Philologica
Sacra_, p. 39, a number of instances of the confusion of עם or עמא with
עלם or עלמא, to which I would now add Daniel viii. 19, Sirach xlv. 7;
xlvii. 4; Matt. i. 21 (in the Curetonian Syriac). Compare also Eusebius,
_Eccles. Hist._, iv. 15, 26; _History of Mary_, ix. 17; xiv. 11 (ed.
Budge). Whether the change in the passage in question is really to be
explained in this way, or by the supposition of an “anti-Judaic
tendency,” as Corssen prefers (_Göttinger gelehrte Anzeigen_, 1896, vi.
444), may be left an open question for the present. I would just point
to one thing in favour of my view, and in answer to what Zahn says in
his _Einleitung_, ii. 423. He says there: “Linguistic considerations are
against the supposition that a pure Greek like Luke, the physician of
Antioch, was able to read a Hebrew book. For a thousand Jews (Syrians
and Copts) who were able at that time to read, write, and speak Greek,
there would be at most a single Greek possessed of a corresponding
knowledge of Hebrew or Aramaic. And I confess that I have hitherto
sought in vain for this rara avis.” Quite true, but how do we know that
the physician of Antioch was a pure Greek? All the Prologues to the
Gospels unanimously call him “natione Syrus.” I have pointed out in my
_Philologica Sacra_, p. 13, what is very generally admitted, that in the
New Testament Ἕλληνες denotes simply the “heathen,” whether they speak
Greek or not.[278] The woman mentioned in Mark vii. 26 was a Ἑλληνὶς
Συρο-Φοινίκισσα τὸ γένος, and in the same way Luke was a Ἕλλην of
Antioch (Acts xi. 20), but Σύρος τὸ γένος. He is one of the thousand who
could read, write, and speak Greek, though he was not above making such
a mistake in translation when using a Hebrew or Aramaic book as I think
he certainly does in Luke xi. 41, and as I am inclined to think he does
in Acts iii. 14, till I find a better explanation of the reading
ἐβαρύνατε than has yet been given.[279] I am glad to see from Zahn that
more than seventy years ago, in his dissertation entitled _De Codice
Cantabrigiensi_ (1827), p. 16, Schultz suggested that the text of D may
perhaps be derived from a Syriac version. According to what I have said
above on Tatian, this view must certainly be admitted as possible, and I
see that it has been revived by Chase.
A new solution of the textual problem in Acts has been suggested by Aug.
Pott (_Der abendländische Text der Apostelgeschichte und die
Wir-Quelle_, Leipzig, 1900). He thinks that the original narrative drawn
up by Luke existed as a separate work for some time after it had been
worked up into our canonical Acts, and that notes were taken from the
former and inserted in the margin of the latter, and in this way came
into the text of Codex D and its associates. Against this, however,
there is the fact that similar problems emerge in the Gospel of Luke
where this distinction cannot be made.
For the sake of brevity I append notes to a few passages only of Acts.
But at the outset I must express my surprise that Wendt, even in his
eighth edition of 1899, repeats the statement that the title of the book
in D is πρᾶξις ἀποστόλων. Even without the assurance given by Blass in
his _Grammatik_, § iii. 1, 2, it should be borne in mind that “δωσιν
stands equally for both δῶσιν and δώσειν,” and that accordingly πραξις
may be either πράξεις or πρᾶξις. In the case before us it is the former.
As illustrations take the following from D in Acts:—δυναμι, iii. 12, iv.
7; πιστι, vi. 7; ις, iv. 30; μηνας τρις, vii. 20; and conversely
θλειψεις μεγαλη, vii. 11; μερεις, viii. 21; δυναμεσει and σημιοις side
by side in ii. 22. Compare also Mark vi. 2; vi. 14; xiii. 25; Luke xxi.
26; Acts viii. 13; (δυναμις τοιαυται; αι δυναμις; δυναμις μεγαλας). It
is true that in every case in which the title is written out, which
occurs only five times altogether, it is πραξις, but this is to be
understood as plural, like _actus_ in the Latin. It came afterwards to
be used as singular in the Syriac (Zahn, _Einl._, ii. 370, 383, 388),
but that is nothing strange. We say “the Times _says_”; and we have an
analogy in the use of the word _biblia_ in the Middle Ages when the
neuter plural _biblia bibliorum_ became _biblia bibliae_ (singular
feminine).
i. 23. It is a matter of commentary rather than of textual criticism,
but Wendt, in his eighth edition, asserts that nothing further is known
of this Joseph surnamed Justus. Eusebius, on the authority of Papias,
mentions παράδοξον περὶ Ἰοῦστον τὸν ἐπικληθέντα Βαρσαβᾶν γεγονός, ὡς
δηλητήριον φάρμακον ἐμπίοντος καὶ μηδὲν ἀηδὲς διὰ τὴν τοῦ Κυρίου χάριν
ὑπομείναντος (_Eccles. Hist._, iii. 39). The name of Aristion is
inserted in the margin of this passage in Rufinus’s Latin translation of
Eusebius. This marginal gloss acquires a peculiar importance from the
fact that the name Ariston is inserted in the Etschmiadzin manuscript of
the Gospels over Mark xvi. 9-20, apparently ascribing these verses or
their main contents to him. Compare Zahn, _Einleitung_, ii. 231, and see
Plate IX.
iv. 6. On the reading Ἰωνάθας in D for Ἰωάννης, see above, p. 243.
iv. 24, and v. 39. See Harris, _Two Important Glosses in the Codex
Bezae_, _Expositor_, November 1900, pp. 394-400.
xi. 27, 28. In his treatise, “On the Original Text of Acts xi. 27, 28”
(_Berliner Sitz.-Berichte_, Heft 17), Harnack comes to the conclusion
that the Western text here cannot be the original.
xv. 20, 21. On Harnack’s examination of the Apostolic Decree, see Selbie
in the _Expository Times_ for June 1899, p. 395. Harnack comes to the
same results as Zahn, but draws the opposite conclusion from them. See
above, p. 232 f.
xvi. 6. The article is omitted before Γαλατικὴν χώραν by א A B C D
minuscules. For this Blass, on the authority of p, which reads “Galatie
regiones,” substitutes τὰς Γαλατικὰς χώρας = “vicos Galatiae.” On this
see Zahn, _Einleitung_, i. 133. The omission of the article does not
necessitate taking τὴν Φρυγίαν as an adjective (so Wendt^8); it might
still be rendered “through Phrygia and Galatian territory.”
xvii. 27. In my _Philologica Sacra_, p. 42, I say that it was easier to
change τὸ θεῖον (β) into τὸν θεόν (α) than _vice versa_. To this Wendt
replies in his eighth edition, p. 294, by saying, “In all probability
offence was taken at the representation of God himself as an object of
τὸ ψηλαφᾶν.” Yes, there is a considerable difference between Hector
alive and Hector dead, and of the latter it could be truly said
(_Iliad_, xxii. 372 f.):
Ὧδε δέ τις εἴπεσκεν ἰδὼν ἐς πλησίον ἄλλον·
Ὢ πόποι ἦ μάλα δὴ μαλακώτερος ἀμφαφάασθαι.
But the θεῖον of which Paul speaks on the Areopagus is most assuredly no
more and no less a _noli me tangere_ than the θεός. Among the witnesses
in support of τὸ θεῖον is Clement of Alexandria. I can only repeat what
Zahn says: “Whoever is careful to bear in mind that our earliest
manuscripts are some two hundred years later than Marcion, Tatian, and
Irenæus, and has any sense of the difference between naïve originality
and a regularity due to liturgical, dogmatic, and stylistic
considerations,” cannot but judge differently with respect to β.
xviii. 3. See my article, “The Handicraft of St. Paul,” in the _American
Journal of Biblical Literature_, xi. 2, 1892, on _lorarius_ as the
Syriac rendering of σκηνοποιός = ἱμαντοτόμος, σκυτοτόμος,
leather-cutter, and the notes in the _Expository Times_ for December
1896, and January and March 1897. Chrysostom calls Paul σκυτοτόμος, and
in the _Inventio Sanctae Crucis_, it is said, “exercebat artem
scaenographiam.” This last word I have explained as a confusion with
σκηνορραφίαν, as Professor Ramsay also does. In the _Compendious Syriac
Dictionary_ of J. Payne Smith (which must not be confounded with the
_Thesaurus_ of her father), _lorarius_ is explained as “a maker of rough
cloth for tents or horse-cloths.” But there is nothing said about tents
even by the Syriac scholiasts. The correct meaning will be found in
Brockelmann. Celsus (Origen, _Contra Celsum_, vi. 33) speaks of ἐκεῖνος
ἀπὸ κρημνοῦ ἐρριμμένος, ἢ εἰς βάραθρον ἐωσμένος, ἢ ἀγχόνῃ πεπνιγμένος, ἢ
_σκυτοτόμος_, ἢ λιθοξόος, ἢ σιδηρεύς. Paul is evidently referred to
after Judas Iscariot, but who are meant by λιθοξόος and σιδηρεύς?
xix. 6. I fail to understand how anyone can dismiss D here with the
remark, “On account of Paul’s express declaration as to the desirability
of the gift of tongues being supplemented by that of interpretation (1
Cor. xiv. 5, 13, 27), this addition seemed to be required in this case
where Paul communicated the gifts of the Spirit” (Meyer-Wendt, eighth
edition, p. 312).
xx. 4. For Δερβαῖος D* has Δουβεριος or Δουβριος, and g _doverius_.
Moreover, D* has Βερυιαιος, not Βερυαιος, as Tischendorf has it.
Valckenaer and Blass insert a comma after Γάϊος, and substitute δὲ for
καὶ after Δερβαῖος, with the result that Gaius becomes a Thessalonian,
and Timothy a Derbean. For this Zahn sees no necessity. See his
_Einleitung_, i. 149.
xxviii. 16. On στρατοπεδάρχης (β) which Gigas renders _princeps
peregrinorum_, see note on xxvii. 1, in Knowling’s _Acts of the
Apostles_, _Expositor’s Greek Testament_, vol. ii. p. 516; article
“Julius” in Hastings’ _Bible Dictionary_, Ramsay in the _Expositor_,
November 1900; Zahn, _Einleitung_, i. 389 f. Wendt (eighth edition, p.
420) omits the words in xxviii. 16, on the ground that their omission
either by mistake or design is very unlikely, but their insertion, on
the other hand, quite intelligible. This only shows how little reliance
can be placed on subjective criticism.
We are not yet sufficiently well acquainted with the subscriptions of
the minuscules, but it may be cited here that in one of them Luke is
called συνέκδημος Παύλου, and in another θεηγόρος ὁ συγγράψας αὐτὰς
ἐμπνεύσει θείᾳ.
PAULINE EPISTLES.
In the arrangement of the books of the New Testament, it has become
customary to follow the order adopted by Tischendorf and Westcott and
Hort, who place the Catholic Epistles before the Pauline. In the
Stuttgart edition of the New Testament, however, I have, in accordance
with earlier usage, put the Pauline Epistles after the Gospels and Acts.
Considering what is said by Hort himself in § 422 of his _Introduction_,
and also what we find in No. 6 of Berger’s List of the various
arrangements of the books of the New Testament (_Histoire de la
Vulgate_, p. 339 f.), it might have been more correct to have put Paul
immediately after the Gospels, as in Codex Sinaiticus. But seeing that
the Latin and German Bibles at present exhibit the order, Gospels, Acts,
Pauline Epistles, Catholic Epistles, and that Meyer’s Commentary is also
arranged on this principle, I have retained this arrangement for the
sake of uniformity.
Here again I must refer the student for matters of detail to larger
works, especially to Zahn’s _Einleitung_. A few of the more important
passages will be considered in the sequel, but previously something may
be said here of the origin and circulation of the collective writings of
Paul.
1. Paul, accompanied by Silvanus and Timothy, came from Philippi to
Thessalonica on his second missionary journey, somewhere about the year
54, though Harnack puts it as early as 49-50. There he gathered together
a church in the short space of three or four weeks, if we may credit the
account given in Acts xvii. 2 in this particular. At all events he was
not long there. Disturbances similar to those in Philippi arose, which
compelled him to leave the city. He came to Athens. In his anxiety over
the internal and external circumstances of the newly-founded church at
Thessalonica, he sent back Timothy from Athens to confirm those he had
left behind. When his messenger returned he wrote to the Thessalonian
Church, in all probability not from Athens but from Corinth, where he
had gone in the interval of Timothy’s absence. This letter we know as
the First Epistle to the Thessalonians. It is uncertain whether the
apostle, as in most other cases, dictated the epistle, writing only the
salutation and concluding benediction with his own hand (compare 2
Thess. iii. 17: ὁ ἀσπασμὸς τῇ ἐμῇ χειρὶ Παύλου, ὅ ἐστιν σημεῖον ἐν πάσῃ
ἐπιστολῇ· οὕτως γράφω),[280] or whether he wrote it all himself in large
letters, as he did in the case of the Epistle to the Galatians which he
wrote πηλίκοις γράμμασι (Gal. vi. 11), either on account of some
affection of the eyes or because he was a craftsman and had little
practice in writing. The epistle was intended for the entire church at
Thessalonica, of which Aristarchus, Secundus, and perhaps also Gaius
(see above, on Acts xx. 4), are known to us by name. It was probably
addressed to the oldest, or most prominent, or most active member of the
Christian community. At the close of the epistle, the writer expressly
adjures them to see that it is read by all the brethren. It would,
therefore, be read aloud at the next meeting of the congregation. There
and then, some poor slave or aged woman would ask to have the letter for
the purpose of copying it. What became of the original we do not know.
In the very first copy that was made, mistakes and alterations would
make their appearance, and these would be multiplied with every fresh
copy.
2. At the close of the Epistle to the Colossians (iv. 16), Paul asks
that when they have read it, they will see that it is also read in the
Church of Laodicæans, and that they themselves read the epistle from
Laodicæa (τὴν ἐκ Λαοδικείας). From this it has generally been supposed
that an epistle of Paul to Laodicæa has been lost. An epistle with this
title was restored at a very early date, in the second century. It is no
longer extant in Greek, but many Latin manuscripts and editions of the
Bible contain it, and it is also found in the pre-Lutheran German
Bibles. But the epistle from Laodicæa referred to by the Apostle may
perhaps have been the circular letter which we now know as the Epistle
to the Ephesians, and which may have been intended to go, among other
places, to Laodicæa, and from there to Colossae. However that may be, we
see that at a very early date there were epistles of Paul to various
places, and that copies of these might be made at each place, and still
further distributed. A parallel case is that of the Koran, the different
recensions of which are distinguished according to the cities whence
they originated. Even at that time, therefore, the beginnings of a
collection of the Pauline Epistles might be made. By the time that the
Second Epistle of Peter was written, it was known that “brother Paul,
according to the wisdom given to him, had written many epistles, in
which were some things hard to be understood” (2 Peter iii. 15).
3. When a great man dies, we have usually a collection of the letters he
received in his lifetime, but not of those he himself wrote, and to
collect these last is frequently a matter of considerable difficulty. We
have therefore reason to congratulate ourselves that we have, within the
covers of the New Testament, epistles of Paul addressed to the most
diverse regions—to Macedonia (1 and 2 Thess., Philippians), to Achaia (1
and 2 Corinthians), to Asia Minor (Ephesians, Colossians, Galatians),
and to Italy (Romans), not to speak of the so-called Pastoral or private
Epistles—epistles, moreover, the dates of which extend over a period of
at least eight years.[281] It is, of course, evident that the appearance
of an epistle in this collection is not in itself a guarantee of Pauline
authorship. But on the other hand, the collection must have been made at
a very early date, because we find, almost without exception, not only
the same number of Pauline epistles, but also the same order of their
arrangement. There is scarcely any evidence of the circulation of a
particular epistle by itself. True, the order now usually adopted, which
has been the prevailing order from the fourth century onwards and which
seems, for the most part, to arrange the epistles according to their
length (Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, and so on),
is not the original. In the Muratorian Canon (so called from its
discoverer), which is a very old catalogue of the books of the Bible,
the Epistles to the Corinthians stand at the head of the collection and
that to the Romans at the end. Tertullian had the same arrangement,
while Marcion, for dogmatic reasons apparently, put Galatians first,
then 1 and 2 Corinthians, Romans. The present condition of our Epistle
to the Romans is also supposed to point to its former position at the
end of Paul’s epistles to the churches. In that epistle the concluding
doxology is found at different places, while many look upon chap. xvi.
1-23 as a separate document, originally intended for Ephesus, which was
attached to the entire collection at the end. Among other varieties of
arrangement it may be mentioned that Colossians frequently followed 2
Thessalonians. When and where the first collection took its rise, and by
whom the second arrangement was introduced, can no longer be determined
with certainty. Zahn thinks the first originated at Corinth about the
year 85, his reason being that it seems to be presupposed in the Epistle
to the Corinthians written by Clement of Rome about the year 95. The
second he would date from Alexandria, between 220 and 260. If we might
suppose that all our extant manuscripts are derived, not from separate
copies of the Epistles, but from a copy of the earliest collection, it
would serve to explain how it comes that certain corruptions have found
their way into the text of all our manuscripts—_e.g._ in Colossians ii.
18. On the other hand, the variations at the end of Romans, _e.g._, are
of such a sort that their origin seems to be anterior to the formation
of the collection.
It is not so difficult to understand how it is that the Epistle to the
Hebrews, which, it is certain, was not written by Paul, varies so much
with regard to its position in the collection. In the Syriac Bible, and
in the majority of later Greek manuscripts, it comes after all the
Pauline epistles, the reason being that the Syrian Church did not
consider it to be really of the number of these. (See Westcott, _Bible
in the Church_, p. 233 f.). In the earlier Greek manuscripts, however,
it occupies the tenth place, standing between the epistles of Paul to
the churches and the Pastoral Epistles. In the early Sahidic version,
and in the Commentaries of Theodore of Mopsuestia, it is found between 2
Corinthians and Galatians; in the parent manuscript of Codex B it stood
between Galatians and Ephesians. In his _Histoire de la Vulgate_, p. 539
f., Berger gives seventeen different ways in which the Pauline epistles
are arranged in Latin Bibles—viz., Col., Thess., 1 Tim.; Thess., Col., 1
Tim.; Phil., Laod., Col.; Col., Laod., Thess.; Col., Thess., Laod.;
Thess., Col., 1, 2 Tim., Tit., Laod.; Thess., Col., Laod.; Phil., Laod.,
Heb.; Heb., Laod.; Heb., 1, 2 Tim., Tit., Phil.; Apoc., Laod.; Ephes.,
Col.; Gal., Laod., Ephes.; Ephes., 1, 2, 3 Cor., Laod.; Phil., Thess., 1
Tim.; Apoc., 3 Cor.; Col., Phil.
Romans.
With regard to the very name and introduction of the Epistle to the
Romans, it is worth observing, that while the words ἐν Ῥώμῃ are read in
verses 7 and 15 by all our manuscripts, with the sole exception of G,
their omission by Origen is attested by the critical work discovered by
von der Goltz on Mount Athos (_vide supra_, pp. 90, 190), which says
that Origen takes no notice of the words: οὔτε ἐν τῇ ἐξηγήσει οὔτε ἐν τῷ
ῥητῷ μνημονεύει. The Latin commentary has them, and presupposes them in
the exposition. Our editions of Origen have hitherto given them once in
the Greek as well (iv. 287), but we must wait for the new edition before
we can say with certainty that this is correct. The matter is not devoid
of importance. If the omission is original, then it is possible to think
that Romans, like Hebrews, was originally a circular letter; while on
the other hand, if the words are an integral part of the epistle, we may
suppose with von der Goltz that they were afterwards dropped when the
epistle began to be read in church, so as to make it applicable to all
Christians. See Jacques Simon, _Revue d’Histoire et de Littérature
religieuses_, iv. 2 (1899), 177; Zahn, _Einleitung_, i. 278; _ThLbl._,
1899, 179.
i. 3. On the Syriac reading “of the house of David,” see Vetter, _Der
apokryphe dritte Korintherbrief_, 1894, p. 25, and my Note in the
Lectionary published in _Studia Sinaitica_, vi. (see above, p. 106).
i. 13. For οὐ θέλω D* G Ambrosiaster read οὐκ οἴομαι, which Zahn thinks
sounds more natural, and quite likely to be replaced by the other
expression so common in Paul’s epistles. _Einleitung_, i. 262.
i. 15. For ὑμῖν D* reads ἐν ὑμῖν, G ἐπ’ ὑμῖν, g _in vobis_.
i. 16. Marcion was accused of having removed πρῶτον or τε πρῶτον from
his text. This, however, is not so (see Zahn, _GK._, i. 639; ii. 515).
It is also omitted in B G, showing, as Zahn thinks, that it was regarded
as obnoxious at an early date (_Einleitung_, i. 263). Marcion did,
however, drop the quotation from Habakkuk in the next verse.
ii. 16. Marcion in all probability wrote τὸ εὐαγγέλιον without μου,
which is now omitted only by 37 d*. In the time of Origen and in the
centuries following, Marcion’s disciples laid emphasis not on μου, but
on the fact that εὐαγγέλιον is in the singular number. They charged the
Church with having not one Gospel, but several. See Zahn, _Einleitung_,
ii. 171.
v. 1. Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, and Weymouth all follow the mass
of the uncials in reading ἔχωμεν, and I was therefore obliged to give
this as the text of my Stuttgart edition of the New Testament. For
myself, however, I hold with Scrivener and Weiss that ἔχομεν is
certainly the correct reading. The same mis-spelling occurs in several
manuscripts in John xix. 7, ἡμεῖς νόμον ἔχωμεν. For the reason of it,
see Schmiedel’s _Winer_, § 19. According to Zahn, ἔχωμεν must be
considered the right reading, and καυχώμεθα (verse 2) taken also as
subjunctive. See his _Einleitung_, i. 264.
v. 21. The words τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν were omitted by Erasmus, and,
therefore, also by Luther. This is not noticed by Tischendorf, nor by
Baljon, who follows him.
xi. 13. ὑμῖν δὲ is read by א A B P, for which D G L have ὑμῖν γὰρ. Zahn
thinks it difficult to say which is right, but that the sense is much
the same in either case. _Einleitung_, i. 265 f.
xiii. 3. The conjecture ἀγαθοεργῷ is thought by Hort to have a certain
amount of probability (_Notes on Select Readings_, _in loco_). Schmiedel
also thinks it deserving of consideration (_Winer_, § 19).
xiv. 5. On the omission of γὰρ (B D G), see Zahn, _Einleitung_, i. 266.
xiv. 23. =Conclusion of the Epistle.= The best discussion of the
Conclusion of the epistle will now be found in Zahn’s _Einleitung_, vol.
i. § 22, pp. 267-298, _Die Integrität des Römerbriefs_. Compare also
Riggenbach, _Kritische Studien über den Schluss des Römerbriefs_: two
treatises published in the _Neue Jahrbücher für deutsche Theologie_,
Erster Band, 1892. Bonn, 1892; _Die Adresse des 16. Kapitels des
Römerbriefs_, pp. 498-525; _Die Textgeschichte der Doxologie, Röm. xvi.
25-27 im Zusammenhang mit den übrigen den Schluss des Römerbriefs
betreffenden textkritischen Fragen erörtert_. Also, F. J. A. Hort,
_Prolegomena to the Epistles to the Romans and the Ephesians_, 1895;
Sanday and Headlam, _Commentary on Romans_.
In certain manuscripts prior to the time of Origen, the =Doxology= was
found between xiv. 23 and xv. 1. It now stands after xiv. 23 in A L P
and about 200 minuscules, while at the same time the epistle is
certainly continued to xv. 13. Bengel alone has suggested a reason for
this. He supposes that the solemn words in xiv. 23, πᾶν δὲ ὃ οὐκ ἐκ
πίστεως ἁμαρτία ἐστίν, were felt to form an unsatisfactory close to a
church lection, and that the doxology was accordingly inserted here.
Moreover, seeing that no part of xvi. 1-25 was included in any lection,
this would be an additional reason for attaching the doxology to the end
of chapter xiv., as otherwise this grand passage might not be read at
all. It must be confessed, however, that this explanation is not
altogether satisfactory.
It is further to be observed that the =Benediction= is found sometimes
after xvi. 20, sometimes after xvi. 23, and sometimes in both places. In
the last case it is found under three conditions: (1) before the
doxology, (2) without it, (3) after it. With regard to the single
Benediction, it is inserted after verse 20 in א A B C, and after verse
23 in D G. An explanation of these variations has frequently been sought
in the supposition that chapter xvi. is part of an epistle addressed to
Ephesus, which has in some way been incorporated in the Epistle to the
Romans. On this supposition the only question is whether the whole of
chapter xvi. belongs to this Ephesian epistle or only the first twenty
verses, while verses 21-23 belong to the original Epistle to the Romans.
Improbable as this may appear at the first glance, it admits of an easy
explanation. It may be due to the fact that Romans once stood at the end
of the collection of Pauline epistles. Or we may suppose that the
commendatory epistle for Phœbe addressed to Ephesus and the Epistle to
the Romans were written at the same time, and that in sending them off,
the sheet containing the former by some mistake slipped in before the
last sheet of the Roman epistle. On this view, the first benediction in
verse 20, ἡ χάρις ... μεθ’ ὑμῶν, would belong to the Ephesian epistle,
while the second, ἡ χάρις ... μετὰ πάντων ὑμῶν to the Roman. The uncial
L would then be right in retaining both, while D E F G will have omitted
the benediction the first time it occurred, and א A B C the second time.
At the same time it cannot be disguised that there are difficulties in
connection with the close of chapter xv. Minuscule 48 omits the last
verse (33). In verse 32, B reads simply ἵνα ἐν χαρᾷ ἔλθω, while the
other witnesses have ἐλθὼν, and vary between συναναπαύσωμαι ὑμῖν and
ἀναψύξω μεθ’ ὑμῶν.[282] Zahn thinks that the original position of the
Doxology is after xiv. 23 and nowhere else. Now the authority for
inserting the Doxology there only is L and many minuscules, A P and a
few minuscules having it in both places. If Zahn is right, should not
the testimony of L be accepted in other places as well as this, or at
least have more deference paid to it than seems now to be the case. The
testimony for the omission of the Doxology there has recently been
endorsed by that of the Palestinian Syriac Lectionary, published in
_Studia Sinaitica_, vi.
xv., xvi. Zahn points out that we cannot consistently lay stress on the
supposed entire absence of these chapters in Marcion, unless we are
prepared to maintain at the same time that the other passages which he
fails to mention, such as Gal. iii. 6-9, 15-25, iv. 27-30; Romans i.
19-ii. 1, iii. 31-iv. 25, ix. 1-33, x. 5-xi. 32; Coloss. i. 15_b_, 16,
were unknown to him, and only smuggled into the text afterwards by
falsifiers on the Catholic side. Zahn thinks it probable that Marcion
struck out the numerous personal references in chapter xvi. as being
useless and unedifying for the Church of his day.
xv. 23, 24. Zahn holds that the later Antiochean reading ἐλεύσομαι πρὸς
ὑμᾶς (א^c Euthal., etc.) is undoubtedly spurious, and the γὰρ as
certainly genuine (_Einleitung_, i. 267).
xvi. 27. Zahn (_Einleitung_, i. 286) is inclined to regard ᾧ as the
correct reading here for two reasons: (1) because the incompleteness of
the sentence made it liable to correction, and (2) because the
correction is effected in very different ways. In some manuscripts ᾧ is
changed into αὐτῷ (P, Copt., 31, 54), in others it is omitted altogether
(B F-lat. Syr.), while in others again εἴη takes the place of ᾧ ἡ (55,
43-scholion).
Subscription: πρὸς Ῥωμαίους simply, א A B C D; others, ἐγράφη ἀπὸ
Κορίνθου διὰ Φοίβης τῆς διακόνου, to which some add τῆς ἐν Κεγχρεαῖς
ἐκκλησίας; others, ἐγράφη διὰ Τερτίου ἐπέμφθη δὲ διὰ Φοίβης ἀπὸ
Κορινθίων.
1 Corinthians.
All the manuscripts in which the number of the epistle is indicated by a
word and not by a numeral (α’) call it πρώτη, never προτέρα. Origen,
however, says ἐν τῇ προτέρᾳ πρὸς Κορινθίους ὁ Παῦλος (ii. 347).
i. 2. The words ἡγιασμένοις ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ are read immediately after
θεοῦ by B D* G. This arrangement is adopted by Weiss, and supported by
Zahn as undoubtedly genuine (_Einleitung_, i. 210). Heinrici is inclined
to regard it as a transcriptional error which was very apt to occur in
copying stichometric manuscripts. But were there stichometric
manuscripts antecedent to the time of Codex B?
iii. 22. Marcion seems to have dropped the name of Apollos here. Indeed,
there is no trace in Marcion of any of the passages where Paul mentions
his name. “What was Apollos to the Church of the second century?” (Zahn,
_GK._ i. 649.)
v. 2. For ἐπενθήσατε Naber suggests ἐπενοήσατε. This is not noticed by
Baljon, who is elsewhere careful to mention the conjectural emendations
proposed by his countrymen.
vi. 20. It was doubtless owing to a transcriptional error that Marcion
read ἄρατε between δοξάσατε and τὸν θεόν. But how it originated, whether
from ἄρα δὲ = ἄρα δὴ or by dittography, it is hard to say.
x. 9. In place of τὸν κύριον we find τὸν Χριστὸν read by D G K L,
Marcion, Irenæus (iv. 27, 3), Clement (_Ecl. Proph._, 49), and the early
versions. See above, p. 152, and compare Zahn on the reading Ἰησοῦς for
κύριος in Jude 5 (_Einleitung_, ii. 88 f.).
xiv. 19. For νοΐ μου Marcion read “per legem” διὰ τὸν νόμον, which was
arrived at partly by a transcriptional error and partly by conscious
alteration. This could not have occurred, however, unless the original
reading was διὰ τοῦ νοός μου, which is still found in a good many
manuscripts, and not τῷ νοΐ μου, the reading preferred by most of our
editors. The latter is perhaps the result of an assimilation to the
construction of γλώσσῃ.
xiv. 31-34. These verses are variously punctuated by recent editors, the
main difference being with regard to the arrangement of the clause ὡς ἐν
πάσαις ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις τῶν ἁγίων. This clause is referred to verse 31 by
Westcott and Hort, who place a comma after παρακαλῶνται and bracket the
intervening words (32, 33_a_) as a parenthesis. Tischendorf and Weiss
place a period after εἰρήνης, and link the ὡς clause to what follows.
This arrangement Westcott and Hort indicate in their margin. For details
and reasoning, see the Commentaries.
xiv. 34, 35. These two verses follow verse 40 in D E F G 93,
Ambrosiaster, and Sedulius. In Codex Fuldensis, verses 36-40 are found
in the margin after verse 33, where they were inserted by Victor of
Capua (see p. 122), who did not, however, remove them from their place
further down. He must therefore have had before him a manuscript
exhibiting this arrangement. We must suppose either that all these
manuscripts are ultimately derived from one and the same exemplar, in
which this arrangement of the verses occurred, or, as Heinrici suggests,
that the original document itself gave occasion to this variety by
having these verses written in its margin. Our modern editors are
unanimous in following the usual order.
xv. 38. Zahn has shown that in all likelihood the substitution of πνεῦμα
for the first σῶμα was due to certain followers of Marcion. See his
_GK._ i. 615; also _Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte_, ix. 198 ff.
xv. 47. On Marcion’s reading, ὁ δεύτερος κύριος ἐξ οὐρανοῦ, see Zahn,
_GK._ i. 638, who suggests that this may have been an early gloss that
Marcion made use of, seeing that it is in the highest degree improbable
that the heretic and some of his most violent opponents should alter the
original text in exactly the same way.
xv. 55. Tertullian found νεῖκος in Marcion, and he therefore leaves it
an open question whether the word signifies _victoria tua_ or _contentio
tua_ (v. 10, p. 306). See Zahn, _GK._ i. 51.
xvi. 22. On “Maranatha,” see Zahn (_Einleitung_, i. 215 ff.), who, while
admitting that no objection on the ground of language or grammar can be
made to reading the word as מרן אתא = ὁ κύριος ἡμῶν ἦλθεν (not ἔρχεται
or ἐλεύσεται), prefers with Halévy, Bickell, and Nöldeke, to take it as
מרנא תא = κύριε ἔρχου, which corresponds to the Peshitto rendering of
Apoc. xxii. 20, תא מריא ישוע (ἔρχου κύριε Ἰησοῦ). See note by Schmiedel
in the _Hand-Commentar_ on 1 Cor. xvi. 22, and the article by Thayer in
Hastings’ _Dictionary of the Bible_, _sub voce_. Luther has “Maharam
Motha,” but whence he derived this I do not know.
Subscription: ἐγράφη ἀπὸ Φιλίππων (τῆς Μακεδονίας) διὰ Στεφανᾶ καὶ
Φορτουνάτου καὶ Ἀχαϊκοῦ (Κουάρτου) καὶ Τιμοθέου; _al._ ὑπὸ Παύλου καὶ
Σωσθένους; _al._ ἀπὸ Ἐφέσου τῆς Ἀσίας.
2 Corinthians.
i. 12. Recent editors adopt the reading ἁγιότητι on the authority of א*
A B C K M P etc. Zahn, however (_Einleitung_, i. 243), prefers ἁπλότητι
as given by א^c D E G etc. Meyer thinks that ἁπλότητι was substituted
for ἁγιότητι as being the more usual expression. Tischendorf is wrong in
saying: de suo add. syr^{sch} _et cum puritate_. The Syriac has בפשיטותא
ובדכיותא ובטיבותא דאלהא—_i.e._ ἐν ἁπλότητι καὶ ἐν εἰλικρινείᾳ[283] καὶ
ἐν χάριτι [τοῦ] θεοῦ ἀνεστράφημεν ἐν τῷ κόσμῳ καὶ οὐκ ἐν.... vii. 2.
Zahn (_GK._ i. 650; ii. 515) thinks perhaps the whole section vii. 2-xi.
1 was omitted by Marcion: “Let us cleanse ourselves from defilement of
the flesh and blood ... for I espoused you as a pure virgin to one
husband, (even) Christ.”
Subscription: ἐγράφη ἀπὸ Φιλίππων (+ τῆς Μακεδονίας) + διὰ Τίτου (+
Βαρνάβα) καὶ Λουκᾶ.
Galatians.
i. 8. As illustrating how far the sharpest critic may be led astray by
his fondness for conjectural emendation, it may be mentioned here that
Hitzig (_Das Buch Hiob_, 1874, p. 199), suggested that Η Α̅Χ̅Σ̅ formerly
occupied the place of ἡμεῖς in this verse, and that this means ἢ
ἀρχιερεὺς!
i. 18. For Κηφᾶν, as given in our critical editions, Zahn (_Einleitung_,
ii. 14) would read Πέτρον. He accounts for the remarkable transition
from the name Πέτρος in ii. 7, 8 to Κηφᾶς in ii. 9, 11, 14 very well by
saying that Paul in the latter verses is echoing the language used by
the Judaizers from Palestine, just as he does in speaking of the Three
as στῦλοι. Seeing that Paul persistently employs the name Κηφᾶς in 1
Corinthians, a scribe might have introduced this name, with which he had
become familiar, into Galatians i. 18 also, just as Ἰσκαριώτης was
carried over from the Synoptics into most manuscripts of John’s Gospel,
displacing the title ἀπὸ Καρυώτου. The following table will show the
distribution of the Greek manuscripts in support of the readings Κηφᾶς
and Πέτρος in Galatians:—
Κηφᾶς. Πέτρος.
i. 18, א* A B 17, 67**, 71. א^c D E F G K L P.
ii. 7, —— omnes.
ii. 8, —— omnes.
ii. 9, א B C K L P etc. D E F G (A omits).
ii. 11, א A B C H P. D E F G K L.
ii. 14, א A B C 10, 17, D E F G K L P.
67**, 137.
It will be observed that in ii. 9 K L P take the side of א (A) B, while
in verse 11 P alone does so, and that D E F G are the only witnesses
that are consistent.
ii. 5. οἷς οὐδὲ is omitted by D*, by Tertullian, who ascribes the
negative to Marcion (_Adv. Marcionem_, v. 3), by certain manuscripts
known to Victorinus Afer, who says “in plurimis codicibus et latinis et
graecis ista sententia est _Ad horam cessimus subjectioni_,” and by the
Latin translator of Irenæus (_Adv. Haereses_, iii. 13, 3). Ambrosiaster
calls attention to the discrepancy between the Greek and Latin
manuscripts: “Graeci e contra dicunt _Nec ad horam cessimus_,” and
similarly Sedulius. Bengel remarked on the proneness of scribes to
insert or omit a negative: “Omnino apud Latinos lubrica sub calamo est
_non_ particula.... Saepe etiam in graecis aliisque οὐκ omissum.” See
Haussleiter, _Forschungen_, iv. 31 ff., who says that the subject is one
deserving of special treatment. Bengel refers to the exhaustive
discussion “de negationibus quae Pandectis Florentinis recte male
additae vel detractae sunt,” but there might be a good deal said on
these theological _Sic et Non_ also.
A single letter or little word more or less, and the sense of a passage
is completely changed. Did Paul say that in his contention with the
Apostles he gave place “for an hour,” or “_not_ for an hour,” οἷς πρὸς
ὥραν, or οἷς οὐδὲ πρὸς ὥραν, or πρὸς ὥραν simply? In Gal. v. 8 is it ἡ
πεισμονὴ ἐκ τοῦ καλοῦντος ὑμᾶς, or οὐκ ἐκ? In 1 Cor. v. 6 is it “your
glorying is good” or “_not_ good,” καλὸν or οὐ καλὸν? In Rom. iv. 19,
κατενόησεν or οὐ κατενόησεν. In 2 Peter iii. 10, εὑρεθήσεται or οὐχ
εὑρεθήσεται, or are both these wrong? Compare, for example, the reading
μακράν in Matt. viii. 30, where almost all the Latin witnesses, and
Jerome too, read “_non_ longe”; and John vi. 64, where we have οἱ μὴ
πιστεύοντες, and also οἱ πιστεύοντες (א G). In this latter passage the
reading “credentes” was adopted in the Sixtine edition of the Vulgate,
but “_non_ credentes” in the Clementine; Wordsworth and White decide for
the latter against the Sixtine text. In John vii. 8, א D R etc., read
οὐκ, for which B and the majority of the witnesses have οὔπω, but this
is manifestly a correction. In John ix. 27 we have οὐκ ἠκούσατε, where a
solitary Greek manuscript (22), which, however, has the support of the
Vulgate and half the Old Latin witnesses, reads ἠκούσατε: audistis. In
Romans v. 14 we find both τοὺς μὴ ἁμαρτάνοντας and τοὺς ἁμαρτάνοντας. In
1 Cor. iii. 7 A reads ὥστε ὁ φυτεύων ἐστίν τι, omitting the negative; in
ix. 8 we have both ταῦτα λέγει and ταῦτα οὐ λέγει; while in xiii. 5 B
and Clement of Alexandria actually assert that “love seeketh what is
_not_ her own, τὸ μὴ ἑαυτῆς”! Again, in 1 Cor. xv. 51 the position of
the negative fluctuates between the first and second member of the
sentence, so that we have πάντες μὲν οὐ and οὐ πάντες. Similarly, in
Col. ii. 18 we find ἃ ἑόρακεν and ἃ μὴ ἑόρακεν; and in Apoc. iv. 11 ἦσαν
καὶ ἐκτίσθησαν and οὐκ ἦσαν καὶ ἐκτίσθησαν—_i.e._ “they were called out
of nothingness into existence.”
In Codex D seven cases of this variation occur in Acts alone—viz. iv.
20, v. 26, 28, vii. 25, xix. 40, xx. 20, 27. Compare, further, Matt.
xii. 32, where in place of ἀφεθήσεται B* reads οὐκ ἀφεθήσεται. In Matt.
xvii. 25 one Latin manuscript makes Peter say “utique non” in answer to
the question, “Doth not your master pay tribute?” We have in Matt. xxi.
16, ἀκούεις and οὐκ ἀκούεις; xxi. 32, μετεμελήθητε and οὐ μετεμελήθητε;
xxiv. 2, οὐ βλέπετε and βλέπετε. In Mark viii. 14, οὐκ εἶχον and εἶχον;
xiii. 19, καὶ οὐ μὴ, οὐδὲ μὴ and οὐδ’ οὐ. Luke xi. 48, συνευδοκεῖτε: μὴ
συνευδοκεῖτε; xxi. 21, ἐκχωρείτωσαν: μὴ ἐκχωρείτωσαν. John ii. 12, οὐ
πολλὰς: πολλὰς; xv. 19, οὐκ ἐστὲ: ἦτε; xx. 8, ἐπίστευσεν: οὐκ
ἐπίστευσεν. Acts xxv. 6, πλείους: οὐ πλείους. Rom. iv. 5, μὴ ἐργαζομένῳ:
ἐργαζομένῳ (_Studia Sinaitica_, vi. p. lxvi); x. 3, οὐχ ὑπετάγησαν:
ὑπετάγησαν (_ibid._). 1 Cor i. 19, συνετῶν: ἀσυνέτων; iv. 6, ἵνα μὴ:
ἵνα; iv. 19, οὐ τὸν λόγον: τὸν λόγον; vi. 5, οὐδεὶς σοφὸς: σοφὸς; vi. 9,
οὐ κληρονομήσουσιν: κληρονομήσουσιν (B* 93) and _vice versa_ in verse
10. 2 Cor. v. 1, ἀχειροποίητος: οὐκ ἀχειροποίητος (_non manufactam_).
Gal. iv. 14, οὐκ ἐξουθενήσατε: ἐξουθενήσατε (א*). Heb. x. 2, οὐκ ἂν: ἂν:
κἂν. 2 Pet. i. 12, μελλήσω: οὐκ ἀμελήσω: οὐ μελλήσω. 1 John v. 17, οὐ
πρὸς θάνατον: πρὸς θάνατον. Apoc. iii. 8, μικρὰν: οὐ μικρὰν.[284]
ii. 20. Tischendorf fails to mention that Marcion read ἀγοράσαντος
(redemit) in place of ἀγαπήσαντος. The variant is of sufficient
importance to justify a reference to Zahn, _GK._ ii. 499. I cannot at
this moment recall any instance of a confusion between ἀγοράσας and
ἀγαπήσας, though it is not an unlikely mistake to make. In Leviticus
xxvii. 19, the first hand of B by mistake wrote ἀγοράσας for ἁγιάσας.
v. 9. Epiphanius accused Marcion of having altered ζυμοῖ to δολοῖ. See
Zahn, _GK._ i. 639; ii. 503. _Cf._ above, p. 76.
Ephesians.
Tertullian says (_Adv. Marcionem_, v. 17): Ecclesiae quidem veritate
epistulam istam ad Ephesios habemus emissam, non ad Laodicenos, sed
Marcion ei titulum aliquando interpolare gestiit, quasi et in isto
diligentissimus explorator. Nihil autem de titulis interest, cum ad
omnes apostolus scripserit, dum ad quosdam.
iv. 19. For ἀπηλγηκότες D here reads ἀπηλπικότες. A glance at
ΑΠΗΛΓΗΚΟΤΕϹ and ΑΠΗΛΠΙΚΟΤΕϹ will show how easy it was to make such a
mistake in the days of uncial script.
v. 14. The reading ἐπιψαύσεις τοῦ Χριστοῦ is attested by D*, some Latin
manuscripts, and Theodore of Mopsuestia. See above, p. 254.
Subscription: ἐγράφη ἀπὸ Ῥώμης: + διὰ Τυχίκου.
Philippians.
i. 3. εὐχαριστῶ τῷ θεῷ μου is read by א A B D^c E^2 K L P; and ἐγὼ μὲν
εὐχαριστῶ τῷ κυρίῳ ἡμῶν by D* E* F G. Zahn defends the latter in the
_Zeitschrift für kirchliche Wissenschaft_, 1885, p. 184, and in his
_Einleitung_, i. 376 calls it the “genuine text.” Haupt says (Meyer^7,
1897, p. 3): The reading ἐγὼ μὲν εὐχαριστῶ, which is commonly ignored,
is, it appears to me, rightly recommended by Zahn and Wohlenberg. But
Haupt himself ignores the second half of the reading τῷ κυρίῳ ἡμῶν (for
τῷ θεῷ μου), which is far more important from a theological point of
view, and is content merely to explain at length why Paul should thank
_his_ God. Weiss, in his _Text-kritik der paulinischen Briefe_ (pp. 6,
7), mentions ἐγὼ, but says nothing about μὲν, or the change from κυρίῳ
ἡμῶν to θεῷ μου. But you cannot run with the hare and hunt with the
hounds. If you accept ἐγὼ μὲν εὐχαριστῶ you cannot reject τῷ κυρίῳ ἡμῶν.
Haupt, moreover, thinks it is far-fetched to suppose with Zahn that ἐγὼ
μὲν contains an allusion to something the Philippians had said. But that
is by no means the case, as we may learn from what Deissmann and Harris
tell us of the epistolary style of those days (see _A Study in Letter
Writing_, Expositor, September 1898, p. 161 ff.). But if the Western
group preserves the correct text at the very outset of the epistle, what
about it further down?
i. 7. For χάριτος Ambrosiaster has “gaudii,” so that he must have read
χαρᾶς. J. Weiss proposes to read χρείας (_ThLz._, 1899, col. 263). χάρις
and χαρά are frequently interchanged—_e.g._ in Tobit vii. 18; Sirach
xxx. 16. Χόρον is found for χαράν in Ps. xxix. (xxx.) 11. The scribes
felt a difficulty with χρεία in Rom. xii. 13, and still more so in
Ephes. iv. 29. Ephraem found χρεία in place of χεῖρον in John v. 14 (see
above, p. 293, note 2).
i. 14. Zahn and Haupt omit τοῦ θεοῦ with D K etc. So does J. Weiss, who
takes occasion to make certain important observations on the attempts
hitherto made to restore the text. See _ThLz._, 1899, col. 263.
iii. 14. Till lately Tertullian was our only authority for the reading
“palmam incriminationis” in place of τὸ βραβεῖον τῆς ἄνω κλήσεως (_De
resurrectione carnis_, 23). It was accordingly supposed that he had read
ἀνεγκλήσεως instead of ἄνω κλήσεως. We learn now from the Athos
manuscript, discovered by von der Goltz, that Origen also cited the
reading ἀνεγκλησίας in his commentary as being ἀνεγνωσμένον ἔν τισιν
ἀντιγράφοις. Even supposing that τινὰ ἀντίγραφα turned out to be no more
than a single copy, or even Tertullian’s quotation which Origen had
become acquainted with in some way, his mention of this reading is in
the highest degree interesting.
Subscription: ἐγράφη ἀπὸ Ῥώμης: + δι’ Ἐπαφροδίτου: + διὰ Τιμοθέου καὶ
Ἐπαφροδίτου.
Colossians.
ii. 16. On the reading κιρνάτω suggested by the rendering of the
Peshitto, and the Latin version of Ephraem’s Commentary on the Pauline
Epistles, see above, p. 168 f. It was advocated by Lagarde in his
_Prophetae Chaldaice_, p. li. Zahn rejects it on the ground that it
would require περὶ βρώσεως in place of ἐν βρώσει, and also that κρίνειν
agrees better with καταβραβεύειν in verse 18.
ii. 18. On this difficult passage see above, p. 168. Zahn thinks it
quite certain that μὴ is a later insertion even in the Syriac, seeing
that Ephraem knows nothing of it. Of the various conjectural
emendations, he regards that of C. Taylor as the most probable—viz. ἀέρα
κενεμβατεύων. This is also the view of Westcott and Hort. See their
_Introduction_, “Notes on Select Readings,” _in loco_; Zahn,
_Einleitung_, i. 339.
iv. 14. The words ὁ ἰατρὸς ὁ ἀγαπητὸς were omitted by Marcion. See Zahn,
_GK._ i. 647; ii. 528. Two minuscules omit the words ὁ ἀγαπητὸς.
Subscription: ἐγράφη ἀπὸ Ῥώμης διὰ Τυχίκου (+ καὶ Τιμοθέου) καὶ
Ὀνησίμου.
1 Thessalonians.
ii. 7. One can easily see how doubt should arise as to the correct
reading here when we observe the form of the words in the uncial script,
ΕΓΕΝΗΘΗΜΕΝΝΗΠΙΟΙ. Moreover, we must remember that Ν at the end of a line
was very frequently indicated merely by a stroke above the preceding
letter, thus: ΕΓΕΝΗΘΗΜΕ. The same alternative readings are presented in
Hebrews v. 13, and in Clement of Alexandria, i. 140, 7, where Codex F
exhibits ἤπιοι, and M, which is the most important manuscript, has
νήπιοι in the text and ἤπιοι in the margin.
ii. 15. Zahn (_GK._ ii. 521; _cf._ also i. 644) restores Marcion’s text
here in the form τῶν καὶ τὸν κύριον [Ἰησοῦν] ἀποκτεινάντων καὶ τοὺς
προφήτας αὐτῶν. Marcion founds throughout upon a Western text, and the
fact of his agreement in this instance with the Antiochean Recension
(D_{2} E_{2} K_{2} L_{2}) is declared by Zahn to be a mere coincidence,
more especially as the latter here reads τοὺς ἰδίους προφήτας. “Had
Marcion,” he says, “really written ἰδίους, Tertullian would have
translated the passage differently, and would scarcely have applied the
term _adjectio_ to a qualifying expression inserted _before_ προφήτας.”
What Tertullian says is, “dicendo _et prophetas suos_ licet _suos_
adjectio sit haeretici.” The term ἴδιος is employed so frequently to
represent the pronoun when no particular emphasis is intended to be
conveyed, that there seems to me no necessity for Tertullian translating
τοὺς ἰδίους προφήτας _suos prophetas_, or rendering the words in any
other way than _prophetas suos_. Compare above, p. 211.
iii. 3. Lachmann here reads μηδὲν ἀσαίνεσθαι with Reiske and Venema.
Beza and Bentley suggested σαλεύεσθαι, Holwerda ἀναίνεσθαι, Peerlkamp
σινιάζεσθαι. Zahn has no hesitation in adopting μηδένα σαίνεσθαι, which
he understands in the original (metaphorical) sense of to flatter, to
talk over or cajole. See _Einleitung_, i. 158.
1 Timothy.
i. 4. Οἰκοδομίαν, or οἰκοδομὴν, which is attested by Irenæus and a good
many Latin witnesses, and received into his text by Erasmus, is nothing
but an early transcriptional error for οἰκονομίαν.
iii. 1. “The reading ἀνθρώπινος ὁ λόγος is attested in Greek only by D*,
but it was the prevailing reading in the West till the time of Jerome.
When I consider the improbability of its being invented, and its
liability to alteration in conformity with 1 Tim. i. 15, iv. 9; 2 Tim.
ii. 11; Tit. iii. 8, I am compelled, in spite of the one-sided nature of
the testimony, to conclude that it is original. It is a proverbial
expression of general application and profane origin” (Zahn,
_Einleitung_, i. 482). This reading is usually ignored by our editors
and commentators, and yet the passage is one that plays an important
part in the ordination of the clergy, and therefore one on the correct
interpretation of which a good deal might depend. Westcott and Hort
merely mention it in their _Notes on Select Readings_ and insert it in
their _Appendix_. It is not cited by von Gebhardt in his edition. For my
own part I am not quite convinced of its originality. At the same time
it is hard to understand how ΠΙΣΤΟΣ by any clerical error could be
transformed into Α̅Ν̅Ι̅ΝΟΣ, and so become ΑΝΘΡΩΠΙΝΟΣ.
iii. 16. In his _Forschungen_, vol. iii., Beilage iv. p. 277, “Zum Text
von 1 Tim. iii. 16,” Zahn published two or three lines from some
parchment fragments in the Egyptian Museum of the Louvre, which, he
thinks, belong to the IV-VI century. The last three lines run—ευσεβειας
μυστηρ ... | ω εφανερωθη ε ... | και εδ.... He says, “The ω in the
second last line is undoubtedly meant for ὃ. This adds another to the
Greek witnesses supporting this reading, which has till now been
attested only by the Latin manuscripts, by other ambiguous or doubtful
witnesses, and probably by the first Greek hand of Codex Claromontanus.
The και in the last line is, so far as I am aware, supported by no other
evidence.” The reading θεος, which was formerly so much discussed, seems
to be simply an early transcriptional error, ΟϹ being read as
Θ̅Ϲ̅—_i.e._ θεος with the usual mark of abbreviation. The old dispute
over the reading of the earliest manuscripts (most of them exhibit a
correction at the place), whether the middle stroke of the Θ in the
oldest codices A C is by the first or second hand, or whether in the
case of A it may not be simply the tongue of an E shining through from
the other side of the parchment, cannot seemingly be decided now in the
present state of the manuscripts.[285] Codex A was examined by Scrivener
both with and without the aid of a magnifying glass perhaps twenty times
in as many years. Dean Burgon devotes seventy-seven pages of his
_Revision Revised_ to a discussion of the reading. The facility with
which a variant of this sort may arise is shown by the perfectly
analogous passage, Joshua ii. 11. Here B and F read κυριος ο θεος υμων
ΟϹ εν ουρανω ανω, while on the other hand A in place of ΟϹ has Θ̅Ϲ̅,
which in this instance is correct. In 1 Tim. iii. 16 the other
witnesses—viz. the versions and the Fathers—throw their weight into the
opposite scale.
iv. 3. Isidore asks whether κωλυόντων ... ἀπέχεσθαι βρωμάτων may not be
a σφάλμα of the scribes for ἀντέχεσθαι, to which Oecumenius replies that
it is no σφάλμα καλλιγραφικόν but good Attic Greek for κωλύειν ἀπὸ τῆς
βρώσεως. The explanation of Theophylact, however, is nearer the mark,
that συμβουλεύειν is to be supplied from κωλύειν. Bentley, Toup,
Bakhuyzen, and Bois would supply κελευόντων before ἀπέχεσθαι, while Hort
suggests the substitution of ἢ ἅπτεσθαι or καὶ γεύεσθαι in place of
ἀπέχεσθαι. There seems to be no need of such expedients.
Subscription: ἐγράφη ἀπὸ Λαοδικείας + ἥτις ἐστὶν μητρόπολις Φρυγίας τῆς
Καπατιάνης (Πακατιάνης): _al._ ἀπὸ Νικοπόλεως: _al._ ἀπὸ Ἀθηνῶν: _al._
ἀπὸ Ῥώμης + διὰ Τίτου.
2 Timothy.
iv. 19. After Ἀκύλαν two minuscules (46 and 109) insert Λέκτραν τὴν
γυναῖκα αὐτοῦ καὶ Σιμαίαν (Σημαιαν 109) καὶ Ζήνωνα τοὺς υἱοὺς αὐτοῦ. The
interpolation is derived from the _Acta Pauli_, and is to be connected
not with Aquila, but with the “house of Onesiphorus.” See Zahn,
_Einleitung_, i. 411.
Subscription: ἐγράφη ἀπὸ Λαοδικείας: _al._ ἀπὸ Ῥώμης + ὅτε ἐκ δευτέρου
παρέστη Παῦλος τῷ καίσαρι Νέρωνι.
Titus.
i. 9, 11. Considerable additions are made to the text after both these
verses by Codex 109. This manuscript is numbered 11 in the Library of
St. Mark at Venice, and described by Gregory as “haud malae notae.” It
contains both a Latin and an Arabic version, and dates from the
thirteenth or fourteenth, or, as some suppose, the eleventh, century.
After verse 9 we read: μὴ χειροτονεῖν διγάμους μηδὲ διακόνους αὐτοὺς
ποιεῖν, μηδὲ γυναῖκας ἔχειν ἐκ διγαμίας· μηδὲ προσερχέσθωσαν ἐν τῷ
θυσιαστηρίῳ λειτουργεῖν τὸ θεῖον· τοὺς ἄρχοντας τοὺς ἀδικοκριτὰς καὶ
ἅρπαγας καὶ ψεύστας καὶ ἀνελεήμονας ἔλεγχε ὡς θεοῦ διάκονος. After verse
11 we find τὰ τέκνα τοὺς ἰδίους γονεῖς ὑβρίζοντας ἢ τύπτοντας ἐπιστόμιζε
καὶ ἔλεγχε καὶ νουθέτει ὡς πατὴρ τέκνα.
Subscription: πρὸς Τίτον (+ τῆς Κρητῶν ἐκκλησίας πρῶτον ἐπίσκοπον
χειροτονηθέντα) ἐγράφη ἀπὸ Νικοπόλεως τῆς Μακεδονίας (missa per Arteman:
_al._ per Zenam et Apollo).
Hebrews.
i. 3. Instead of φέρων, the first hand of B wrote φανερῶν, which a
second hand altered to φέρων, while a third restored φανερῶν, and wrote
in the margin ἀμαθέστατε καὶ κακέ, ἄφες τὸν [? τὸ] παλαιόν, μὴ
μεταποίει. A great deal of material might be collected from the margin
of old manuscripts, not only for the history of Prayer, as von Dobschütz
recently observed, but for other interesting departments of the history
of civilisation.
ii. 9. The reading χωρὶς θεοῦ instead of χάριτι θεοῦ is now found only
in M and in the second hand of 67. Origen, however, was aware of the
various reading: χωρὶς θεοῦ ἢ ὅπερ ἔν τισι ἀντιγράφοις χάριτι θεοῦ. It
seems to be a primitive transcriptional error.
x. 34. We have here to choose between δεσμοῖς and δεσμίοις. The latter
is manifestly the correct reading. It is attested by A D* and certain
minuscules, among which are 37**, 67**. This last is a Vienna manuscript
(Vindob. gr. theol. 302), whose marginal readings exhibit a text closely
resembling that of the uncials B M, which are defective in Hebrews x.
Δεσμοῖς μου is supported by א D^c H K L P, Clem. Alex., Origen (i. 41,
where, however, μου is omitted by M* P, according to Koetschau’s new
edition), and by d e (_vinculis eorum_). Zahn (_Einleitung_, ii. 122)
thinks that the connection of the reading δεσμοῖς μου with the tradition
of the Pauline authorship of the epistle is suspicious. We find the
reading adopted in those regions where the tradition was accepted. It
may, however, have been the means of confirming and spreading the
tradition, seeing that Clement of Alexandria is actually aware of it.
Pseudo-Euthalius, _e.g._, employs the reading in support of the Pauline
authorship (Zacagni 670).
In this same verse א A H have preserved the proper reading ἑαυτοὺς.
Ἑαυτοῖς, as given by D E K L, is a would-be correction.
xi. 23. In certain manuscripts (D and three Vulgate codices) an entire
verse is inserted after verse 23: Πίστει μέγας γενόμενος Μωϋσῆς ἀνεῖλεν
τὸν Αἰγύπτιον κατανοῶν τὴν ταπείνωσιν τῶν ἀδελφῶν αὐτοῦ. Its position
shows it to be an interpolation.
xiii. 9. The present tense περιπατοῦντες is exhibited only by א* A D*,
all the other witnesses having περιπατήσαντες. The minority are in the
right here. A correction is not always an improvement.
xiii. 18. Zahn accepts the καὶ before περὶ ἡμῶν. It is found only in D d
and Chrysostom. This combination of witnesses is very rare.
Subscription: ἐγράφη (+ ἑβραϊστὶ 31) ἀπὸ τῆς Ἰταλίας διὰ Τιμοθέου: _al._
ἀπὸ Ἀθηνῶν: _al._ ἀπὸ Ῥώμης.
CATHOLIC EPISTLES.
The variety in the order of the Catholic Epistles is even more
significant than that of the Pauline. When the Syrian Church of Edessa
obtained the New Testament, it consisted only of the Gospels, the
Pauline Epistles, and the Acts. It contained neither the Apocalypse nor
the Catholic Epistles. This is proved among other things by the fact
that not a single quotation from these writings is found in the Homilies
of Aphraates, the date of which falls between 336 and 345. At a later
date the Syrian Church accepted the Epistle of James, 1 Peter, and 1
John, but the four so-called Antilegomena—viz. 2 Peter, 2 and 3 John,
and Jude—are to this day excluded from their Canon of the New Testament.
Even in the West, James was not reckoned among the books of the New
Testament previous to the fourth century. There is no mention made of it
in Africa about the year 300, although it was cited at Rome and Carthage
at an earlier date. At Alexandria, however, all the seven Catholic
Epistles were counted in the New Testament as early as the time of
Clement,[286] and their place in the Canon becomes more and more firmly
assured from the time of Eusebius onwards.[287] At the same time, the
order of their arrangement varies very considerably. Indeed, every
possible variety occurs, except that Jude seems never to have been
placed first, nor 2 Peter last. Thus we find James, 2 Peter, 3 John,
Jude; James, Jude, 2 Peter, 3 John; 2 Peter, James, Jude, 3 John; 2
Peter, 3 John, James, Jude; 2 Peter, 3 John, Jude, James, etc.[288] It
follows that in the case of this group of New Testament writings, as
well as in that of the preceding, it is necessary and possible to
distinguish the three longer from the four shorter epistles in tracing
the history of the text. And we see at the same time what justification
Luther had in drawing a line between these epistles and the principal
books of the New Testament as having been held in quite a different
estimation in early times.
1 Peter.
iii. 22. After θεοῦ the Vulgate inserts _deglutiens mortem ut vitae
aeternae haeredes efficeremur_, “apparently from a Greek original which
had the aorist participle καταπιών; _cf._ 1 Cor. xv. 54” (W-H, _Notes_,
_in loco_). See Vetter, _Der dritte Korintherbrief_.
2 Peter.
i. 1. Zahn considers ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ the original reading, and εἰς
δικαιοσύνην a later correction due to taking πίστιν ἐν δικαιοσύνῃ
together as “faith in righteousness.” The last two words are to be taken
with λαχοῦσιν. _Einleitung_, ii. 59.
i. 2. Zahn agrees with Lachmann and Spitta in holding that ἐν ἐπιγνώσει
τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν is the correct text here—that is to say, he omits τοῦ
θεοῦ καὶ Ἰησοῦ. Tischendorf’s Apparatus is very diffuse on this verse,
and Baljon’s note, which is extracted from it, is accordingly not quite
satisfactory.[289] Like all the other editors, he gives ἐν ἐπιγνώσει τοῦ
θεοῦ καὶ Ἰησοῦ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν in the text, but the only variants he
mentions are the insertion of Χριστοῦ after Ἰησοῦ, and the omission of
ἡμῶν. There is no notice of the omission of the words τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ Ἰησοῦ
by any of the witnesses. They are not found in P, the best manuscripts
of the Vulgate (am fu dem harl), Philoxenian and Harklean Syriac, nor in
minuscules 69, 137, 163. These last, however, the Syriac and the
minuscules with m, insert Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ after ἡμῶν. Kühl believes that
the shorter form is probably due to the fact that in the epistle Christ
is everywhere regarded as the object of ἐπίγνωσις. But this is really
very improbable. For the scribe could not have been aware of this when
he began to write the epistle, so that he must have turned back and
deleted the words καὶ θεοῦ καὶ Ἰησοῦ afterwards. At the same time it is
a fundamental principle of textual criticism that the _lectio brevior_
is to be preferred. Reference may be made to the _Epilogus_ of
Wordsworth and White, ch. vi., _De regulis a nobis in textu constituendo
adhibitis_, where the very title of section 4 implies this principle:
“Cum brevior lectio probabilior sit, codices A F H* M Y plerumque
praeferendi sunt,” and where the most conspicuous examples of this rule
are said to be “Additamenta nominum propriorum, et praecipue
sanctorum—_e.g._ Jesus, Christus, Dominus, Deus.” It is true that in the
passage before us we have not simply a case of the insertion of a word
or words understood; at the same time, here if anywhere the text is more
likely to have been extended than abbreviated. It remains to be seen
whether P exhibits a good text in other passages of the Catholic
Epistles as well as this, but so far as the minuscules 69 and 137 are
concerned, they justly bear a good reputation. Hort calls 69 one of the
better cursives, and 137 has a text so closely resembling that of
Codices D E as to be of material assistance when these are defective.
The minuscules are too often regarded as mere ciphers; as if a cipher
more or less behind a number did not make a vast difference. In the very
next verse we find 137 supporting א A in reading τὰ πάντα, which is
accepted by Tischendorf and Weiss, and preferred also by Kühl. In this
instance it contradicts P, which omits τὰ with B C K L.
i. 12. Here μελλήσω is given by א A B C P, οὐ μελλήσω by 8 f tol (_non
differam_), and οὐκ ἀμελήσω by K L etc. (“the Antiochean recension and
the Syriac versions,” Zahn). “Μελλήσω, with the present infinitive, can
hardly be simply a periphrastic future. The idea is rather that the
writer will be prepared in the future, as well as in the past and in the
present, to remind them of the truths they know, whenever the necessity
arises. As they had no evidence of the fulfilment of this promise, the
copyists and translators found a difficulty with this expression, and
hence the variants.” Zahn, _Einleitung_, ii. 53 f.
i. 15. The reading σπουδάζω, found in א 31, and the Armenian, is also
attested by the Philoxenian Syriac, a fact which Zahn regards as
important. “On transcriptional grounds the reading σπουδάσω, preferred
by our editors, would appear to be confirmed by the reading σπουδάσατε,
exhibited by the Harklean Syriac and a few minuscules. But in reality
both these latter readings merely serve to show that a difficulty was
felt again in admitting a promise on the part of Peter which he seemed
never to have fulfilled.” _Einleitung_, ii. 54. Compare on μελλήσω
above.
i. 21. It is probable that Theophilus of Antioch (_Ad Autolycum_, ii. 9)
read (οἱ) ἅγιοι (τοῦ) θεοῦ ἄνθρωποι, the form exhibited by א and A (“the
chief representatives of the Antiochean family”), and also by several
Latin witnesses. See Zahn, _GK._ i. 313; Chase on 2 Peter in Hastings’
_Dictionary of the Bible_, vol. iii. p. 801.
ii. 13. On this passage Zahn remarks (_Einleitung_, ii. 53): “The
similarity of 2 Peter to the Epistle of Jude was doubtless a source of
textual corruption. But it may also aid us in correcting the text.
Because, whichever of the two we regard as the original, in any case the
one is our earliest witness to the text of the other. If we accept the
reading ἀγάπαις in Jude 12, it follows either (1) that Jude read ἀγάπαις
in 2 Peter, and that this is the original reading there, or (2) that
Peter, supposing he wrote second, altered Jude’s ἀγάπαις to ἀπάταις,
which it is hard to conceive, the former being so unmistakable, and the
latter much less suitable to the context. In either case, therefore,
ἀγάπαις would seem to be the correct reading in 2 Peter ii. 13.” No
doubt the alteration of ἀγάπαις to ἀπάταις is “hard to conceive,” but it
is not inconceivable. As illustrating how a piece of writing may be
misread, it is sufficient to point to Justin’s mistake with regard to
“Semoni Sanco Deo Fidio.”[290] As regards the particular words before
us, I may be allowed to cite my _Philologica Sacra_, p. 47, where I have
referred to the frequent confusion of ἀγαπάω and ἀπατάω, ἀγάπη and ἀπάτη
in manuscripts of the Old Testament. In Ps. lxxviii. 36, for example,
out of more than one hundred manuscripts that have been collated, not
one has preserved the correct reading ἠπάτησαν; all have ἠγάπησαν. In 2
Chron. xviii. 2 again only one has the correct text ἠπάτα. From a
psychological point of view, therefore, it would seem more natural to
suppose that ἀπάταις is the original reading in the passage under
consideration, and ἀγάπαις the transcriptional error. The authorities
for each are distributed as follows:—
ἀγάπαις. ἀπάταις.
2 Peter ii. 13, A^c B m vg, Syr^{phil}, א A* C K L P ...
Syr^{hark. mg}, Sahid. Syr^{hark}, Copt., Arm.
Jude 12, א B K L vg, Sahid., A C 44, 56.
Copt.,
Syr^{phil}, Syr^{hark},
Arm.
In the first edition of this work I said it was strange, considering the
frequent confusion of ἀγάπη and ἀπάτη, that Tischendorf goes by the
majority of his witnesses in the case of 2 Peter ii. 13 (Westcott and
Hort in their text, Weiss, Weymouth, and Baljon all do the same),
“whereas the same word should be read in both cases, and that ἀγάπαις.
Otherwise it would be necessary to suppose that the text was already
corrupt when the one writer used the epistle of the other, no matter
whether Peter or Jude: quod variat, verum esse non potest.” I cannot
understand an argument like that of Kühl (Meyer^6, on 2 Peter ii. 13, p.
428): “ἀπάταις is presumably original in one of the passages, most
likely in 2 Peter, as ἀγάπαις goes better with ὑμῶν in Jude 12 than with
αὐτῶν here. B has ἀγάπαις in both places, and C in the same way ἀπάταις,
which is explainable on the supposition that originally the one word
stood in the one passage and the other in the other. Nearly all recent
expositors favour the reading ἀπάταις in 2 Peter.” I am glad now to have
the powerful support of Zahn in my dissent from that view. Reference may
be made to the excellent article on Jude by F. H. Chase in Hastings’
_Dictionary of the Bible_, ii. 799-805. His first paragraph is on the
“Transmission of the Text,” and the article is a model of what such
things should be.[291] On the Philoxenian Syriac see the work of Merx
mentioned above, p. 106 (5). On the rest of the verse, see Zahn,
_Einleitung_, ii. 71. He points out that Tischendorf’s apparatus is
misleading here, as it fails to notice the omission of ὑμῖν by the
Philoxenian Syriac, the Sahidic version, the Speculum of
Pseudo-Augustine (m), and by Pseudo-Cyprian. In his opinion it is an
interpolation due to the συν— of συνευωχούμενοι. These pronouns are very
liable to be interpolated, as is pointed out by Wordsworth and White in
their _Epilogus_, p. 729, where these “additamenta” come next after
“Proper Names”; see above, p. 238.
ii. 15. On Βοσόρ, see p. 243 f.
ii. 22_b_. In Hippolytus, _Refutatio_, ix. 7, we find: μετ’ οὐ πολὺ δὲ
ἐπὶ τὸν αὐτὸν βόρβορον ἀνεκυλίοντο. On the connection of this with 2
Peter ii. 22, see Zahn, _GK._ i. 316. Wendland tried to make out that it
is a saying of Heraclitus. Compare also Clement, Λόγος Προτρεπτικός, x.
96; ὕες γάρ, φασίν, ἥδονται βορβόρῳ μᾶλλον ἢ καθαρῷ ὕδατι, καὶ ἐπὶ
φορυτῷ μαργαίνουσιν κατὰ Δημόκριτον.
iii. 6. The conjectural reading δι’ ὃν for δι’ ὧν Schmiedel thinks well
worthy of consideration. See his _Winer_, § 19.
iii. 10. None of the variants here appears to be the correct reading
(κατακαήσεται in various forms: ἀφανισθήσονται: εὑρεθήσεται). What is
required is a passive form of ῥέω, or one of its compounds (?
διαρρυήσεται).
iii. 16. The article is inserted before ἐπιστολαῖς by א and K L P (“the
Antiochean recension”), but omitted by A B C. Zahn, who would omit it,
points out that ἐν πάσαις ταῖς ἐπιστολαῖς would imply a complete
collection of Paul’s Epistles, and would include all the constituents
without exception, whereas without the article the phrase contrasts one
epistle known to the readers with those of all kinds that he had
written. See _Einleitung_, ii. 108. Tischendorf admitted the reading now
favoured by critics in his seventh edition, but rejected it in the
eighth. This same thing occurs not infrequently. See the article on 2
Peter by Chase in Hastings’ _Dictionary of the Bible_, vol. iii. p. 810.
1 John.
iv. 3. Von der Goltz has shown conclusively what was long a matter of
conjecture, that Origen not only knew the reading ὁ λύει τὸν Ἰησοῦν, but
seemingly preferred it; and that Clement also cites the text in this
form in his work on the Passover, which is all but entirely lost. He has
also established anew the reliable nature of the Latin version of
Irenæus in the matter of Biblical quotations. See Zahn in the _ThLbl._,
1899, col. 180; _Einleitung_, ii. 574.
v. 7. The “comma Johanneum” needs no further discussion in an
Introduction to the _Greek_ Testament, but its history on Latin soil is
all the more interesting. The fact that it is still defended even from
the Protestant side is interesting only from a pathological point of
view. On the decision of the Holy Office, confirmed by the Pope on the
15th January 1897, see Hetzenauer’s edition of the New Testament, and
the notice of it by Dobschütz in the _ThLz._, 1899, No. 10. On the
literature, compare also Kölling (Breslau, 1893); W. Orme’s _Memoir of
the Controversy respecting the Three Heavenly Witnesses, 1 John v. 7_
(London, 1830), New Edition, with Notes and Appendix by Ezra Abbot (New
York, 1866); C. Forster, _A New Plea for the Authenticity of the Text of
the Three Heavenly Witnesses_ (Cambridge, 1867); H. T. Armfield, _The
Three Witnesses: The disputed Text in St. John_ (London, 1893).
James.
An Arabic scholion, attributed to Hippolytus, cites this epistle under
the name of Jude. See Zahn, _GK._ i. 320, 2; 323, 3. In two minuscules
cited by Tischendorf, Ἰακώβου is followed by τοῦ ἀδελφοῦ θεοῦ or
ἀδελφοθεοῦ, and in one of the subscriptions by τοῦ ἀδελφοθεοῦ. The
subscription in ff reads “explicit epistola Jacobi filii Zaebedei
(_sic_).” See Zahn’s _Einleitung_, i. 75.
ii. 2. συναγωγὴν appears without the article in א* B C and one of
Scrivener’s minuscules. This reading is accepted by Zahn, who sees in it
an indication that those to whom the epistle is addressed were in
possession of several synagogues, that is supposing the word to mean
_meeting-place_, and not simply assembly, as he himself is inclined to
believe. See _Einleitung_, i. 60, 66.
Jude.
5. This verse exhibits an uncommonly large number of variants. Thus
εἰδότας occurs with or without ὑμᾶς after it; for πάντα we find both
πάντας and τοῦτο; while the position of ἅπαξ varies, the word being
found before πάντα, ὅτι, and λαὸν. But even that is not all. Most recent
editors read ὅτι Κύριος, but we find also ὅτι Ἰησοῦς: ὅτι ὁ θεὸς: and
ὅτι ὁ Κύριος (_textus receptus_). Tischendorf’s apparatus might lead one
to suppose that the witnesses for Ἰησοῦς and ὁ θεὸς omit ὅτι altogether,
but that is not so. The ambiguity is due to the loose way in which the
note is given. Westcott and Hort think it probable that the original
text was ΟΤΙΟ, and that this was read as ΟΤΙΙ̅Ϲ̅, and perhaps as
ΟΤΙΚ̅Ϲ̅. Kühl thinks that the easiest explanation of the variants is to
suppose that κύριος was the original reading, and that Ἰησοῦς and θεὸς
were derived from it. But it seems to me that Zahn has better reason on
his side when he argues for ὅτι Ἰησοῦς as the original reading. He first
of all eliminates ὁ θεὸς as having no great attestation, and as being
found alongside of κύριος in Clement (_dominus deus_). The choice,
therefore, lies between κύριος and Ἰησοῦς. The latter has by far the
stronger external attestation, it is the _lectio ardua_, and is, on
internal grounds, also to be preferred. See _Einleitung_, ii. 88.
22, 23. Zahn has a strong impression that this passage lies at the
foundation of _Didache_, ii. 7: οὐ μισήσεις πάντα ἄνθρωπον, ἀλλὰ οὓς μὲν
ἐλέγξεις, περὶ δὲ ὧν προσεύξῃ, οὓς δὲ ἀγαπήσεις ὑπὲρ τὴν ψυχήν σου. If
this is really so, we have here a piece of very early testimony, not
certainly to the actual words, but to the thought conveyed. See
_Einleitung_, ii. 86.
Subscription: At the end of the Armenian Bible of 1698 we find a note to
the effect that “this epistle was written in the year 64 by Judas
Jacobi, who is also called Lebbaeus and Thaddaeus, and who preached the
Gospel to the Armenians and the Persians.”
APOCALYPSE.
Apart from particular passages, the last book of the Bible cannot be
unreservedly recommended to the devout laity for special study, but it
is peculiarly well adapted as an introduction to the method of textual
criticism, and that for two reasons. First of all, because the number of
available witnesses to the text is comparatively small, and, secondly,
because these are more easily grouped here than in the other divisions
of the New Testament. Reference may be made in this connection to the
first part of Bousset’s critical studies on the text of the Apocalypse,
where the distinction drawn by Bengel between the Andreas and Arethas
groups of manuscripts is correctly emphasized. At the same time Bousset
himself comes to the rather unsatisfactory conclusion that an eclectic
mode of procedure is all that is possible at present. An attempt has
been made above (p. 157) with the conclusion of the Apocalypse. We shall
now try a few further examples.
In order to ascertain the relationship of the manuscripts we must
select passages that exhibit a considerable divergence of meaning with
a small variation of form. Such a passage occurs in the last chapter.
In Apoc. xxii. 14, after the words “blessed are they,” we read, in the
one class of witnesses, “that wash their robes,” in the other, “that
do his commandments.” That is to say, we have in the one case
ΟΙΠΛΥΝΟΝΤΕϹΤΑϹϹΤΟΛΑϹΑΥΤΩΝ and in the other ΟΙΠΟΙΟΥΝΤΕϹΤΑϹΕ̅ΤΟΛΑϹΑΥΤΟΥ.
The difference is exceedingly small, especially when we consider that
in early times ΟΙ was frequently written Υ, and ΕΝ at the end of a
line Ε̅. I have no doubt that “wash their robes” is the original
reading here and that “do his commandments” is the later alteration,
though, of course, others will hold the opposite view. For the former
we have the authority of א A, for the latter that of Q (_i.e._,
B^{apoc}; see above, p. 80) with its associates. The question now
becomes: Are there any passages where א and A part company, and which
are decisive in favour of א? It is impossible to say offhand whether א
or A has preserved the correct text. א contains corrections that A
does not, and _vice versa_. Take another example.
The author of the Apocalypse follows the Hebrew idiom, according to
which the word or phrase in apposition to an oblique case is put in the
nominative.[292] Thus we have:
ii. 20. τὴν γυναῖκα Ἰεζαβὲλ ἡ λέγουσα. Q makes this ἣ λέγει, and the
corrector of א τὴν λέγουσαν. Similarly, iii. 12, τῆς καινῆς Ἱερουσαλὴμ ἡ
καταβαίνουσα, where again Q has ἣ καταβαίνει, and א^c τῆς καταβαινούσης.
But it is not only the later corrector of א that does this: the first
scribe of that manuscript does it himself. For example:
xiv. 12. א has τῶν τηρούντων instead of οἱ τηροῦντες; in verse 14 ἔχοντα
instead of ἔχων; in xx. 2, τὸν ὄφιν instead of ὁ ὄφις, etc. In other
places A, in this last A _alone_, it appears, has preserved the correct
text.
There are other places, again, where the correct reading is preserved,
perhaps, only in a later manuscript, or in none at all. We may compare
with the idiom in the Apocalypse what we find at the beginning of the
book in the passage about the seven spirits before the throne of God.
i. 4. ἀπὸ τῶν ἑπτὰ πνευμάτων ... ἐνώπιον τοῦ θρόνου αὐτοῦ. In the space
indicated by the dots Erasmus has ἅ ἐστιν, Codex 36 has ἅ εἰσιν, Q and C
have ἃ, which is adopted by Tischendorf and Westcott and Hort, א and A
have τῶν, which is adopted by Lachmann, Tregelles, and by Westcott and
Hort in their margin, while Codex 80 has nothing at all. All these
variants are explainable on the supposition that the original reading
was τὰ. Exception being taken to this construction, one copyist made it
τῶν, the other ἃ, the third supplied the copula, and the fourth dropped
the offending word altogether. Similarly, in chap. v. 13, א alone has
preserved the correct reading τὸ, for which the others have ὃ or ὅ
ἐστιν. Another case is ii. 13, where the writer wished to say, “in the
days of Antipas, my faithful witness, who was slain.” According to the
idiom mentioned above, while Ἀντίπα was in the genitive, ὁ μάρτυς would
be in the nominative of apposition. But owing to the influence of this
nominative, Ἀντίπα was made nominative so as to agree with it, and the
sentence then ran, ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις Ἀντίπας ὁ μάρτυς μου ... ὃς ... which
could not be construed. The consequence was corrections of all sorts.
The boldest expedient was simply to drop the ὃς, but other means were
adopted to relieve the construction. After ἡμέραις some inserted αἷς or
ἐν αἷς, Erasmus read ἐμαῖς, א has ἐν ταῖς, and some Latin witnesses
_illis_. But read Ἀντίπα in the genitive and all is in order.[293]
The Apocalypse presents quite a number of passages enabling us to
distinguish the manuscripts. There is very little difference in form
between λύσαντι and λούσαντι (i. 5), ἀετοῦ and ἀγγέλου (viii. 13), λίθον
and λίνον (xv. 6), but it makes a great difference whether we read “who
redeemed us” or “who washed us,” an “eagle flying” or “an angel flying,”
“wearing pure linen” or “wearing pure stone.” These variations are the
result of _accidental_ errors in transcription. But we meet an instance
of _intentional_ alteration in xiii. 18, where the number of the beast
is variously given as 666 and 616.
Grouping the witnesses for the former variants we have—
i. 5. λύσαντι, א A C, Syriac,[294] Armenian.
λούσαντι, Q P, Vulgate, Coptic,
Ethiopic.
viii. 13. ἀετοῦ, א A Q, Vulgate, Syriac,
Coptic, Ethiopic.
ἀγγέλου, P, Armenian.
The two readings are combined not only by certain commentators, but in
some manuscripts, ἀγγέλου ὡς ἀετοῦ.
xv. 6. λίθον καθαρόν, A C, am fu demid
tol.
λίνον καθαρόν, P, Syriac, Armenian,
Clementine-Vulgate.
λινοῦν καθαρόν is read by Q, and
καθαροὺς λίνους by
א.
Tregelles and Westcott alone accept the reading λίθον; all the other
editors regard it as an early transcriptional error. Holtzmann refers to
the parallel passages i. 13, iv. 4, vii. 9, 13, xvii. 4, xviii. 16, xix.
8, 14, in support of λίνον, but they point rather the other way. For
“fine linen” Apocalypse has βύσσινος five times, but never once λίνος,
which means only the material, and not the garment made of it. Moreover,
we find a parallel in the Old Testament, though in another connection,
in Ezekiel xxviii. 13, where we read πάντα λίθον χρηστὸν ἐνδέδεσαι, so
that λίθον here must not be so confidently rejected. Λίθον was more
liable to be changed to λίνον than _vice versa_, as the Vulgate shows,
in which the authorised printed edition has _linteo_ where the
manuscripts read _lapidem_. At the same time one cannot but admit that
primitive transcriptional errors do occur. The reading ἀγγέλου in viii.
13, to which certain manuscripts prefix ἑνὸς, seems to me to be
corroborated by _ἄλλον_ ἄγγελον πετόμενον in xiv. 6. Or are we to read
ἀετόν there in the face of all the witnesses?
v. 1. The correct text here is that adopted by Zahn: γεγραμμένον ἔσωθεν
καὶ ὄπισθεν κατεσφραγισμένον. Grotius, though mistaken as to the true
text, was the first to give the right interpretation of the words by
taking ἔσω (ἔσωθεν) with γεγραμμένον, and ἔξωθεν (ὄπισθεν) with
κατεσφραγισμένον. “Locus sic distinguendus γεγραμμένον ἔσω, καὶ ἔξωθεν
κατεσφραγισμένον.” This combination of the words (“haec nova
distinctio”) was combated for the reason among others that it deprived
them of all their force and rendered them superfluous, for who ever saw
a roll that was written on the outside and sealed on the inside. See
Pole’s _Synopsis_, where it is said of Grotius, “tam infelix interpres
Apocalypseos est magnus ille Hugo in rebus minusculis.” Zahn
(_Einleitung_, ii. 596) improves the text of Grotius, but retains his
connection of the words. He holds that ἔσωθεν and ὄπισθεν are not
correlative terms, and that the idea of a papyrus roll written on both
sides (ὀπισθόγραφον) must be abandoned; compare above, p. 43, n. 2. The
book was, in fact, not a roll but a codex. Two things point to this.
There is, first, the fact that is said to be ἐπὶ τὴν δεξιὰν. Had it been
a roll it would have been ἐν τῇ δεξιᾷ. Moreover, the word used for
opening the book is ἀνοῖξαι, and not, as in the case of rolls,
ἀνελίσσειν, ἀνειλεῖν, or ἀναπτύσσειν. That it was not written on the
outside is also shown by the fact that it was sealed with seven seals,
the purpose of which was to make the reading of the book impossible. Not
till the seventh seal is broken is the book open and its contents
displayed. This βιβλίον is quite different from the βιβλαρίδιον
mentioned in chapter x. 2, 9. See also E. Huschke, _Das Buch mit 7
Siegeln_ (1860), to which Zahn refers (_lib. cit._ 597).
ix. 17. For ὑακινθίνους Primasius has _spineas_ (= ἀκανθίνους), a
reading which neither Bousset nor Baljon, strange to say, think worth
recording. Bousset rightly observes that in the following verse πῦρ
corresponds to πύρινος, and θεῖον to θειώδης, so that καπνός lets us see
what the writer understood as the colour of hyacinth—viz. the colour of
smoke. But the ideas of “thorns” (_spineae_) and “smoke” are even more
closely related.
xiii. 18. Irenæus found 616 given as the number of the beast in some
manuscripts, which he could only explain as a transcriptional error:
“hoc autem arbitror scriptorum peccatum fuisse ut solet fieri quoniam et
per literas numeri ponuntur, facile literam Graecam quae sexaginta
enuntiat numerum in _iota_ Graecorum literam expansam.” In reality,
however, the change from ξ to ι would be a contraction rather than an
expansion, and the alteration would seem to be intentional, seeing that
666 in Hebrew characters gives the Greek form Neron Kesar, and 616 the
Latin Nero Kesar. Irenæus himself, however, appeals to the fact that the
number 666 was found ἐν πᾶσι τοῖς σπουδαίοις καὶ ἀρχαίοις ἀντιγράφοις,
μαρτυρούντων αὐτῶν ἐκείνων τῶν κατ’ ὄψιν τὸν Ἰωάννην ἑωρακότων (v. 30,
1-3). The opening words in the Latin translation run, “in omnibus
antiquis et probatissimis et veteribus scripturis.” The subscription
which he himself appended to his own principal work (see above, p. 149)
shows how scrupulously exact he was with respect to ἀντίγραφα, so that
we may give him credit for having consulted old and reliable manuscripts
of the Apocalypse. The erroneous reading (616) is now found only in C
and two minuscules (5 and 11).
xxii. 11. The only authorities cited by Tischendorf in support of the
reading δικαιωθήτω (in place of δικαιοσύνην ποιησάτω) are the two
minuscules 38 and 79 and the Clementine Vulgate. But we find the passage
alluded to in the epistle which the Church of Lyons wrote giving an
account of the Martyrdom of the year 177: ἵνα πληρωθῇ ἡ γραφή· ὁ ἄνομος
ἀνομησάτω ἔτι, καὶ ὁ δίκαιος δικαιωθήτω ἔτι (apud Euseb., _Eccles.
Hist._, v. 1, 58). This lends such support to the reading δικαιωθήτω in
Apoc. xxii. 11, that Zahn not unnaturally speaks of it as “certainly the
original text” (_GK._ i. 201). E. A. Abbott places the date of the
Epistle of the Church of Lyons as early as 155 (see _Expositor_, 1896,
i. 111-126). Another aspect would be given to the question if the Greek
form of the Epistle were derived from a Latin, or if, as Resch supposed,
the words were a quotation of a saying of Jesus (_Agrapha_, § 133, p.
263 ff.).
I take the opportunity of appending to Resch’s work the fine saying
which Zahn cites from Augustine’s _Contra Adversarium Legis et
Prophetarum_ (ed. Bassan. x. 659 ff.) as an otherwise unknown
Apocryphum. The disciples asked Jesus “de Judaeorum prophetis, quid
sentire deberet, qui de adventu eius aliquid cecinisse in praeteritum
putantur.” And He, “commotus talia eos etiam nunc sentire, respondit:
Dimisistis vivum qui ante vos est et de mortuis fabulamini.” A similar
saying from the _Acta Petri Vercell._ 10 is cited by Harnack in
connection with the third of the Oxyrhynchus Logia: “Qui mecum sunt, non
me intellexerunt.”
Footnote 265:
See Mrs. Lewis, in the _Expository Times_, November 1900, p. 56 ff.,
_What have we gained in the Sinaitic Palimpsest? I. St. Matthew’s
Gospel_, where a number of important variants are cited from that
manuscript.
Footnote 266:
Corderius (_Caten. Psal._, ii. 631) substitutes “ancient” for
“accurate.”
Footnote 267:
Or “exemplo graeco,” according as the plural points are inserted or
not. The passage is printed in Syriac by Cureton, p. xxxvi, who says
that it is also found in the margin of the London manuscript of the
Peshitto, 14456. He also gives the verses in which Juvencus
paraphrases this text.
Footnote 268:
The other variations of the Latin witnesses are extremely
instructive—viz.:
locis eminentioribus superioribus g_{2} emm. honorificis m
clarior dignior d m g_{2} honoratior e
emm.
deorsum inferius g_{2} emm. infra m
inferior humilior minor
superius sursum in superiori
loco.
utilius utile gloriam.
This variety is an indication of the early age at which the text was
translated into Latin.
Footnote 269:
The _Thesaurus Syriacus_ does not contain the word either in col. 1405
under חשמיתא, or in col. 2205 under מרא.
It may also be observed in passing, that the passage is one of those
whose sense is entirely changed by the insertion or omission of the
negative in this or that witness (see below on Gal. ii. 5). Instead of
καὶ ἐκ μείζονος, Syr^{cu} reads καὶ μὴ ἐκ μείζονος. Moreover, it takes
ζητεῖτε as imperative, a fact that Tischendorf has failed to notice.
Footnote 270:
I see that Chase, who discusses the passage in pp. 9-14 of his
_Syro-Latin Text_, has the same impression: “the compound Greek word
in D, ὁ δειπνοκλήτωρ, seems intended to represent the Syriac
expression ‘the lord of the supper.’”
Footnote 271:
The case is quite different in 1 Macc. v. 2, where the first hand of א
wrote ὠργίσθησαν for ἐβουλεύσαντο. Here ὠργίσθη occurs immediately
before it.
Footnote 272:
So given in Merx’s edition, but not in Lewis.—_Tr._
Footnote 273:
See also von Dobschütz, _Das Kerygma Petri_, p. 82, where he cites the
passage of Origen relating to the _Doctrina Petri_, which is also
quoted by Tischendorf on Luke xxiv. 39, and insists rightly that in
the LXX δαιμόνιον is never employed to represent דוּחַ. Conybeare’s
articles on “The Demonology of the New Testament” in the _Jewish
Quarterly Review_ (1896) I have unfortunately been unable to consult.
Joh. Weiss never mentions φάντασμα in his article on _Dämonen und
Dämonische_ in the PRE^3, iv.
Footnote 274:
This description is elsewhere understood as applying to Theodore of
Mopsuestia.
Footnote 275:
The same variation occurs in Luke vi. 7, where א* B S X read
κατηγορεῖν (κατηγορῆσαι D), while א^c A E F have κατηγορίαν.
Footnote 276:
When examining Codex B I took occasion to look at certain other
passages, and discovered some strange mistakes in Tischendorf’s
statements with regard to that manuscript, as I did previously in the
case of Codex D. In 3 John 13 B has ἀλλὰ for ἀλλ’, on which
Tischendorf has no note. Westcott and Hort mention the passage in
their _Notes on Orthography_, ii. p. 153, but say nothing about B. On
Jude 5 we find Tischendorf saying in his Apparatus: ειδοτας sine υμας
cum A B C^2 ... ϛ (Gb^{oo}) add. υμας cum א K L. But υμας stands quite
plain in B. Had they known this, Tischendorf and Westcott and Hort
would certainly have printed their text differently. How far back this
false testimony with regard to B extends I am unable to certify. It is
found in Tischendorf’s seventh edition of 1859, and in Huther’s
Commentary of the same date. I repeat my Ceterum censeo, that two or
three sharp eyes should really revise the statements current about B.
This one is repeated from Tischendorf by Baljon, Weiss, and all our
Commentators. At the same time, Weiss has quite properly inserted υμας
in his text, on the ground that while there was no occasion for its
interpolation, its omission is quite conceivable. He will, no doubt,
be gratified to see his reasoning confirmed by this weighty testimony
afforded by Codex B.
Footnote 277:
Further instances of changes requiring investigation are:—ερωταν and
παρακαλειν; οραν and θεασθαι; αγειν and φερειν; ερχεσθαι and υπαγειν;
υπαρχειν and ειμι; συν and μετα; εις and εν; εως, μεχρι and αχρι;
ενωπιον and εμπροσθεν; ετερος and αλλος; οικος and οικια; παις and
παιδιον; πολις and κωμη; λαος and οχλος; ναος and ιερον; φεγγος and
φως; active and middle voice, αρχεσθαι, etc.
Footnote 278:
See, however, Romans i. 14, and compare Zahn, _Einl._, i. 263.—_Tr._
Footnote 279:
I have already (p. 37) referred to the frequency with which mistakes,
often quite incredible mistakes, in translation occur. A few
additional instances may be cited here.
There is, for example, that of Ephraem in John ii. 2, mentioned above,
p. 287.
According to Aphraates 41, 16, Jesus promised to the mourners דלהין
נתבשפון, _i.e._ that they should be _entreated_. The writer of the
text, therefore, that Aphraates used, must have taken παρακαλεῖν here
in the sense of “to entreat.” See Zahn, _Forschungen_, i. 78.
The same writer (383, 16) renders the words in Luke xvi. 25 νῦν δὲ ὅδε
παρακαλεῖται in the form יומנא דין בעית מנה, _i.e._ “but to-day thou
_entreatest_ of him”, where παρακαλεῖν is again taken in the sense of
“to entreat”, though a different word is used for it. See Zahn,
_ibid._
Again, Aphraates (390, 4) renders παράκλησιν (αὐτῶν) in Luke vi. 24
בעותהין, “their _prayer_, their _request_.” Zahn, _ibid._
The last clause of John v. 14 is rendered “that thou mayest have need
of nothing else,” where χρεία must have been read instead of χεῖρον.
Zahn, _Forschungen_, i. 161 f. Compare also the Syriac text of Apoc.
ii. 13; viii. 13, etc.
Footnote 280:
On the custom of dictating letters, see Norden, _Die antike
Kunstprosa_ (1898), p. 954 ff. On the autograph additions to the
letters of the Emperor Julian, see Bidez and Cumont, _Recherches
etc._, p. 19 (see above, p. 174).
Footnote 281:
What an amount of perplexity would have been avoided had Paul been in
the way of dating his letters exactly, or had the copyists preserved
the dates, supposing they were there originally! One, but only one, of
the epistles of Ignatius bears a date—viz. that to the Romans: ἔγραψα
ὑμῖν ταῦτα τῇ πρὸ ἐννέα καλανδῶν Σεπτεμβρίων (x. 3).
Footnote 282:
On these two verbs compare Exod. xxxi. 17, where the LXX has ἐπαύσατο
and Aquila ἀνέψυξε; Isa. xxxiv. 14, LXX ἀναπαύσονται, Aquila ἀνέψυξε;
Isa. xxviii. 12, Aquila ἀνάψυξις; compare also ἀνάπαυσις, Matt. xi.
29; καιροὶ ἀναψύξεως, Acts iii. 20. Weiss, in his Commentary, ignores
the reading of B in Rom. xv. 32; in his discussion of the text he
supposes that the text was mutilated by a translator, and that D E F G
“sought to restore it in their own way.”
Footnote 283:
See 1 Cor. v. 8, where the Syriac has קדישותא—_i.e._ ἁγιότητος—for
ἀληθείας.
Footnote 284:
To these examples, gathered quite incidentally, one might add as many
from the Old Testament and other books if one paid any attention to
them in reading. Take, for example, Herodotus i. 24. Was the votive
offering that Arion set up at Taenarum μέγα or οὐ μέγα? In the
_Germania_ xv. 1 did Tacitus say of the Germans “_non multum_
venationibus, plus per otium transigunt,” or “_multum_ venationibus,
etc.”? In the new edition of Origen (i. 87, 16) Koetschau reads
ἀχρήσιμα where the manuscript and the earlier editions have χρήσιμα,
and he lets an οὐκ stand which others omit, etc.
Footnote 285:
In his _Lucian_ Lagarde gives examples of his being deceived by
certain letters shining through from the opposite side—_e.g._ Esther
v. 22 and 27. This latter is a most interesting case. The following
verse begins with μη, and Lagarde thought that the first scribe had
added another μη by mistake and afterwards erased it, whereas it
turned out that what he took to be ΜΗ was nothing else than ΗΝ shining
through from the other side.
Footnote 286:
_Cf._ Westcott, _Canon_, Part II. ch. ii. § 1, p. 354 ff.; _Bible in
the Church_, p. 125 f.
Footnote 287:
_Cf._ Westcott, _Bible in the Church_, p. 153 ff.
Footnote 288:
See Article on _The Catholic Epistles_, by Salmond, in Hastings’
_Dictionary of the Bible_, i. p. 359 f.
Footnote 289:
It is certainly difficult to construct an Apparatus which shall be
concise and yet clear. In Jude 22 Baljon adopts ἐλεᾶτε in the text,
and yet he leaves the apparatus arranged in such a way as to suggest
that he intended to read ἐλέγχετε with Tischendorf.
Footnote 290:
The inscription on a column at Rome dedicated to a Sabine god which
Justin read as “Simoni Sancto Deo,” and understood as referring to
Simon Magus. See Kurtz, _Church History_ (Macpherson), i. p. 97;
Neander, _Church History_ (Bohn), ii. p. 123, note.
Footnote 291:
Compare also the articles on 1 and 2 Peter by the same writer in vol.
iii.
Footnote 292:
See Blass, _Grammar of N. T. Greek_, § 31, 6, Eng. Tr., p. 80 f.
Compare the similar German idiom used in the titles of books, “von X.
Y. ordentlicher Professor.” How naturally this comes to a Hebrew is
shown by the fact that Sal. Bär, in his translation of the Massoretic
note at the end of the books of Samuel (Leipzig, Tauchnitz, 1892, p.
158), among other lovely things has “ad mortem Davidis _rex_
Israelis.”
Footnote 293:
In this (independent) suggestion I am glad to find myself in agreement
with Lachmann (_Studien und Kritiken_, 1830, p. 839), and Westcott and
Hort (ii., App., 137). I see that Baljon and Zahn too follow it. But
Bousset still writes ἡμέραις αἷς.
Footnote 294:
Including Gwynn’s Syriac manuscript; see above, p. 102.
APPENDIX I.
The following is a list of writers most frequently cited in critical
editions of the New Testament. They are arranged chronologically, but it
must be remembered that the dates are more or less uncertain, and that
in the case of many writers the period of activity lies in two
centuries:—
FIRST CENTURY.
Greek. Latin.
Clement of Rome, fl. 95
Ignatius, d. 107?
Barnabas, ?
SECOND CENTURY.
_Didache_, ?
Hermas, 140?
Marcion (in Epiphanius
and Tertullian), fl. 145
Aristides, 139
Polycarp, d. 155
Justin Martyr, d. 165
_Clementine Homilies and
Recognitions_, ca. 190
Papias, fl. 140
_Gospel of Peter_, ca. 170
Tatian, fl. 170
Athenagoras, fl. 177
Theophilus of Antioch, d. 182
Celsus (in Origen), ca. 180
Hegesippus, fl. 180
Irenæus (see Latin), d. 202 Tertullian, fl. 200
Clement of Alexandria, fl. 194 Irenæi Interpres (according to
Tischendorf and Gregory, but
see below).
THIRD CENTURY.
Hippolytus, fl. 220
Julius Africanus, fl. 220
Gregory Thaumaturgus, d. 265
Origen, d. 248 Cyprian, d. 258
Dionysius of Alexandria, d. Novatian, fl. 251
265
Porphyry, d. 304 Lactantius, fl. 306
Pamphilus, d. 308 Arnobius, d. 306
Methodius, d. 310 Victorinus of Pettau, d. 303
_Didascalia_, ?
_Apostolic Constitutions_
(and fourth century,
etc.).
FOURTH CENTURY.
Arius, fl. 325
Jacobus Nisibenus (Syrian), d. Juvencus, fl. 330
338
Eusebius of Cæsarea, d. 340 Irenæi Interpres (according
Aphraates (Syrian), fl. 340 to Westcott and Hort).
Eustathius, Bishop of
Antioch, fl. 350 Hilary of Poictiers, d. 368
Zeno, fl. 350 Victorinus of Rome, fl. 360
Athanasius, d. 373 Damasus, Pope, fl. 366
Ephraem (Syrian), d. 373 Lucifer, d. 371
Basil the Great, d. 379 Pacianus, fl. 370
Evagrius of Pontus, d. 380 Optatus, fl. 371
Cyril of Jerusalem, d. 386 Philastrius, fl. 380
Amphilochius, fl. 370 Gaudentius, fl. 387
Macarius Magnes, fl. 373 Rufinus, fl. 397
Gregory Nazianzen, d. 390 Ambrose, d. 397
Gregory of Nyssa, d. 394 Ambrosiaster, fl. 390
Diodorus of Tarsus, d. 394 Chromatius, fl. 390
Didymus of Alexandria, d. 394 Tyconius, fl. 390
Theophilus of Alexandria, fl. Jerome, d. 420
388
Epiphanius, d. 403 Priscillian, ca. fin.
Chrysostom, fl. 407 Auctor libri _De
Rebaptismate_.
Isidore of Pelusium, fl. 412
FIFTH CENTURY.
Nonnus, fl. 400 Faustus, fl. 400
Theodore of Mopsuestia, d. 429 Hilary of Arles, d. 429
Victor of Antioch, d. 430 Augustine, d. 430
Cyril of Alexandria, d. 444 Prosper of Aquitania, fl. 431
Theodotus of Ancyra, fl. 431 Sedulius, fl. 431
Basil of Seleucia, fl. 440 Leo the Great, fl. 440
Socrates, fl. 440 Petrus Chrysologus, d. 455
Theodoret, Bishop of Gennadius, fl. 459
Cyrus, d. 457 Vigilius, fl. 484
Euthalius, d. 458 Auctor libri _De
Promissionibus_.
Sozomen, fl. 440
SIXTH CENTURY.
Candidus Isaurus, fl. 500 Fulgentius, Bishop of Ruspe,
d. 533
Severus of Antioch, fl. 512 Justinian, fl. 530
Theodorus Lector, fl. 525 Cæsarius of Arles, d. 543
Andreas, Bishop of Primasius, fl. 550
Cæsarea, ca. fin.
Maxentius, ? Victor, Bishop of Tunis, d.
565
Cosmas Indicopleustes, fl. 535 Cassiodorus, d. 575
Eutychius, fl. 553 Gregory the Great, d. 604
_Chronicon Paschale._
SEVENTH CENTURY.
Antiochus the Monk, fl. 614 Peter the Deacon, ?
Andreas of Crete, fl. 635?
Maximus Confessor, d. 662
Modestus of Jerusalem, ?
EIGHTH CENTURY.
Damascenus, Johannes, fl. 730 Bede, d. 735
Nicephorus, fl. 787
Petrus Siculus, ?
NINTH CENTURY.
Photius of Constantinople, d.
891
TENTH CENTURY.
Arethas, ?
Symeon, ?
Œcumenius, ca. 950?
Suidas the Lexicographer, ca.
980
ELEVENTH CENTURY.
Theophylact, Bishop of
Bulgaria, fl. 1077
TWELFTH CENTURY.
Euthymius Zigabenus, fl. 1116
Nicetas of Byzantium, d. 1206
APPENDIX II.
Ἀντίγραφα.
I had intended to give in full those passages of the Fathers known to me
in which mention is made of manuscripts prepared by themselves or
others. In this way I hoped to make a start towards supplying the
desideratum spoken of on p. 154 above. But I feel that in order to be
anything like complete, this would occupy too much space for the present
work. Even the passages in which Origen speaks of ἀντίγραφα, though not
“innumerable,” as Zahn says with a touch of exaggeration, are yet too
numerous to be included here. A considerable number of such passages are
already given in full in Tischendorf’s Editio Octava. I have contented
myself with giving here, an alphabetic list of these, in order to
facilitate a geographical and chronological survey of the relevant
matter. Where only one passage is given, it will be found in full in
Tischendorf. Passages in which the word ἀντίγραφον itself or its
synonyms (codex, exemplar, etc.) does not occur, but where express
mention is yet made of readings found in manuscripts, are given in
brackets.
Some surprising facts are brought to light by such quotations. Witness
the remark made by Basil the Great (ob. 379) on Luke xxii. 36, who tells
us that in Cappadocia in his time many manuscripts, indeed, if the text
is correct the majority of manuscripts (τὰ πολλὰ τῶν ἀντιγράφων),
exhibited a reading now found in only one single manuscript, and that
the main representative of the “Western” text; I refer to Codex Bezae.
See above on Luke xxii. 36. I may mention here that a certain “Basilius
diaconus” was the possessor of a magnificent Bible, the cover of the
first part of which was used for Codex Syrohexaplaris Ambrosianus. The
inscription ran: † ΒΙΒΛΟΣ Ᾱ ΤΩΝ ΘΕΙΩΝ | ΓΡΑΦΩΝ ΠΑΛΑΙΑΣ ΚΑΙ || ΝΕΑΣ
ΔΙΑΘΗΚΗΣ ΔΙΑΦΕΡ|ΕΙ| ΔΕ ΒΑΣΙΛΕΙΩ ΔΙΑΚΟΝΩ †|. See the facsimile and
description in Ceriani’s edition, _Monumenta Sacra et Profana_, vol.
vii., folio.
Adamantius (_i.e._ Origen), see Hieronymus.
Ambrosiaster, Rom. v. 14; the quotation should be corrected in
accordance with Haussleiter, _Forschungen_, iv. 32; (Rom. xii. 13);
1 Cor. v. 3; Gal. ii. 5.
Ambrose, Luke vii. 35; Gal. iv. 8.
Anastasius, Matt. xxvii. 18.
Andreas, Apoc. iii. 7.
Apollinarius, possibly mentioned in the scholia in Codex
Marchalianus (see Swete’s _Septuagint_, iii. p. viii), John vii. 53.
——, see Macedonius.
Apollonides, Eusebius, _Eccles. Hist._, v. 28.
Arethas, Apoc. i. 2, iii. 7.
Asclepiades, Eusebius, _Eccles. Hist._, v. 28.
Athanasius (also Pseudo-Athanasius), Matt. v. 22; 2 Thess. ii. 9;
for his mention of the πυκτία made for the Emperor Constans, see
above, p. 181, note, and p. 184; Zahn’s _Forschungen_, iii. 100,
_GK._ i. 73.
Augustine, Matt. xxvii. 9; Luke iii. 22; Rom. v. 14; (Rom. xiii.
14); 1 Cor. xv. 5; Phil. iii. 3.
Basil (the Great), Luke xxii. 36; Ephes. i. 1; Zahn, _Einleitung_,
i. 345.
Bede, Acts, _passim_.
Chronicon Paschale, John xix. 14 (see above, p. 30).
Chrysostom, John i. 28.
Didymus, 2 Cor. i. 1.
Epiphanius, Matt. i. 8, ii. 11 (τὰς πήρας ἑαυτῶν, ἢ τοὺς θησαυρούς,
ὡς ἔχει ἔνια τῶν ἀντιγράφων, i. 430, 1085). See Westcott and Hort,
“Notes,” _in loco_; Matt. viii. 28; Luke viii. 26, xix. 41, (xxii.
43 f.); John i. 28; Ephes. i. 1.
Eusebius, Matt. xiii. 35, xxvii. 9; Mark i. 2, xvi. 3, 9 ff.; John
xix. 14.
Euthalius, Jude 25.
Euthymius, (Mark xvi. 9); John vii. 53.
Gregory of Nyssa (Pseudo-), Mark xvi. 2, 9.
Hermophilus, Eusebius, _Eccles. Hist._, v. 28.
Hesychius, Mark xvi. 2, 9.
Hieronymus (Jerome), Matt. xiii. 35, xxi. 31, xxiv. 17; Mark iii.
17, xvi. 9; Luke ii. 33, (xviii. 30), xxii. 43 f.; John vii. 53;
Acts xv. 29; 1 Cor. ix. 5; Gal. ii. 5, iii. 1; Ephes. iii. 14; 1
Tim. v. 19; Heb. ii. 10.
Irenæus, Apoc. xiii. 18 (see above, _in loco_).
Isidore, Heb. ix. 17.
Macedonius (see Draeseke, _ThStKr._, 1890, 12), Rom. viii. 11.
Marcion, see Epiphanius, Ephes. i. 1.
Maximinus, 1 Cor. xv. 47.
Œcumenius, Acts xiv. 26.
Origen, Matt. ii. 18, viii. 28, xvi. 20, xviii. 1, (xix. 19), (xxi.
15), (xxvii. 9), xxvii. 16 ff. (see above, _in loco_); Mark ii. 14;
Luke i. 46; John i. 28; Rom. iv. 3, xvi. 23 (see Zahn, _Einleitung_,
i. 276, 285); Col. ii. 15.
Pierius, see Hieronymus.
Severus, Mark xvi. 9.
Socrates, 1 John iv. 3.
Theodoret, Rom. xvi. 3.
Theodore of Mopsuestia, Heb. ii. 10.
Theodotus, Eusebius, _Eccles. Hist._, v. 28.
Theophylact, 2 Thess. iii. 14; Heb. ii. 10, x. 1.
Victor, Mark xvi. 9.
Mention is made of ἀντίγραφα in anonymous scholia on Matt. ii. 18, xx.
28, (xxii. 12); Mark xi. 13; Luke xvi. 19 (giving the name of the Rich
Man as Ninive, _i.e._, Phinees; see Rendel Harris in the _Expositor_,
March 1900); Luke xxii. 43 f., xxiv. 13; John i. 29, vii. 53, xxi. 25;
Rom. viii. 24.
INDEX I.
Subjects
Abbot, E., 9, 58.
Abbreviation, 48, 315, 317, 330.
Accentuation, 47, 61.
Achmim, dialect of, 133, 135.
Acts, text of, 224, 294.
Adamantius, 187.
Additions, 238.
Adler, 19, 103.
African Latin, 110, 119.
Aggaeus, 96.
Alcuin, 125, 176.
Aldus, 2.
Ambrose, 109, 205.
Ambrosiaster, 148, 205.
Amélineau, 70, 135, 137.
Amelli, 113.
Ammonian sections, 56.
Andreas, 191, 329.
Anselm, 7.
Antilegomena, 12, 95, 321.
Anthony, 135.
Antwerp Polyglot, 10.
Aphraates, 98, 216, 254, 293, 321.
Apocrypha, 26, 137.
Apollonides, 200 f.
Apollos, 242.
Apostolicum of Marcion, 207.
Arabic version, 142.
Aramaic, 93.
Arethas, 191, 329.
Arians, 205.
Arias Montanus, 10.
Aristion, 142, 295.
Armenian version, 141.
Artemonites, 200.
Article, importance of the, 258, 287, 288, 295, 328.
Asclepiades, 200 f.
Asterisks, 101, 186.
Athanasius, 62, 181, 183.
Dialogue of A. and Zacchaeus, 99 n.
Athos manuscripts, 90, 152, 190.
Augustine, 108, 120, 147.
Autographs, 29 f., 97.
Balg, 139.
Baljon, 24, 168.
Barabbas, prenomen of, 103, 244, 259.
Barnabas, 30, 54 f.
Barnard, 154 n.
Basil the Great, 277, 340.
Basilides, 203.
Bashmuric dialect, 133.
Bäthgen, 105.
Batiffol, 73, 75, 139.
Bebb, 95.
Bede, 75, 221.
Bellarmin, 127.
Belsheim, 112 ff.
Benedict, Rule of, 173.
Bengel, 3, 16, 30, 123, 221, 256.
Bensly, 79, 97, 102, 105.
Bentley, 16, 77, 83.
Berger, J. G., 30.
Berger, S., 111, 116 f., 123, 130.
Bernhardt, 139.
Bernoulli, 174.
Bernstein, 100.
Bertheau, 18.
Bessarion, 87.
Beurlier, 117.
Beza, 9, 64, 221.
Bibliotheca, 39, 53.
Bidez, 174.
Birch, 19.
Bianchini, 111 f., 131.
Blass, 32, 65, 163, 224, 260.
Bohairic version, 133.
Boniface, 46, 122.
Bonnet, 26.
Bonus, 105.
Boetticher, see Lagarde.
Bouriant, 135.
Bousset, 91, 158, 329.
Brandscheid, 26.
Breathings, 47.
Brightman, 66.
British and Foreign Bible Society, 4, 13.
Brugsch, 137.
Burgon, 83, 146, 159.
Burkitt, 97, 104 f., 109, 131, 139, 143, 229.
Byzantine Recension, 21, 180 ff.
Canons of Criticism, 16, 234, 239.
Eusebian, 56, 263.
Capitals, 34, 59, 261.
Cary, 160.
Caryophilus, 14.
Cassels, 106.
Cassiodorus, 50, 128, 175.
Castle, 12.
Catalogus Claromontanus, 76, 162.
Catenae, 147.
Celsus, 144, 204, 296.
Ceolfrid, 122.
Cephaleus, 7.
Ceriani, 116.
Ceugney, 135.
Chapter division, 8.
Charlemagne, 125.
Charles the Bald, 125.
Charles, R. H., 140.
Chase, 65, 216, 274.
Cheikho, 104.
Chronicon Paschale, 30.
Chrysostom, 92, 181.
Ciasca, 135.
Clay as writing material, 45.
Clement of Rome, 59, 110, 153.
of Alexandria, 147, 153, 204.
Clementine Vulgate, 127.
Codex, 41.
Cola and Commata, 49.
Colinæus, 7.
Columns, 37.
Comma Johanneum, 4, 26, 30, 86, 327.
Complutensian Polyglot, 1.
Conflate readings, 245.
Confusion of vowels and consonants, 168 ff., 236, 262.
Conjectural emendation, 167.
Constans, 181, 183.
Constantine, 54, 205.
Contents of manuscripts, 38, 52.
Conybeare, 79, 99, 142.
Copinger, 6.
Coptic dialect, 132.
Copying, mistakes in, 37, 170, 234 ff., 313, 330.
Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, 146.
Corrections, intentional, 192, 209, 239.
Corrector (διορθωτής), 57.
Correctoria Bibliorum, 126.
Corruption of the text, Greek and Latin terms for, 198.
Corssen, 116, 123.
Cotton paper, 36, 44.
Courcelles, 14.
Cozza, 60, 62.
Credner, 65.
Criticism, object of textual, 28, 156.
subjective, 157.
Cromwell, 12.
Cronin, 68.
Crowfoot, 105.
Crum, 135 f.
Curetonian Syriac, 97, 104, 248.
Cursive script, 35, 81 f.
Cursive manuscripts, see Minuscules.
Cyprian, 117, 119, 147.
Cyril Lucar, 13, 58.
Damasus, 107.
Dated manuscripts, 69, 72, 300 n.
Deane, 101, 103.
De Dieu, 101.
Δειπνοκλήτωρ, 217, 256.
Delisle, 123.
Delitzsch, 2, 4, 5.
Dialects of Egypt, 132.
of Palestine, 93, 103.
Diatessaron, see Tatian.
Dictation, 234, 298.
Didascalia, 155.
Dillmann, 140.
Dionysius of Corinth, 199.
Διορθωτής, see Corrector.
Διφθέρα, 41, 43.
Dobschütz, von, 70, 72, 79, 123.
Dogmatic alterations, 166, 197 f., 200 ff., 209, 239.
Dutch school of conjectural criticism, 168.
Dziatzko, 33.
Eckstein, 139.
Eclectic method of criticism, 170.
Editio Regia, 7.
Editions, number of, 5.
collections of, 5.
size of, 7.
Catholic, 25.
Egyptian versions, 132 ff.
Ehrhard, 79.
Ellis, 16.
Elzevir, 13.
Engelbreth, 135.
Ephraem, 98, 106, 216, 254.
Erasmus, 3, 146.
Erizzo, 102.
Errors, sources of, 234 ff.
Ess, van, 25.
Ethiopic version, 140.
Etschmiadzin manuscript, 142, 295.
Eugipus, 122.
Eumenes, King of Pergamum, 40.
Eusebius of Cæsarea, 54, 56, 179, 185.
Eusebian Canons, 56, 263.
Euthalius, 78 f., 188.
Evagrius, 78 n.
Evangeliaria, 39 f., 91 f., 106.
Fabiani, 60, 62.
Families of manuscripts, 17, 119, 176 ff.
Fathers, list of. See Appendix I.
Fayumic dialect, 133, 135.
Falsification of text by heretics, 197 ff.
Fell, 15, 133.
Ferrar Group, 84 f., 99, 177.
Field, 181, 264.
Ford, 134.
Froben, 3, 126.
Gabelentz, 139.
Gebhardt, O. von, 7, 22, 73, 174.
Gehringer, 25.
Gelasian Decree, 183.
Genealogical method, 164, 171 ff.
Gennadius, 173.
Georgian version, 142.
Gibson, 97, 105, 106, 144.
Gildemeister, 140.
Gnostics, 203 f.
Goltz, von der, 90, 190.
Goodspeed, 91.
Gospels, collection and order of, 161 f.
division of, 56, 61.
title of, 165, 247.
Gospel-book of Marcion, 207.
Gothic version, 137 ff.
Goussen, 135, 137.
Graefe, 66, 231.
Grandval Bible, 125.
Gratz, 25.
Graux, 48.
Gregory, Pope, 125.
Gregory of Nyssa, 87.
Gregory, C. René, 6, 7, 20, 83, 91, 111.
Grenfell, 74.
Griesbach, 18.
Guidi, 140.
Gwilliam, 96, 103, 104.
Gwynn, 102, 106.
Haase, 114.
Häberlin, 43.
Hahn, 206 n.
Hall, Isaac H., 6, 8, 100.
Hammond, 159.
Harding, 125.
Harklean Syriac, 79, 100, 106, 189, 255.
Harmony of the Gospels, 16, 98.
Harnack, 155, 202, 232.
Harris, J. R., 30, 44, 65, 74, 86, 91, 97, 102, 105 f., 115, 153, 214.
Haseloff, 73.
Hauler, 155.
Haussleiter, 311.
Hebrew Bible printed, 1.
Hebrews, Gospel of the, 72, 96.
Hegesippus, 96.
Heidenreich, 119 n.
Henten, 127, 128.
Heracleon, 203.
Heretics, their falsifications, 197 ff.
Hermas, 47, 54.
Hermophilus, 200 f.
Hesychius, 61, 62, 183 ff.
Hetzenauer, 25, 132.
Heyne, 139.
Hieronymus, see Jerome.
Hilgenfeld, 26, 116. Addenda.
Hill, 105.
Hitzig, 169, 309.
Hogg, 106, 214.
Holtzmann, 6, 116.
Holzhey, 105.
Homer, manuscripts of, 33.
Homoioteleuton, 235 f.
Höppe, 139.
Horner, 134, 136.
Hort, 21, 170 f.
Hoskier, 5, 62, 83.
Hug, 61, 182.
Hunt, 74.
Hyvernat, 135, 136.
Iberian version, see Georgian.
Ignatius, 146, 300 n.
Illustrated manuscripts, 51.
Indiction, 69.
Indiculus Cheltonianus, 161.
Ink, 42.
Interpolation, 238, 241 n.
Irenæus, 147, 176, 202 ff.
Irico, 111.
Irish hands in manuscripts, 77, 113, 129.
Iscariot, the variants, 242.
Ishodad, 282.
Islinger, 79.
Itacism, 236, 287.
Itala, 109.
Ἰωάννης, spelling of the name, 162 f.
Jacob, 63.
Jannon, 7.
Jaumann, 25.
Jebb, 16.
Jerome, 107, 124, 173.
Jerusalem Syriac, 102, 106.
Jostes, 139.
Jovinian, 155.
Julian the Apostate, 144, 174.
Jülicher, 116, 198.
Junius, 10.
Karkaphensian version, 103.
Karlsson, 116.
Kauffmann, 139, 181. Addenda.
Kaulen, 123, 130, 131.
Kenyon, 33, 58, 81.
Kipling, 65.
Knapp, 19.
Koetschau, 149 ff.
Krall, 135.
Kroll, 155.
Küster, 15.
La Croze, 66, 134, 141.
Lachmann, 19, 83, 123.
Lagarde, Paul de, 30, 60, 95, 102, 106, 137, 140, 143, 223.
A. de, 106.
Lake, 66, 73, 91.
Land, 103 n.
Langton, 8.
Laodicæa, Epistle to, 77, 114, 129, 207, 299, 313.
Latin versions, 107 ff.
Laud, Archbishop, 75.
Lead as writing material, 44.
Lectionaries, 39, 91.
Le Jay, 11.
Le Long, 95.
Leo X., Pope, 2, 3.
Leusden, 104.
Lewis, 97, 102, 105, 106.
Lewis Syriac, see Sinai Syriac.
Linen as writing material, 45.
Lines in manuscripts, 37.
Linke, 112.
Linwood, 168 n.
Lippelt, 162 f.
Liturgical alterations, 91, 239, 267.
Loebe, 139.
London Polyglot, 12.
Louvain Vulgate, see Henten.
Löhlein, 104.
Löwe, 140.
Lucas Brugensis, 127, 146.
Lucian, 85, 138, 180 ff.
Luft, 139, 140.
Luther, 5, 149 n., 286, 309.
Mace, 16.
Maestricht, Gerhard von, 16, 239.
Mai, Cardinal, 60, 113, 139.
Manuscripts, age and locality, 35.
contents, 38, 52 f.
de luxe, 49.
material, 36, 40 ff.
number, 33, 81, 89, 90, 92.
size, 38.
Marcion, 87, 205, 206 ff.
Marcosians, 202.
Margoliouth, 106.
Marshall, 133.
Martin, Abbé, 160.
Martyrs, era of, 136.
Masch, 95.
Maspero, 135.
Masudi, 162.
Materials for writing, 40 ff.
Matthaei, 19.
Ματθαῖος, spelling of the name, 247.
Mazarin Bible, 126.
Melanchthon, 86, 140, 159.
Μεμβράναι, 36, 41.
Memphitic dialect, 133.
Mercator, 138.
Merx, 105, 106.
Mesrob, 141.
Michaelis, 104.
Middle Egyptian versions, 133, 135.
Mill, 15.
Miller, 6, 152, 159.
Mingarelli, 135.
Minuscules, 34, 82, 83 ff.
Moldenhauer, 19.
Montfortianus, 4, 86.
Morillon, 138.
Morin, 11.
Morrish, 170.
Müller, 139.
Münter, 135.
ν abbreviated at the end of a word, 315, 330.
Name of Dives, 342.
Names, importance of proper, 241.
of the two thieves, 266.
of prophets confused, 251, 258.
Negative liable to be omitted, see οὐ.
Nestle, 3, 17, 23, 26, 48, 65, 132.
Noetus, 203.
Northumbrian manuscripts, 125, 176.
Novatian, 155.
Number of words in the N.T., 48.
of manuscripts. See Manuscripts.
of Greek editions printed, 5.
of letters in the N.T., 48.
Obelus, 101, 186.
Oikonomos, 49 n., 189.
Old Latin version and manuscripts, 110 ff.
Order of the Gospels, 161 f.
of the Catholic Epistles, 321.
of the Pauline Epistles, 300 f.
Order of words, variation in the, 237.
Origen, 147, 149 ff., 185 ff.
Orthodox correctors, 192.
Osgan, 141.
οὐ, omission and insertion of, 310 ff.
Oxyrhynchus papyri, 74, 80.
Palæography, 32 f., 81 f., 181, 184.
Palestinian Syriac, 102.
Palimpsest, 37, 51, 63.
Pamphilus, 57, 78, 185 ff.
πανδέκτης, 39, 53.
Paper, 36, 44.
Papyrus, 36, 42.
Parchment, 36, 40.
Paris Polyglot, 11.
Correctoria, 126.
Patricius, 25.
Paul’s “Books,” 45.
Paul of Tella, 102.
Pens, 45.
Pericopæ, 39, 91, 239, 267, 277.
Pericope adulteræ, 68, 84, 112, 142, 177, 282 ff.
Peshitto version, 95, 103 f.
Philoxenian Syriac, 100.
Pickering, 7.
Pierius, 187.
Pius V., Pope, 127.
Plantin, 10 f.
Pococke, 100.
Polycarp the Chorepiscopus, 100.
Polyglots, 1, 10 ff.
Pott, his view of Acts, 294.
Praetorius, 140.
Praxapostolos, 40, 92.
Preuschen, 161, n. 1.
Printing of the N.T., earliest, 1, 3.
Primasius, 119, 148.
Priscillian, 119.
προ and προς, 237 n.
Prologues in Latin Gospels, 115 f.
Proper names, see Names.
Provençal New Testament, 117.
Psalters, 3, 68.
Pseudepigrapha, 26.
Punctuation in manuscripts, 38, 52.
importance of, 52, 201, 204, 261, 276, 297.
Quaternio, 41.
Quotations, 32, 144 ff.
Quotation, marks of, 38.
Rabbulas of Edessa, 98, 104.
Rahlfs, 35 n., 62, 183 ff.
Ranke, 113, 129.
Ravianus, 86.
Reading and writing, Greek terms for, 46.
Reed pen, 45.
Rehdiger, 114.
Reithmayer, 25.
Resch, 26, 280.
Resultant Greek Testament, 22.
Reuss, 6, 11, 159.
Richelieu, 11.
Ridley, 100.
Riegler, 130.
Rieu, 141.
Riggenbach, 190.
Robinson, 79, 106.
Rocchi, 60.
Roll, 36, 41, 43.
Rönsch, 118, 123, 131, 146.
Rooses, 11.
Rossini, 140.
Rüegg, 231. Addenda.
Rules of textual criticism, 234 ff.
Saalfeld, 131.
Sabatier, 111, 131.
Sachau, 282.
Sahak, 141,
Sahidic version, 134.
Salmon, 160, 170, 227.
Saubert, 14.
Schaaf, 104.
Schaff, 6.
Schjøtt, 24, 165.
Schmidt, 137.
Schmiedel, 56 n., 117.
Scholz, 19.
Schultze, 41 n., 51.
Schulz, 65.
Schwartze, 134.
Scriptio continua, 37, 47, 315, 330.
Script, various kinds of, 34 f., 81 ff.
Scrivener, 6, 8, 33, 58, 65, 77, 83.
Sections, 56, 61 n.
Seidel, 66.
Semler, 18.
Sergio, 60.
Simon of Cyrene, 203.
Simon Magus, 205, 324 n.
Simon, Richard, 15, 95.
Sinai Syriac, 97, 105.
Sionita, 11.
Sitterly, 33.
Sixtus V., Pope, 127.
Skeat, 140.
Speculum Augustini, 114.
Steindorff, 134.
Stephen, Henry, 7.
Robert, 7, 126.
Stichometry, 37, 48, 49.
Stilus, 45.
Strein, 138.
Stunica, 1.
Stuttgart New Testament, 23.
Subjective criticism, 157.
Subscriptions, 57, 69, 72, 78, 122, 188, 189, 260, etc.
Sulke, see Euthalius.
Swete, 26.
Syllables, division of, 48.
Synodos, 140.
Synonyms, interchange of, 236.
Syriac versions, 95 ff.
Syro-Latin, 216, 218, 223.
σωμάτιον, 41, 54 f.
Tatian, 97, 105, 212 ff.
his Diatessaron, 98, 105, 212 ff.
Tattam, 134.
ταχυγράφοι, 50.
Taylor, Isaac, 172 n.
Tertullian, 29, 119, 146, 147, 276.
τεῦχος, 53.
Textual criticism, literature of, 6, 159.
Textus brevior, 245.
Textus receptus, 13.
Thaddaeus, 96.
Thebaic dialect, 133.
Theile, 19.
Theodore of Tarsus, 75.
Theodoret, 98, 213.
Theodotus, 200 f.
Theodulf, 125.
Thomas of Heraclea, 100.
Thompson, E. M., 33, 59.
Timothy and Aquila, Dialogue of, 99 n.
Tischendorf, 19, 26, 53, 58, 63.
Title of the Gospels, 164, 247.
Tittmann, 19.
Toinard, 15.
Trabaud, 65.
Transcriptional errors, 234 ff.
Transposition of letters and words, 236 f.
Traube, 173.
Tregelles, 6, 20, 83, 141, 159.
Tremellius, 10.
Trent, Council of, 127.
Tuki, 135, 137.
Ubaldi, 60.
Ulfilas, 137.
Uncial script, 34, 81 f.
Uncial manuscripts, 53 ff.
number of, 81.
Valder, 7.
Valentinians, 198, 203.
Valla, Laurentius, 126.
Vercellone, 60 ff., 123.
Verse division, 8.
Versions:
Syriac, 95.
Latin, 107.
Egyptian, 132.
Gothic, 137.
Ethiopic, 140.
Armenian, 141.
Georgian, 142.
Arabic, 142.
other, 143.
Victor of Capua, 122, 308.
Vincent, 160.
Vogt, 139.
Vollert, 34 n., 35.
Voss, 138.
Vulgate, 25, 109, 122 ff., 127, 132.
Walton, 12.
Warfield, 159.
Weiss, 22, 229.
Wells, 16.
Westcott and Hort, their N.T., 21.
their types of text, 21.
their method, 171.
Western text, 211, 214, 221.
Wettstein, 18.
Weymouth, 22.
White, H. J., 131.
White, Joseph, 100.
Widmanstadt, 95.
Wilcken, 33, 43.
Wilkins, 133.
William of Hirsau, 126.
Wobbermin, 90.
Woide, 134.
Wolf, J. Chr., 66 f.
Wölfflin, 118, 173.
Wordsworth and White, 123, 131, 174, 176.
Wright, Arthur, 26.
Writing, styles of, 34 f., 81 ff.
Greek terms for, 46.
Xenaia, see Philoxenian-Syriac.
Ximenes, 1.
Years, reckoning of, 69 n., 100 n., 141 n.
Zahn, 160, 196 n. 2, 208 ff., 218, 224.
Ziegler, 118, 123, 130.
Zimmer, 77, 118.
Zoega, 135.
Zohrab, 141.
Zwingli, 86.
Zycha, 130.
INDEX II.
Passages of the New Testament referred to.
NOTE.—_Passages treated in the Critical Notes are not entered here._
Matthew.
i. 2,......165
i. 3,......165
i. 11,......166
i. 16,......99
i. 25,......166
iii. 15,......166
v. 3, 4,......166
v. 10,......204
v. 22,......167
vi. 8,......192
viii. 9,......52
ix. 18,......37
x. 33,......150
xiii. 17,......203
xvi. 23,......37
xviii. 20,......143
xix. 17,......239
xx. 28 f.,......216
Mark.
i. 11,......52
viii. 38,......150
ix. 7,......52
x. 40,......37
xiii. 22,......239
xvi. 8,......67, 142
Luke.
i. 35,......201
i. 46-55,......3
i. 68-79,......3
ii. 7,......166
iii. 27,......242
vi. 4 f.,......64
ix. 26,......150
xi. 2,......64, 87
xiii. 7, 8,......193
xvi. 12,......211
xvi. 19,......342
xvii. 10,......237
xx. 30,......241
xxi. 30,......211
xxii. 52,......226
xxiii. 53,......64, 136
xxiv. 4, 5, 11, 13,......120
xxiv. 26,......211
xxiv. 51-53,......230, 245
John.
i. 14,......201
i. 28,......203
ii. 20,......203
iii. 6,......205
v. 8,......198
vi. 47,......245
vi. 71,......242
vii. 39,......245
vii. 53,......142, 177
xvi. 13,......124
xix. 14,......30
xix. 34,......227
Acts.
i. 5,......136
iii. 14,......170
iv. 6,......243
iv. 12,......237
vi. 8,......245
xii. 10,......64
xv. 15,......170
xv. 20, 29,......136, 206, 232
xvi. 10,......136
xviii. 24,......242
xix. 1,......242
xxi. 25,......232
xxiii. 25 f.,......9
xxiv. 19 f.,......9
Romans.
v. 14,......205
xv. 31-33,......179
1 Corinthians.
ii. 9,......148
x. 9,......152
xii. 28,......37
xv. 29,......204
2 Corinthians.
x. 15,......168 n.
Galatians.
ii. 11,......37
iii. 1,......186
iv. 3,......77
Colossians.
i. 16,......204
ii. 16,......169
ii. 18,......168
1 Thessalonians.
ii. 15,......211
1 Timothy.
ii. 5,......52
iii. 16,......37
2 Timothy.
ii. 17,......77
iv. 13,......36
Hebrews.
i. 9,......52
James.
iii. 1,......168
v. 7,......245
2 Peter.
i. 4,......240
ii. 15,......243
1 John.
iv. 3,......152
v. 7,......4, 86
2 John.
12,......36
3 John.
13,......36
Apocalypse.
v. 1,......43 n.
viii. 13,......101
xvii. 4,......4 n.
xvii. 8,......4 n.
xviii. 17,......168
xxii. 21,......157
ΘΕΩ ΔΟΞΑ.
PRINTED BY NEILL AND CO., LTD., EDINBURGH.
Plates
Plate I.
[Illustration: PLATE I.: (1) א Codex Sinaiticus. (2) A. Codex
Alexandrinus.]
Plate II.
[Illustration: PLATE II: (1) D. Codex Bezae Cantabrigiensis. (2) D.
Codex Claromontanus.]
Plate III.
[Illustration: PLATE III: d. Codex Bezae Cantabrigiensis. (2) d. Codex
Claromontanus.]
Plate IV.
[Illustration: PLATE IV: B. Codex Vaticanus.]
Plate V.
[Illustration: PLATE V: Siniatic Syriac Palimpsest.]
Plate VI.
[Illustration: PLATE VI: am. Codex Amiantinus, circa 700 A.D.]
Plate VII.
[Illustration: PLATE VII: “Bible of Grandval”, of the ninth century.]
Plate VIII.
[Illustration: PLATE VIII: Sahidic Manuscript, probably of the fifth
century, in the British Museum.]
Plate IX.
[Illustration: PLATE IX: Armenian Manuscript of Etschmiadzin, A.D. 986.]
Plate X.
[Illustration: PLATE X: Minuscule Evv. 274 (Par. Nat. Suppl. Gr. 79) of
the tenth century.]
● Transcriber’s Notes:
○ Text that was in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).
○ Text in bold print is enclosed by equal signs (=bold=).
○ Footnotes have been moved to follow the chapters in which they are
referenced.
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