Restoring the NT Text

1. Restoring the NT Text Commentary and Excerpts From the Book by Neil R. Lightfoot

2. Restoring the NT Text • NT text had been born through centuries by means of manuscripts and other materials • Mistakes were bound to happen • The primary concern is what affect mistakes have on the text • Practically all variations found among all extant manuscripts do not affect our present text • The few textual problems that remain are explained in footnotes etc. of recent translations • Understanding that the text is sound and why now enables us to learn about our accepted text and something of its history

3. Restoring the Text • Our modern Greek text should be considered a restored or reconstructed text • Only two things can be done • Select a single manuscript and declare it an authority and the standard text • Consult a number of manuscripts and authorities and by comparison reconstruct a text acceptable as like the original • No one manuscript is free of scribal error • Consultation has always been followed in the printing of the Greek NT • Our modern text is an edition of the NT • It has been restored through all the aids of textual criticism

4. Authorities for Restoring the Text • If we did not have a modern edition of the NT how would we go about restoring it? • Manuscripts – Vatican, Siniatic, Alexandrian, Ephrahem Manuscript, Codex Bezae and others • Manuscripts of the original language (Greek) • Not all of equal weight • Some are good, better, and a few best • Some of these habitually agree in their readings and are obviously derived from a common ancestor • These are called a “text type” • These can be traced back to different quarters of the world • Alexandria and Egypt (Alexandrian) • Antioch of Syria (Syrian or Byzantine) • Western Europe (Western) • Since these represent a wide range of textual variations, whenever they agree on a reading, this is textual certainty

5. Authorities for Restoring the Text • Versions – Syriac, Latin, Coptic, Armenian, Gothic, Ethiopic and Georgian • All appeared in the early centuries of the Christian era • They had to made from some Greek text • Each different type of text provides us with an independent line of witnesses • Early Christian writers • Most lived near the end of the 1st century and early into the 2nd, they wrote extensively of their religion and quoted frequently from Scripture • Volume upon volume of writing of these “Church Fathers” have been preserved • These writing are literally filled with quotations of the NT from their copies which were much older than ours • The reading of their many quotations tells us much about the early church • So extensive are these quotations that if all other sources for the NT were lost, these would be sufficient to reconstruct practically all of the NT • The manuscripts, the versions and citations from early Christian are the tools used to restore the NT text • There are so many readings available we come so near to the original autographs as to all but grasp them in our hands

6. The Greek NT in Print • Erasmus of Rotterdam edited and published the first printed Greek NT • 1516, invited by a printer John Froben in Basle, Switzerland • Erasmus had learned Greek and had worked on his own Latin translation • He was known as Europe’s greatest scholar • The edition used parallel columns with Greek on the left and Latin on the right • The Latin was not Jerome’s Vulgate but Erasmus’ own translation • Erasmus also attached about 1,000 pages of notes and essays • The volume was rushed through printing in about five months because a Spanish Bible in Hebrew, Greek and Latin was underway and Erasmus wanted to get ahead of it • Erasmus’ NT • 1st publication of the NT in Greek • Prepared using a few late Greek manuscripts that were available • Edited and carried through printing very hastily • Although corrected by 4 subsequent editions of Erasmus its many shortcomings would be perpetuated by subsequent editors of the Greek text • Despite all this Erasmus did lead the way in valuing Greek manuscripts over Latin • He also spoke boldly against the Roman Church, Bishops, secular scholars and Monks were all publicly dragged out for wrongs

7. Seeds of Reformation • After Erasmus came a man named Stephanus Estienne • 1546 through 51 brought out several editions of the Greek text • 3rd and 4th editions were most noteworthy • 1551, first time text was divided into verses • To this day when citing NT verses it is Stephanus’ arrangement that is used • The edition of 1550 “the Royal edition” was smaller, 9 x 13, it was very beautiful and almost entirely used Erasmus’ text • From this, plus minor alterations, came the “Received Text” • The Protestant Reformer Theodore Beza forwarded Stephanus’ work by putting out a number of Greek editions, 1565-1604, but they were essentially the text of Stephanus • This was the type of text used by the translators of the KJ • By now the Greek text had become standardized • A Dutch family, the Elzevirs, confirmed this with their edition in 1633, “You have the text now received by all” written in Latin which read “Textus Receptus” or “Received Text” • This edition was scarcely different from the Stephanus text which is about the same as the Erasmus text • Erasmus’ text is based on no more than a handful of late Greek manuscripts

11. The Evidence Mounts • As more and earlier manuscripts came to light demands became strong for an improved Greek text • The Alexandrian Uncial came to England in 1627, as a 4th century document it predated Erasmus’ sources by 700 years • Collations of manuscripts began to appear, then evidence from the versions and then quotations of early Christian writers

12. The KJ • Our issues can be many • 1) The Vulgate • No one knows for sure who translated Acts through Revelations • It was certainly Jerome but he did not declare it in writing • The original commission was only to gather all of the Old Latin writings and create one Bible • Thankfully it appears with the Gospels that Greek writings were consulted • 2) Codex Bezae, known for its peculiar readings and general issues with the “Western” type of text was the only uncial available for the original KJ writers • 3) The “Received Text” has as its beginnings a hastily prepared translation that used only a handful of very late Greek manuscripts • Even though subsequent editions made changes, the errors of the original perpetuated throughout the publications • Stephanus Etienne and Theodore Beza did little revision of the text • 4) The Alexandrian uncial has many disagreements with the KJ and it predates the KJ source material by 700 years

16. John Mill + Richard Bentley • Dr. John Mill of Oxford • After 30yrs, in 1707, he issued his edition of the Greek NT • He wanted to present as much of the existing evidence on the text as was possible • He gathered previous collations, collated additional manuscripts himself, and had colleagues make yet more collations • Along with the testimony of the manuscripts he included • Abundant information from the ancient versions (Syriac, Coptic, Latin) • Writings of the Church Fathers • Mills’ work was not a new NT, he did what his predecessors had done and merely reprinted the Stephanus text of 1550 • Mills’ work provoked controversy because of the large number of variants (30,000) • The problem was including so much from the Church Fathers and so many collations • Many charged that Mill’s had only succeeded in making the text uncertain

17. John Mill + Richard Bentley • In 1713, Anthony Collins, published a pamphlet “Discourse of Free-Thinking” that slammed the Bible and held up works such as Mills’ as evidence • Richard Bentley, a great classics scholar from Trinity College in Cambridge, wrote “Remarks upon a Late Discourse of Free-Thinking” • Bentley sought to defend Mills’ text against those who magnified textual variations • He also wanted to clearly speak out against those who defended the “Received Text” at all costs • Bentley went on to plan and begin an entirely new edition of the “Received Text” that would be corrective and use original Greek • He died before finishing it and no one took up the cause

18. The Westcott-Hort Text • The original Greek is our source for all of our NT translations • In the middle of the nineteenth century two extraordinary things happened • 1) Tischendorf’s discovery of the Sinaitic Manuscript • 2) His successful collation of the Vatican Manuscript • The availability of these witnesses gave momentum for a new edition of the Greek text and for a thorough revision of the Authorized or King James Version

19. 1881 • Two Cambridge scholars: • Brooke Foss Westcott and Fenton John Anthony Hort • May 12th published the first of two volumes entitled “The New Testament in the Original Greek” • It was a completely new text revised or reconstructed with accuracy • Tischendorf and other Biblical scholars had long set aside the “Received Text” or “KJ” but fully accepted the work of Westcott and Hort as definitive

20. Westcott and Hort • On September 4th the 2nd edition came out with an Appendix and Introduction • Appendix: had notes on selected textual problems • Introduction: comprises a monumental discussion of the principles underlying the Westcott-Hort Greek text • They had labored thirty years and the achievement was revolutionary • Not because of new ideas but because of the deliberate thoroughness of their work and the principles that backed it up • No piece of evidence was passed over, no authority had been set aside without vetting • The Westcott-Hort text was a rejection of mass authorities and an acknowledged dependence on the Sinaitic and Vatican Manuscripts, particularly the Vatican • Every edition of the Greek text since Westcott-Hort has only confirmed their miraculous work • In the same year, 1881, the English Revised Version of the NT appeared • It received immense attention • While it was not entirely based on Westcott-Hort, they were on the Revision Committee

21. English Revised and Westcott Hort • There were “Received Text” scholars and proponents on the committee of the English Revised Version • The fact that the text so heavily relies on Westcott-Hort speaks to its validity • The Westcott-Hort text along with the English Revised Version dealt the final blow to the “Received Text” on which the KJ Version is based • The work begun by Tischendorf, carried on by Mills and then Bentley, finally came to public recognition as definitive and authoritative

22. Summary • Our NT is a reconstructed or restored text • It has been reconstructed using the rules of textual criticism and modern scholarship from three independent lines of witnesses • 1) the manuscripts, 2) the versions, 3) writings of the early Church Fathers • 1516 Erasmus: First NT in Greek • Based on a few late manuscripts • 1550 Stephanus: published a beautiful edition of the Greek that became the “Received Text” • Almost identical with Erasmus’ work • Printed and accepted for almost 300 years • 1881 and Westcott-Hort published their work and it holds true to this day with only slight modifications • All new editions of the NT and almost all new translations heavily depend on Westcott-Hort

23. For Discussion • What three main sources are available to us in restoring the original text of the New Testament? • Manuscripts, versions, Church Fathers • Manuscripts = Vatican, Sinaitic, Alexandrian • Which is the most important source? • Manuscripts (Vatican) • What is the text of Erasmus? • A hastily prepared manuscript based on very late Greek manuscripts and Erasmus’ own Latin translation • Why is the work of Erasmus important? • It was the first Greek NT in print and it was the basis for what would become the “Received Text” • What is the “Received Text”? • Stephanus’ third edition (1550) known as the Royal edition because of its beauty and based almost entirely on Erasmus • From this edition with a few slight alterations came the text know as the “Received Text” • Who were the two textual scholars who produced a completely revised edition of the Greek text? • Westcott and Hort