(4) The Georgian Version (Georg.).

The Church of the Iberians was founded during the reign of Constantine according to tradition; though, if we consider how intimate and frequent had been from a much earlier period their intercourse with the Greeks, we may safely infer that the seeds of Christianity had been long before sown among them. There is no certain evidence of the date at which they translated the Scriptures; but it is probable that their version of the New Testament was made in the fifth and sixth centuries; and that it was made from a Greek text the most perfunctory examination suffices to prove. According to Armenian historians of the fifth century, St. Mesrop, at the same time that he invented the Armenian characters and made the Armenian version for his own countrymen, fulfilled the same service for the Georgians also. In this tradition, however, the Georgians do not concur; and, no doubt, rightly, seeing that their ancient alphabet and their version are alike independent of the Armenian. It is said by some native Georgian scholars that before the tenth century a revision was made of their version, in order to make it more complete.

The present writer knows of no manuscript of the entire Bible in Europe except at Mount Athos, where there is one reputed to be of the tenth century. Others are preserved in the Convents of the Holy Cross at Jerusalem, and of Mount Sinai. In the Vatican Library there is a codex of the New Testament, neatly written on parchment in majuscule, parts of which the present writer has collated with the printed text. This codex is at least as old as the thirteenth century, and in the collations below is referred to as a. Beside this codex the writer has examined in the Georgian Library at Tiflis three very ancient codices of the Gospels, written in uncials on parchment. These books were smaller in size than are, as a rule, the copies of the Gospels used in Eastern Churches.

Of the accompanying collations, nos. i-iv are made from them, and the passages collated were photographed by the present writer. These photographs, which represent the originals on a reduced scale, have been deposited by him in the Bodleian Library for the inspection of the curious. The text referred to as b is probably of the tenth century or earlier; the one referred [pg 157] to as c cannot be much later than the eleventh, while that indicated by d must belong to the twelfth, and is the most beautifully written of them.

The Bible was not printed in Georgian until the year 1743 at Moscow in large folio. It is a rare volume, and has never been reprinted. The character is that called ecclesiastical or priestly majuscule, which differs wholly from the civil characters and can, as a rule, be read by the priests only. The New Testament and Psalms have been reprinted at various times from this original edition, both in priestly and civil characters, and of the latter kind very good and cheap copies can be obtained at the British and Foreign Bible Society, printed, however, at Tiflis. It is said that the edition of 1743 was conformed to the Slavonic version of the Bible; and if this were true, it would, of course, impair its value for critical purposes. Of this statement, however, the writer's collations, so far as they go, afford no proof. Such variations as there are between the printed edition and the manuscript texts are notified in these collations. The point, however, could easily be settled by a thorough comparison of the printed text with the Slavonic.

The MSS. of Tiflis include the last verses of Mark, and the Vatican MS. contains the narrative of the woman taken in adultery, but places it after ver. 44, instead of after ver. 52 of the seventh chapter of John. The printed edition places it after ver. 52, and this uncertainty as to where to insert the narrative, in itself indicates that it is a later interpolation. The printed text also contains the text about the three witnesses; but it is pieced into the context in an awkward and ungrammatical way; and whether it is in any MS. the writer cannot say. The following all too brief collations prove that the printed text fairly represents the MSS.; from which, indeed, it differs very little except in its more modern orthography. It is certain, however, that the most ancient MSS. of this version must be collated and a critical text of it prepared, before it can be quite reliably used as an early witness to the Greek text in regard to any particular points. Where the earliest Greek authorities waver as to the particles by which the parts of the narrative shall be connected—some, e.g. giving καί, others δέ, others οὖν—the Georgian constantly passes abruptly to the new matter without any connecting particle at all—and this, although as a language [pg 158] Georgian is richer in such connecting particles than is Greek. This peculiarity of the version, which is also shared by the old Armenian version, seems to prove that it was made from a primitive text, in which editors had not yet begun to smooth away the sudden transitions.