CRITICAL NOTES ON VARIOUS PASSAGES OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. (continued 2)
William Edie translation
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).
295i. 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 Wendt8); 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 296God 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 297with 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 298of 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 299whether 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 300of 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 301at 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 302version, 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 303Note 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 304have 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 305of 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 306well 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. 15b, 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 (אc 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 307after 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, 33a) as a parenthesis. Tischendorf 308and 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 309Apoc. 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 אc 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. syrsch 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!
310i. 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. אc 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, 67**, 137. D E F G K L P.
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 311aliisque 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; 312and 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. 313ii. 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 Dc E2 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 (Meyer7, 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 314der 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.
315Subscription: 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.
316ii. 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 (D2 E2 K2 L2) 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 317that 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 318Scrivener 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.
319
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 320by 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 Dc 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 321Church 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.
322
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 323to 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 324difficulty 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 325words 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, Ac B m vg, Syrphil, א A* C K L P ...
Syrhark. mg, Sahid. Syrhark, Copt., Arm.
Jude 12, א B K L vg, Sahid., Copt., A C 44, 56.
Syrphil, Syrhark, 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 (Meyer6, 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 326that 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. 22b. 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. 327Zahn, 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).
328
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. 329He 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.
330In 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., Bapoc; 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 אc 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 331ὁ 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]
332The 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 333λίνον 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 334E. 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 335account 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.”
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