28-1

29

A S t u d y i n t h e H i s t o r y o f t h e B i b l i c a l Te x t

Malcolm H. Watts

THE

LORDGAVE THE

WORDA Study in the History of the Biblical Text

Trinitarian Bible SocietyTyndale House, Dorset Road, London, SW19 3NN, England

© Trinitarian Bible Society 1998

The Old Testament 1The first language 1Writing materials 2Revelation 2Twin doctrine 3Written 4The Originals 4The Temple 4Significance of the Ark 5One Book 6Copies 6The work of scribes 7Loss of the originals 7The Great Synagogue 8The Famous Massoretes 9The Massoretic Text 10Old Testament Summary 11

The New Testament 12Christian truth written down 13The Divine Originals 13Accurate Copying 14Textual Variants 15Reproducing the authentic

New Testament Text 16The Surviving Greek manuscripts 17

1. Papyri 172. Uncials 183. Minuscules 194. Lectionaries 19

Classification 20A. Byzantine Text-type 21B. The Alexandrian Text-type 24

Critics attack the Byzantine Text 25The Authorised Version 27Endnotes 28

Contents

1


T he Bible is the eternalWord of God. It has beengiven by God to man that itmight be the absolute, su-

preme, authoritative, infallible, andunchangeable standard for faith and prac-tice. In this article we shall trace thehistory of the Bible from its origin in di-vine self-revelation, through itsembodiment in written form by super-natural inspiration, to its accuratetransmission to this present age by provi-dential preservation. It is our firm beliefthat, although the storms of criticism con-tinue to rage against God’s Word, thehumble believer’s confidence in it is jus-tifiable and substantiated. This sacredvolume is – and always will be – the Bookof God.

The greater part of the Old Testa-ment was written in Hebrew,sometimes called “the language ofCanaan” (Isaiah 19:18) or “the Jews’

Malcolm H. Wattslanguage” (Isaiah 36:11). It probablydeveloped from the old Hebrew spo-ken by Abraham in Ur of the Chaldees(Genesis 14:13) and a number of schol-ars believe that this old Hebrewpredated Abraham and that it was the“one language” and “one speech” ofpre-Babel times (Genesis 11:1). Inother words, they believe it was theoriginal language of man.

Supporting evidence for this viewis quite substantial. First of all, in He-brew the names of animals expressvery accurately their nature and char-acteristics – more so, indeed, than inany other ancient language. Thiswould tie in with the fact that Adam,soon after his creation, gave names tothe animals by observing the peculiarqualities and characteristics of eachspecies (Genesis 2:19-20). Second,proper names, like Adam, Eve, andCain, have significant meanings in

THE

LORDGAVE THE

WORDA Study in the History of the Biblical Text

THE FIRST LANGUAGE

The Old TThe Old TThe Old TThe Old TThe Old Testestestestestamentamentamentamentament

2

T H E L O R D G AV E T H E W O R D

Hebrew, some of which are actuallyassigned to them in the Old TestamentScriptures (Genesis 2:23; 3:20; 4:1).Third, the names of various ancientnations appear to be of Hebrew ori-gin, being derived from the sons andgrandsons of Shem, Ham andJapheth: as, for example, the Assyriansfrom Ashur; the Elamites from Elam;and the Aramaeans from Aram.

An argument can therefore bemade for some form of Hebrew hav-ing been the first language spoken andheard in this world; but be that as itmay, it is an indisputable fact thatpractically the whole of the Old Tes-tament is written in Hebrew. The onlyexceptions are in Aramaic (a close, cog-nate language to Hebrew) which did,in fact, supersede Hebrew at the timeof the captivity. These exceptions aretwo parts of the book of Ezra (4:8-6:18;7:12-26), accounted for by Aramaicbeing the official language of the Per-sian Empire; a verse in Jeremiah(10:11), where there is a quotation ofan Aramaic proverb; and quite a largesection of the book of Daniel (2:4 to7:28), where Aramaic is used, probablybecause the entire section deals withthe nations of the world.

Now on what were the ancientScriptures written? Originally, theOld Testament Scriptures appear tohave been written on papyrus. Thiswas made from reeds which grew onthe banks of the Nile River. The reedswere cut into strips and placed lineupon line at right angles: then, theywere beaten, pressed, and polished toform a kind of primitive paper. We

know that papyrus was used in Egyptlong ago, certainly in the time of Mo-ses, and it is therefore likely that thefirst documents of the Old Testamentwere written on this material. If not,they would have been written on ani-mal skins which were being usedaround 2,000 BC. Skins came to be pre-ferred because they lasted longer andproved not to be so brittle: hence, theypreserved the text more perfectly.

We know that God is the greatestof beings. Scripture says, “Canst thouby searching find out God? canst thoufind out the Almighty unto perfec-tion?” (Job 11:7). And the answerassumed is, of course, No. We cannotwith all our ingenuity discover the in-finite God. He is far, far above ourhuman comprehension. Does thismean, then, that we have no hope ofknowing Him? Thankfully, it does notmean that. Although we cannot – evenwith intense investigation – discoverGod, He is able to make Himself knownto us. As the source of all truth, Hecan teach us about His own wonder-ful Being; and therefore, as thePsalmist says, “In thy light shall we seelight” (Psalm 36:9). This brings us,quite naturally, to the doctrine of rev-elation.

A concise, but accurate, definitionof revelation comes from the pen ofDr. James Bannerman. He wrote:“Revelation, as a divine act, is thepresentation of objective truth to aman in a supernatural manner by God.Revelation, as the effect of that act, isthe objective truth so presented”.1

WRITING MATERIALS

REVELATION

3


Now revelation is of two kinds.First of all, there is general revelation.This comes partly from outside us,from the world round about us. In theworks of creation and providence,God shows something of His divinityand perfection. “For the invisiblethings of him from the creation of theworld are clearly seen, being under-stood by the things that are made, evenHis eternal power and Godhead” (Ro-mans 1:20; cf. Psalm 19:1; Acts 14:27).Looking at the various parts of thisvisible universe, we are compelled tothink, with reverential awe, of the di-vine Architect and Maker. Furthergeneral revelation comes from insideus. Made in the image of God, wehave some natural sense of God, im-mortality, and the difference betweenright and wrong. We are, as Paul says,a law unto ourselves because “thework of the law” is written in our“hearts”, our “conscience also bearingwitness” (Romans 2:14,15).

Such revelation is said to be gen-eral: not only because it is generallymade throughout the world, but alsobecause it deals only with generalthings. It says nothing about specif-ics, like reconciliation with God, theforgiveness of sins, or the way toheaven.

However, in His wonderful mercy,God has been pleased to grant specialrevelation. This, too, is both externaland internal. External special revela-tion came through “theophanies” asGod actually appeared to men andalso through “voices”, as God spoke tothem. “The LORD appeared untoAbram, and said, Unto thy seed will Igive this land…” (Genesis 12:7; cf. 3:8-

19). Internal special revelation cameto chosen men through visions,dreams, and burdens. As God Him-self once said, “If there be a prophetamong you, I the LORD will make my-self known unto him in a vision, andwill speak unto him in a dream”(Numbers 12:6). “Burdens” wereheavy messages laid upon the mind andheart. Hence, we read: “The burden ofthe word of the LORD to Israel byMalachi” (Malachi 1:1). Special revela-tion meets the deepest needs of men’shearts. It answers the question whichis as old as man’s soul – “How shouldman be just with God?” (Job 9:2).

Through general and special rev-elation (which climaxed, of course, inthe Incarnation), God has graciouslygiven to us a divine self-disclosure andmade known the way of His salvation.

There is a twin doctrine which wenow need to consider: inspiration,which Professor Louis Gaussen oncedefined as “that inexplicable powerwhich the Divine Spirit put forth ofold on the authors of holy Scripture,in order to their guidance even in theemployment of the words they used,and to preserve them alike from all er-ror and from all omission”.2

Inspiration, then, is the process bywhich God exerts a supernatural in-fluence upon certain men, enablingthem accurately and infallibly torecord whatever has been revealed.“Holy men of God”, we read, “spakeas they were moved by the HolyGhost” (2 Peter 1:21). The result of theprocess is the written Word of God,

TWIN DOCTRINE

4


“the scripture of truth” (Daniel 10:21).The apostle’s classic statement imme-diately comes to mind: “All scriptureis given by inspiration of God” (2Timothy 3:16).

Inspired Scripture is God’s book ofrevelation. As a result of revelationand inspiration, we are able to holdthe Bible in our hands and know thatwe have in our possession the writ-ten Word of God.

The first recorded example of suchwriting is found in Exodus 17:14where, soon after the war with theAmalekites, the Lord said to Moses:“Write this for a memorial in a book…”Again, in Exodus 24:4, we read how“Moses wrote all the words of theLORD”. And yet again, in Exodus 34:27,the Lord said to him, “Write thou thesewords…” And so we could proceed.There are many other passages show-ing that Moses wrote more, muchmore, even the whole of the Penta-teuch, i.e., the first five books of theBible (e.g., Deuteronomy 31:9,24-26;Numbers 33:1,2).

Once written, the inspired origi-nals, or “autographs” (as they arecalled), were most carefully preserved.Moses’ scroll, for example, was com-mitted to the priests who depositedit near the sacred ark. We read in Deu-teronomy 31:25,26 that “Mosescommanded the Levites, which barethe ark of the covenant of the LORD,saying, Take this book of the law [thebook which he had written] and put

it in [or, by] the side of the ark of thecovenant of the LORD your God, thatit may be there for a witness againstthee” (cf. Joshua 1:8; 1 Kings 2:3;Nehemiah 8:1).

After Moses came Joshua, the au-thor of the book which bears hisname; and towards the end of his life,according to Joshua 24:26, he did ex-actly as Moses had once done. Havingmade an addition to Moses’ scroll, hehad that scroll replaced in the sanctu-ary. “And Joshua wrote these wordsin the book of the law of God, and tooka great stone, and set it up there un-der an oak, that was by the sanctuaryof the LORD”.

It was not long before there was afurther addition, this time by Samuel,who “told the people the manner ofthe kingdom, and wrote it in a book,and laid it up before the LORD” (i.e., inGod’s presence, in the holiest apart-ment and by the ark of the covenant;1 Samuel 10:25).

When the tabernacle was changedfor the temple, these precious origi-nals appear to have been transferredto the more permanent building.There may be a reference to them in 2Kings 22:8, where Hilkiah, the highpriest, is recorded as saying, “I havefound the book of the law in the houseof the LORD”. Some scholars have sug-gested that this “book of the law” wasMoses’ original copy, hidden by thepriests during the wicked reigns ofManasseh and Amon and only nowdiscovered and brought to the king’sattention.3 In 2 Chronicles 34:14, it is

THE ORIGINALS

THE TEMPLE

WRITTEN

5


called “a book of the law of the LORD

given by Moses”. A more literal trans-lation would be “the book of the lawof the LORD by the hand of Moses”.

Dr. W. H. Green points out thatkeeping these documents in this holyplace was “in accordance with the us-age of the principal nations ofantiquity”. He alludes to the fact that“the Romans, Greeks, Phoenicians,Babylonians, and Egyptians had theirsacred writings, which were jealouslypreserved in their temples, and en-trusted to the care of officials speciallydesignated for the purpose”.4

There were, however, more impor-tant reasons why the scrolls were laidup in this place:

The ark was enshrined in the di-vine sanctuary; and writings placed atthe side of the ark were therefore pe-culiarly associated with God. He isindeed the author of the Scriptures.What He has said and what the Scrip-tures say are one and the same thing(Romans 9:17; Galatians 3:2). Here,then, is God’s written Word and, as awhole, these inspired books may becalled “the oracles of God” (Romans3:2; cf. Acts 7:38).

Pious Israelites understood the arkto be the throne of God (Exodus 25:22;Psalm 80:1). The fact that these writ-ings were placed by the ark suggestedthat they were divinely authoritative.Scripture possesses tremendous au-thority. It demands of menunhesitating faith in its teachings andunfaltering obedience to its precepts.

Every soul of man must bow to it. “Forhe established a testimony in Jacob,and appointed a law in Israel, whichhe commanded our fathers, that theyshould make them known to theirchildren…” (Psalm 78:5).

Furthermore, since these Scrip-tures were placed near the ark, in theheart of the tabernacle or temple, theywere separated from all commonbooks. They were manifestly declaredto be holy. Certainly, God’s writtenWord is pure and sublime. It is truth,without any mixture of error. “Thewords of the LORD are pure words: assilver tried in a furnace of earth, puri-fied seven times” (Psalm 12:6). Theinspired writings should always berevered as “the holy scriptures” (2Timothy 3:15).

The ark, of course, had its mercy-seat whereon sacrificial blood wassprinkled (Exodus 25:21); and thebooks were placed nearby, intimatingperhaps that they explained the doc-trine of atonement and set forth theonly way of approach to God. “Thus it iswritten, and thus it behoved Christ tosuffer, and to rise from the dead thethird day: and that repentance andremission of sins should be preachedin his name…” (Luke 24:46,47).

One final thought: the scrollswould have been under the wings ofthe Cherubim (Exodus 25:18-20), anindication of their being divinely safe-guarded and preserved. Although oftendenied today, the doctrine of the pres-ervation of Scripture is to be believedand boldly declared. “The Old Testa-ment in Hebrew…and the NewTestament in Greek…being immedi-

SIGNIFICANCE OF THE ARK

6


ately inspired by God, and by His sin-gular care and providence kept purein all ages, are therefore authentical”(The Westminster Confession of Faith,Chap. 1; Sect. 8). Our Lord Himselfsaid: “Till heaven and earth pass, onejot or one tittle shall in no wise passfrom the law, till all be fulfilled” (Mat-thew 5:18; cf. Psalm 119:152; Isaiah40:8).

God continued to inspire men un-til there was a wonderful collection ofbooks (1 Chronicles 29:29; 2 Chroni-cles 9:29, 12:15; Isaiah 30:8; Jeremiah36:1,2). The earliest of Moses’ writingswould be dated about 1450 BC, whileMalachi’s writing would have beenfinished somewhere around 450 BC.So it was for approximately 1,000 yearsthat God graciously communicatedwith men and, by the supernatural in-fluence of His Spirit, caused Hiscommunications to be written down,free of all error in both fact and doc-trine. These writings were thenwonderfully preserved. It only re-mains for us to observe here that, fromthe beginning, this collection was re-garded as essentially one book, called“the book of the LORD” (Isaiah 34:16).

The first time copying is men-tioned is with respect to the TenCommandments, originally writtenof course on tablets of stone by the fin-ger of God. Those first tablets havingbeen broken, the Lord commandedMoses to chisel out new tablets andthe Lord wrote on them the samewords. It was then that God laid

down the rule for copying: the copymust be “according to the first writ-ing” (Deuteronomy 10:4). And wehave solid grounds for believing thatthis rule was strictly enforced. WhenJeremiah’s written message was de-stroyed by King Jehoiakim, God toldthe prophet to make another copy but,in doing so, he stipulated that it hadto be an exact copy. “Take thee againanother roll”, he said, “and write in itall the former words that were in thefirst roll” (Jeremiah 36:28). Accordingly,Baruch (Jeremiah’s scribe) rewrote, un-der the prophet’s dictation, all thewords which had been written on theformer scroll (36:32 – the second scrollwas therefore an accurate copy of thefirst, even though on this occasionBaruch added further material from Jer-emiah’s inspired ministry).

So copies were made, not only ofthe Ten Commandments but also ofother parts of Scripture. A copy of thebook of Deuteronomy, or perhapseven the whole Pentateuch, was to bein the hands of every king of Israel.“He shall write him a copy of this lawin a book out of that which is before thepriests the Levites: and it shall be withhim and he shall read therein all thedays of his life” (Deuteronomy 17:18;cf. 2 Chronicles 23:11). The originals,of course, were in the charge of “thepriests the Levites”; and when it says,“he shall write him a copy”, it prob-ably does not mean that he himselfshould do this but that he should ar-range for someone to do it for him (cf.1 Samuel 1:3; 13:9; 1 Kings 8:62; John19:19, where certain men are said todo what, in the event, was almost cer-tainly done by others).

ONE BOOK

COPIES

7


In order to function properly,judges would have needed access tothe various laws of Moses (2 Chroni-cles 19:10), as would the priests,especially those sent with certainLevites to teach in the cities of Judah(2 Chronicles 17:7-9). In the lattercase, it is specifically said that “theytaught in Judah, and had the book ofthe law of the LORD with them” (v 9).We are not to suppose that only offi-cials possessed copies of theScriptures. There is evidence to sug-gest that believers generally had accessto biblical books (Psalm 1:4, Psalm119).

Originals, as we have already ob-served, are called “autographs”.Copies are known as “apographs”. Itis clear that great care was taken incopying the Scriptures. At first, thepriests were responsible for this (Deu-teronomy 17:18) but later scribes(Hebrew: sopherim, from saphar, towrite) assumed this role, as the lan-guage of Jeremiah, the prophet,indicates: “How do ye say,…the lawof the LORD is with us? Lo, certainlyin vain made he it; the pen of scribesis in vain” (Jeremiah 8:8). Those des-ignated as scribes originally had manyand various responsibilities. How-ever, as time went on, they tended toconcentrate on the work of transcrip-tion: and hence a man like Ezra cameto be called “a scribe of the words ofthe commandments of the LORD, andof his statutes to Israel” (Ezra 7:11).

Understandably, the demand forcopies of the Scriptures became verygreat. The scribes therefore formed

themselves into “families” or “guilds”,combining their efforts to ensure thebest possible results (1 Chronicles2:55). Their expertise in this field, to-gether with their profound reverencefor Holy Scripture, meant the produc-tion of really excellent copies. In fact,only the scrolls which proceeded fromthis class of scribes were relied upon.

It is worthy of note just here that,in the purpose and providence ofGod, the Jews took greater care of theirsacred writings than any other peo-ple in the ancient world.

Such accuracy was achieved thatthe scribes’ copies could be cited as thevery Word of God and therefore di-vinely authoritative. In 1 Kings 2:3,David commands Solomon, his son:“Keep the charge of the LORD thy God,to walk in his ways, to keep his stat-utes, and his commandments, and hisjudgments, and his testimonies, as itis written in the law of Moses”. NowKing Solomon would only have hadaccess to a copy, such as is mentionedin Deuteronomy 17:18,19; but observehow this copy is described as what is“written in the law of Moses”. Suchpainstaking care had taken over thecopying that the resultant manuscriptretained the authority of the original.It was the Word of God and it couldbe cited as such.

Jerusalem fell to the Babyloniansin 586 BC. The city suffered dreadfuldamage and the great temple built bySolomon was completely destroyed (2Chronicles 36:17-19). Although notmentioned in the history, it is almost

THE WORK OF SCRIBES

LOSS OF THE ORIGINALS

8


certain that the original writings per-ished along with the city. However,all was not lost. By that time numer-ous copies had been made and someof these were taken into the land ofcaptivity; for we find Daniel quotingfrom what must have been a copy ofMoses’ Law (Daniel 9:11) and alsomaking mention of Jeremiah’s proph-ecy, a copy of which must also havebeen in his possession (9:2).

In 537 BC, the Jews began to returnfrom their captivity and we know thatEzra re-established worship in Jeru-salem “as it is written in the book ofMoses” (Ezra 6:18). This suggests thatthey still had copies of the Scripturesand that they were able to consultthem when arranging worship for thesecond temple. According toNehemiah 8:1, the people actually re-quested Ezra to bring “the book of thelaw of Moses, which the LORD had com-manded to Israel”. This was not theoriginal – only a copy – yet it is sig-nificantly described as “the law ofMoses”. We conclude from such Scrip-tures that God had wonderfullypreserved His Word.

The history of the Old Testamentends rather abruptly with the returnfrom captivity; but, according to thelater books, Ezra appears to have as-sumed presidency of a body of learnedand wise men (Nehemiah 8:4,7,13; cf.Ezra 7:6,11,22). Jewish tradition in-forms us that, after the Jews returned,Ezra called into being the Great Syna-gogue with a view to re-organizingthe religious life of the nation. Thiscouncil – for that is what it really was

– consisted of 120 members and cameto include the prophets Haggai,Zechariah and Malachi. The “Men ofthe Great Synagogue” collected to-gether all copies of Holy Scripturewhich they could find. These, theysubjected to detailed examination andcomparison. Many minor errors, in-advertently made, were nowcorrected. These errors were such asthe omission of a letter, a word, or per-haps even a line. That they had creptinto some manuscripts is not at all sur-prising when we remember that thereare at least eight pairs of Hebrew let-ters which are similar, even to thepoint of being nearly identical. Themost conscientious of scribes was notbeyond making a small mistake.Eventually, however, the copies un-derwent correction and if any werefound particularly faulty, they wereburied in a “genizah”, a holy placenear to a Jewish synagogue. As a re-sult of the Great Synagogue’s work,the Second Temple appears to havebeen supplied with a text very simi-lar to the later, received Hebrew text.5

By the time our Lord came on thescene, many reliable copies wereavailable. The Lord Jesus constantlyappealed to the sacred Scriptures. Heread from them in the synagogues(Luke 4:16); He quoted from them inHis public ministry (Matthew 19:3-5;21:16,42); and He exhorted His hear-ers to read them for themselves (John5:39). There can be no doubt that Heregarded the extant copies as the veryWord of God. Although He correctedPharisaical interpretations andglosses, never once did He call into ques-tion the integrity of the Hebrew text. Hewas able to say, “It is written” (Mat-

THE GREAT SYNAGOGUE

9


thew 4:4,7,10) and, again, “the scrip-ture cannot be broken” (John 10:35).The same applies, of course, to theApostles (Acts 1:16, 4:25, 28:25; He-brews 1:1,6,7; etc.).

It might be argued that this provestoo much, insofar as the Septuagint(LXX: the Greek translation of the OldTestament made by Alexandrian Jewsaround 250 BC) is also constantlyquoted in the New Testament, with-out ever once being called intoquestion. On the same premise,therefore, could this not be said to in-dicate endorsement of the Septuagintas an inspired and accurate text? No,there is a serious flaw in such reason-ing. The fact is that there are anumber of places in the New Testa-ment where the Septuagint versionappears to have been deliberately re-jected (e.g., Matthew 2:15, where theLXX reads: “Out of Egypt I called hischildren”; Romans 10:15, where theLXX reads, “I am present as a seasonof beauty upon the mountains, as thefeet of one preaching glad tidings ofpeace, as one preaching good news”.See also: Romans 11:4; 1 Peter 4:8).

While some New Testament quo-tations show preference for theSeptuagint rendering, the variation inthese cases will be found to be veryslight, and not at all in sense (e.g.,Matthew 15:8,9 - Hebrew: ”...theirheart they have removed far from me,and their fearing of me has become aprecept of men, a thing taught”; Acts13:34 - Hebrew: “I will give you thesure mercies of David”, but the NewTestament Greek text actually quotesthe Septuagint here, as in the marginof our Authorised Version: ”[I will

give] to you…the holy things of David,the sure things”).

Furthermore, the purpose behindquoting the Septuagint Version is of-ten to bring out more clearly theintended meaning of the original (See:Romans 10:18, where the rendering“sound” is preferred to the Hebrew“line”, a somewhat obscure expres-sion, although as a “string” of amusical instrument, it clearly meansmuch the same thing).

“We do not find”, comments Dr.Roger Nicole, “any example of a NewTestament deduction or applicationlogically inferred from the Septuagintand which cannot be maintained onthe basis of the Hebrew text”. He con-cludes: “The use of the LXX in quotingdoes not indicate that the New Testa-ment writers have thought of thisversion as inspired in itself… Yet theirwillingness to make use of the LXX,in spite of its occasional defects,teaches the important lesson that thebasic message God purposed to de-liver can be conveyed even through atranslation, and that appeal can bemade to a version insofar as it agreeswith the original”.6

To return to our earlier point: theendorsement given by our Lord andHis apostles to the first-century He-brew text shows that text to have beenboth accurate and reliable.

As we have seen, God raised upscribes, or sopherim, to produce a re-markably pure text. It fell to othersto continue their work and take the

THE FAMOUS MASSORETES

10


necessary steps for the text’s preser-vation. These were the Massoretes, aname derived from the Hebrew word“Massorah” which means “tradition”.They were families of Jewish scholarsand textual critics who eventuallyopened academies, one at Tiberius (onthe coast of the sea of Galilee) andanother in Babylon (in the East). No-one knows exactly when theMassoretes first appeared. Some be-lieve they can be traced back to thefirst century AD. Others date their be-ginnings later, somewhere around 500AD. Whichever is correct, theMassoretes’ achievement is what re-ally matters.

Jerusalem had been destroyed inAD 70. As a result, the Jews were scat-tered throughout the variouscountries of the Roman Empire. TheMassoretes knew that these dispersedJews and their succeeding generationswould require copies of the HolyScriptures and they believed that cer-tain things could be done to ensure thepreservation of the pure Hebrew text.With this in mind, they collected vitalinformation about the text and laiddown detailed rules for the propercopying of it.

They introduced vowel-points(Hebrew has no vowels), fixed accents(to ensure correct pronunciation), ex-plained the meaning of words (whereambiguity existed), supplied marginalreadings (to remove obscurity), andmarked intended pauses (which oftenaffect the meaning). So meticulouswere they in their studies that theyeven counted the verses, words, andletters of the Old Testament, notingfor example, that Aleph occurs 42,377

times; Beth, 38,218 times; Gimel,29,537 times; and so on.

Copyists had to follow the Tal-mud’s strict rules, which included thefollowing: only the skins of clean ani-mals were to be used; each skin mustcontain the same number of columns;there were to be no less than forty-eight and no more than sixty lines;black ink was to be prepared accord-ing to a particular recipe; no word orletter was to be written from memory;if so much as a letter was omitted, orwrongly inserted, or even if one let-ter touched another, the sheet had tobe destroyed; three mistakes on a pagemeant the whole manuscript was con-demned; and revision of the copy hadto take place within 30 days, for oth-erwise it had to be rejected. Amanuscript surviving this processcould hardly be anything but amaz-ingly accurate.

The Massoretes’ purpose was topreserve the Old Testament fromevery kind of alteration; and it was tosecure that objective that they madetheir collection of detailed notes (theMassorah). The Jews called their fin-ished work “The Fence of the Law”.As a result of their labours, we pos-sess today a standard and traditionaltext.

The text from which our Author-ised Version was translated is calledthe Ben Chayyim Text (after Jacob benChayyim, under whose editorship itwas printed in 1524-5) and it is simi-lar to the Text of Ben Asher (who livedin the tenth century at Tiberius, in Pal-

A MASSORETIC TEXT

11


estine, and who, along with membersof his family, established an accurateedition of the Masssoretic Text). Thisis a faithful and dependable text.

Through God’s special providence,we are able confidently to say that inthe Hebrew Massoretic text we have atext which is very close to the HebrewOriginal.

Summing up, then, what were themeans God used to ensure the pres-ervation of His Word?

The first was the Jew’s profoundreverence for the Holy Scriptures. AJew would literally tremble before thewritten Word. According to Philo andJosephus, they would suffer any tor-ments, and even death itself, ratherthan change anything in the HolyScriptures. God used this reverencefor the text to prevent it from beingfalsified and corrupted.

Second, there were the solemncommands of the Scriptures, such asDeuteronomy 4:2: “Ye shall not addunto the word which I command you,neither shall ye diminish ought fromit”. These commands, issued with di-vine authority, instilled genuine fearinto men’s hearts.

Third, these scrolls were laid up inthe Holy of Holies. There being nomore sacred spot on earth, it placedthem beyond the reach of interferinghands.

Fourth, the sheer professionalism

of the scribes and Massoretes securedand preserved a pure text. They weregreat scholars, skilled in the divinelaw and revered as interpreters of theHoly Scriptures.

Fifth, there was the oversight ofprophets. Throughout the Old Testa-ment period, prophets exercised aunique ministry and they were wellable to superintend the copying work.Any error in transcription would havebeen quickly detected by them.

Sixth, the Jews constantly repeatedtheir Scriptures, as Deuteronomy 6:7clearly shows: “Thou shalt teach themdiligently unto thy children, and shalttalk of them when thou sittest inthine house, and when thou walkestby the way, and when thou liestdown, and when thou risest up”.These repetitions created such famili-arity with the text that if so much as aword had been altered, it would havebeen immediately noticed and, with-out doubt, strong and even vehementprotest would have been made.

Seventh, Christ and His apostlesconfirmed the Scriptures as they werereceived in their times. The standardtext used by them is the very same aswe use today. Their unhesitating ci-tation of it as God’s Word is anindisputable seal of its authenticityand reliability.

These and other considerationslead us to believe that God has won-derfully preserved the Old Testamenttext. When the Old Testament is read,according to the Massoretic text, wecan believe that we are reading andhearing the Word of God. Interesting

OLD TESTAMENTSUMMARY

12


as they may be, it is not for us to ac-cept peculiar renderings from the DeadSea Scrolls, from the Latin version, orfrom any other source.

God has preserved His Word. Thisis not to be understood as meaningthat, throughout history, God has per-formed repeated miracles, nor that Hehas “inspired” the various rabbis andscribes who worked on the text. Weconcede that the autographs havelong since perished and that some er-rors have crept into the copies nowavailable to us. Hence there is needfor textual criticism. The doctrine of“providential preservation” requirescareful definition. What exactly do wemean by it? Here, I would quote thewords of Professor John H. Skilton:“God who gave the Scriptures, whoworks all things after the counsel ofhis will, has exercised a remarkablecare over his Word, has preserved itin all ages in a state of essential pu-rity, and has enabled it to accomplishthe purpose for which he gave it”.7

The Hebrew text, then, was origi-nally given by Moses and theprophets; it was faithfully copied bythe scribes, standardized by Ezra alongwith the Men of the Great Synagogue,endorsed by our Lord and His apos-tles, and edited with meticulous careby the Massoretes. Orthodoxy re-quires that we boldly affirm our faithin the Old Testament as translatedfrom the Hebrew Massoretic text.

The Lord Jesus Christ ascribed in-spired authority to the Old TestamentScriptures (Matthew 5:18; 15:3; Mark

12:36; John 10:35). He also promisedthat, after His return to heaven, Hewould send the Spirit of God to com-municate further truth to His chosenservants and enable them to record it.This would provide the ChristianChurch with an infallible guide. “TheComforter ”, He said, “which is theHoly Ghost, whom the Father willsend in my name, he shall teach youall things, and bring all things to yourremembrance, whatsoever I have saidunto you” (John 14:26; cf. 16:12,13).

At first, there was only oral teach-ing. It soon became apparent, however,that Christian truth needed to be com-mitted to writing. For one thing, theapostles (the witnesses of our Lord inthe days of His flesh) were beginningto travel to distant lands and beforelong they would all be removed bydeath (2 Timothy 4:6; 2 Peter 1:14); foranother, the ever increasing numberof new converts and churches were inneed of regular, detailed, and compre-hensive instruction (Luke 1:3,4; Acts1:1); and for yet another, spurious andheretical writings, even then in circu-lation, were causing serious doctrinalconfusion (2 Thessalonians 2:1,2; 3:17).

The Holy Spirit, anticipating allthis, exerted His supernatural influ-ence on certain chosen men so thatthey wrote down what was infallibleand inerrant. Thus, at the end of hisGospel, John describes himself as “thedisciple which testifieth of thesethings, and wrote these things”, andadds, “we know that his testimony istrue” (John 21:24,25; cf. 1 Corinthians14:37; Galatians 1:20; Philippians 3:1;1 John 1:4; etc.).

The NThe NThe NThe NThe New Tew Tew Tew Tew Testestestestestamentamentamentamentament

13


Thus the New Testament Scrip-tures came into being. At first, theywere written in Greek which was thecommon language of the Roman Em-pire at the time when Christianitybegan. The writing was committed tospecially prepared materials: “papyrus”(a paper-like substance, made from thepith of the papyrus plant) and, later on,“parchment” (animal skin, called “vel-lum” when particularly fine in quality).In outward form, the documents wouldhave looked like scrolls (if papyrus) andbooks (if parchment or vellum). Thetechnical name for the latter is codices(the singular of which is codex).

As for the pens used, they wouldhave been reed or quill-pens (madefrom stalks or feathers) and the inkwould almost certainly have beenblack and carbon-based (preparedwith soot and mixed with gum). Later,in about the fifth century, a red me-tallic ink (prepared from gall-apples)was used, but this appears only to havebeen used for emphasis.

There are, of course, references in theNew Testament to “writing”, “paper (pa-pyrus) and ink”, and also to “books” and“parchments” (i.e. parchments of pre-pared skins). See: 2 Timothy 4:13; 2Corinthians 3:3; 2 John 12; and 3 John13. An interesting question now arises:What happened to these original docu-ments?

Immediately recognized by the earlyChristians as divinely authoritative (1

Corinthians 14:37), these texts were firstread by those to whom they were sent,whether individuals or churches, andthen they were circulated so that asmany as possible could benefit from theapostles’ teachings (1 Thessalonians5:27; Revelation 1:3; Colossians 4:16; 2Peter 3:15,16). Sadly, these originals (or“autographs”) could not have survivedlong, partly because they tended to be-come brittle and constant use sooncaused them to disintegrate, and partlybecause they were exposed to hazardsof both accident and persecution.

There may possibly be a reference tothe originals in a treatise dated about200 AD. Tertullian, one of the EarlyChurch Fathers, was responsible for atreatise entitled “The Prescriptionagainst Heretics” and, in the thirty-sixth chapter, he wrote: “Come now, youwho would indulge a bettercuriosity,…run over the apostolicchurches…in which their own authen-tic writings are read… Achaia is verynear you, (in which) you find Corinth.Since you are not far from Macedonia,you have Philippi; (and there too) youhave the Thessalonians. Since you areable to cross to Asia, you get Ephesus.Since, moreover, you are close uponItaly, you have Rome, from whichthere comes even into our own handsthe very authority (of apostles them-selves)”.8

Although denied by some scholars,it is affirmed by others that the refer-ence here is to the Greek originals.Tertullian, it is said, is urging his read-ers to visit those places where theoriginals are being kept and thus tosee for themselves the divine and sa-cred writings of the New Testament.9

CHRISTIANTRUTH WRITTEN DOWN

THE DIVINE ORIGINALS

14


Be that as it may, the apostles’ ownmanuscripts would almost certainlynot have lasted much beyond the year200 AD. Yet our Lord had intimatedthat the Christian Scriptures would bepreserved. “Heaven and earth shallpass away”, He said, “but my wordsshall not pass away” (Matthew 24:35;cf. 28:20; Mark 8:38; 1 Peter 1:23-25).Their preservation was ensured, ofcourse, by faithful and conscientiouscopying.

Even in apostolic times, copies ofNew Testament books were in thepossession both of individuals and ofchurches. Peter, at any rate, was fa-miliar with Paul’s epistle to theChristians living in Asia Minor(Galatians, Ephesians, or Colossians)and, indeed, he intimates quite clearlythat he was acquainted with “all[Paul’s] epistles” (2 Peter 3:15,16). TheColossian church was told that Paul’sletter to them was not to be regardedin any sense as their peculiar prop-erty, but it – almost certainly a copy –was to be “read also in the church ofthe Laodiceans”. The Colossians werefurther told, “ye likewise read theepistle” – again, probably a copy –“from Laodicea” (probably Ephesians;Colossians 4:16). Before long, therewere collections of these books. Chris-tian churches needed whole sets forreading in public worship.

This is indirectly confirmed by thewritings of the Apostolic Fathers in thesecond century. For brevity’s sake, ref-erence can be made to only one ofthem: Polycarp, a disciple of the apos-tle John. Writing to the Philippians,

he quotes extensively from the Gos-pels and the Epistles and thenexpresses his confidence that thePhilippians themselves are “wellversed in the Sacred Scriptures”.10 Bythis time, copies had certainly beenmade and the evidence suggests thatthey were widely circulated.

The first copies may have been madeby the apostles themselves. Paul, in hisRoman prison, requested that he bebrought “books, but especially theparchments” (2 Timothy 4:13). J.P.Lilley suggests that “the ‘parchments’may have been copies or portions of theScriptures or even of his own letters tothe Churches”.11 It is also supposed –and with some probability – that Johnprepared seven copies of his “Revela-tion” and sent one to each of the sevenchurches of Asia Minor (Revelation1:4-6; 2:1,8,18, etc).12

If the apostles themselves werenot always responsible for copying,then it is likely that the work was of-ten done by their secretaries. Weknow for certain that such were some-times employed to write books orletters (Romans 16:22; 1 Peter 5:12).Why should they not be seconded tothe work of copying?

“Scribes”, originally equivalent to“secretaries” (Ezra 4:8; Esther 3:12; Jer-emiah 8:8), had been promised to theChristian Church. “Behold,” said ourLord, “I send unto you prophets, andwise men, and scribes…”(Matthew23:34; cf. 13:52). We may suppose thatsuch were among Paul’s assistants.Indeed, the apostle makes reference to“Zenas the lawyer and Apollos” (Titus3:13).

ACCURATE COPYING

15


The copyists transcribed thesedocuments with scrupulous care.How can we be sure about this? Firstof all, these New Testament bookswere invested with the same sanctityas were the Old Testament Scriptures(I Timothy 5:18 which cites Luke 10:7,along with Deuteronomy 25:4, as“scripture”; and 2 Peter 3:16 whichplaces Paul’s epistles in the same cat-egory as “the other scriptures”). Second,nearly all the early copyists wouldhave been hired or converted Jewishscribes whose reverence for God’swritten Word compelled them tostudy perfect accuracy in transcription(Jeremiah 36:28; cf. Deuteronomy10:4). Third, the writings themselves,claiming to be the inspired and au-thoritative Word of God, issued mostsevere prohibitions against any kindof tampering with the holy text (1Corinthians 2:13; 2 Corinthians 2:17;Revelation 22:18,19). Fourth, knowingthat the apostles were still alive andactive, the early copyists would havebeen all the more careful to producemanuscripts of first-class quality.Fifth, and finally, if at first the task ofmaking copies was committed to theapostles’ fellow-workers who wereknown as “evangelists” (and accordingto Eusebius it was their responsibil-ity to “give [new converts] the bookof the divine Gospels”),13 it should beremembered that these men receivedthe miraculous gifts of the Holy Spiritand were therefore peculiarlyequipped to preserve the inspired text(2 Timothy 1:6, 4:5).

Furthermore, there is a divine fac-tor which must not be overlooked. InHis superintending and graciousprovidence, God evidently ensured

that the authentic text of the New Tes-tament was transmitted to futuregenerations.

Notwithstanding all this, errorsdid appear in some copies and, as morecopies were made, there began to ap-pear a number of variant readings.These are usually classified as (1) unin-tentional changes, and (2) intentionalchanges. The unintentional kind in-clude misspelt words, confusion ofletters, changes in the word-order, theuse of synonyms or verbal equivalents,and the omission or repetition of let-ters, words, lines, and even sections.By far the largest number of variantsare due to slips like these on the partof the scribes.

There are, however, intentionalchanges, by which we mean deliber-ate tampering with the sacred text,usually in the interests of a particulartheology or doctrine. Dionysius, aminister at Corinth, in a letter datedabout AD 168-170, deplores the factthat his own letters have been altered,and then adds: “It is not marvellous,therefore, if some have set themselvesto tamper with the Dominical Scrip-tures”.14 An unknown author(thought by some to be Hippolytus,but by others, Gaius) writes some-where around AD 230: “They (theheretics) laid hands fearlessly on thedivine Scriptures, saying that they hadcorrected them”.15 Who were the her-etics who dared to do such a thing?

Some are practically unknown, asAsclepiades, Theodotus, Hermophilus,and Apollonides, but others were well-

TEXTUAL VARIANTS

16


known as, for example, some of theearly Gnostics (who taught salvationthrough a secret knowledge):Basilides, Valentinus, and of courseMarcion, who accepted as canon onlyhis mutilated editions of Luke’s Gos-pel and ten of the Pauline epistles.“Marcion expressly and openly usedthe knife, not the pen, since he madesuch an excision of the Scriptures assuited his own subject-matter”.16

Orthodox teachers were fullyaware of these wicked alterations, ex-posing them both in their teachingsand in their writings. As a result,manuscripts considered faulty werenot generally used for copying pur-poses. Only those which faithfullypreserved the original became thestandard documents from which mul-tiplied copies were made.

Do we have any evidence, how-ever, for believing that this is indeedwhat happened?

Early Christian leaders certainlyclaimed ability to evaluate the variousmanuscripts and decide which werethe best and most accurate. For exam-ple, Irenaeus in his great work“Against Heresies” refers to “the mostapproved and ancient copies”.17 Thekind of criteria used to ascertain afaithful text would be such as the fol-lowing:

1. The identity of the copyist. If hewas an ordinary Christian man, his

copy would probably contain a numberof mistakes. If, on the other hand, hewas known to be an apostolic assistantor professional scribe, a very high de-gree of accuracy could be expected.

2. The nature of the manuscript fromwhich the copy was made. In earliesttimes this may have been the inspiredoriginal, but later it would certainlyhave been itself a copy. Now manycopies were what we call “private”copies: that is, such as were intendedfor personal and devotional use.Some, however, were “official” copiesfrom which Christian ministers readand preached in the services of publicworship. The latter would alwaysprove far more reliable than theformer. Copies made from thesewould share much of their reliability.

3. The number of copyings which hadalready taken place. A copy of theoriginal or one of the earliest copiesof the original would be far morelikely to provide a sound text than acopy with a long and rather compli-cated line of descent. Hence, theoldest copy was not always reckonedthe best, for it may have been copiedfrom another of the same period,whereas a later copy may have beencopied from a much earlier one, closeto the original.

4. The place where the copy wasfound. Churches themselves becamethe custodians of the pure Word ofGod (as was the case formerly withlocal synagogues); and if the copieddocument had been preserved in achurch, one could be reasonably cer-tain that it was a recognized, true andproper transcript.

REPRODUCINGTHE AUTHENTIC

NEW TESTAMENT TEXT

17


5. The general quality of the copy.Some copies are manifestly faulty.They are badly written and full of mis-takes of the most palpable character.Whoever produced them was eitherignorant or careless – or, of course,both. These would neither be re-garded nor used as trustworthywitnesses to the authentic New Tes-tament text. The carefully writtencopies, however, would inspire confi-dence and, as a result, they would bepainstakingly transcribed.

6. The agreement with other exist-ing copies. It would be a mistake toassume that a scribe had only one textbefore him. In the first two centuriesthere was a rapid multiplication ofcopies, so it was possible by compar-ing copies to detect odd readings and,in the same way, to ascertain what theinspired writers actually wrote. Theearly Christians were in a far betterposition to do this than we are. Afterall, they had access to manuscriptswhich have long since perished.

7. The close proximity to a well-known Christian centre. A copy madeat a distance from where apostles andtheir immediate successors had regu-larly ministered would be the mostlikely to have suffered some seriouschanges or alterations; but a copymade in an area of early church activ-ity would very probably be therepresentative of a pure textual tradi-tion.

Orthodox teachers of the first andsecond centuries may not always havehad access to the best manuscripts butthey appear to have known how toidentify “the approved and ancient

copies”. Every attempt was made toutilize their underlying text, with theresult that the overwhelming majority ofearly Greek manuscripts were in essen-tial agreement. We may thereforebelieve that the text of the majority rep-resented the Original with impressiveaccuracy.

According to one recent list, thetotal number of manuscripts of thewhole or a part of the New Testamentis 5,488.18 They are placed in the usualcategories:

1. Papyri.

According to the 1989 statistics,there are 96 of these catalogued.Nearly all are fragmentary, althoughoriginally they would have appearedin codex or book form. They havemainly been discovered in Egyptwhere the climate and sand havehelped to preserve them. When re-ferring to these fragments, scholarsuse the letter ‘P’ followed by a serialnumber: P1, P2, P3 and so on.

P52 (the so-called Rylands frag-ment) is reckoned the oldest. Itmeasures only 2 1/2 by 3 1/2 inches andcontains a few verses from the Gos-pel of John (18:31-33, 37-38). It is datedapproximately 125 AD.

Among the most important areP45, P46, and P47. Known as the Ches-ter Beatty Biblical papyri (after SirChester Beatty who acquired them in1930-1), these contain portions fromthe Gospels, the Pauline Epistles and

THE SURVIVING GREEKMANUSCRIPTS

18


the book of Revelation. Another im-portant collection is the BodmerLibrary collection (acquired by M.Martin Bodmer from 1956 onwards).This includes P66, pages and frag-ments from a codex of John’s Gospel,written around 200 AD; and P72, athird century copy – and thereforepossibly the earliest we have – of theEpistles of Peter and Jude.

2.Uncials.

There are 299 known uncials. Writ-ten from the beginning of the fourthcentury on parchment or vellum andin codex or book form, they are all inthe uncial script: that is, they are allwritten in capital letters with nopunctuation. The earlier ones are ac-tually designated by capital lettersalong with serial numbers beginningwith a zero (e.g., A-02). Later onessimply have the numbers (e.g., 046).

Among those in the British Mu-seum is Codex Alexandrinus, A-02.This was copied in Egypt in the firsthalf of the fifth century and, whencomplete, it contained the wholeGreek Bible along with one or twoapocryphal works. It now containspractically the whole of the Old Tes-tament and most of the New(omitting Matthew 1:1-25:6; John6:50-8:52; 2 Corinthians 4:13-12:7).The Patriarch of Alexandria presentedthis manuscript to Charles I in 1627.

Another codex which dates fromthe fifth century is Codex Bezae, D-05. In 1581, Theodore Beza, successorto John Calvin, presented this manu-script to Cambridge University whereit still remains. This codex has both

Greek and Latin texts (the left page inthe former, the right in the latter) andit contains most of the Gospels and theBook of Acts, together with a fewverses from 3 John.

The most famous of the uncials areCodex Sinaiticus, Aleph-01 (Alephbeing the first letter of the Hebrewalphabet), and Codex Vaticanus, B-03.

Codex Sinaiticus, dated in the mid-or late-fourth century, contains onlya part of the Old Testament but thewhole of the Greek New Testament.It is the only complete uncial manu-script of the New Testament extant.This Egyptian codex was written onvellum, with four columns of forty-eight lines on each page, but there areclear indications in the text itself thatit has several times been corrected. Inthe year 1844 Constantine Tischendorfdiscovered some of its leaves in awaste-paper basket in the library of St.Catherine’s monastery on Mount Si-nai. He had to wait until 1859,however, before he had sight of thewhole New Testament. After obtain-ing permission, he transferred it toCairo where he produced a copy of it;and in 1862, through the generosity ofAlexander II, the Russian Emperor, hepublished an edition of the manu-script with an Introduction andCritical Notes.

Codex Vaticanus may also be datedabout the middle of the fourth cen-tury and, like Aleph, it is written onfine vellum but with three columns tothe page, each consisting of forty-twolines. Once a complete Greek Bible, ithas long since lost portions of the OldTestament and several large sections

19


of the New Testament. Missing fromthis uncial are the Pastoral Epistles,Philemon, the conclusion of Hebrews(9:14 to the end), and the whole of thebook of Revelation. Various correctorshave been at work on the manuscriptand, in the tenth century, someonetraced over much of the original, fear-ing, it seems, that its letters mightotherwise fade away. Peculiarities inspelling suggest an Alexandrian ori-gin but no-one knows how it cameinto the Library of the Vatican inRome. The Library was founded in1448 by Pope Nicolas V and thismanuscript is listed in the earliestcatalogue, issued in 1475. SamuelTregelles tried to consult it in 1845 buthe was greatly hindered by its clericalcustodians. In 1866, Tischendorf wasgiven permission to study it for forty-two hours and, from his study andnotes, an edition of this manuscript –Codex B – was produced in 1867. Thiswas followed by an edition issued bythe Papal authorities and prepared byVercellone and Cozza in 1868; and,then, in 1889-90, a photographic fac-simile was made available to scholars.

3.Minuscules.

There are 2,812 of these. They arecalled minuscules because they arewritten not with capitals but withsmall letters (called minuscules orcursives). This style of writing hadbeen used for centuries in privatedocuments but it was not until theninth century that it was used for lit-erary purposes. With the demand forNew Testament books ever increasing,this script had the advantages of tak-ing less time to write and of occupyingless space on the parchment. For pur-

poses of identification, they are des-ignated by ordinary numbers (1,2,3and so on).

The minuscules, then, were writ-ten from the ninth century onwards;but their later date does not necessar-ily mean that they are less crediblewitnesses to the originals. Ninth cen-tury manuscripts may have beencopied from others of the third cen-tury. As Professor Warfield onceobserved, “It is not the mere numberof years that is behind any ms. thatmeasures its distance from the auto-graph, but the number of copyings”.19

These minuscules include the fol-lowing:

MS 1: a codex of the twelfth century,containing the whole of the New Tes-tament, apart from the book ofRevelation. MS 4: a twelfth centurycopy of the four Gospels. MS 12: aneleventh century copy of the Gospels.MS 21: from the tenth century but alsocontaining the Gospels. MS 43: aneleventh century work in two vol-umes, the first containing the Gospelsand the second, the Acts and the Epis-tles. MS 330: eleventh century,containing the Gospels, Acts, and Epis-tles. MS 565: a very fine ninth centurycopy of the Gospels, written in goldletters on purple vellum.

4.Lectionaries.

Totalling 2,281, these are texts fromas early as the sixth century, contain-ing the Gospels and Epistles(Evangeliaria and Apostoli) appointedto be read in the early Christianchurches. Most of them use uncial let-

20


ters but some are minuscules; and,once again, designation is by numbersbut this time prefixed with an ‘l’ orwith the abbreviation ‘Lect’ (e.g., l59or Lect. 1280).

These are important manuscripts,not only because some of them areearly, but also because they were usedfor reading in the public services of theChurch. The greatest care would havebeen taken over these church copies to pre-serve their original purity; and thetestimony of a lectionary would be, ineffect, the testimony of all the churches.Now, the surviving lectionaries whichhave been examined are found toagree to an amazing extent. The onlyreasonable explanation, surely, is thatthere was a recognized lectionary text.

A great number of Greek manu-scripts is therefore available to us,written from as early as the secondcentury. Scholars who have studiedthem maintain that, while there arevariants, certain manuscripts have agreat many readings in commonwhich suggests that there are groupsor families. The major text-types areas follows: (i) the Byzantine (some-times called the Traditional, Majority,or Antiochian text); (ii) theAlexandrian (or what some havecalled Neutral Text); (iii) the Western;and (iv) the Caesarean.

For the purposes of this article, thelast two text-types do not require de-tailed comment. It was B.H. Streeter,in The Four Gospels (1924), who firstclaimed to have found the Caesareantext. He believed that this was the text

of Mark’s Gospel which Origenquoted after 231 AD, the year in whichhe came to Caesarea. Modern textualcritics, however, doubt whether thiscan really be called a distinct text-type.They tend rather to think of it as amere mixture.

As for the Western text-type, iden-tified by B.F. Westcott and F.J.A. Hort,and thought to originate in WesternEurope, there would appear to be someevidence for its existence. It is repre-sented by Codex Bezae (fifth century),Codex Claromontanus (sixth century),and the Old Latin and CuretonianSyriac translations (third and fifth cen-turies respectively). It is also quoted bysome of the early Church Fathers, suchas Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Cyprian.However, this text-type is often radicallydifferent from all others. It is marredby a number of omissions, not only ofverses but also of whole passages. Itsprevailing tendency, however, is tomake additions, either by way of para-phrase or by the insertion of additionaldetails. In the Gospels (especially in thelatter part of Luke’s Gospel) it isshorter, while in the Acts it is a greatdeal longer (approximately 10%longer). Sir Frederic Kenyon describedit as “a type of text characterised by veryfree departures from the true tradi-tion”. Paucity of manuscript support,along with a multitude of distinctivereadings, renders this text-type atbest questionable, at worst wholly un-reliable.

This really leaves us with two ma-jor groups of texts: the Byzantine andthe Alexandrian.

CLASSIFICATION

21


A. The Byzantine Text-type

This text receives its name fromthe fact that it was early associatedwith the imperial capital of Constan-tinople, formerly called Byzantium,and also from the fact that it becamethe standard text of the ChristianChurch throughout the Byzantineperiod, 312-1453 AD (and actually longafter that). Prior to its enthronementin the Eastern capital, however, thisform of text had been preserved inAntioch, capital of the Roman prov-ince of Syria. Christian teachersconnected with the church thereclearly used it. These include Basil ofCaesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, Gregoryof Nazianzus (the Cappadocian Fa-thers), Theodoret of Cyrus, andChrysostom of Constantinople (whomoved from Antioch to become bishopof Constantinople in 398 AD).

The Byzantine text-type has over-whelming support from the Greekmanuscripts.

In the early papyri there is an im-pressive number of distinctivelyByzantine readings. P45 and P46 ofthe Chester Beatty Papyri contain suchreadings, as does P66 of the BodmerLibrary collection. Professor H. A.Sturz was able to list 150 Byzantinereadings with early papyri support.20 Thisplainly shows that, contrary to theviews of earlier textual critics, the Byz-antine readings can be traced as farback as the second century.

Among the Uncials, this text isfound in the fifth century CodicesAlexandrinus (A-02; Byzantine in theGospels), and Ephraemi (C-01), and in

practically all the later ones. It is esti-mated that approximately 95% of theUncial manuscripts have a Byzantinetype of text. Even more can be claimedfor the Minuscules, since nearly all ofthese are Byzantine in their readings.

The Lectionaries thus far examinedalso give support to the Byzantinetext-type.

1. Supported by the early Versions

These were the early translationsof the New Testament Scriptures, pre-pared to help spread the ChristianFaith among the peoples of the world.Among the earliest known to us arethe Syriac (or Aramaic) and Latin Ver-sions which go back to the mid-secondcentury. The Peshitta, “Queen of Ver-sions”, is one of the early Syriactranslations and it certainly containsByzantine readings. This is also trueof the Gothic version of the fourth cen-tury, said to be translated by Ufilas,bishop of Antioch.

2. Confirmed by the early Fathers

Critics who deny the primacy ofthe Byzantine text, preferring to viewit as a fourth century revision, oftenrefer to the fact no Early Church Fa-ther before Chrysostom (347-407 AD)appears even to refer to it, let alonequote from it. Now this is simply nottrue. Painstaking scholarly researchhas shown that Justin Martyr (100-165AD), Irenaeus (130-200 AD), Clementof Alexandria (150-215 AD), Tertullian(160-220 AD), Hippolytus (170-236AD), and even Origen (185-254 AD)quote repeatedly from the Byzantinetext. Edward Miller, after classifying

22


the citations in the Greek and LatinFathers who died before 400 AD,found that their quotations supportedthe Byzantine text 2,630 times (andother texts only 1,753 times). Further-more, subjecting thirty importantpassages to examination, he found 530testimonies to the Byzantine text (andonly 170 in favour of its opponents).This was his conclusion: “The originalpredominance of the Traditional Textis shewn in the list of the earliest Fa-thers. Their record proves that intheir writings, and so in the Churchgenerally, corruption had made itselffelt in the earliest times, but that thepure waters generally prevailed…The tradition is also carried onthrough the majority of the Fatherswho succeeded them. There is nobreak or interval: the witness is con-tinuous”.21

The plain fact of the matter is thatby the fourth century the Byzantinetext was emerging as the authoritativetext of the New Testament and for thenext twelve hundred years (and more)it held undisputed sway over thewhole of Christendom.

The Greek New Testament wasfirst printed in 1514, although notpublished in a separate edition until1522. This was the work of FranciscoXimenes, Cardinal Primate of Spain,and it formed part of his six-volumeComplutensian Polyglot. In his Dedi-cation to Pope Leo X, Ximenes wrote:“For Greek copies indeed we are in-debted to your Holiness, who sent usmost kindly from the Apostolic Li-

brary very ancient codices, both of theOld and New Testament; which haveaided us very much in this undertak-ing”. The resultant Greek text appearsto be have been of the Byzantine type(and there is no evidence that Ximenesever followed the Codex Vaticanus[B]).

In 1516, when Desiderius Erasmus,the foremost scholar in Europe, pub-lished the first edition of the GreekNew Testament, he based it on repre-sentative Byzantine manuscripts.Erasmus issued four further editionsof his work, in 1519, 1522, 1527, and1535. Others soon followed in hisfootsteps: most notably, RobertEstienne (Latinized as Stephanus), theFrench editor and printer, whose pub-lished text in 1546 was practicallyidentical with that of Erasmus. Therewere three subsequent editions in1549, 1550, and 1551. Still further edi-tions were edited and published byTheodore Beza between 1565 and 1604.Then, in 1624, Bonaventure andAbraham Elzevir issued their edition.The Preface to the Elzevirs’ second edi-tion, published in 1633, contains thewords: “Therefore you have a textnow received by all, in which we giveno alteration or corruption”. Fromthis came the now familiar name “TheReceived Text”.

The Byzantine text was the under-lying text of all the great EnglishProtestant Bibles, including those asso-ciated with the names of WilliamTyndale (1525), Miles Coverdale(1535), John Rogers (1537), and Rich-ard Taverner (1539), as well as thoseknown as The Great Bible (1539), TheGeneva Bible (1560), The Bishops’ Bi-

3. The PrintedGreek New Testament

23


ble (1568), and, of course, the Author-ized Version (1611); and the Reina inSpanish, the Karoli in Hungarian, theLuther in German, the Olivetan inFrench, the Statenvertaling in Dutch,the Almeida in Portuguese and theDiodati in Italian.

Summing up here, the argumentsin favour of the Byzantine text are asfollows:

1. This text-type is associated withthe city of Antioch in Syria. AfterStephen’s death, Christians from Je-rusalem fled to this city and began topreach the Gospel to the Greeks there(Acts 11:19,20). A strong church cameinto being, largely through the min-istries of Barnabas and Paul (11:22-26),and from this church the apostlestarted on each of his missionary jour-neys (Acts 13:1-3, 15:35,36, 18:22,23).Other apostles visited the place, in-cluding the apostle Peter (Galatians2:11,12). It was not long beforeAntioch became the mother city ofGentile churches and, after the fall ofJerusalem in 70 AD, it became the trueundisputed centre of Christianity. Atext proceeding from Antioch wouldbe the text approved by the apostlesand the early Christian Church.

2. As has already been observed,this text received its name from Con-stantinople (Byzantium), the capital ofthe Eastern Empire, because it soonbecame established there as the stand-ard Greek text. Constantinople wasthe centre both of the Greek-speakingworld and of the Greek-speakingChurch, for whereas in the West,Greek had given way to Latin, in theEast, it had remained the official and

common language. This meant, ofcourse, that Greek scholars in Constan-tinople were peculiarly fitted to recognizeand reproduce the authentic text.

3. During the fourth century whenthis text became supreme, the Church wasblessed with exceptional scholars such asMethodius (AD 260-312), Athanasius(296-373), Hilary of Poitiers (315-67),Cyril of Jerusalem (315-386), andGregory of Nazianzen (330-394).These men – and others like them –were involved in formularizing ortho-dox doctrine and ratifying the canon ofthe New Testament. They also devotedthemselves to the study of the text; andthey had an advantage over later criticson account of their access to many earlyand invaluable manuscripts which longsince have perished. The emergence ofa predominant text from this period ishighly significant. It was obviously con-sidered the genuine, uncorrupted, andauthorised text.

4. The Jews were appointed theguardians of the divine revelationsimparted to them and, in fulfilmentof the trust reposed in them, theycarefully preserved the Old Testamenttext uncorrupted and entire (the He-brew Massoretic text). As the apostlePaul has observed, “unto them werecommitted the oracles of God” (Romans3:2). Now it is reasonable to supposethat the New Testament Scriptures werecommitted to professing Christians, or tothe professing Christian Church. Thequestion which naturally arises is:Which text-type, generally speaking,has been recognized and propagated bythe Church from earliest times? The an-swer is: the text-type known asByzantine.

24


5. The fact is that approximately 90%of the Greek manuscripts represent theByzantine text-type. Although thesemanuscripts are not as early as somecritics would have liked, they are sonumerous that we must assume thatthere were literally hundreds of olderparent-documents, many of whichbelonged to earliest Christian times.Somehow this fact has to be ex-plained; and it is not at all satisfactoryto persist in arguing – against mount-ing evidence – that the Byzantine textdoes not appear in history until thefourth century. This text is early. Itbecame widespread because it faith-fully represented the original.

6. Providential care has always beenexercised towards God’s Truth, becausebelievers have needed that Truth in an ac-curate and correct form (Matthew 24:35;1 Peter 1:23,25). Hence, the Wordgiven by inspiration has been the sameas that subsequently published(Psalm 68:11). It is inconceivable thatGod would give a totally corrupt andmutilated text to His people and thenallow that text to be used by them forover eighteen centuries. Yet that is ex-actly what some modern textualcritics would have us believe! “Let itbe remembered”, writes Dr. Owen,“that the vulgar copy we use (The Re-ceived Text) was the public possessionof many generations…; let that, then,pass for the standard, which is con-fessedly its right and due, and weshall, God assisting, quickly see howlittle reason there is to pretend suchvarieties of readings as we are nowsurprised withal”.22

7. It is reasonable to suppose thatGod acted similarly with respect to the

texts of the Old and New Testaments. Hismethod with the Old Testament wasto preserve the text, in a practicallyunaltered form, through many gen-erations. The result – as Christ andHis apostles clearly taught – was aBook in which every letter and partof a letter was sacred (Matthew 5:18;cf. John 10:35). When this ancient rev-elation was supplemented, Godproceeded in the same way: He infal-libly recorded His latest Word, placedit in the possession of His Church, andthen ensured that it was passed on throughsucceeding centuries, even to this presenttime. “The word of the Lord…livethand abideth for ever” (1 Peter 1:25).

B. The Alexandrian Text-type

This is a very small group of manu-scripts. Peculiarities of spelling showthat they are to be associated with Al-exandria in Egypt; and, notsurprisingly, readings from this typeof text are to be found among the earlyEgyptian papyri (e.g., P46, P47). Itschief representatives, however, areCodex Sinaiticus (or Codex Aleph)and Codex Vaticanus (or Codex B).

Support for this text-type comesfrom the Alexandrian Fathers, mostnotably from Origen (AD 185-254)and Cyril (376-444).

Several things should be observedhere:

1. This text-type originated from Al-exandria, in Egypt. Scripture gives noindication that there was ever an ap-ostolic presence in those parts, butchurch history reveals that many no-torious heretics lived and taught there

25


including such Gnostics as Basilides,Isidore, and Valentinus. Anythingproceeding from this place must beregarded with some suspicion.

2. There is clear evidence of revisionby its rearrangement of words. B.H.Streeter suggested that the editor wasan Egyptian bishop calledHesychius.23 This means that al-though great claims are made for it,this text-type cannot be regarded assingularly “pure”.

3. The two great representatives ofthis text-type, Codices Aleph(Sinaiticus) and B (Vaticanus) are ex-ceedingly poor in quality. When examinedby Dr. F.H.A. Scrivener, Codex Alephwas declared to be “roughly written”and “full of gross transcriptural blun-ders” such as “leaving out whole linesof the original”. Codex B, although “lessfaulty”, was found to be “liable to err”committing “errors of the most palpa-ble character”.24

4. These principal manuscripts showtheir corruptions by disagreeing withthemselves in literally thousands of places(3,000 times in the Gospels alone).

5. The text attested by Aleph(Sinaiticus) and B (Vaticanus) is at vari-ance with the overwhelming majority of theGreek manuscripts. Not only is it con-fined to a very small family ofmanuscripts, but it has been estimatedthat there are somewhere in the re-gion of 6,000 differences between theAlexandrian and Byzantine texts.

6. It is true that there is severe lossof text in B (Vaticanus), but consider-ing their age (mid- or late-fourth

century), these two uncials are in re-markably fine condition. Since mostaccurate manuscripts of this age per-ished through reason of use, it may besupposed that these were rejected asflawed and therefore were not used bythe early church.

7. Supporting this conclusion is thefact that very few copies indeed weremade from them. As stated by Dr.Gordon Clark, “If a score or twomanuscripts have a single ancestor, itimplies that a score or two copyistsbelieved that ancestor to be faithful tothe autographs. But if a manuscripthas not a numerous progeny, as is thecase with B’s ancestor, one may sus-pect that the early scribes doubted itsvalue. Possibly the early orthodoxChristians knew that B was corrupt.”25

In the last century, two Cambridgescholars, B.F. Westcott and F.J.A. Hort,elaborated a radical new theory aboutthe early transmission of the New Tes-tament text. They argued that the besttext was actually the Alexandrian(which they called the “Neutral Text”)represented by Aleph and B. Sincethose two manuscripts were slightlyearlier than others, they claimed thattheir common ancestor was close tothe inspired original. While absolutepurity was not ascribed to this text,Westcott and Hort were prepared tosay, “It is our belief (1) the readings ofAleph B should be accepted as the truereadings until strong internal evi-dence is found to the contrary, and (2)that no readings of Aleph B can safelybe rejected absolutely, though it is

CRITICS ATTACK THEBYZANTINE TEXT

26


sometimes right to place them only onan alternative footing, especiallywhere they receive no support fromVersions or Fathers”.26

The Byzantine text (called the “Syr-ian Text”) contained, as they thought,“conflate readings”, i.e., combinationsof earlier readings; and they believedthey originated in a two-stage revi-sion produced at or near Antioch inthe fourth century. Admitting this tobe only “supposition”, they advancedthe view that “the growing diversityand confusion of Greek texts led to anauthoritative revision at Antioch” andlater “to a second authoritative revi-sion”. The whole process, accordingto them, was completed by 350 AD;and they even put forward the sug-gestion that Lucian of Antioch(martyred in 312) may have been in-volved in the earlier revision.

The theory is seriously flawed. Al-though critics and versions still referto “the oldest and best manuscripts”,the phrase is altogether misleadingbecause, in this particular debate, the“oldest” are in fact the “worst”. As for“conflate readings” in the Byzantinetext, convincing evidence in supportof them has never been produced(even after twenty-eight years ofstudy Westcott and Hort could pro-duce only eight examples). Anyway,long readings do not prove a later in-terference with the text. ProfessorSturz has shown that some of thesereadings are supported by the earli-est papyri (the longer readings of John10:19 and 10:31, for example, are sup-ported by P66).27 This leads to theconclusion that the fault lies with theAlexandrian text. It stands accused of

shortening the Byzantine text. Whatthen of the so-called “LucianicRecension”? There is no evidence thatit ever took place.

Westcott and Hort set about thetask of preparing a revised Greek text.It so happens that they were also mem-bers of the committee, appointed bythe Convocation of Canterbury in1880, to prepare a revised edition ofthe English Bible. Although theirGreek text was not yet published, aproof copy was made available to therevisers; and when in 1881 the NewTestament of the Revised Version ap-peared, it was immediately apparentthat Westcott and Hort’s Greek texthad not only greatly influenced thecommittee but that it had also beengenerally followed in the Revised Ver-sion of the English New Testament.

This Westcott/Hort Text was the fore-runner of what is known today as theNestle/Aland (United Bible Societies)Text, which has usurped the place of theByzantine or Traditional Text and subse-quently formed the basis for practically allmodern versions. The New Interna-tional Version, for example, whileclaiming in its preface to follow an ‘ec-lectic’ Greek text (i.e., one compiledfrom a variety of manuscripts), pro-ceeds at once to inform the reader that“where existing manuscripts differ,the translators made their choice ofreadings according to the acceptedprinciples of New Testament textualcriticism”. Adoption of fundamen-tally flawed ‘principles’ has meantthat the resultant text is very similarto the one produced in 1881 byWestcott and Hort.

27


During the Reformation and Puri-tan periods, a number of Protestantversions appeared, all based on thesame authentic texts and translatedaccording to the same valid principles.

In 1611, the Authorised Versionwas published and it was destined tosupersede all its rivals. Like the ear-lier English versions – and versions ofthe same era in other languages – thisused the providentially preservedHebrew Massoretic Text and Greek Re-ceived Text (from the Byzantinefamily). The translators, justly famedfor their godliness and scholarship,carried out their work with meticu-

THE AUTHORISEDVERSION

lous care. As a result, they produceda most faithful and accurate transla-tion, still unrivalled in its majesticstyle, simplicity, and power. Indeed,such is this version’s intrinsic worththat it has been called “the most ex-cellent book in our language”.

Modern versions come and theygo, for which we are thankful. Thisversion maintains its reputation, evenagainst keen competitors like The NewKing James Version.

The Authorised Version, proventhrough the centuries and greatlyloved by the Lord’s people, is a trulynoble production and it remains thebest English translation of God’s in-fallible and inerrant Word.

Malcolm Watts, a member of the General Commit-

tee of the Trinitarian Bible Society, was born in 1946

in Barnstaple, North Devon, England. Brought up in

a Christian home, he was called by grace in his teen-

age years and, subsequently, called into the ministry.

He trained at London Bible College between 1967-

70, and since 1971 has been the minister of Emmanuel

Church, Salisbury. He and Gillian were wed in 1976,

and they have two daughters, Lydia and Naomi.

28


Gregory comments: “No one will imagine…thatonly those letters and not the book of Revelationwere to be sent to the churches, for that verse (Rev-elation 1:11) says that John is to write in the bookwhat he sees, that is to say the visions which follow,and send it to the churches” (p. 310).

13 The Ecclesiastical History and Martyrs of Pales-tine, Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, book 3, chap.37. (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowl-edge, 1928).

14 Ibid., book 4, chap. 23.

15 Ibid., book 5, chap. 28.

16 Tertullian, chap. 38, 3:262.

17 The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Irenaeus, Irenaeus againstHeresies, book 5, chap. 30, sect. 1, 1:558.

18 Kurt and Barbara Aland, The Text of the New Testa-ment: an Introduction to the Critical Editions and to theTheory and Practice of Modern Textual Criticism, 2nded, 1989. Cited by Bruce M. Metzger in The Text ofthe New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, andRestoration, third, enlarged edition (Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press, 1992), p. 262.

19 Benjamin B. Warfield, An Introduction to the Tex-tual Criticism of the New Testament (London: Hodderand Stoughton, 1886), pp. 110, 111.

20 Harry A. Sturz, The Byzantine Text-Type and NewTestament Textual Criticism (Nashville, TN: ThomasNelson Publishers, 1984), pp. 61ff, 145ff.

21 Edward Miller in “The Antiquity of the TraditionalText”, in John William Burgon, The Traditional Text ofthe Holy Gospels Vindicated and Established (London:George Bell and Sons, 1896), p. 121.

22 John Owen, “Of the Integrity and Purity of theHebrew and Greek Text of the Scripture”, in TheWorks of John Owen (London: The Banner of TruthTrust, 1968), 16:366.

23 B.H. Streeter, The Four Gospels: A Study of Origins,revised from the 1924 edition (London: Macmillan& Co. Ltd, 1956), pp. 112ff, 121ff.

24 F.H.A. Scrivener, Six Lectures on the Text of the NewTestament and the Ancient Manuscripts (Cambridge:Deighton, Bell, and Co., 1875), pp. 41, 43.

25 Gordon H. Clark, Logical Criticisms of Textual Criti-cism (Jefferson, MD: The Trinity Foundation, 1986),p. 15.

26 B.F. Westcott and F.J.A. Hort, Introduction to theNew Testament in the Original Greek (Massachusetts:Hendrickson Publishers, 1988. Originally publishedby Harper and Brothers, New York, 1882), p. 225.

27 Sturz, p. 84.

1 James Bannerman, Inspiration: the Infallible Truthand Divine Authority of the Holy Scriptures (Edin-burgh: T & T Clark, 1865), p. 158.

2 Louis Gaussen, Divine Inspiration of the Bible (GrandRapids: Kregel Publications, 1971. Published in Ed-inburgh in 1842 under the title, Theopneustia: TheBible, its Divine Origin and Entire Inspiration, Deducedfrom Internal Evidence and the Testimonies of Nature,History, and Science), p. 34.

3 This was the view of the older commentators,Piscator, Poole, Clarke, Gill, and others. More re-cently, it has been maintained by Dr. Greg L. Bahnsenin “The Inerrancy of the Autographa”, a chapter in-cluded in the symposium entitled Inerrancy, editedby Dr. Norman L. Geisler (Grand Rapids: ZondervanPublishing House, 1980), p. 167.

4 William Henry Green, General Introduction to theOld Testament: The Canon (London: John Murray,1899), p. 11.

5 Further information on the state of the text at thisperiod may be found in John H. Skilton, “The Trans-mission of the Scriptures”, in The Infallible Word, aSymposium by the Members of the Faculty of Westmin-ster Theological Seminary, third revised printing(Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed Publish-ing Company, 1967) pp. 153ff. See also ThomasHartwell Horne, An Introduction to the Critical Studyand Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, seventh edi-tion, (London: T. Cadell, 1834), 2:34.

6 Roger Nicole, “New Testament Use of the Old Tes-tament”, in Revelation and the Bible, Carl F.H. Henry,ed. (London: The Tyndale Press, 1959), pp. 142-43.See also the comments by Walter C. Kaiser Jnr, TheUses of the Old Testament in the New (Chicago: MoodyPress, 1985), pp. 4ff.

7 Skilton, p. 143.

8 The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Tertullian, On Prescrip-tion against Heretics, chap. 36 (Grand Rapids: WilliamEerdmans Publishing Company, 1979), 3:260.

9 Dr A. Cleveland Coxe, who edited Tertullian’sworks for the original Edinburgh edition, concedesin a footnote that the “much disputed phrase (‘theirown authentic writings’) may refer to the autographsor the Greek originals”. However, he thinks that“probably” the reference is to “full unmutilated cop-ies”. Edward Miller (who edited several of DeanBurgon’s works), appears to have believed thatTertullian was alluding to the original manuscripts.He wrote: “Tertullian, in arguing with heretics, bidsthem consult the autographs of the Apostles at Cor-inth, or Thessalonica, or Ephesus, or Rome, wherethey are preserved and read in public” (A Guide tothe Textual Criticism of the New Testament [London:George Bell and Sons, 1886], p. 72).

10 The Ante-Nicene Fathers, Polycarp, The Epistle ofPolycarp to the Philippians, chap. 12, 1:35.

11 J.P. Lilley, The Pastoral Epistles (Edinburgh: T & TClark, 1901), p. 216.

12 Caspar Rene Gregory, Canon and Text of the NewTestament (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1907), p. 309. Dr

Endnotes

Documents

28-1