Chronology of Printed GNTs: 1500 - 1600

This is the first part of a series that deals with the history of printed texts of the New Testament. Consider if you will the following diagram:

Click to Enlarge

1500 - 1600 (16th century)

The 16th century was the beginning of printed critical Greek New Testaments, because even the very first, that of Erasmus, was made by the careful collation of as many manuscripts as could be readily available, and both critical judgement and comparison with the standard Latin text was used. The first three editors/printers of the Greek NT laid the foundation for the Great Protestant translations which quickly followed.

Erasmus (1516-22): The first printed Greek NT, with a fresh translation into Latin from it in parallel columns. Although he only had a half-dozen MSS available later, he must have also accessed various MSS while in England preparing his new translation (1505-6). It is estimated that he consulted about a dozen MSS, mostly later Byzantine copies, as well as the Latin Vulgate. Even at this early time, Erasmus was aware of the issues surrounding the four most serious variants,

(1) Mark's Ending: Mk 16:9-20,
(2) Pericope de Adultera: Jn 7:53-8:11,
(3) The Johannine Comma: 1st Jn 5:7, and
(4) The Great Mystery: 1st Tim 3:16.

In fact, Erasmus had left out the Johannine Comma in the first 2 printings. He also discussed variants like The Lord's Prayer (Matth 6:13), The Rich Young Man (Matt. 19:17-22), The Angelic Song (Lk 2:14), and The Bloody Sweat (Lk 22:43-44). It is said that copies of Revelation available to him at Basel lacked the final verses, and so he back-translated those from the Latin Vulgate, but Hoskier doubts this, and thinks he followed Codex 141.

Erasmus on several occasions preferred the Latin Vulgate reading, where the Byzantine texts seemed deficient, the most important being:

(1) Matt. 10:8 'raise the dead', as in א B C D 1, Latin Vulg.
(2) Matt 27:35 'that it might be fulfilled..' - MS 1, Caes. MSS, Syr-Hark., OL/Vulg. Euseb.
(3) John 3:25 '...the Jews about purification' - MS 1, P66, א , Caes. MSS, OL/Vulg.
(4) Acts 8:37, - MS F, Iren. Cypr. OL/Vulg.
(5) Acts 9:5,6 - MS E, 431, OL/Vulg.
(6) Acts 20:28 'Church of God' - Vulgate, א B etc.
(7) Rom 16:25 - placed at end of chapt 16 as in א B C D etc.
(8) Rev 22:19 - 'book' MS F, Vulgate, Boh. Ambrose, Prim. Haym.

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Robert Stephanus, 'Estienne', (1550): The third and most important of R. Stephanus’ editions, known as the Editio Regia, substantially based on the final lifetime recension of Erasmus. A collation against the first edition of Stephanus, 1546, reveals that in 38 passages the editor here rejected the Complutensian reading in favor of that if Erasmus, whereas the converse occurs only twice. This edition is the important 1550 printing in Paris by Estienne (Robert Stephanus) of the Greek NT, based on the final lifetime edition of Erasmus of Rotterdam. This was this printing that Stephanus used to divide the text into numbered verses which he first put into print in the 1551 edition. These two Stephanus printings (1550, 1551) were utilized by the translators of the New Testament for the 1611 King James Bible and became cited as the fundament of the 1633 “Textus Receptus” Greek New Testament printed by the Elzeviers in Amsterdam (DM 4679) – “Est haec ipsa editio ex qua derivatur quem nostri textum receptum vulgo vocant, nomine rei minus bene aptato”.

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Theodore Beza (1565, 1582): - was a French Protestant Christian theologian and scholar who played an important role in the early Reformation. A member of the monarchomaque movement who opposed absolute monarchy, he was a disciple of John Calvin and lived most of his life in Switzerland.

In 1565 he issued an edition of the Greek New Testament, accompanied in parallel columns by the text of the Vulgate and a translation of his own (already published as early as 1556). Annotations were added, also previously published, but now he greatly enriched and enlarged them.

In the preparation of this edition of the Greek text, but much more in the preparation of the second edition which he brought out in 1582, Beza may have availed himself of the help of two very valuable manuscripts. One is known as the Codex Bezae or Cantabrigensis, and was later presented by Beza to the University of Cambridge; the second is the Codex Claromontanus, which Beza had found in Clermont (now in the National Library at Paris).

It was not, however, to these sources that Beza was chiefly indebted, but rather to the previous edition of the eminent Robert Estienne (1550), itself based in great measure upon one of the later editions of Erasmus. Beza's labors in this direction were exceedingly helpful to those who came after.

"Beza’s name will ever be most honorably associated with biblical learning. Indeed, to many students his services in this department will constitute his only claim to notice. Every one who knows anything of the uncial manuscripts of the Greek New Testament has heard of the Codex Bezae, or of the history of the printed text of the New Testament has heard of Beza’s editions and of his Latin translation with notes. The Codex Bezae, known as D in the list of the uncials, also as Codex Cantabrigiensis, is a manuscript of the Gospels and Acts, originally also of the Catholic Epistles, dating from the sixth century.1310 Its transcriber would seem to have been a Gaul, ignorant of Greek. Beza procured it from the monastery of St. Irenaeus, at Lyons, when the city was sacked by Des Adrets, in 1562, but did not use it in his edition of the Greek Testament, because it departed so widely from the other manuscripts, which departures are often supported by the ancient Latin and Syriac versions. He presented it to the University of Cambridge in 1581, and it is now shown in the library among the great treasures.

Beza was also the possessor of an uncial manuscript of the Pauline Epistles, also dating from the sixth century. How he got hold of it is unknown. He merely says (Preface to his 3d ed. of the N. T., 1582) that it had been found at Clermont, near Beauvais, France. It may have been another fortune of war. After his death it was sold, and ultimately came into the Royal (now the National) Library in Paris, and there it is preserved.1311 Beza made some use of it. Both these manuscripts were accompanied by a Latin version of extreme antiquity.

Among the eminent editors of the Greek New Testament, Beza deserves prominent mention. He put forth four folio editions of Stephen’s Greek text; viz. 1565, 1582, 1589, with a Latin version, the Latin Vulgate, and Annotations. He issued also several octavo editions with his Latin version, and brief marginal notes (1565, 1567, 1580, 1590, 1604).1312

What especially interests the English Bible student is the close connection he had with the Authorized Version. Not only were his editions in the hands of King James’ revisers, but his Latin version with its notes was constantly used by them. He had already influenced the authors of the Genevan version (1557 and 1560), as was of course inevitable, and this version influenced the Authorized. As Beza was undoubtedly the best Continental exegete of the closing part of the sixteenth century, this influence of his Latin version and notes was on the whole beneficial. But then it must be confessed that he was also responsible for many errors of reading and rendering in the Authorized Version." *

* Ezra Abbot, the biblical textual critic, at Dr. Schaff’s request, made a very careful collation of the different editions of Beza with the Authorized Version, and found that "the Authorized Version agrees with Beza’s text of 1589 against Stephen’s of 1550 in about 90 places; with Stephen’s against Beza in about 40; and in from thirty to forty places, in most of which the variations are of a trivial character, it differs from both." - Schaff: The Revision of the English Version of the New Testament, New York, 1873 (Introd. p. xxviii). Cf. Farrar, History of Interpretation, p. 342, note 3.

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mr.scrivener

The Sabotage of the Christian O.T.: (1550-1700) The Hebrew text

We noted that the sabotage of the Christian O.T. began with Martin Luther, adopting the medieval Hebrew text taken from European Jews, in a misguided and botched attempt to convert them to Christianity.

This competition between the Greek O.T. used by the early Christians (later to be translated into Latin) and the Hebrew texts preferred by Jews really began in the 1st and 2nd centuries A.D., when Christians (many of whom were Jews) were actively engaged in debating with Jews and establishing their own legitimacy.   But that initial confrontation went nowhere, and Christians and Jews each went their own way, with the Jews rejecting as "cursed" the ancient (pre-Christian)  translation into Greek which was originally viewed as "blessed".   At first, several Jewish scholars tried to publish new Greek translations, but this also went nowhere, as the early Church stuck to the now traditional Greek O.T. text of the Septuagint (LXX).

The Reformation however, offered a new opportunity for Jews to 'correct' the Christian text, and they lost no time in providing help with both the Hebrew text and its translation.

Medieval Hebrew Scroll

Jews suffering from persecution by the Roman Catholic Church and previous European governments were initially open to assisting the Reformers like Luther in securing their own independent O.T., more in conformity with their own texts (and interpretations).   So in Protestant jurisdictions, many Jewish scholars began to help the Reformers translate directly from Jewish copies into their local languages.

The naive position the Reformers put themselves in became rather apparent by the end of the 19th century, and many Protestants wanted to see some correction of this undesirable alliance.   The situation as to the English O.T. was described succinctly in the Dictionary of the Bible, (Ezra Abbot, Hackett, Smith, NY, 1872) vol. 4, p. 3441:

"Still less had been done at the commencement of the 17th century for the text of the O.T.  The Jewish teachers, from whom Protestant divines derived their knowledge, had given currency to the belief that in the Massoretic text were contained the ipisisima verba, of Revelation, free from all risks of error, from all casualties of transcription.   The conventional phrases, "the authentic Hebrew", "the Hebrew verity", were the expression of this undiscerning reverence. ¹  They refused to apply the same rules of judgement here which they applied to the text of the N.T.   They assumed that the Masoretes were infallible, and were reluctant to acknowledge that there had been any variations since.  Even Walton did not escape being attacked as unsound by the great Puritan divine, Dr. John Owen, for having called attention to the fact of discrepancies (Proleg. cap vi.).   The materials for a revised text are, of course scantier than with the N.T.; but the labors of Kennicott, De Rossi, J H. Michaelis, and Davidson have not been fruitless, and here, as there, the older versions must be admitted as at least evidence of variations which once existed, but which were suppressed by the rigorous uniformity of the later Rabbis.  Conjectural emendations, suchas Newcombe, Lowth, and Ewald have so freely suggested, ought to be ventured on in such places only as are quite unintelligible without them."

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1. The Judaizing spirit on this matter culminated in the Formula Helvetici Consensus, which pronounces the existing O.T. text to be "tum quoad consonas, tum quoad vocalia, sive puncta ipsa, sive punctorum potestatem, tum quoad rea, tum quoad verba, θεοπνευστος."

sincerely,
The Dean

Majority Text: True Power of the Probability Argument (pt V)

Some people may think that the argument in favor of the Majority text is simply this:  That errors, being introduced later in the stream, will almost always be stuck in the minority of manuscripts. 

This however, is not the actual argument at all.  The possibility that a manuscript with a given error (or set) could be copied more often than manuscripts without the error(s), is actually a given.   As Hodges notes:

"...of course an error might easily be copied more often than the original in any particular instance." (Pickering, Identity..., Appendix C p 165).  

 But the point is, this only works once.   Errors can't accumulate gradually in such a manner.  Lets see why.   We start with Yellow Packet copies getting copied more often, and this gives as an initial false majority for the Errors introduced by the Yellow master-copy:

Errors do indeed accumulate.   In the above diagram, all manuscripts copied from the first copy with the Yellow Packet will have its errors.  Further down, an Orange, Red, and Purple Error Packet are added.   But the effect is obvious:

White (Pure)     - 10 / 25  = 40% minority reading (unfortunate)
Yellow Packet   - 15 / 25  =  60% majority - false ('lucky break')
Orange Packet  -  8 / 25  =  32% minority 
Red Packet        -  3 / 25  =  12% minority
Purple Packet   -   1 / 25  =   4% minority

It doesn't take a genius to see that again, the natural tendency pins down most subsequent errors as minority readings.  This doesn't bode well for the Purple text.   The very manuscripts that support the Yellow Packet readings testify strongly against the Purple Packet readings. 

(Secondly, although the 'White text' (pure text) as a unit is in the minority of MSS, its readings remain in 99% of cases perfectly safe, still vouchsafed by majority readings. )

Even wiping out all earlier generations doesn't help.   This only stabilizes the percentages for each group of readings, once normal or average copying is resumed:

White   Packet   -  2 / 8  =  25% - minority   (in present / future)
Yellow  Packet   -  6 / 8  =  75% - majority  - 1 false reading set 

Orange Packet  -  4 / 8   =  50% - neutral     / uncertain

Red       Packet  -  2 / 8   =  25% - minority   / true reading
Purple  Packet   -  1 / 8   =  12% - minority    / true reading

Although this extreme case seems to undermine the reliability of majority readings, this simply isn't the case.  Probabilities remain strongly in favor of Majority readings.  Lets see why.   We need to remember that only a very small number of early and frequently copied readings will have a false majority rating (e.g. Yellow Packet). 
The majority of errors in the extreme texts (e.g. the Purple Text) will have their reading-support all over the map, and with very few false-positives (e.g. Yellow); but the bulk of errors will remain graduated minority readings.
Error Packets (and real errors) will still be identifiable because:

(1) These minority readings will however, still be strongly associated with the most corrupted and generationally later texts (e.g. Orange, Red, Purple).  

(2) These texts will be easily identified, because (a) as texts or composite groups of error-packets they will remain minority texts. (b) The differently supported packets allow us to use genealogical methods.

 Typically, opponents of the Majority of MSS Model will reason that a process of uneven copying could occur repeatedly, boosting minority readings into majority readings on a larger scale.   Hodges showed the failure of this argument by showing that cumulatively speaking, the probabilities for multiple accidents favoring a bad text quickly skyrocket downward.  In discussing the case of a second error (or error packet) in a following generation, Hodges has stated:

"Now we have conceded that 'error A' is found in 4 copies while the true reading is only in 2.  But when 'error B' is introduced [in the next generation], its rival is found in 5 copies.  Will anyone suppose that 'error B' will have the same good fortune as 'error A', and be copied more than all the other branches combined?...but conceding this far less probable situation, ...will anyone believe the same for 'error C'? ...the probability is drastically reduced.  " (Append. p. 167)

These 'errors' would be equivalent to our Yellow, Orange, Red Packets respectively. 

Compounding Unlikely Events: Rapidly Decreasing Probability

We allowed for one catastrophe: over-copying of the Yellow Packet.  Hodges' argument here is actually so powerful, its clinching:


Probabilities are calculated by multiplication, with the probability of each event represented by a fraction less than 1.  A 50% chance of an error being over-copied (as an example) means 1/2 the time it could happen.  But the second error also being over-copied at the same time is (1/2) times (1/2), = 1/4, only a 25% chance.   The chance of three equally probable events in a row happening is 12.5%.   This is the same as flipping a coin.  For a fair and random coin-toss, the chances of tossing 7 'heads' in a row is less than 1%!:

Likewise, even with 50/50 odds, seven generations of errors have almost no chance of ever being consistently copied more often than their rival readings in a random undirected process.

But our observations here go far beyond even this argument:  Its a case of the experiment being poisoned before it can even get off the ground.  


The Defocussing Effect of Noise on Transmission

What is not being mentioned so far in any of the discussions is the fact that ALL scribes introduce errors, in every single copy.  Contrary to intuition, this actually also assists the Majority Reading Model, by sabotaging false positives further.

   The scheme above isolates four Error-Packets for discussion, and the analysis is valid because they are 'independent' in the sense that normally errors won't overlap or interfere with each other in the early transmission.  Its like a needle in a haystack:  The chances of two errors bumping into each other is nearly zero.

But with errors being added randomly and on average roughly equally with each copy, we have now introduced random noise into the signal at all points.  This random noise acts to mask the false signals as effectively as the true signals.

   One can think of injected random noise as a 'damping factor':  A bell rings clearly and long in the air.  But a mute, or mask attenuates both the loudness of the bell and the duration of the note.   Imbalances (spikes and dips) in the transmission process are softened, evened out and muted in a variety of ways, randomly.   This impedes the efficiency of transmission; the clarity, and the duration of false signals (errors) as well as true ones are attenuated.

However, the true signals have an enormous starting-advantage:  They are already 100% Majority readings, and it takes a lot of accumulated noise in the transmission to disturb the original text enough to actually supplant a majority reading.  These are modern considerations now well analyzed by engineers, but which were unknown to 19th century textual critics relying on 'common sense' or intuitive guesses. 
Although both true and false signals are attenuated and masked by noise, the much smaller error signals suffer the most relative damage from further random noise.  Anomalies in the error transmission are smoothed, masked, and truncated by random processes, which defocuss unique and unusual signals in the mix.

peace
Nazaroo

When Redundancy is not Redundant

The minute we turn to any dictionary for a definition of Redundancy, we note a startling contradiction of two opposing notions regarding the meaning of redundancy:

(a)  superfluous and unnecessary; needless repetition of an act or speech.

This first notion is certainly commonly accepted and clear.  The question is, does it really reflect the true purpose and function of redundancy in the practical world?

Consider now these alternate modern definitions:

(b)  repetition of messages to reduce errors in transmission;
      duplication of components/functions to overcome component failure.

Plainly, the description in (b) suggests deliberate actions and choices that are anything but superfluous, needless, or unnecessary.   And it gets right to the heart of the matter of the modern scientific perspective on "redundancy".  Redundancy is simply not 'redundant' at all in the common meaning of the term.  Its absolutely essential for the reliable function of both communications and mechanical machines that lives depend on.


Redundancy in human communications

Its easy to see that most human communication is heavily redundant.  In the sense of efficiency in packing the maximum amount of information in the smallest package, human speech is by nature clumsy, inefficient, time-consuming, and often ambiguous and error-prone.
Information Theorists themselves express this inefficiency as follows:

"Redundancy in information theory is the number of bits used to transmit a message minus the number of bits of actual information in the message. Informally, it is the amount of wasted "space" used to transmit certain data. ..."    (wikipedia)

The idea here is that the same message could have been transmitted with less words.   Notice the old definition creeping back in, even here.  "wasted space"(!).   Its as if the theorists have forgotten what the engineers have been insisting in all along.  Redundancy isn't 'waste' - its critically important for reliability.   We wouldn't want to eliminate redundancy in communication any more than we'd want to remove a safety railing beside Niagara Falls.   Redundancy is built into every engineering structure, in the form of extra supports, extra-strong steel, materials and designs made to withstand disasters and part failures.

But is human communication really redundant in the first sense (a) = needless?  We can all laugh at the stupidity of the guards in the famous Monty Python skit from the Holy Grail movie:

But the skit illustrates perfectly the problem of the ambiguity of human speech, and the need for repetition and explanation to assure that meaning is communicated clearly and effectively.


Biblical Redundancy:

The Bible is a message placed in the form of human communication, and not surprisingly, there are ample instances of redundancy in it.  In the Old Testament, we may note the parallel accounts of the books of Kings and the books of Chronicles, or the passages in the middle of Isaiah, duplicating the same stories as those found in Kings (Isaiah ch. 36-39 etc).   In the NT, we have three gospels with largely duplicated materials, and many of Paul's letters dealing with the same topics in different words.  Even at the verse-level, Hebrew poetry and prose often repeats an idea or sentence in alternate words.

Redundancy serves several functions in the Bible. 

(a) it can fill in detail, and bring precision to a picture. 


(b) It can provide alternative expressions to protect the meaning, for those with limited vocabularies.


(c) It can protect message of the Holy Scriptures from damage through wear, copying, and even tampering.

Redundancy in the Bible plainly fulfills important purposes, and cannot be viewed as 'redundant' in the common sense, as if repetitions were needless, or alternate expressions were merely 'wordy'.   The Holy Scriptures have been designed in part by their own authors to reach the widest audience, and maintain the purity of the message by thoughtful use of repetition and alternate expression.

Biblical redundancy is one of the deliberate means used by Bible authors to protect the message of the Holy Scriptures for future generations.  In the days of handcopying, parallel passages in Mark, Luke and Matthew could be compared for accuracy in transcription of the message.   Passages in Paul could be compared to ensure Paul's meaning was well understood.  Redundancy is in that sense what Bible study is all about.

Peace
Nazaroo

Errors in Transmission with Perfect Reception: Real-Life Examples

Joe Layman wasn't kidding when he described the human capacity for pattern recognition and filtering of unwanted noise from a signal.  Take the following real readout from a dual-trace oscilloscope:

The original signal to be transmitted is the top line.   The transmitted signal is the bottom line.  One can see the obvious noise added to the signal in the transmission. But by the same token, the oscilloscope operator has no trouble at all identifying the noise and differentiating the signal with complete success and purity.  He can mentally invert the received signal, straighten out the D.C. drift causing the slowly waving amplitude, and eliminate the small jittering noise component.  With a pencil and paper he can draw the original signal in exactitude with 100% reliability.

Even a sophisticated filter network can't do what the human operator can do without even thinking, just using his eyes and common sense.   The same effect can be seen in any printed book.  We can have a 3rd generation photostat of a poorly printed book on cheap recycled newsprint, even cutting off a few letters, and blanching out the text, and yet an ordinary person can read the message completely accurately without any effort at all.

Click to Enlarge

 (Scroll down to compare your abilities to the average English reader of the above sample)

 Every time you sign up for membership in a forum, or try to post comment on many a blog, you'll be confronted with a simple test, which usually defeats the most sophisticated Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software, but which any below-average human can pass without undue effort:

Imagine the most critically important message one can think of, transmitted during a heated war and received by key operators in a crucial moment.  Even the simplest strategy can practically guarantee the message gets through without error, even with 10% of the transmission dropping out randomly:

"XXXon't launch the ICBMs: repeat: XXXXX launch the ICBMs. repeat: Don't launch xxxxxxxBMs."

The receiver of this message need not worry.  Just repeating the message three times has made reconstructing the original perfectly clear and certain, even with random dropouts at the most dangerous and significant places. 

_____________________________________________

- Answer for Poorly Reproduced Text Above:

"...Dr. Temples doctrine, as above stated.  It was a favourite article in the creed of the men who set up the guillotine in Paris, and who kept that instrument of progress in such constant action.  The ultimate perfectability of the race was a prominent doctrine in the new Gospel then preached.  since then, it has fascinated the speculative genius of our German neighbours in an extraordinary degree.  And now the time has come, it seems, in which we Englishmen are to be treated to some grave discoursing on this theme."

mr.scrivener

Engineering 101: The Receiver/Reader Impact

Much has been written about the potential for distortion of the signal by the reader/interpreter, in literary criticism circles.

But another very well-known technical phenomenon regarding the impact of the receiver of a transmission has found little awareness or discussion.    Lets look at the following transmission graph:

Transmission Signal vs. Background Noise Floor

The signal transmission begins, and the signal is clear and unambiguous (error-free, for all practical purposes).   But during periods of non-transmission, we can see the background random noise-floor rises up to a typical level.   What happens to the noise-floor during transmission?  How can it just disappear?

In fact, the background noise doesn't just disappear.  However, it is removed from the signal by processes which are only activated when the receiver of the signal is alerted and begins differentiating between noise and signal, effectively removing noise that would otherwise interfere or negatively impact the reception.

This is a very real effect, and is hard-wired into human perception.  It is linked to attention-span and attention-focus, and activates powerful information filters already designed into our input receptors.   If it were not for this advanced and largely uncontrolled, automatic function, we would be overwhelmed with non-essential and distracting information from all our senses.   But human beings are designed to automatically filter out distractions (background noise), detect and selectively concentrate on the signal of interest, in part chosen by the listener.

While mechanical and electronic filters are usually very primitive and crude, simply shutting down or stopping the flow of frequency ranges or patterns known to be "noise-full"  or "noise-like" (i.e., carrying noise), the human brain and itsprocesses are quite sophisticated and can be trained via pattern-matching and reasoning processes to intelligently and very effectively mask out unwanted noise from the signal.

As a result, humans are able to perform nearly 'super-human' feats of concentration, memory, and filtering that ordinary electronic devices are incapable of.  The analogy can be likened to imagining the difference between a person with good eyesight and lighting, versus a blind person, in attempting to do the dishes, or drive a car.  Even in such a simple and usually easy task, the trained eye is a powerful and essential tool, changing what is nearly impossible   (for the blind person) into a virtually error-free operation.


The key component here is not the "background noise level" facing the transmitter of the message, but the amazingly gifted ability of the receiver, who can have quite fantastic powers to filter out noise and errors in the process of transmission.   These powers are based on extremely intelligent and sophisticated processes possessed by the receiver, and enable very crude and primitive transmissions to be very successful with a high accuracy, frequency and duration.


- Joe Layman

Engineering 101: The Nature of a Transmission Signal

At the very basic level, each individual manuscript, and the entire transmission stream as a whole, can be viewed as a transmission-signal. This can be broadly represented by an instructive graph:

Click to Enlarge - use backbutton to return here

Although the information content may be pre-decided, or fixed in advance, like a snap-shot or finished writing, the transmission process in most cases will still be sequential, and involve a process extending over time, like the act of copying or a radio broadcast.   The nature of this transmission process is such that the information must be broken down into packets and transmitted piece by piece, both in ancient times and even in the modern digital age.

This process actually works in favor of inerrancy in the overview.   For instance, a Gospel will normally be broken down into 'pericopes' or paragraphs, each of which is complete and functional in terms of carrying its information content.   If a Gospel breaks down into say 40 paragraphs or Units, 39 of them can still be transmitted successfully, even if one suffers loss or damage.    With parallel or redundant copies or transmissions, the entire 40 units can still be transmitted without error, even if every individual copy (or set of units) suffers some hits.

Making a significant number of good copies of a document, even by hand, ensures the essential integrity of the information and the accuracy of the text as a whole, provided all or a reasonably good sample of the copies is preserved and used to establish the text.

It is perhaps surprising but not totally unexpected, that a message can be fully preserved, even with such a simple mechanism as reasonably careful copying.  The idea is very simple in fact.  With reasonably good copying, it is unlikely that two copies will have the very same errors.  Even if two copyists occasionally make the same mistake, this mistake will remain a very small minority reading.

Some good statistical discussion of this issue can be found in Pickering's Online book, in an appendix here:

Appendix C: The Implications of Statistical Probability

The best technique to ensure error-free transmission is in fact the simplest:

(1) Multiply Good Copies: Make as many good copies as possible of each document,
(2) Minimize Copy Generations: Always start as close to the original as possible.
(3) Preserve Adequate Samples: Keep a good number of MSS available,  or at least recoverable, at the end of the transmission process.
(4) Avoid Emendations: Resist the temptation to 'correct' or edit the text, but duplicate as accurately as possible what is found in your master-copy.

That is, all that is required is to make say 3 or more copies of each copy,  and preserve a good representative sample of the same collection of copies.   The technique is surprisingly robust, even without special methods or techniques to improve accuracy.   Any well-executed application of this basic method will create what may be reasonably labelled a "bullet-proof" transmission.

What is perhaps remarkable, but goes unnoticed, is that what is true for hand-copying manuscripts is also true for printed edited texts!   This is because the same rules govern any transmission process.  Any critical text which breaks these basic rules will inevitably introduce errors into the transmission process.  Examples of such cases are these:

(1) Failing to rely on adequate samples of available manuscripts.

(2) Making conjectural emendations without statistical foundation in the surviving copies.

We will examine the special cases in which a transmission may go awry later, and also simple and reasonable techniques for countering information loss and correcting the transmission process.

Joe Layman

D.A. Carson on Inerrancy (Video)

Here is the sharpest concise bit of brilliancy on inerrancy we have seen in a long while.

This is fresh stuff from the new "Ehrman Project", which already has a lot of interesting videotaped interviews with notable experts and apologists, such as Daniel Wallace etc.

The Ehrman Project

mr.scrivener

The Inerrancy Bombshell: Part A

I was going to title this post "What Physicists think", but of course there are many viewpoints in physics, and this post is not about that, but about a lot more.

But physicists have a unique and privileged viewpoint, because of their knowledge and experience in scientific matters. That is the part that I would like to introduce the reader to in this post, before explaining how it applies to the concept of 'inerrancy'.


The World of Perfection

The physicist's world is blessed. Its a world of paradox, but also of perfection. Physicists have no problem with concepts of perfection and purity: they experience it every day. Our world is made up of atoms, and atoms are made up of subatomic particles as perfect and pristine as any you can imagine. All electrons and protons are 'perfect' particles, absolutely identical and indistinguishable, according to both theory and measurement; they are ageless and exist forever, dancing in space.

All atoms, elements, compounds, metals; all matter, is built out of these flawless building-blocks. But its even better than that. These particles also behave according to precise and perfect laws of motion and energy exchange. The universe we inhabit is entirely made up of these perfect particles conforming to perfect laws of action.

In this world of physics there is no real 'data loss' or sloppiness, no real 'random' events. Most physicists have absolute faith in this world of measurement. Even what appear to be inexplicable, unexplained events are fully believed to be simply the result of our own over-simplification or ignorance of some powerful but previously unknown Law, soon to be unraveled. Every difficulty is just another mystery to be solved, another complex truth to be discovered. And its the repeated success of such investigations that leads the physicist, compels him to believe in the fundamental order and rule of law in our universe.

19th Century Materialism

So it was a no-brainer that scientists in the 19th century, given the physics current at that time, embraced Materialism. Due to Newton's powerfully successful physical laws, they had a kind of 'billiard-ball' view of the universe, as atoms bouncing off each other continuously in perfectly elastic collisions that lost no energy. Everything could be explained by this model.

There was no room in this model for magical forces, no room even for Dualism of mind and body, or spirit and matter. Anything that couldn't be measured and touched simply didn't exist, and anything unusual was a simply an illusion, misunderstanding, or fraud. It was natural for other researchers and scientists to embrace these same notions. All reports of supernatural events were of course mistaken or fabricated, and 19th century Rationalists went at the Bible with the same skeptical approach.

It was simply assumed that supernatural stories were added to the texts, in a time when superstitious belief ruled men's minds. The idea that the Bible had been interpolated and had accumulated numerous superstitions was taken for granted. It needed to be trimmed down, and the assumed 'interpolations' could be discovered and removed by straightforward comparison of differences among manuscripts.

So the TC Rule, 'Prefer the shorter reading.' was not arbitrary, accidental or even based on manuscript evidence. It actually came out of the 19th century Rationalist worldview, and was based fundamentally upon a skepticism of all superstition and religious belief.


The Crisis in Physics: (1908)

But just as textual critics were getting up to speed and putting into action the consequences of their own worldview (Lachmann, Hort, 1882 etc.), the very scientists who had embraced Materialism and Rationalism were facing the greatest crisis of 'modern science'. And the 19th century worldview was about to completely collapse.

The first problem was inexplicable lack of our ability to measure, see, touch, "the aether", the medium in which it was assumed everything floated. The second embarrassment was in the discrepancy regarding additivity of speeds, and an apparent "speed limit", that of light. The third problem was the 'quantization' of energy: why it always exchanged in discrete packets. There seemed to be a series of disastrous incongruencies that threatened confusion and the collapse of the explanatory power of physics.

All of these panic-causing mysteries were 'solved' when Einstein simply did the unthinkable: he embraced them as the new paradigm of physics: There was no aether, the universe had a built-in speed limit, and energy was transfered via discrete particles called 'quanta'. It would take another 50 years to work out the full impact of the new viewpoint. But by the 1950s we had got our head around the new ideas and had a full size electronics industry, computers and the atom bomb.

But these were not the real revolutionary items. They were only the first wave of discoveries. The real breakthroughs came in unlikely new fields of science and mathematics, Chaos theory, Information Theory, and other obscure investigations into oddball phenomena.

Unfortunately however, the thinking and ideas of ordinary men slid further and further out of sync with the real view of modern science. And, not surprisingly, the field of Textual Criticism, like many other fields, continues even now to flounder with an out-of-date and unworkable philosophical worldview.

I will save the bombshells for the next posts.

Modern Versions and Jewish Fables

Lets take a look at Leviticus 16:8 (KJV):

The Law commands two goats be offered, a yearly atonement for the people's sins.  One goat is sacrificed on the altar, but interestingly, the other is sent off eastward from the Temple as a scapegoat.  First the King James Version (KJV/AV):

'And Aaron shall cast lots upon the two goats; one lot for the LORD, and the other lot for the scapegoat.'

 Although the details of the complex offering are unknown to the average English-speaker, the idea of 'scapegoat', a substitute for sin or blame, is as familiar as apple-pie.  This is because naturally enough, of the powerful and near-endless influence of the King James, or Authorized Version,  on our very way of speaking.

The American KJV follows suit, with  scapegoat,  as does the  New American Standard (NASV - 1971, 1995),  World English Bible (WEB). 

The Roman Catholic Douay-Rheims edition varies but little, with "emissary goat", not a significant difference, if less popular.

Young's Literal Translation (YLT - 1898) and the Revised Young's Literal Translation (RYLT) give a clear idea, of the meaning of scapegoat, with "goat of departure", which certainly describes its function in the ritual.


Webster's Bible Translation (WBT - ) hyphenates the words, with "scape-goat", leaving the rendering essentially the same.

Even the New International Version (NIV - 1984) gets it right without a fuss: scapegoat.

What can go wrong?
________________________________________

Rather suddenly, with the Revised Version (RV, 1882), we have "Azazel".  A proper name of some kind, capitalized!  

We are told  by the Germans that it refers to some kind of Desert Demon, whom the Israelites sacrificed to under Moses or shortly after,  on an equal par with Jehovah the Exclusive and Jealous God.  One goat for Jehovah, and one for Azazel, just in case. This of course is 'modern scholarship'. 


A 'brilliant innovation' in translation based on the latest research in 1880.  ...

It matters not that the God of Israel, the Old Testament is a Jealous, Monotheistic God, who in His very first commandment banishes all other 'gods' to oblivion.

Because, according to the latest new 'scientific' techniques, context doesn't matter, even if it is an overwhelming doctrine permeating throughout the Torah and a thousand years of history. 


The new 'Canon' is of course, 

(1)    'Prefer the Harder Reading.'  

- Because obviously, (not even the 'scribe' this time, but) every translator and commentator for the last 2,000 years were confused, incompetent to translate the word, and naturally emended every translation to 'smooth over' the difficult text. [/sarcasm]

And so, we find, following suite, and not wishing to appear naive and out-of-date, the Darby Bible Translation (DBT), the American Standard Version (ASV), the Bible in Basic English (BBE), GOD'S WORD  (GWT, 1995), English Standard Version (ESV, 2001) and even the New Living Translation (NLT, 2007).


On what authority is this nonsense actually based?  The reader will be utterly shocked to learn it comes from late speculation by Jews in the Middle Ages, as found in the Book of Enoch:

"the main interpretations have been  (a) a local deity, a wilderness goat-demon:  Later Jewish literature, notably the Book of Enoch, understood Azazel as a demon, one of the fallen angels and brings him into its complex mythology of supernatural angels and demons."

Thats right:  The translators of a whole line of 'modern versions', from the RV , ASV, ESV, right up to the NLT, have introduced a damnable heresy and piece of obvious nonsense from the Ethiopic Book of Enoch, a work from the 1st century A.D. rejected by Jews and Christians alike for 2,000 years.  

Well, there is no denying that the Book of Enoch  is some kind of Jewish Apocalyptic literature from the 1st century.  Fragments of it were found at Qumran, with the Dead Sea Scrolls.   But it is notable that it is nowhere quoted by Jesus, the Apostles, or Paul, and only briefly does it appear to be mentioned by Jude, although this too is disputed.   Obviously Enoch is not in anyone's Canon of Holy Scripture, not the Jews, nor the Catholics, Greek Orthodox,  not even the Muslims, excepting the small Coptic Christian Church in Egypt.


Real scholars however identify Enoch as an obvious pseudonymous forgery, and not written by the Biblical Enoch.  So what were they thinking in the O.T. Committee room of the Revised Version in 1882?  Were they intending to embrace the Coptic Bible?   No one knows, except that this was no decision of scholarship, but rather a bizarre short-circuit of the brain, some kind of mass-hypnosis, with the culprit, an early Houdini-like character, perhaps Aleister Crowley himself, escaping in the confusion.

Does 'Prefer the Harder Reading' really lead inevitably to the Book of Enoch?

  Or are the majority of sensible translators, such as those behind the King James Version and even  the Jewish Talmud correct in rejecting such an assinine piece of foreign drivel?

Lets check the Rabbis:  They too speculated later about this early text:

" Rabbinic interpretation understood Azazel to be a cliff off which the goat was driven to its death.  The Rabbis, interpreting "Azazel" as "Azaz" (rugged), and "el" (strong), refer it to the rugged and rough mountain cliff from which the goat was cast down (Yoma 67b; Sifra, Ahare, ii. 2; Targ. Yer. Lev. xiv. 10, and most medieval commentators)."... (from the Jewish Encyclopedia).

 Whether or not the Rabbis were correct in their speculations about the etymology of this word (which after all is secondary to its actual usage in any case), they hardly embraced the 'modern' view.   Instead, we are told:

"...Most modern scholars, after having for some time indorsed the old view, have accepted the opinion mysteriously hinted at by Ibn Ezra and expressly stated by Nahmanides to Lev. xvi. 8, that Azazel belongs to the class of "se'irim," goat-like demons, jinn haunting the desert, to which the Israelites were wont to offer sacrifice (Lev. xvii. 7 [A. V. "devils"] (from the Jewish Encyclopedia).

Understand the real source here now.  Not the Rabbis.   Not the Talmud itself.  Not Jewish tradition.  But the opinion of the Spanish-born Jewish scholar Nahmanides (1194-1270 A.D.), writing in the Dark Ages at a time of near-illiteracy, even among Jews. 

Thus we have: (a) an apocryphal and pseudonymous work from the 1st century, using the word "Azaziel" or something like it as the name of a fallen angel (not a 'desert-demon',  and (b) we have the opinion of a 13th century Spanish philosopher that it meant 'desert-demon', something impossible to harmonize either with the Book of Enoch or Leviticus. 


And we have 'most modern scholars' (read "idiots") rejecting the context of the entire Bible, and all of Jewish and Christian tradition (including the Coptics who read Enoch as Scripture!), and embracing the opinion of Nahmanides, which turns out to be a Jewish fable. 

But don't blame the Jews.  They rejected this horse-poop 800 years ago, and prefer the ordinary and obvious meaning of 'azazel' as defined by the context of 3,000 years of Judaism without Nahmanides, or the book of Enoch.

Now it turns out that even more modern scholarship supports the KJV (who knew?):


_____________________________

"Of course, all of that may be for naught if this Hittite parallel is correct and the term is connected with a type of offering.

“In the Leviticus 16 ritual a crux has always been the term laʿ^azāʾzēl rendered in the Septuagint and Vulgate by “as a scapegoat” (followed by the English AV), but replaced in more recent English translations by “for Azazel,” sometimes thought to denote a wilderness demon. Appealing to scapegoat rites in the Hurrian language from the Hittite archives, Janowski and Wilhelm would derive the biblical term from a Hurrian offering term, azazḫiya. This is particularly appealing to me. There were two goats used in the Leviticus 16 ritual. One is designated for Yahweh as a “sin offering” (Heb. ḥaṭṭāʾṭ, LXX peri hamartias) (16:9), and the other is “for Azazel,” but is presented alive before Yahweh to make atonement, and is sent away into the wilderness “to/for Azazel.” The contrast is twofold: (1) Yahweh versus Azazel, and (2) sin offering versus Azazel. If one adopts the first, Azazel seems to be a divine being or demon, who must be appeased. But if one adopts the second as primary, the word ʿ^azāʾzēl represents the goal of the action. In the system of Hurrian offering terms to which Wilhelm’s azazḫiya belongs, the terms represent either a benefit that is sought by the offering (e.g., keldiya “for wellbeing,” cf. Heb. š^elāmîm), or the central element offered (e.g., zurgiya “blood”). If Janowski and Wilhelm’s theory is correct, the Hebrew term would not denote a demon as recipient of the goat, but some benefit desired (e.g., removal of the sins and impurities) or the primary method of the offering (e.g. the banishment of the goat).”^[1]

Similar rituals are widely attested in the ancient Near East with examples from Ebla and elsewhere. I'm sure much more could be said about the practice and its ancient parallels. Leviticus 16 and the term Azazel provide a fascinating example of how misunderstandings and speculation sometimes spin off into elaborate traditions that fall far from the likely original meaning of the biblical text.

---

Harry A. Hoffner, Jr., “Hittite-Israelite Cultural Parallels” in Hallo, W. W., & Younger, K. L. (2003). Context of Scripture, vol. 3 (xxxii). Leiden; Boston: Brill.

King James Version: 1.  
Modern Versions: 0.




The Dean

The 'Christian Academic' view is fatally stupid

In our last post here :Part II: The Modern Academic Position Examined, we saw that modern secular academics stubbornly cling to an unrealistic position, and ply their trade upon the NT with inadequate tools, in an obviously biased fashion. Like king Agrippa, they imagine they are still living in a pagan Roman world, and sit in judgment upon Paul and the Apostles, as if the Advent of Christianity never happened, and it can be safely ignored.

Now we wish to examine the "Christian Academic" position, a hopeless compromise, offering a watered-down gelded gospel of no potency to the world, a poison that drains faith and hope from its hearers. Its a sad case of co-dependency upon secular academia, a shameful addiction to what can only be called 'academic alcoholism'. Like the real alcoholic, Christian Academics constantly seek to proselytize others, drawing them into their weak-ass nonsense, a kind of agnostic purgatory.

Here we briefly recount from our first post on this,
the Christian Academic Compromise
(CAC - its the sound a cat makes when coughing out a disgusting furball):

(1) No important Christian doctrine is affected.

(2) The edited text is as good as the traditional text for salvation etc.

(3) The critical text is sufficient for all religious and doctrinal matters.

(4) The critical text is closer to the original autographs.

(5) Adopting the critical text makes no difference, for practical purposes.

The first thing to observe, is that all five points would simply be a truism for Christians, if only the critical Greek text we were talking about was the Traditional Text used by Christians for the last 1,500 years.

But of course its not. The critical text is a drastically truncated, mutilated text created by academics, using a crude bag of tools designed for and meant to apply to ordinary (secular) works. The approach resulted in what teens today call an "Epic Fail".


We'll get into why secular tools in the 19th century were ludicrously inadequate later. For now we want to focus on the planks in the Christian Academic Compromise (CAC) itself.


(1) No important Christian doctrine is affected...

Where did this absurd notion come from? It comes from the 'Father' of NT Criticism. To quote mr. Scrivener on TC-Alt-list:

"I have mentioned previously the famous 'bet' in which a 19th century
critic [Bentley, 1720] suggested that even if you took the worst possible text, all
the most extreme variants (within sensible reason... e.g., not
counting blank MSS) no fundamental Christian doctrine would be affected.

This bet appeared to have actually been taken up literally by
Westcott/SHort, who produced the world's shortest NT.

This was followed by a century of apologetic nonsense attempting to
prove that the NT text wasn't degraded, degenerated, corrupted by
following the new cropped Greek text."
(scrivener, TC-Alt-List, Yahoo Groups, Msg# 2428, Jan 21, 2009)

Mr. Scrivener actually quotes me, in an even earlier, and more informative post:

"It would be wrong to call these clownish attempts to 'dethrone' the traditional text the acts of 'enemies of the Gospel'. These men are actually better called 'pests of the Gospel'. How is it that their attacks, in spite of such enthusiasm, are so lame?

As Dr. Evil from the Austin Powers comedy would say,

"Mr. Editor, you are merely the 'diet-coke' of evil."

The answer is surprisingly more lame than could have been guessed. The critics are operating under self-contradictory impulses and restraints.

On the one hand, they are determined to remove every possible verse, phrase, or word that a scribe or early editor has inadvertantly or imprudently dropped in the history of copying. On the other, they are determined to *only* use 'legitimate' textual (manuscript) 'evidence' to mutilate the Holy Scriptures. What kind of evil genius ties his own shoes together before falling on his face on his way out of the starting gate?


Bentley's Wager!

The answer is here, in the 'Great Blueprint', the secret agenda of all the textual critics and editors of the Greek N.T.: Bentley's Wager:

'The oft-repeated dictum of Bentley is still valid that "the real text of the sacred writings is competently exact, nor is one article of faith or moral precept either perverted or lost, choose as awkwardly as you will, choose the worst by design, out of the whole lump of readings." '

(UBS text Intro.)

Here we can now see exactly what happened in the mind of Hort and his followers: They set out to actually PROVE that Bentley was right.

And the result is exactly as predicted: They produced a ludicrously inferior NT by choosing the worst readings by design, and have yet shown that even this monstrosity is only marginally heretical and just as vague from a doctrinally simplistic point of view as the Textus Receptus.

And how could it be otherwise? The errors at least, if not the deliberate mutilations, were hardly systematic.

For this incredible accomplishment we can now thank them. Yes even the worst manuscripts are not so substandard that they couldn't be usable on a desert island somewhere to save souls.

But can we please now go back to the traditional text? The point has now been beaten to death. We willingly concede that even the 'vile Codex Vaticanus' can be used to preach a limited form of Gospel, at least in Egypt, or if necessary, it can even be used to get a fire going literally."

( - Nazaroo, PA website article, quoted in Msg # 337, Sept 27 2006)

But why is Bentley's Wager actually wrong?

(1) Bentley's infamous claim was actually a sad and desperate act. It was meant to stave off a whole new round of witchhunts and Inquisition-like dramas. Academics were subjected to prosecution, job loss or worse, for voicing any dissent regarding current Christian views or doctrine in the early 18th century. While he had some good intentions, the proposal was doomed to failure for its ethical compromise, in the same way that Dietrich Bonhoeffer's attempted assassination of Hitler involved a catastrophic failure of ethics. Dishonest compromise cannot be fruitful in the long run.

(2) Secondly, the claim was methodologically fatally flawed. On its face, it is a fundamental claim about the quality of the "worst manuscript", one which was untested, unknown, and blatantly false from what was already known. Of course there were badly flawed copies of the NT books. Of course some copies, like Marcion's were significantly altered theologically. It is utterly foolish to think that the worst possible text one could construct out of existing materials will still be an adequate Gospel text. How patently absurd.

(3) One important doctrine, namely the reliability of the New Testament itself as an accurate message from God is viciously undermined, and so is the authority of the Bible as the revealed word of God. "one article of faith or moral precept is either perverted or lost", namely the doctrine of Divine Preservation of the Scriptures as we actually have them.

To pretend that such a stupid methodology could still result in an adequate text that could inspire any confidence in its contents is an immoral, dishonest farce.

It only remains to be shown whether the current critical Greek NT texts are significantly corrupt, and to all intents and purposes inadvertant fulfillments of Bentley's Wager.

Such a demonstration will in no way affect the quality of the Traditional Text, or the doctrine of Divine Inspiration and Preservation which is claimed for it. What academics print and publish is their own business, and only becomes the problem of Christians, when we naively buy into their weak nonsense, by adopting inferior versions of our own religious documents.


It goes without saying that since the very first plank #(1) of the Christian Academic Compromise (CAC) is an "Epic Fail", the other four planks collapse like the precariously posed house of cards that they are.


peace
Nazaroo

Why Late Evidence can be Invaluable

Sometimes, in the process of answering one question, we actually discover the answer to a completely different question, unsought.   It remains for someone to look afresh at longstanding ordinary data to see what in hindsight is obvious.

One of the most fruitful occasions for such lucky discovery is in the re-casting of long-known facts, or in their more efficient display. Such was the case recently, when we, in the process of attempting to improve standards, readability, accuracy and utility of Manuscript Stemma, we allowed easy viewing some crucial facts concerning later miniscule manuscripts.

Here is K. Lake's original stemma (family tree) for the MS Group Family Π:

Click to Enlarge

The problem with Lake's original stemma,is that in spite of dating each MS, the vertical position does nothing to place the MSS on a proper timeline, and it also makes somewhat difficult reading off the generational level of a MS.

Nazaroo's improved stemma design allows for charting of both MS age and generational position. 

click to enlarge

We used Nazaroo's new stemma display design to make simultaneous visualization of both manuscript age and generational position easy:

click to enlarge

The semi-orthogonal time and generation scales allow easy grasp of MS position in the copying stream.

But now look at the actual situation for Family Π:  The two very latest MSS for this transmission-stream happen to be 3rd and 5th generation copies of the archetype or Master-copy for this Group.  Lake placed these manuscripts here in the tree because of their text: that is, their accuracy and close agreement with MS Π. 

Had no copies older than the 10th century from this family survived, we could have reconstructed a very excellent copy of the archetype (Π) from these two 14th century manuscripts alone.  

We might have done what textual critics habitually suggest, and ignored these two late MSS,   instead preferring to use 11th century MSS like 72, 652, , 1478, and 178.  We would have in that case reconstructed a 6th generation text, far inferior in quality to the text offered by either 116 or 489 alone!

Nor is this an unusual situation, or some kind of exception to the rule.  Over half of the surviving MSS here have texts which are 5th generation or earlier (10 MSS).  A minority of the MSS have late 6th - 7th generation texts (8 MSS).

Most manuscripts will be made from the oldest and most reliable master-copy available at the time of manufacture.   As a result, late MSS made on parchment or vellum typically have texts some 500 years earlier than their own date. 

Typically, the older manuscripts of a transmission-line (or Family of MSS) are rare to non-existant.  But excellent copies of the early text will have survived in later MSS.

Erasmus' choice of a dozen handy but later copies for his Textus Receptus was not particularly "lucky" in this respect.  His result would be typical of taking any 12 manuscripts at random, and would inevitably involve some copies of very ancient exemplars, only a few generations away from family Archetypes.

Picking the absolute latest MSS available, and limiting collations to a few of the very best copies will in most cases result in an excellent and reasonably early generation text.

mr.scrivener

The Modern Academic Position Examined

In my previous post I listed the five main planks in the modern Academic position on the Bible:

(1) The Bible is just like any other book.

(2) Biblical books were exposed to corrupting forces.

(3) Biblical books were not exposed to 'special forces'.

(4) Ordinary text-critical methods are valid and adequate.

(5) The Bible has not been protected by God (no Divine Preservation).

The Academic position depends to one degree or another on every one of these points. And to the extent that these do not hold, the academic view will be false, misleading and unreliable.

If we leave supernatural questions aside for now, and treat (5) above as something to be established at the end of an investigation, then we have four remaining points which are open to scientific and historical investigation and susceptible to practical testing.


(1) Is the New Testament (NT) like other Books?

On the 'supernatural' side of the question, we strongly hold that such a question is not testable by scientific means. So we must move on to the more practical aspect of this question. The qualified answer on the one hand, is "yes", in the sense that these texts were collected and hand-copied, and display the expected physical features of such a (non-supernatural) process. That is, the NT is represented by hand-copied manuscripts of varying condition and quality, and these show signs of scribal activity and method, such as hand-correction, spelling variants etc.. This makes the evidence open to ordinary scientific investigation.

On the other hand, there are so many startling and significant differences between the Bible documents and other books (both secular and religious), that we have to conclude that the Bible has been transmitted under special, if not extraordinary, circumstances. Some specific and unique details about the Bible's transmission include:

(a) The NT books form the core of a major Religious Movement. The only near-parallel is the OT Judaism from which Christianity sprang. Most ordinary books, even valuable scientific works, had a relatively luke-warm following.

(b) The NT books are represented by some 15,000 copies and fragments, 10,000 in Latin, 5,000 in Greek, and hundreds of manuscripts containing other language versions. No other group of writings in antiquity has ever been so profusely replicated and dispersed. Other writings survive in perhaps one or two, up to at most a few hundred ancient copies.

(c) The NT religion has been the root of unprecedented political activity and upheaval. This began with the hijacking of the Roman Empire, and was followed by centuries of large-scale conflict with other cultures.

(d) The NT religion has suffered violent opposition and persecution, including the destruction of its writings, in the earliest era. Very few other works have suffered such targeted destructive forces in antiquity.

(e) The NT writings have been exposed to attempted 'heretical' alterations due to subsequent theological and political conflicts and controversies. Attacks came from within and without the Christian Movement, but seem to have been effectively repulsed in favor of the core-teachings.

As should be obvious, the NT writings have been exposed to powerful distorting forces, and have been defended by equally powerful interests and concerns. These historical forces make many of the claims about the NT being 'ordinary' patently absurd.

While seeming to affirm Plank #(2) above, these facts strongly contradict Plank #(3), and call into serious doubt the central claim of Plank #(4).

Plank #(4) appears even more ludicrous, when we realise that secular historians have no real experience, skill, or credibility in dealing with the unique documents of a major, living World Religion. The sorry record of propagandizing against 'foreign religions' and the staggeringly unprofessional and dishonest portrayal of religions generally by historians triggers an alarm-bell that screams for caution in accepting the claims of modern academics.

Placing secular historians in a position to 'pronounce' on Plank #(5) Divine Inspiration, is simply too obviously like putting the foxes in charge of the hen-house, to need any further comment.

peace
Nazaroo

Why do modern Academics opt for the W/H Text?

We already know why non-Christian academics opt for the W/H text. We can sum it up as follows:

(1) Non-Religious scholars believe that the Bible is just like any other book. It is not 'magically' protected from the normal historical and mechanical forces at work for ordinary books hand-copied from antiquity. It follows that the Biblical texts were vulnerable to corruption in the copying process.

(2) Non-Religious scholars believe that the Biblical books were indeed exposed to the same corrupting forces in the copying process, and so need significant restoration of their texts.

(3) Non-Religious scholars believe that the Bible has not been exposed to any 'special forces' or circumstances that cannot be handled by the normal methods of restoration in use for secular and other religious books.

(4) Non-Religious scholars believe that the Bible has not been protected by God or supernatural powers, and so they have no reason to believe that it has escaped the same kind of significant corruption that other books have suffered in the hand-copying process.

(5) Non-Religious scholars believe that ordinary text-critical methods are perfectly valid and effective, as currently developed, for restoring the text of all books hand-copied in antiquity.

Together these five points form the viewpoint of modern academia on the Biblical text, and all other texts.

The question is, how valid really are each of these planks in the modern position, and what happens when some of them become questionable under examination, or turn out to be unreliable? How much of the total modern secular view collapses, and what does the true picture become?

A second question is, why do so many modern Christian academics so easily absorb and embrace the modern secular viewpoint? And as far as they do embrace this position, how can they be trusted or relied upon for guidance in matters of faith and doctrine?

Christian academics seem helpless to confront the modern secular position on the Bible. It all appears natural enough and reasonable to them, and even logically impeccable. Basically, they surrender on all five points, and find themselves with an uninspired, unprotected, unpreserved Biblical text (the "inerrancy" is restricted to the original autographs, now lost).

As a result, they accept the critically reconstructed text of textual critics over the traditional text plainly used by the majority of Christians for the last thousand years. This is no exaggeration, for the Byzantine and Latin Vulgate texts together constituted the Bible for virtually the whole Christian world from about 400 to 1400 A.D.

In order to rationalize, justify, or excuse this position, modern Christian academics offer a lame apology along the following lines:

(1) No important Christian doctrine is affected in the editing of the Bible text.

(2) The edited critical text is as good as the traditional text for salvation etc.

(3) The critical text is sufficient for all religious and doctrinal matters.

(4) The critical text is closer to the original autographs than the traditional text.

(5) Adopting the critical text makes no difference, for all practical purposes.

Examples of Christian scholars who hold this view are:

(a) Daniel Wallace, "Whatever the evangelical doctrine -- it is not compromised by these new translations or the MSS behind them”, and

(b) Ben Witherington, "we are closer now today to the original text of the GNT than any time in history since about the 2nd or 3rd century A.D. ..."

Of course, the central doctrines of Divine Preservation and Inerrancy (rather important to some christians) are conveniently left out of the "important doctrines" not affected by adopting the modern position on the Biblical text.

Peace
Nazaroo