Evangelical Textual Criticism

An Inconvenient Quiz

noreply@blogger.com (maurice a robinson) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 21:23:00 +0000

The cover of the DVD containing last Fall's Wallace-Ehrman Debate, "Can we Trust the Text of the New Testament" (mentioned on this blog on 11 Nov 2011) features a manuscript containing a Greek minuscule text, written in quite a neat hand.

The only problem is that -- in relation to the title of the debate -- the MS pictured is not to be trusted for the purpose stated. I pointed this out to Dan, and he assured me that he had nothing to do with the packaging of the DVD (nor, I presume, with the selection of the same manuscript pages for flyer and poster promotion of the debate).

So, as an interesting challenge, what text is actually displayed in the photograph? I know, and Dan knows, but do you?

If you need a larger version of the photo, see the flyer at:

http://www.friendsofcsntm.com/smudebate/smu_debate_flyer_4.25x11.pdf

PERI/UPER in Gal 1.4

noreply@blogger.com (Peter M. Head) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 12:50:00 +0000

Another interesting variant at Gal 1.4a: τοῦ δόντος ἑαυτὸν ὑπὲρ τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν ἡμῶν ...
As noted in NA27 P46 and Sinaiticus (among other important witnesses: A DFG PSI 1739 1881 Maj) read PERI. See the following pictures:

Sinaiticus is corrected from PERI to UPER, showing the spatial similarity of the words (ca corrector acc Sin Proj. Website; not first corrector as NA27 represents).

This is a common variation (not only in NT manuscripts, cf. DBAG), and there doesn't seem much of a differential in meaning in this sort of context. The parallel in 1 Cor 15.3 (Χριστὸς ἀπέθανεν ὑπὲρ τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν ἡμῶν ...) is obviously relevant in terms of appeal to Pauline style. But I don't have a strong feeling either way on this one. Any thoughts?

New fragment of Romans 9 and 10

noreply@blogger.com (P.J. Williams) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 23:36:00 +0000

Reported on CNN is a newly identified papyrus fragment of Romans 9 and 10. Also news of something to do with Cambridge and the Codex Climaci Rescriptus. I know a little more about that and will share before too long...

Yet Another Scribal Tendency: Swapping Syllables

noreply@blogger.com (Dirk Jongkind) — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 11:39:00 +0000

Very short recap: I believe that a single act of copying goes wrong when the cumulative weight of distracting forces is bigger than that of the focussing forces. This means that often there may not be one single factor (or 'explanation') that accounts for the creation of a textual variant, but rather a number of factors working in tandem to tip the balance.

Here is another one of those scribal tendencies, misreading αυτου for τουθυ or τουχυ and vice verse. Visually there are two syllables involved (not of course in the full nomen sacrum του θεου, or του χριστου), and such metathesis when reading is not uncommon at all.

A few examples (all [sub]singular readings in order to demonstrate the phenomenon):

Alexandrinus in Eph 3:2, της χαριτος αυτου (for του θυ)

P46 in Eph 3:7, της δυναμεως του θυ (for αυτου)

Minuscule 33 in Eph 3:8, πλουτος αυτου (for του χυ)

In each of these examples there is the additional factor of harmonisation to the immediate context, but the combination of the two has of course more force.
(Other examples, 69 (and others?) Rev 14:10 θυμου αυτου (for του θυ); 1854 Rev 20:4 λογον αυτου (for λογον του θυ).

What is perhaps most instructive is that this phenomenon underlines that even though Greek is written without word breaks and that there is, therefore, a large phonetic component needed when reading a text, there is still a visual component too that also works on the level of 'syllables' or perceived syllables.

Free Baker Commentary on James by Robert H. Gundry

noreply@blogger.com (Tommy Wasserman) — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 09:40:00 +0000

Bryan Dyer notified me last week that Baker Academic offers some free commentaries (9, 16, 23 January):

New E-book Shorts from Robert Gundry’s Commentary on the New Testament

Baker Academic is proud to announce new ebook shorts from Robert H. Gundry.

In these verse-by-verse commentaries taken from Commentary on the New Testament, Robert Gundry offers a fresh, literal translation and a reliable exposition of every book of the New Testament.

Students and scholars will welcome Gundry’s nontechnical explanations and clarifications, and readers at all levels will appreciate his sparkling interpretations. Priced from $1.99 to $5.99 these affordable and convenient resources are available wherever ebooks are sold.

As we celebrate the release of this series, Baker Academic will be making selected entries from this commentary series free for one day only.

On Monday January 9th, Gundry’s commentary on Ephesians will be free to download for 24 hours on Amazon, CBD, and Barnes & Noble.

This will be followed by other selections made free to download on January 16th and 23rd.

Today's commentary is on the Letter of James (Amazon).

Resolving a mystery in NA26 & 27 at Gal 1.1

noreply@blogger.com (Peter M. Head) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 10:23:00 +0000

There is an unusual error in my New Testaments (NA26 & NA27).

At Gal 1.1 AUTON, towards the end of the verse, is marked in the text with the little right-angle mark which indicates that a different word occurs in the textual tradition, but there is nothing in the apparatus. I have occasionally wondered what happened there. I figured there probably was a variant and that the editors decided to leave it out but forgot, or were too late, to delete the marker in the text. If I had ever thought about it for long I could have checked Tischendorf or Swanson, but I never bothered. But today I was looking at Sinaiticus and found what I assume is the variant:

It is definitely an odd reading: 'from God the father who raised them from dead'. AUTWN if taken seriously would have to refer to the ANQRWPWN from whom Paul did not get his apostleship, but why think that God had raised THEM from the dead? It doesn't make any sense, it is a nonsense reading, it was quickly corrected (S1 acc Sin Proj). It is interesting in relation to the scribes of Sinaiticus (since blunders reveal more about a scribe than good copying), but it doesn't warrant a mention in the NA editions.

HMWN in Gal 1.3: the problem of arguments from Pauline style

noreply@blogger.com (Peter M. Head) — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 09:44:00 +0000

So there is an interesting textual question in Galatians 1.3 about the position of HMWN. P46, as shown above has the HMWN following K[URIO]U. In ET: 'Grace and peace from God the father and our Lord Jesus Christ'. This reading is without doubt the best attested reading: P46, P51, B D F G H 075 1739 1881 Byz vg sy sa. It is also the reading which explains the other readings. But it is interesting that it is not the text of NA/UBS. As Metzger noted: they preferred the reading which accords with Pauline style. This proposed original text was then ‘altered by copyists who, apparently in the interest of Christian piety, transferred the possessive pronoun so it would be more closely associated with “Lord Jesus Christ”.’ TCGNT, p. 520.
Why pious scribes made this alteration to Galatians and left Rom, 1 & 2 Cor, Eph and Phil apparently untouched is not discussed. Nor is the tendency of scribes to harmonise towards a standard feature of Pauline style (as can in fact be seen in Col 1.2 [01 A C 075 Byz it etc. add supplement] and 1 Thess 1.1 [01 A (D) 33 Byz etc. add supplement).
A better solution is probably to follow the text of P46, the weight of the external evidence, and the Holmes/SBLGNT text (which I just checked).

SBL Amsterdam Call for Papers

noreply@blogger.com (Tommy Wasserman) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 07:59:00 +0000

This is a reminder to submit your proposal for the for the 2012 SBL International Meeting held in Amsterdam (Universiteit van Amsterdam), July 22-26.

The program unit "Working with Biblical Manuscripts," which I and Jan Krans (who lives in the town) chair, has already received some interesting proposals of papers.

Here is the call for papers:

Papers concentrating on any aspect of textual criticism are welcome, in particular the practical work with manuscripts. Examples of topics: papyrological insights, scribal habits, preservation techniques, technical developments, computer assisted tools, producing critical editions, evaluating the evidence of fathers or versions, discussion of particular passages, social historical studies, new projects, systematic-theological problems, teaching text-criticism in an academic setting, etc.

The call for papers closes 1 February. So go to the SBL site, log in, and make your submission!

There will be a slightly modified schedule this year:

9:00 AM – 12:00 PM Morning sessions with coffee break from 10:15 – 10:45 AM
1:30 PM – 2:30 PM Special, plenary sessions
3:00 PM – 6:00 PM Afternoon sessions with coffee break from 4:15 – 4:45 PM

Moreover, this meeting is held in conjunction with the 2012 annual conference of the European Association of Biblical Studies (EABS) and the triennial joint meeting of the Oudtestamentish Werkgezelschap in Nederland en België (OTW) and the Society for Old Testament Study (SOTS), so there will surely be a lot of participants, and a good book exhibition.

New Year Quiz

noreply@blogger.com (Peter M. Head) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 01:15:00 +0000

So here are some images of places that important manuscripts come from. Identify the place and at least one manuscript from there. But only one answer each (give the others a go too!).

Number One:

Number Two:

Number Three:

Number Four:

Number Five:

Number Six:

Number Seven:

Number Eight:

Number Nine:

THE KING JAMES BIBLE AT 400

noreply@blogger.com (Peter Rodgers) — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 23:10:00 +0000

THE KING JAMES BIBLE AT 400

The party is coming to an end. We have had a year of celebrations of the 400^th anniversary of the translation of the King James Bible. Celebrations, large and small, scholarly and devotional, have taken place all over the world in honor of this milestone. Mostly the presentations at these events have celebrated the literary, historical and cultural achievement of the King James Bible. Not much attention has been given to text-critical matters relating to the KJV.

Our celebration of this splendid early seventeenth century achievement comes at a time when its language is revered but the text on which it is based is generally regarded as late and corrupt. Especially over the last two centuries stunning manuscript discoveries and refinement of methods have overthrown the once dominant Textus Receptus (The New Testament in the KJV was based on Beza’s 1598 edition of this text), and today translators generally depend on an eclectic text, like The Nestle/Aland 27^th edition. Many readings found in the King James have been relegated to the apparatus by modern editors. For example, few scholars today would be willing to argue that either Mark 16:9-20 or John 7:53-8:11 were part of the original (or initial) text of these books.

However, there are a few places in the New Testament where I believe the King James represents the original text of the writer. In my recent book, Text and Story: Narrative Studies in New Testament Textual Criticism (Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2011), I argue on eclectic grounds that three readings represented in the King James, but missing from modern editions, should be re-considered:

Mark 9:29: prayer and fasting

Luke 4:18: to heal the brokenhearted

Romans 8:2: set me free.

In addition to these I have argued in earlier studies listed below that other readings found in the King James Version but absent from the modern editions should be placed in our printed texts rather than in the apparatus:

Mark 15:28: “And the scripture was fulfilled which saith, And he was numbered with the transgressors” (Evangelical Quarterly, LXI, 1989, 81-84)

Ephesians 5:30: “…of his flesh and of his bones” (JTS 41, 1990, 92-94)

1 Peter 4:14: “On their part he is evil spoken of, but on your part he is glorified” (CBQ 43, 1981, 93-95).

As the birthday party for the KJV comes to a close, let us celebrate this translation for its splendid language and influence. But we should also be alert in these and a few other instances for indications of the original text of the New Testament.

The Christmas Story (Part 4)

noreply@blogger.com (Peter M. Head) — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 15:34:00 +0000

The Christmas Story (Part 3)

noreply@blogger.com (Peter M. Head) — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 15:26:00 +0000

A Tendency in the Pauline Corpus of Codex Vaticanus

noreply@blogger.com (Dirk Jongkind) — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 16:46:00 +0000

Before anyone accuses me of heresy, yes, Vaticanus is a good manuscript, and especially in the gospels. But the longer I am working in Paul, the more difficult I find it to treat it with the same respect here as in the gospels. Clearly something has happened in its ancestry, which is, let us say, remarkable.

I don't think the scribe of Vaticanus is responsible for this phenomenon. We have his work elsewhere in the manuscript and I haven't noticed something comparable there. So any tendency only to be found in the Pauline corpus is more likely a remnant of something that happened earlier on. And frankly, I don't think the particular tendency we are talking about is exclusive to Vaticanus, it may share this tendency with a number of other manuscripts, in particular the Greek - Latin bilinguals. But it is at times quite pronounced in Vaticanus, more so than in the others.

So what is the vice we are talking about? Hold your chair. It is that of reversing the order of the name-title 'Jesus Christ'. And Vaticanus will almost always be at the side of the order 'Christ Jesus'. In Romans, for example, it is the singular reading of Vaticanus in 5:17, 5:21, and 16:27. And elsewhere it has 'Christ Jesus' often with only minimal support from others (regardless of whether it is deemed to be the original text or not), such as the Latin bilinguals, or minuscules 33 and 81, or Sinaiticus (and it may be that each of these three combination agreements have a different meaning).

I said that very often Vaticanus will be on the side of the 'Christ Jesus' reading, but not always. In Gal 2:16 we find the collocation Jesus and Christ twice, in either order —and twice Vaticanus gets it wrong (I agree here with NA27). Anyway, all this is leading me to a rethink of quite a number of variants, because it seems to me that, strong though Vaticanus might be, we have hit a particular weakness here.

Ingrid Lilly – New Assistant Editor of TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism

noreply@blogger.com (Tommy Wasserman) — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 09:00:00 +0000

Ingrid E. Lilly, Assistant Professor of Hebrew Bible and Religious Studies at Western Kentucky University, has become the new assistant editor of TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism.

This is very good news, because she is not only a very nice person, but also a scholar of the Hebrew Bible and the chair of the SBL program unit, "Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible." There was really a gap to fill here, since the other editors are all working in the area of the New Testament (and papyrology). In this year's volume of the journal there are two published articles in each field. The new appointment is also positive in another sense of equality, i.e., gender equality, in a field which is strongly dominated by men (there are currently twenty men and three women on the editorial board, the editors included).

Ingrid Lilly wrote her dissertation on "Two Books of Ezekiel: Papyrus 967 and the Masoretic Text of Ezekiel as Variant Literary Editions." It will be published in Brill's Vetus Testamentum, Supplements series.

We have mentioned her work previously here and here.

The Christmas Story (Part 2)

noreply@blogger.com (Peter M. Head) — Fri, 16 Dec 2011 15:47:00 +0000

New from Brill: Textual Research on the Psalms and Gospels

noreply@blogger.com (Tommy Wasserman) — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 13:02:00 +0000

A new publication from Brill has appeared:

Textual Research on the Psalms and Gospels / Recherches textuelles sur les psaumes et les évangiles: Papers from the Tbilisi Colloquium on the Editing and History of Biblical Manuscripts. / Actes du Colloque de Tbilisi, 19-20 septembre 2007.
Edited by Christian-B. Amphoux & J. Keith Elliott with Bernard Outtier.
Novum Testamentum, Supplements 142
ISBN13: 9789004209275
Pages, Illustrations: xxvi, 274 pp.
List price: €105.00 / $144.00

Publisher's description
"Recent research on the text of the Psalms and Gospels in Greek and in certain versions, principally Coptic, Georgian and Armenian, reveals common characteristics when attempting to separate later editions of a text from its earliest forms. The essays in this collection give concrete examples of the issues involved and suggested explanations for textual changes."

Table of Contents
Part I The Psalms/psaumes

Gilles Dorival, Titres hébreux et titres grecs des psaumes

Mzekala Shanidze, Old Georgian Psalter and the Titles of the Psalms

Florence Bouet, Pluralité et choix éditoriaux: étude des variants λόγος-νόμος au Ps 118, 105 et νόμου-ὀνόματος au Ps 129,5

Charles Renoux,Quelques psaumes dans les documents liturgiques anciens géorgiens et arméniens

Part II The Gospels/évangiles

Christian-Bernard Amphoux, Qu’est-ce que le type de texte “césaréen”?

Didier Lafleur, Le codex de Koridethi (Θ.038) et la famille 13: une nouvelle collation de l’évangile de Marc

J.Keith Elliott, The Endings of Mark’s Gospel and the Presentation of the Variants in the Marc multilingue Edition

Josep Rius-Camps, Le Codex de Bèze: Base indispensable pour une edition de l’évangile de Marc

Jenny Read-Heimerdinger, The Problem of Editing a Text with a Multiple Textual Tradition

Bernard Outtier, Les types de texte des évangiles en géorgien ancient
Appended: D.M. Lang, Recent Work on the Georgian New Testament

Darejan Tvaltvadze, The Manuscripts of Georgian Translations of the Gospels from the Black Mountain

Manana Machkhaneli, The Manuscript Anbandidi

Jost Gippert, Fragments of St John’s Gospel in the Language of the Causasian Albanians
Appended: Review, The Caucasian Albanian Palimpsests of Mount Sinai, Simon Crisp

Anne Boud’hors, Le caractère harmonisant des traditions de l’évangile de Marc en copte sahidique

Extract from the preface (kindly shared by J. K. Elliott)

... As far as the Psalms are concerned, there are four essays here. Two concern the titles, the first by Gilles Dorival. He revisits a topic that he has made his own, namely the headings of the individual Psalms in Hebrew and Greek.

...

Mzekala Shanidze’s essay parallels Dorival’s, by looking at the titles of the Psalms in Georgian. As in other essays dealing with the Georgian versions, we are obligated to examine the Georgian ‘Vulgate’ as well as the earlier, often more fluid, pre-Athonite versions, and note any differences and changes between the texts.

...

Florence Bouet homes in on two highly significant variants in the Psalms, those at Ps. 118 (119):5 νόμος/λόγος and at Ps. 129 (130):5 νόμου/ ὀνόματος. ... Obviously here Christian and Jewish influences seem to be in evidence but the attestation as a whole cries out for explanation.

...

Inevitably and appropriately, because these essays originated at a conference in the Caucasus, there are also important examples from the Georgian and Armenian traditions concerning the history of the Psalms. Charles Renoux takes up the important liturgical uses of the Psalter in those languages. Obviously, the Psalms were used from their beginnings in liturgical contexts in the Temple and for particular Jewish festivals. Renoux’ essay explores how, where and when the Armenian and Georgian Christian communities made use of the Psalms. They seem to have originated from the Jerusalem liturgical practices of the 4th-5th centuries....

Moving to the New Testament and the Gospels there are eleven major contributions in this volume. The first, by Christian Amphoux, concerns itself with the Caesarean text-type. Amphoux’ own distinctive contribution to the history of the New Testament has been to locate the differing forms of text within the history of the fissiparous early church and his idiosyncratic and carefully-argued conclusions are to be found in the essay here. ... Amphoux is a keen defender of the Caesarean text-type and his paper here stresses the position of this form of the Gospels in relation to other text-types, ‘Western’, Alexandrian and Byzantine.

...

As a corollary to Amphoux’ paper, Didier Lafleur’s contribution happily meshes with it. He fortuitously writes about the text of a major Caesarean witness, namely Codex Koridethi (Θ, 038), a manuscript that happens to be housed in Tbilisi. Alongside that, his new collations of the manuscripts of family 13 in Mark confirm the homogeneous character of this family and he also shows the agreements of the family with not only Koridethi but also minuscules 28, 565, 700 and uncial W 032. He establishes that one of the family members, minuscule 788, stands closest to the archetype of that family and how frequently family 13 as a whole allies itself to Codex Koridethi. Consequently, he, like Amphoux, encourages the use of the Caesarean text-type (obviously not a geographically-centred ‘local’ text) as a serious and distinctive grouping and a legitimate textual form found not only in Mark but in the New Testament Gospels as a whole.

J. Keith Elliott’s essay focuses on two other early Greek manuscripts א 01 and Vaticanus B 03 particularly in that perennial textual crux, the ending of Mark which they conclude at 16:8. These two manuscripts are both accorded separate sections amid the seven differing manuscripts of Mark in Marc mutilingue as both demonstrate differing textual stages in the history of Mark. But they happen to agree in their form of the ending of Mark and are the only two ancient Greek witnesses to the shorter text. Among other supporters of the shorter reading are the two earliest Georgian witnesses. Elliott’s paper shows whatever Mark’s original intention may have been – and it is unlikely that anything he may have written beyond 16:8 has survived – his Gospel once circulated in the truncated form now exhibited by these two old Greek uncials. Inevitably, and within the second century, attempts were made to repair the damaged ending and Mark was duly provided with a ‘proper’ and satisfying conclusion that included references to the anticipated post-Easter appearances. The longer ending, commonly numbered Mark 16:9-20, represents a later editing of the text of Mark and, as such, belongs to a history of this Gospel that had an inevitable impact on a reader’s understanding of Mark as narrator and on his theology.

...

Rius-Camps’ paper advocates the use of this bilingual [Codex Bezae] in any establishing of an edition of Mark. Jenny Read-Heimerdinger looks at D in Luke. Based on her and Rius-Camps’ studies of D in Acts, she is prepared now to promote D in Luke as an early and coherent writing that must be taken into account because it represents the first volume of a comprehensive ‘demonstration’ of the claims of Christianity from a Jewish perspective.

Luke 24: 13-35 is taken as an example to show how Jesus in this work was interpreted in Jewish written and oral traditions.

...

As befits a contribution by the director of the Orioni project at Tbilisi State University responsible for examining the Georgian Gospels, Sophio Sarjveladze’s essay is an over-arching survey that may be seen as a worthy introduction to the other essays in this volume dealing with aspects of the Georgian version. But as is typical of most articles in this volume, broad principles and generalised summaries give rise to, and are indeed supported by, specific and well-chosen Biblical references. Sophio Sarjveladze’s examples reveal the complexity of her text-critical researches and the care with which her team’s efforts are rooted in close philological examination.

Following this is Bernard Outtier’s essay. With his long-established and wide-ranging expertise in Georgian studies he is well placed to proffer a general survey of current research in the area of the Georgian version of the Gospels and its text-types. He appends a valuable bibliography. Once more we are enabled to observe parallels between the materials and methodologies applied by Georgian scholarship and those relevant to other versions as well and also to the Greek New Testament manuscript tradition as well.

Attached to Outtier’s piece is an important but now inevitably outdated article by David M. Lang (1924-1991).

...

Darevan Tvaltvadze’s article narrows Outtier’s and Lang’s surveys to the Georgian manuscripts emanating from the Black Mountain where Georgian monks produced a distinctive form of the pre-Athonite Gospels that began a process of examining the Georgian against the Greek. Her analysis of certain of the Black Mountain manuscripts reveals where older readings still survive. These manuscripts thus form a median position between the oldest forms and Giorgi’s Athonite Vulgate.

Focussing even more narrowly, Manana Machkhaneli examines one Georgian manuscript under the microscope, namely the so-called Anbandini manuscript. Following her researches into its distinctive readings she reports here that she has been able to place it in the family tree of Georgian Gospel manuscripts as a ‘mixed’ type, comparable to the Ksani manuscript that shared some characteristics with the protovulgate text and with the Adish recension but which also has singular readings. Another building block in the multifaceted history of the Georgian Gospels now seems to have been placed.

Shortly before the Tbilisi colloquium in 2007 we became aware that a publication was about to emerge that concerned Biblical writings in a hitherto virtually unknown language, Caucasian Albanian. It was entirely appropriate that one of that publication’s editors, Jost Gippert of Frankfurt am Main, should introduce that version and its importance, especially in its relation to the Georgian and Armenian versions. In the time between the conference and the present book the publication appeared. As a consequence, Gippert’s paper here is a revision of his original text which describes the recently deciphered manuscripts. As well as having this insider’s contribution, it seemed worthwhile to append to it a review of it by Simon Crisp of the United Bible Societies. His review was commissioned as an article for Novum Testamentum and is reproduced here to emphasise the significance of this new version.

...

In the present volume Anne Boud’hors looks at the situation of the Coptic, a version as early as the Latin and Syriac. Here, after a comprehensive tour d’horizon concerning the current state of Coptic study of the Gospels, she zooms in on five textual variation units in Mark to demonstrate what may be learned from the Sahidic Coptic manuscripts. She observes a harmonising tendency not only in relation to its revised version but also in the earliest redactions. Her conclusions are preliminary and tentative as work is still underway and to a certain extent pioneering in its attempt to trace and track the history of the early Coptic version. As in other essays, this article also flags up potentially profitable methodologies that consider variants not only within one particular tradition but in connexion with other versions. The approach again is interdisciplinary and cross-cultural.

UPDATE: Order page from Eisenbrauns

Ba(si)leia as nomen sacrum?

noreply@blogger.com (Simon Gathercole) — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 17:14:00 +0000

Perhaps lots of other people have, but I haven't seen basileia written as a nomen sacrum. (I mentioned this to Larry Hurtado and he hadn't either.) I think there is one in POxy 5072. Richard Goode has discussed the Egerton Papyrus's use of basileus as a nomen sacrum (in the 2007 Birmingham conference volume), and I looked at the nice photo in Bell and Skeat, and interestingly the supralinear stroke starts in almost exactly the same place there as it does in POxy 5072 - at the very end of the beta, almost at the beginning of the alpha. The abbreviation is - mutatis mutandis - in the same form as well (BALEUSI in P.Eg. and BALEIA in the text below).

Check out line 9 of POxy 5072:

http://www.ox.ac.uk/images/hi_res/12836_Papyrus_lost_gospel.jpg

(It's one of the images posted by oxy.ac when they publicised the open access of the papyri images. It'll be the first in the next POxy vol.)

Simon

New Article in TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism

noreply@blogger.com (Tommy Wasserman) — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 16:52:00 +0000

A new article has appeared in TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism vol. 16 (2011).

"The Diversification of Colossians’ Text and Women’s Status in the Early Church" by Matteo Grosso.

Abstract
In the Epistle to the Colossians, the family of 06 and other documents traditionally labeled as “Western” display notable variant readings in passages concerning women and their status in the Christian community. In this note the author examines these readings with the purpose of detecting what pictures they provide over against the other branches of the tradition. He also evaluates to what degree, if any, an ideologically oriented scribal tendency is at work.

Ending the Year on a High: The Euthalian Apparatus

noreply@blogger.com (Dirk Jongkind) — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 20:24:00 +0000

It is quickly running to the end of this year, and it started to look like as if no exciting books were going to appear this year at all. However, when I came in Tyndale House this morning, I found an unexpected but most pleasant surprise waiting for me. Vemund Blomkvist had sent me his dissertation on the Euthalian apparatus.

Vemund Blomkvist,The Euthalian Apparatus: Text, Translation, Commentary Series of Dissertations Submitted to the Faculty of Theology, University of Oslo / Acta Theologica 39 (Oslo: Unipub, 2011).

So far I have had tremendous fun with this study, which does exactly what the title says (with the limitation that it concentrates on the chapter titles (κεφαλαια - τιτλοι), the introductions to the big divisions (προλογοι), and the υποθεσεις to the individual letters. Blomkvist's interest is not text-critical but that of reception history - which is totally legitimate, especially when one puts so much work into translating and bringing together all this material that is also of interest for people with different questions. Truly original work, and research that will spark off other research.

Just the translation of and commentary on Euthalius would have been tremendous, but Blomkvist also throws in the 'Marcionite' prologues (which I actually hold to be originally Marcionite - pace Dahl and Ulrich Schmid), the Priscillan edition (from the Latin), the υποθεσεις on Paul of Theodoret, and the same by Theophylact.

I hope to come back later with some further thoughts, but one of the fascinating gems is worth sharing straightaway. Since the author had worked with and has access to the notes of the late Nils Dahl, he mentions a discovery made by Dahl in four Latin mediaeval manuscripts of Monte Cassino where the Euthalian prologue to Paul is fused with the Muratorian canon. Harnack had discussed the Muratorian part back in 1898, but did not mention the importance of finding Euthalian material in Latin.

Congratulations to Vemund with this excellent dissertation!

Update: Blomqvist will defend his thesis publicly tomorrow (15 December). English summary is found here.[TW]

The Christmas Story (Part 1)

noreply@blogger.com (Peter M. Head) — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 16:59:00 +0000

Notes on Luke 22: P75, NA27 & Sinaiticus

noreply@blogger.com (Peter M. Head) — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 12:16:00 +0000

Yesterday we had some fun with P75 in an MPhil seminar. The basic assignment was to read page 53 (containing Luke 22.38-56). Among the many things we noticed were the following:

For the last word of v41 P75 reads PROSEUXATO (not PROSHUXATO as NA27 app. suggests) - a reminder that the NA apparatus is somewhat an approximation and can't be guaranteed to present sufficient evidence to reconstruct readings of manuscripts in detail. We wondered whether it would be better to place P75 in parentheses in the apparatus (I think it probably would be better).
For the omission of 22.43f NA27 app. refers to the first corrector of Sinaiticus - from NA27 one would think that the original of Sinaiticus has the verses, the first corrector (in the scriptorium) deletes; and a later corrector restores them. But the Sinaiticus project web page now attributes the deletion to the Ca corrector, and the restoration to the Cb2 corrector - which places the action much later than the first corrector. I guess/hope that the next revision of NA (NA28) will incorporate the results of the Sinaiticus Project in the apparatus.
For the same variant NA27 cites for the addition (among other things): Ju[stin] Ir[enaeus] Hipp Eus Hier. Immediately one wants to know the reference in Justin so as to assess whether Justin knows the text as part of Luke or (possibly) as an independent floater. This is such a general problem with patristic references in our small editions that I began to wonder about how big an appendix - which provided a reference for each patristic citation in the apparatus - would actually be, especially for second and third century writers. In my imagination it would be about as long as the appendices for minor variants and differences between the editions, and would be just as valuable than either of those. What do you think?
In 22.47 P75 reads PROSHRCETO (NA27 txt: PROHRCETO). Here it is a helpful outcome of reading the manuscript that one realises it is more than a simple one letter variant, since the reading of P75 suggests a different referent for the following AUTOUS - it would refer to the disciples and Jesus (v45); whereas for the NA27 reading it presumably refers to the OCLOS mentioned earlier in the verse (but pluralised). Just an example of how textual criticism helps close reading of the text.
We noted that NA27 doesn't offer any evidence in support of the txt reading for 22.19b-20, which would suggest that the editors were completely (IMO overly) satisfied with the originality of the longer reading here. Or is it more a by-product of the decision to take such a large unit as v17-20 for the variants - for such a long unit listing support for the txt reading would involve a lot of parentheses no doubt.

Pics from SBL Annual Meeting San Francisco 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Tommy Wasserman) — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 08:00:00 +0000

Edgar Ebojo, PhD student at Birmingham University (working on P46) is also an excellent photographer. He generously shares with us his pics from the recent annual meeting in San Francisco. They are uploaded to this folder.

Since I noticed that Edgar was everywhere with his camera, I never got out to get new batteries for my own camera, which I brought to San Francisco. I just used my mobile phone whenever I felt I had to capture a moment, e.g., Peter Head still fervently revising his presentation during a session ...

... a few minutes before delivery. For further reference, see his famous six steps for a successful paper. Unfortunately, this year, Peter had omitted his famous red circles and arrows from the presentation (something I have started to use to great success myself).

BASP 48 (2011) – Lots of Interesting Stuff

noreply@blogger.com (Tommy Wasserman) — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 07:35:00 +0000

The Bulletin of the American Society of Papyrologist 48 (2011) has just been published (HT: Papy-L). The following articles and reviews are of particular interest:

"Two More Pages of Crosby-Schøyen Codex MS 193: A Pachomian Easter
Lectionary?" by Albert Pietersma and Susan Comstock (pp. 27-46)

See recent discussion about this codex on this blog here.

"Grenfell and Hunt on the Dates of Early Christian Codices: Setting the
Record Straight" by Brent Nongbri (pp. 149-162)

Brent Nongbri presented an interesting paper on the subject of dating with focus on P66 at this year's SBL in San Fransisco.

"Greek Amulets and Formularies from Egypt Containing Christian Elements:
A Checklist of Papyri, Parchments, Ostraka, and Tablets" by Theodore S. de Bruyn and Jitse H.F. Dijkstra (pp. 163-216)

See here and here for background and criteria. De Bruyn has also published an essay on the subject in a Brill volume on Early Christian Manuscripts edited by Kraus & Nicklas (see here).

Review of Stanley E. und Wendy J. Porter, New Testament Greek Papyri and Parchments: New Editions. Mitteilungen aus der Papyrussammlung der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek, N.S. 29 (Text) und 30 (Tafeln) by Amphilochios Papathomas (pp. 255-258)

There are also reviews of the Oxyrhynchus Papyri volumes 73 and 75. By the way, the new book review editor of the journal is AnneMarie Luijendijk (Princeton University), also chair of the SBL Annual Meeting program unit of New Testament Textual Criticism.

I take this oppurtunity to mention that the electronic archives of this journal are maintained by the University of Michigan who has made available volumes 1-46 (1963-2009) on-line. Here you have articles and reviews that could keep you busy for days.

More Digitized GNT MSS from the British Library

noreply@blogger.com (Tommy Wasserman) — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 12:55:00 +0000

Some more Greek MSS have been uploaded to the The British Library's Digitised Manuscripts. There are three GNT MSS among them:

Harley 5777 = GA 446
Four Gospels, 15th century

Arundel 524=GA 476
Four Gospels, 11th century

Arundel 534= GA 1961
Theophylact of Bulgaria, Commentary on the Letters of Paul, 14th century

(HT: Jim Snapp)

For other reports on this project and the digitized GNT MSS of the British Library (which I think are now 74 MSS) , see here, here, here, here and here.

Made it home from sbl

noreply@blogger.com (Peter M. Head) — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 14:37:00 +0000

Made it home from SBL and San Francisco yesterday. Had some teaching today - supervisions which may have been a bit ragged around the edges (no lectures though fortunately). One of the (many) highlights of the trip was a visit (by bike) to the Muir Woods, an old-growth forest of Coastal Redwoods. I also heard (and gave) some presentations, ate some food, got some exercise, talked with some friends, bought some books and had a couple of misadventures. And thanks to a crowded flight and an unexpected upgrade I had quite a comfortable flight back to Heathrow.