Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!iuvax!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: jamesa@amadeus.wr.tek.com (James Akiyama) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Re: Compiling the Bible Message-ID: Date: 29 Aug 89 07:16:41 GMT Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton, OR. Lines: 99 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu Our moderator writes: > There is greatest concensus in the area of textual criticism. I'm not really sure about this. Today, there exists two types of Greek New Testaments. The first, and by far the most common, are two based on the Westcott and Hort theory. These two are the Nestle-Aland text (published by the German Bible Society) and the United Bible Society Greek New Testament (I should add that my church support's the Westcott and Hort theory). The Nestle-Aland Greek text (26th edition) and UBS text (3rd edition, corrected) are nearly identical. A second group exists, however, that believes in the Majority text. Note that the majority text more closely follows the Textus Receptus (published by Oxford in 1825) which was the text used to translate the King James Version. The Majority text is now out in 2nd edition by Nelson press. It was edited by Hodges. The major thrust of the argument has to do with whether the New Testament should be based on the relatively few, oldest Greek text we have (namely, the Codex Vaticanus, Codex Alexandrinus, and Codex Sinaiticus) or the reading from the majority of Greek manuscripts found. A long time ago (around the time of King James), we used the majority text. Then later, two people (Westcott and Hort) published a paper (actually two books), proposing that the text should really be based on the most ancient version we have; that the other, newer versions, probably represent changes or "revisions" to the manuscript. The publication also included a "new" rendition of the Greek New Testament based on the above three with an emphasis on the Codex Vaticanus. This theory was (and is today) very widely accepted. People who support the Majority text argue that the "oldest" manuscripts are all from Egypt. Preservation there is due to the unique climate of Egypt. They argue that the differences in reading are due to differences which are unique to Egypt; not a period of time. I should also note that some of these differences are quite substantial (e.g. the ending of Mark). For the New Testament I would encourage interested user to read the works of Westcott and Hort, and the preface to the Nestle-Aland and UBS editions. For the counter arguments, you can read the preface to Hodges Greek New Testament According to the Majority Text (Copyright 1985, second edition). One thing you'll want to note is that most commentaries and modern day Translations are based on the Westcott and Hort theory. As far as the Hebrew Old Testament goes, some newer research is questioning the exactness of our Masoretic text (published as the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, by the German Bible Society in cooperation with the United Bible Societies). There is now mounting evidence that the Septuaginta and Latin Vulgate were translated from a much older Hebrew manuscript and that many of the differences between the Masoretic text and Septuaginta (and Vulgate) may need re-thinking. Again, some of these differences are significant. There has been a large amount of effort, known as the Goettingen project in Cambridge, to create a critical apparatus of the Septuagint (its probably worth noting that the Goettingen project is following the principles of Westcott and Hort; it is mainly relying on the Codex Vaticunus, Alexandrinus, and Sinaiticus). Over the past few years there has been a renewed interest in the Septuagint as a whole (partly because of the above, partly because it was the most probable translation during the time of Christ; this is evident in that much of the New Testament quotes from the Old Testament follows the Septuagint, not the Masoretic text). I think the reason the Latin Vulgate is not also being considered has more to do with christian politics (i.e. the Vulgates heavy use in the Catholic church). My own belief (probably not supported by my church) is that the Vulgate needs to also be considered here. The Vulgate has always been considered "historically" important to the Protestants, but usually not widely used (again, I believe, due to its heavy use and endorsement by the Catholics churches). It is another, independent source for trying to determine, "most probable reading". A lot of the reason why the Masoretic text has remained unquestioned is because there exists very few "second" copies of the text. Thus, in the past, there was little to compare our current Hebrew text to. The only time the Septuagint and Vulgate were consulted was when our Masoretic text was incomplete (e.g. Genesis 4:8). Now, many are starting to wonder whether we should be consulting the Septuagint and Latin Vulgate renditions, when considering passages in Hebrew. Note that the Greek Orthodox churches use the Septuagint rather than our Masoretic Hebrew. Also note that the pointing (vowels) and accents in our Masoretic text was not done until about 200-300 BC (prior to that vowels had not yet been invented, at least in Hebrew). The pointing was done by the scribes because Hebrew was beginning to die out as a language. There are questions on the accuracy of the pointing done by the scribes of that time. In Exodus, for example, there are known inconsistencies, such as a single consonant containing both, a Dagesh (which is used to indicate consonantal doubling), and the Rape (which is used to indicate the consonent is not doubled). This seems to indicate that the pointing done by the scribes, or at least our copies of that work, is not inerrant (or, perhaps, that it is trying to convey a secondary usage which has been lost over time). Now I'm not suggesting that our current versions are unreliable. In spite of the age, our rendition of the Bible is probably much more assured than the writings of Shakespeare and other old text. Still, much work needs to be done. James E. Akiyama jamesa@amadeus.WR.TEK.COM UUCP: ....!uunet!tektronix!amadeus.WR.TEK.COM!jamesa ARPA: @RELAY.CS.NET:jamesa%amadeus.WR.TEK.COM