‘Tenet ecclesia nostra, tenuitque semper firmam illam et immotam Tertulliani regulam “Id verius quod prius, id prius quod ab initio.” Quo propius ad veritatis fontem accedimus, eo purior decurrit Catholicae doctrinae rivus.’

Cave’s Prolog. p. xliv.

‘Interrogate de semitis antiquis quae sit via bona, et ambulate in ea.’—Jerem. vi. 16.

‘In summa, si constat id verius quod prius, id prius quod ab initio, id ab initio quod ab Apostolis; pariter utique constabit, id esse ab Apostolis traditum, quod apud Ecclesias Apostolorum fuerit sacrosanctum.’—Tertull. adv. Marc. 1. iv. c. 5.

PREFACE

THE reception given by the learned world to the First Volume of this work, as expressed hitherto in smaller reviews and notices, has on the whole been decidedly far from discouraging. All have had some word of encomium on our efforts. Many have accorded praise and signified their agreement, sometimes with unquestionable ability. Some have pronounced adverse opinions with considerable candour and courtesy. Others in opposing have employed arguments so weak and even irrelevant to the real question at issue, as to suggest that there is not after all so much as I anticipated to advance against our case. Longer examinations of this important matter are doubtless impending, with all the interest attaching to them and the judgements involved: but I beg now to offer my acknowledgements for all the words of encouragement that have been uttered.

Something however must be said in reply to an attack made in the Guardian newspaper on May 20, because it represents in the main the position occupied by some members of an existing School. I do not linger over an offhand stricture upon my ‘adhesion to the extravagant claim of a second-century origin for the Peshitto,’ because I am content with the companionship of some of the very first Syriac scholars, and with the teaching given in an unanswered article in the Church Quarterly Review for April, 1895. Nor except in passing do I remark upon a fanciful censure of my account of the use of papyrus in MSS. before the tenth century—as to which the reviewer is evidently not versed in information recently collected, and described for example in Sir E. Maunde Thompson’s Greek and Latin Palaeography, or in Mr. F. G. Kenyon’s Our Bible and the Ancient Manuscripts, and in an article in the just mentioned Review which appeared in October, 1894. These observations and a large number of inaccuracies shew that he was at the least not posted up to date. But what will be thought, when attention is drawn to the fact that in a question whether a singular set of quotations from the early Fathers refer to a passage in St. Matthew or the parallel one in St. Luke, the peculiar characteristic of St. Matthew—‘them that persecute you’—is put out of sight, and both passages (taking the lengthened reading of St. Matthew) are represented as having equally only four clauses? And again, when quotations going on to the succeeding verse in St. Matthew (v. 45) are stated dogmatically to have been wrongly referred by me to that Evangelist? But as to the details of this point in dispute, I beg to refer our readers to pp. 144-153 of the present volume. The reviewer appears also to be entirely unacquainted with the history of the phrase μονογενὴς Θεός. in St. John i. 18, which, as may be read on pp. 215-218, was introduced by heretics and harmonized with Arian tenets, and was rejected on the other side. That some orthodox churchmen fell into the trap, and like those who in these days are not aware of the pedigree and use of the phrase, employed it even for good purposes, is only an instance of a strange phenomenon. We must not be led only by first impressions as to what is to be taken for the genuine words of the Gospels. Even if phrases or passages make for orthodoxy, to accept them if condemned by evidence and history is to alight upon the quicksands of conjecture.

A curious instance of a fate like this has been supplied by a critic in the Athenaeum, who, when contrasting Dean Burgon’s style of writing with mine to my discredit, quotes a passage of some length as the Dean’s which was really written by me. Surely the principle upheld by our opponents, that much more importance than we allow should be attributed to the ‘Internal evidence of Readings and Documents,’ might have saved him from error upon a piece of composition which characteristically proclaimed its own origin. At all events, after this undesigned support, I am the less inclined to retire from our vantage ground.

But it is gratifying on all accounts to say now, that such interpolations as in the companion volume I was obliged frequently to supply in order to fill up gaps in the several MSS. and in integral portions of the treatise, which through their very frequency would have there made square brackets unpleasant to our readers, are not required so often in this part of the work. Accordingly, except in instances of pure editing or in simple bringing up to date, my own additions or insertions have been so marked off. It will doubtless afford great satisfaction to others as well as the admirers of the Dean to know what was really his own writing: and though some of the MSS., especially towards the end of the volume, were not left as he would have prepared them for the press if his life had been prolonged, yet much of the book will afford, on what he regarded as the chief study of his life, excellent examples of his style, so vigorously fresh and so happy in idiomatic and lucid expression.

But the Introduction, and Appendix II on ‘Conflation’ and the ‘Neutral Text,’ have been necessarily contributed by me. I am anxious to invite attention particularly to the latter essay, because it has been composed upon request, and also because—unless it contains some extraordinary mistake—it exhibits to a degree which has amazed me the baselessness of Dr. Hort’s theory.

The manner in which the Dean prepared piecemeal for his book, and the large number of fragments in which he left his materials, as has been detailed in the Preface to the former volume, have necessarily produced an amount of repetition which I deplore. To have avoided it entirely, some of the MSS. must have been rewritten. But in one instance I discovered when it was too late that after searching for, and finding with difficulty and treating, an example which had not been supplied, I had forestalled a subsequent examination of the same passage from his abler hand. However I hope that in nearly all, if not all cases, each treatment involves some new contribution to the question discussed; and that our readers will kindly make allowance for the perplexity which such an assemblage of separate papers could not but entail.

My thanks are again due to the Rev. G. H. Gwilliam, B.D., Fellow of Hertford College, for much advice and suggestion, which he is so capable of giving, and for his valuable care in looking through all the first proofs of this volume; to ‘M. W.,’ Dean Burgon’s indefatigable secretary, who in a pure labour of love copied out the text of the MSS. before and after his death; also to the zealous printers at the Clarendon Press, for help in unravelling intricacies still remaining in them.

This treatise is now commended to the fair and candid consideration of readers and reviewers. The latter body of men should remember that there was perhaps never a time when reviewers were themselves reviewed by many intelligent readers more than they are at present. I cannot hope that all that we have advanced will be finally adopted, though my opinion is unfaltering as resting in my belief upon the Rock; still less do I imagine that errors may not be discovered in our work. But I trust that under Divine Blessing some not unimportant contribution has been made towards the establishment upon sound principles of the reverent criticism of the Text of the New Testament. And I am sure that, as to the Dean’s part in it, this trust will be ultimately justified.

EDWARD MILLER.

9 BRADMORE ROAD, OXFORD:

Sept. 2, 1896.

CONTENTS.

INTRODUCTION.

IN the companion volume to this, the Traditional Text, that is, the Text of the Gospels which is the resultant of all the evidence faithfully and exhaustively presented and estimated according to the best procedure of the courts of law, has been traced back to the earliest ages in the existence of those sacred writings. We have shewn, that on the one hand, amidst the unprecedented advantages afforded by modern conditions of life for collecting all the evidence bearing upon the subject, the Traditional Text must be found, not in a mere transcript, but in a laborious revision of the Received Text; and that on the other hand it must, as far as we can judge, differ but slightly from the Text now generally in vogue, which has been generally received during the last two and a half centuries.

The strength of the position of the Traditional Text lies in its being logically deducible and to be deduced from all the varied evidence which the case supplies, when it has been sifted, proved, passed, weighed, compared, compounded, and contrasted with dissentient testimony. The contrast is indeed great in almost all instances upon which controversy has gathered. On one side the vast mass of authorities is assembled: on the other stands a small group. Not inconsiderable is the advantage possessed by that group, as regards numerous students who do not look beneath the surface, in the general witness in their favour borne by the two oldest MSS. of the Gospels in existence. That advantage however shrinks into nothing under the light of rigid examination. The claim for the Text in them made at the Semiarian period was rejected when Semiarianism in all its phases fell into permanent disfavour. And the argument advanced by Dr. Hort that the Traditional Text was a new Text formed by successive recensions has been refuted upon examination of the verdict of the Fathers in the first four centuries, and of the early Syriac and Latin Versions. Besides all this, those two manuscripts have been traced to a local source in the library of Caesarea. And on the other hand a Catholic origin of the Traditional Text found on later vellum manuscripts has been discovered in the manuscripts of papyrus which existed all over the Roman Empire, unless it was in Asia, and were to some degree in use even as late as the ninth century before and during the employment of vellum in the Caesarean school, and in localities where it was used in imitation of the mode of writing books which was brought well-nigh to perfection in that city.

It is evident that the turning-point of the controversy between ourselves and the Neologian school must lie in the centuries before St. Chrysostom. If, as Dr. Hort maintains, the Traditional Text not only gained supremacy at that era but did not exist in the early ages, then our contention is vain. That Text can be Traditional only if it goes back without break or intermission to the original autographs, because if through break or intermission it ceased or failed to exist, it loses the essential feature of genuine tradition. On the other hand, if it is proved to reach back in unbroken line to the time of the Evangelists, or to a period as near to them as surviving testimony can prove, then Dr. Hort’s theory of a ‘Syrian’ text formed by recension or otherwise just as evidently falls to the ground. Following mainly upon the lines drawn by Dean Burgon, though in a divergence of my own devising, I claim to have proved Dr. Hort to have been conspicuously wrong, and our maintenance of the Traditional Text in unbroken succession to be eminently right. The school opposed to us must disprove our arguments, not by discrediting the testimony of the Fathers to whom all Textual Critics have appealed including Dr. Hort, but by demonstrating if they can that the Traditional Text is not recognized by them, or they must yield eventually to us

It must be always borne in mind, that it is not enough for the purpose of the other side to shew that the Traditional Text was in a minority as regards attestation. They must prove that it was nowhere in the earliest ages, if they are to establish their position that it was made in the third and fourth centuries. Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels, p. 95.

In this volume, the other half of the subject will be discussed. Instead of exploring the genuine Text, we shall treat of the corruptions of it, and shall track error in its ten thousand forms to a few sources or heads. The origination of the pure Text in the inspired writings of the Evangelists will thus be vindicated anew by the evident paternity of deflections from it discoverable in the natural defects or iniquities of men. Corruption will the more slim itself in true colours:—

Quinquaginta atris immanis hiatibus hydra ‘A hydra in her direful shape, With fifty darkling throats agape.’—

Altered from Conington’s version, Aen. vi. 576.

and it will not so readily be mistaken for genuineness, when the real history is unfolded, and the mistakes are accounted for. It seems clear that corruption arose in the very earliest age. As soon as the Gospel was preached, the incapacity of human nature for preserving accuracy until long years of intimate acquaintance have bred familiarity must have asserted itself in constant distortion more or less of the sacred stories, as they were told and retold amongst Christians one to another whether in writing or in oral transmission. Mistakes would inevitably arise from the universal tendency to mix error with truth which Virgil has so powerfully depicted in his description of ‘Fame’:—

Tam ficti pravique tenax, quam nuntia veri ‘How oft soe’er the truth she tell, What’s false and wrong she loves too well.’—

Altered from Conington, Aen. iv. 188.

And as soon as inaccuracy had done its baleful work, a spirit of infidelity and of hostility either to the essentials or the details of the new religion must have impelled such as were either imperfect Christians, or no Christians at all, to corrupt the sacred stories.

Thus it appears that errors crept in at the very first commencement of the life of the Church. This is a matter so interesting and so important in the history of corruption, that I must venture to place it again before our readers.

Why was Galilee chosen before Judea and Jerusalem as the chief scene of our Lord’s Life and Ministry, at least as regards the time spent there? Partly, no doubt, because the Galileans were more likely than the other inhabitants of Palestine to receive Him. But there was as I venture to think also another very special reason.

‘Galilee of the nations’ or ‘the Gentiles,’ not only had a mixed population

Strabo, xvi, enumerates amongst its inhabitants Egyptians, Arabians, and Phoenicians.

CHAPTER I.

GENERAL CORRUPTION.

§ 1.

WE hear sometimes scholars complain, and with a certain show of reason, that it is discreditable to us as a Church not to have long since put forth by authority a revised Greek Text of the New Testament. The chief writers of antiquity, say they, have been of late years re-edited by the aid of the best Manuscripts. Why should not the Scriptures enjoy the same advantage? Men who so speak evidently misunderstand the question. They assume that the case of the Scriptures and that of other ancient writings are similar.

Such remonstrances are commonly followed up by statements like the following:—That the received Text is that of Erasmus:—that it was constructed in haste, and without skill:—that it is based on a very few, and those bad Manuscripts:—that it belongs to an age when scarcely any of our present critical helps were available, and when the Science of Textual Criticism was unknown. To listen to these advocates for Revision, you would almost suppose that it fared with the Gospel at this instant as it had fared with the original Copy of the Law for many years until the days of King Josiah

2 Kings xxii. 8 = 2 Chron. xxxiv.15.

Yielding to no one in my desire to see the Greek of the New Testament judiciously revised, I freely avow that recent events have convinced me, and I suppose they have convinced the public also, that we have not among us the men to conduct such an undertaking. Better a thousand times in my judgement to leave things as they are, than to risk having the stamp of authority set upon such an unfortunate production as that which appeared on the 17th May, 1881, and which claims at this instant to represent the combined learning of the Church, the chief Sects, and the Socinian

[This name is used fur want of a better. Churchmen are Unitarians as well as Trinitarians. The two names in combination express our Faith. We dare not alienate either of them.]

Now if the meaning of those who desire to see the commonly received text of the New Testament made absolutely faultless, were something of this kind:—That they are impatient for the collation of the copies which have become known to us within the last two centuries, and which amount already in all to upwards of three thousand: that they are bent on procuring that the ancient Versions shall be re-edited;—and would hail with delight the announcement that a band of scholars had combined to index every place of Scripture quoted by any of the Fathers:—if this were meant, we should all be entirely at one; especially if we could further gather from the programme that a fixed intention was cherished of abiding by the result of such an appeal to ancient evidence. But unfortunately something entirely different is in contemplation.

Now I am bent on calling attention to certain features of the problem which have very generally escaped attention. It does not seem to be understood that the Scriptures of the New Testament stand on an entirely different footing from every other ancient writing which can be named. A few plain remarks ought to bring this fact, for a fact it is, home to every thoughtful person. And the result will be that men will approach the subject with more caution,—with doubts and misgivings,—with a fixed determination to be on their guard against any form of plausible influence. Their prejudices they will scatter to the winds. At every step they will insist on proof.

In the first place, then, let it be observed that the New Testament Scriptures are wholly without a parallel in respect of their having been so frequently multiplied from the very first. They are by consequence contained at this day in an extravagantly large number of copies [probably, if reckoned under the six classes of Gospels, Acts and Catholic Epistles, Pauline Epistles, Apocalypse, Evangelistaries, and Apostolos, exceeding the number of four thousand]. There is nothing like this, or at all approaching to it, in the case of any profane writing that can be named

See The Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels (Burgon and Miller), p. 21, note 1.

And the very necessity for multiplying copies,—a necessity which has made itself felt in every age and in every clime,—has perforce resulted in an immense number of variants. Words have been inevitably dropped,—vowels have been inadvertently confounded by copyists more or less competent:—and the meaning of Scripture in countless places has suffered to a surprising degree in consequence. This first.

But then further, the Scriptures for the very reason because they were known to be the Word of God became a mark for the shafts of Satan from the beginning. They were by consequence as eagerly solicited by heretical teachers on the one hand, as they were hotly defended by the orthodox on the other. Alike from friends and from foes therefore, they are known to have experienced injury, and that in the earliest age of all. Nothing of the kind can be predicated of any other ancient writings. This consideration alone should suggest a severe exercise of judicial impartiality, in the handling of ancient evidence of whatever sort.

For I request it may be observed that I have not said—and I certainly do not mean—that the Scriptures themselves have been permanently corrupted either by friend or foe. Error was fitful and uncertain, and was contradicted by other error: besides that it sank eventually before a manifold witness to the truth. Nevertheless, certain manuscripts belonging to a few small groups—particular copies of a Version—individual Fathers or Doctors of the Church,—these do, to the present hour, bear traces incontestably of ancient mischief.

But what goes before is not nearly all. The fourfold structure of the Gospel has lent itself to a certain kind of licentious handling—of which in other ancient writings we have no experience. One critical owner of a Codex considered himself at liberty to assimilate the narratives: another to correct them in order to bring them into (what seemed to himself) greater harmony. Brevity is found to have been a paramount object with some, and Transposition to have amounted to a passion with others. Conjectural Criticism was evidently practised largely: and almost with as little felicity as when Bentley held the pen. Lastly, there can be no question that there was a certain school of Critics who considered themselves competent to improve the style of the Holy Ghost throughout. [And before the members of the Church had gained a familiar acquaintance with the words of the New Testament, blunders continually crept into the text of more or less heinous importance.] All this, which was chiefly done during the second and third centuries, introduces an element of difficulty in the handling of ancient evidence which can never be safely neglected: and will make a thoughtful man suspicious of every various reading which comes in his way, especially if it is attended with but slender attestation. [It has been already shewn in the companion volume] that the names of the Codexes chiefly vitiated in this sort prove to be BאCDL; of the Versions,—the two Coptic, the Curetonian, and certain specimens of the Old Latin; of the Fathers,—Origen, Clement of Alexandria, and to some extent Eusebius.

Add to all that goes before the peculiar subject-matter of the New Testament Scriptures, and it will become abundantly plain why they should have been liable to a series of assaults which make it reasonable that they should now at last be approached by ourselves as no other ancient writings are, or can be. The nature of God,—His Being and Attributes:—the history of Man’s Redemption:—the soul’s eternal destiny:—the mysteries of the unseen world:—concerning these and every other similar high doctrinal subject, the sacred writings alone speak with a voice of absolute authority. And surely by this time enough has been said to explain why these Scriptures should have been made a battle-field during some centuries, and especially in the fourth; and having thus been made the subject of strenuous contention, that copies of them should exhibit to this hour traces of those many adverse influences. I say it for the last time,—of all such causes of depravation the Greek Poets, Tragedians, Philosophers, Historians, neither knew nor could know anything. And it thus plainly appears that the Textual Criticism of the New Testament is to be handled by ourselves in an entirely different spirit from that of any other book.

§ 2.

I wish now to investigate the causes of the corruption of the Text of the New Testament. I do not entitle the present a discussion of ‘Various Readings,’ because I consider that expression to be incorrect and misleading

See Traditional Text, chapter ii, § 6, p. 32.

CHAPTER II.

ACCIDENTAL CAUSES OF CORRUPTION.

I. PURE ACCIDENT.

[IT often happens that more causes than one are combined in the origin of the corruption in any one passage. In the following history of a blunder and of the fatal consequences that ensued upon it, only the first step was accidental. But much instruction may be derived from the initial blunder, and though the later stages in the history come under another head, they nevertheless illustrate the effects of early accident, besides throwing light upon parts of the discussion which are yet to come.]

§ 1.

We are sometimes able to trace the origin and progress of accidental depravations of the text: and the study is as instructive as it is interesting. Let me invite attention to what is found in St. John x. 29; where,—instead of, ‘My Father, who hath given them [viz. My sheep] to Me, is greater than all,’—Tischendorf, Tregelles, Alford, are for reading, ‘That thing which My (or the) Father hath given to Me is greater (i.e. is a greater thing) than all.’ A vastly different proposition, truly; and, whatever it may mean, wholly inadmissible here, as the context proves. It has been the result of sheer accident moreover,—as I proceed to explain.

St. John certainly wrote the familiar words,—ὁ πατήρ μου ὃς δέδωκέ μοι, μείζων ἐστί. But, with the licentiousness [or inaccuracy] which prevailed in the earliest age, some remote copyist is found to have substituted for ὃς δέδωκε, its grammatical equivalent ὁς δεδωκώς. And this proved fatal; for it was only necessary that another scribe should substitute μεῖζον for μείζων (after the example of such places as St. Matt. xii. 6, 41, 42, &c.), and thus the door had been opened to at least four distinct deflections from the evangelical verity, — which straightway found their way into manuscripts:—(1) ο δεδωκως . . . μειζων—of which reading at this day D is the sole representative: (2) ος δεδωκε . . . . μειζον—which survives only in AX: (3) ο δεδωκε . . . . μειζων—which is only found in אL: (4) ο δεδωκε . . . . μειζον—which is the peculiar property of B. The 1st and 2nd of these sufficiently represent the Evangelist’s meaning, though neither of them is what he actually wrote; but the 3rd is untranslatable: while the 4th is nothing else but a desperate attempt to force a meaning into the 3rd, by writing μειζον for μειζων; treating ο not as the article but as the neuter of the relative ὅς.

This last exhibition of the text, which in fact scarcely yields an intelligible meaning and rests upon the minimum of manuscript evidence, would long since have been forgotten, but that, calamitously for the Western Church, its Version of the New Testament Scriptures was executed from MSS. of the same vicious type as Cod. B

See the passages quoted in Scrivener’s Introduction, II. 270-2, 4th ed.

CHAPTER III.

ACCIDENTAL CAUSES OF CORRUPTION.

II. HOMOEOTELEUTON.

NO one who finds the syllable ΟΙ recurring six times over in about as many words,—e. g. καὶ ἐγένετο, ὡς ἀπῆλθον . . . ΟΙ ἄγγελΟΙ, καὶ ΟΙ ἄνθρωπΟΙ ΟΙ πΟΙμένες εἶπον,—is surprised to learn that MSS. of a certain type exhibit serious perturbation in that place. Accordingly, BLΞ: leave out the words καὶ οἱ ἄνθρωποι; and in that mutilated form the modern critical editors are contented to exhibit St. Luke ii. 15. One would have supposed that Tischendorf’s eyes would have been opened when he noticed that in his own Codex (א) one word more (οἱ) is dropped,—whereby nonsense is made of the passage (viz. of οἱ ἄγγελοι ποιμένες). Self-evident it is that a line with a ‘like ending’ has been omitted by the copyist of some very early codex of St. Luke’s Gospel; which either read,—

Another such place is found in St. John vi. 11. The Evangelist certainly described the act of our Saviour on a famous occasion in the well-known words,—καὶ εὐχαριστήσας

The one sufficient proof that St. John did so write, being the testimony of the MSS. Moreover, we are expressly assured by St. Matthew (xiv. 19), St. Mark (vi. 41), and St. Luke (ix. 16), that our Saviour’s act was performed in this way. It is clear however that some scribe has suffered his eye to wander from τοις in l. 2 to τοις in l. 4,—whereby St. John is made to say that our Saviour himself distributed to the 5000. The blunder is a very ancient one; for it has crept into the Syriac, Bohairic, and Gothic versions, besides many copies of the. Old Latin; and has established itself in the Vulgate. Moreover some good Fathers (beginning with Origen) so quote the place. But such evidence is unavailing to support אABLΠ, the early reading of being also contradicted by the fourth hand in the seventh century against the great cloud of witnesses,—beginning with D and including twelve other uncials, beside the body of the cursives, the Ethiopic and two copies of the Old Latin, as well as Cyril Alex.

Indeed, there does not exist a source of error which has proved more fatal to the transcribers of MSS. than the proximity of identical, or nearly identical, combinations of letters. And because these are generally met with in the final syllables of words, the error referred to is familiarly known by a Greek name which denotes ‘likeness of ending’ (Homoeoteleuton). The eye of a scribe on reverting from his copy to the original before him is of necessity apt sometimes to alight on the same word, or what looks like the same word, a little lower down. The consequence is obvious. All that should have come in between gets omitted, or sometimes duplicated.

It is obvious, that however inconvenient it may prove to find oneself in this way defrauded of five, ten, twenty, perhaps thirty words, no very serious consequence for the most part ensues. Nevertheless, the result is often sheer nonsense. When this is the case, it is loyally admitted by all. A single example may stand for a hundred. [In St. John vi. 55, that most careless of careless transcripts, the Sinaitic א omits on a most sacred subject seven words, and the result hardly admits of being characterized. Let the reader judge for himself. The passage stands thus:—ἡ γὰρ σάρξ μου ἀληθῶς ἐστι βρῶσις, καὶ τὸ αἷμά μου ἀληθῶς ἐστιν πόσις The transcriber of א by a very easy mistake let his eye pass from one ἀληθῶς to another, and characteristically enough the various correctors allowed the error to remain till it was removed in the seventh century, though the error issued in nothing less than ‘My Flesh is drink indeed.’ Could that MS. have undergone the test of frequent use?]

But it requires very little familiarity with the subject to be aware that occasions must inevitably be even of frequent occurrence when the result is calamitous, and even perplexing, in the extreme. The writings of Apostles and Evangelists, the Discourses of our Divine Lord Himself, abound in short formulae; and the intervening matter on such occasions is constantly an integral sentence, which occasionally may be discovered from its context without evident injury to the general meaning of the place. Thus [ver. 14 in St. Matt. xxiii. was omitted in an early age, owing to the recurrence of οὐαὶ ὑμῖν at the beginning, by some copyists, and the error was repeated in the Old Latin versions. It passed to Egypt, as some of the Bohairic copies, the Sahidic, and Origen testify. The Vulgate is not quite consistent: and of course אBDLZ, a concord of bad witnesses especially in St. Matthew, follow suit, in company with the Armenian, the Lewis, and five or more cursives, enough to make the more emphatic the condemnation by the main body of them. Besides the verdict of the cursives, thirteen uncials (as against five) including Φ and Σ, the Peshitto, Harkleian, Ethiopic, Arabian, some MSS. of the Vulgate, with Origen (iii. 838 (only in Lat.)); Chrysostom (vii. 707 (bis); ix. 755); Opus Imperf. 185 (bis); 186 (bis); John Damascene (ii. 517); Theophylact (i. 124); Hilary (89; 725); Jerome (iv. 276; v. 52; vi. 138; vii. 185)].

Worst of all, it will sometimes of necessity happen that such an omission took place at an exceedingly remote period; (for there have been careless scribes in every age:) and in consequence the error is pretty sure to have propagated itself widely. It is observed to exist (suppose) in several of the known copies; and if,—as very often is the case,—it is discoverable in two or more of the ‘old uncials,’ all hope of its easy extirpation is at an end. Instead of being loyally recognized as a blunder,—which it clearly is,—it is forthwith charged upon the Apostle or Evangelist as the case may be. In other words, it is taken for granted that the clause in dispute can have had no place in the sacred autograph. It is henceforth treated as an unauthorized accretion to the text. Quite idle henceforth becomes the appeal to the ninety-nine copies out of a hundred which contain the missing words. I proceed to give an instance of my meaning.

Our Saviour, having declared (St. Matt. xix. 9) that whosoever putteth away his wife εἰ μὴ ἐπὶ πορνείᾳ καὶ γαμήσῃ ἄλλην, μοιχᾶται. Those five words are not found in Codd. אDLS, nor in several copies of the Old Latin nor in some copies of the Bohairic, and the Sahidic. Tischendorf and Tregelles accordingly reject them.

CHAPTER IV.

ACCIDENTAL CAUSES OF CORRUPTION.

III. FROM WRITING IN UNCIALS.

§ 1.

CORRUPT readings have occasionally resulted from the ancient practice of writing Scripture in the uncial character, without accents, punctuation, or indeed any division of the text. Especially are they found in places where there is something unusual in the structure of the sentence.

St. John iv. 35-6 (λευκαί εἰσι πρὸς θερισμόν ἤδη) has suffered in this way,—owing to the unusual position of ἤδη. Certain of the scribes who imagined that ἤδη might belong to ver. 36, rejected the καὶ as superfluous; though no Father is known to have been guilty of such a solecism. Others, aware that ἤδη can only belong to ver. 35, were not unwilling to part with the copula at the beginning of ver. 36. A few, considering both words of doubtful authority, retained neither

It is clearly unsafe to draw any inference from the mere omission of ἤδη in ver. 35, by those Fathers who do not shew how they would have begun ver. 36—as Eusebius (see below, note 2), Theodoret (i. 1398: 233), and Hilary (78. 443. 941. 1041).

CHAPTER V.

ACCIDENTAL CAUSES OF CORRUPTION.

IV. ITACISM.

[IT has been already shewn in the First Volume that the Art of Transcription on vellum did not reach perfection till after the lapse of many centuries in the life of the Church. Even in the minute elements of writing much uncertainty prevailed during a great number of successive ages. It by no means followed that, if a scribe possessed a correct auricular knowledge of the Text, he would therefore exhibit it correctly on parchment. Copies were largely disfigured with misspelt words. And vowels especially were interchanged; accordingly, such change became in many instances the cause of corruption, and is known in Textual Criticism under the name ‘Itacism.’]

§ I.

It may seem to a casual reader that in what follows undue attention is being paid to minute particulars. But it constantly happens,—and this is a sufficient answer to the supposed objection,—that, from exceedingly minute and seemingly trivial mistakes, there result sometimes considerable and indeed serious misrepresentations of the Spirit’s meaning. New incidents:—unheard-of statements:—facts as yet unknown to readers of Scripture:—perversions of our Lord’s Divine sayings:—such phenomena are observed to follow upon the omission of the article,—the insertion of an expletive,—the change of a single letter. Thus παλιν, thrust in where it has no business, makes it appear that our Saviour promised to return the ass on which He- rode in triumph into Jerusalem

St. Mark xi. 4. Sec Revision Revised, pp. 57-58.

Speaking of our Saviour’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem, which took place ‘the day after’ ‘they made Him a supper,’ and Lazarus ‘which had been dead, whom He raised from the dead,’ sat at the table with Him’ (St. John xii. 1, 2), St. John says that ‘the multitude which had been with Him when He called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised Him from the dead bare testimony’ (St. John xii. 17). The meaning of this is best understood by a reference to St. Luke xix. 37, 38, where it is explained that it was the sight of so many acts of Divine Power, the chiefest of all being the raising of Lazarus, which moved the crowds to yield the memorable testimony recorded by St. Luke in ver. 38,—by St. John in ver. 13

St. Matt. xxi. 9. See also St. Mark xi. 9, 10.

CHAPTER VI.

ACCIDENTAL CAUSES OF CORRUPTION.

V. LITURGICAL INFLUENCE.

§. 1.

THERE is one distinct class of evidence provided by Almighty God for the conservation of the deposit in its integrity

[I have retained this passage notwithstanding the objections made in some quarters against similar passages in the companion volume, because I think them neither valid, nor creditable to high intelligence, or to due reverence.]

CHAPTER VII.

CAUSES OF CORRUPTION CHIEFLY INTENTIONAL.

I. HARMONISTIC INFLUENCE.

[IT must not be imagined that all the causes of the depravation of the text of Holy Scripture were instinctive, and that mistakes arose solely because scribes were overcome by personal infirmity, or were unconsciously the victims of surrounding circumstances. There was often more design and method in their error. They, or those who directed them, wished sometimes to correct and improve the copy or copies before them. And indeed occasionally they desired to make the Holy Scriptures witness to their own peculiar belief. Or they had their ideas of taste, and did not scruple to alter passages to suit what they fancied was their enlightened judgement.

Thus we can trace a tendency to bring the Four Records into one harmonious narrative, or at least to excise or vary statements in one Gospel which appeared to conflict with parallel statements in another. Or else, some Evangelical Diatessaron, or Harmony, or combined narrative now forgotten, exercised an influence over them, and whether consciously or not,—since it is difficult always to keep designed and unintentional mistakes apart, and we must not be supposed to aim at scientific exactness in the arrangement adopted in this analysis,—induced them to adopt alterations of the pure Text.

CHAPTER VIII.

CAUSES OF CORRUPTION CHIEFLY INTENTIONAL.

II. ASSIMILATION.

§ 1.

THERE results inevitably from the fourfold structure of the Gospel,.—from the very fact that the story of Redemption is set forth in four narratives, three of which often ran parallel,—this practical inconvenience: namely, that sometimes the expressions of one Evangelist get improperly transferred to another. This is a large and important subject which calls for great attention, and requires to be separately handled. The phenomena alluded to, which are similar to some of those which have been treated in the last chapter, may be comprised under the special head of Assimilation.

It will I think promote clearness in the ensuing discussion if we determine to consider separately those instances of Assimilation which may rather be regarded as deliberate attempts to reconcile one Gospel with another: indications of a fixed determination to establish harmony between place and place. I am saying that between ordinary cases of Assimilation such as occur in every page, and extraordinary instances where per fas et nefas an enforced Harmony has been established,—which abound indeed, but are by no means common,—I am disposed to draw a line.

This whole province is beset with difficulties: and the matter is in itself wondrously obscure. I do not suppose, in the absence of any evidence direct or indirect on the subject,—at all events I am not aware—that at any time has there been one definite authoritative attempt made by the Universal Church in her corporate capacity to remodel or revise the Text of the Gospels. An attentive study of the phenomena leads me, on the contrary, to believe that the several corruptions of the text were effected at different times, and took their beginning in widely different ways. I suspect that Accident was the parent of many; and well meant critical assiduity of more. Zeal for the Truth is accountable for not a few depravations: and the Church’s Liturgical and Lectionary practice must insensibly have produced others. Systematic villainy I am persuaded has had no part or lot in the matter. The decrees of such an one as Origen, if there ever was another like him, will account for a strange number of aberrations from the Truth: and if the Diatessaron of Tatian could be recovered

This paper bears the date 1877: but I have thought best to keep the words with this caution to the reader.

§ 2.

1. When we speak of Assimilation, we do not mean that a writer while engaged in transcribing one Gospel was so completely beguiled and overmastered by his recollections of the parallel place in another Gospel,—that, forsaking the expressions proper to the passage before him, he unconsciously adopted the language which properly belongs to a different Evangelist. That to a very limited extent this may have occasionally taken place, I am not concerned to deny: but it would argue incredible inattention to what he was professing to copy, on the one hand,—astonishing familiarity with what he was not professing to copy, on the other,—that a scribe should have been capable of offending largely in this way. But in fact a moderate acquaintance with the subject is enough to convince any thoughtful person that the corruptions in MSS. which have resulted from accidental Assimilation must needs be inconsiderable in bulk, as well as few in number. At all events, the phenomenon referred to, when we speak of ‘Assimilation,’ is not to be so accounted for: it must needs be explained in some entirely different way. Let me make my meaning plain:

(a) We shall probably be agreed that when the scribe of Cod. א, in place of βασανίσαι ἡμᾶς (in St. Matt. viii. 29), writes ἡμᾶς ἀπολέσαι,—it may have been his memory which misled him. He may have been merely thinking of St. Mark i. 24, or of St. Luke iv. 34.

(b) Again, when in Codd. אB we find τασσόμενος thrust without warrant into St. Matt. viii. 9, we see that the word has lost its way from St. Luke vii. 8; and we are prone to suspect that only by accident has it crept into the parallel narrative of the earlier Evangelist.

(c) In the same way I make no doubt that ποταμῷ (St. Matt. iii. 6) is indebted for its place in אBC, &c., to the influence of the parallel place in St. Mark’s Gospel (i. 5); and I am only astonished that critics should have been beguiled into adopting so clear a corruption of the text as part of the genuine Gospel.

(d) To be brief:—the insertion by א of ἀδελφέ (in St. Matt. vii. 4) is confessedly the result of the parallel passage in St. Luke vi. 42. The same scribe may be thought to have written τῷ ἀνέμῳ instead of τοῖς ἀνέμοις in St. Matt. viii. 26, only because he was so familiar with τῷ ἀνέμῳ in St. Luke viii. 24 and in St. Mark iv. 39.—The author of the prototype of אBD (with whom by the way are some of the Latin versions) may have written ἔχετε in St. Matt. xvi. 8, only because he was thinking of the parallel place in St. Mark viii. 17.—Ἤρξαντο ἀγανακτεῖν (St. Matt. xx. 24) can only have been introduced into א from the parallel place in St. Mark x. 41, and may have been supplied memoriter.— St. Luke xix. 21 is clearly not parallel to St. Matt. xxv. 24; yet it evidently furnished the scribe of א with the epithet αὐστηρός; in place of σκληρός.—The substitution by א of ὃν παρητοῦντο in St. Matt. xxvii. 15 for ὃν ἤθελον may seem to be the result of inconvenient familiarity with the parallel place in St. Mark xv. 6; where, as has been shewn

Above, p. 32.

(e) But I should have been willing to go further. I might have been disposed to admit that when אDL introduce into St. Matt. x. 12 the clause λέγοντες, εἰρήνη τῷ οἴκῳ τούτῳ (which last four words confessedly belong exclusively to St. Luke x. 5), the author of the depraved original from which אDL were derived may have been only yielding to the suggestions of an inconveniently good memory:—may have succeeded in convincing himself from what follows in verse 13 that St. Matthew must have written, ‘Peace be to this house;’ though he found no such words in St. Matthew’s text. And so, with the best intentions, he may most probably have inserted them.

(f) Again. When א and Evan. 61 thrust into St. Matt. ix. 24 (from the parallel place in St. Luke viii. 53) the clause εἰδότες ὅτι ἀπέθανεν, it is of course conceivable that the authors of those copies were merely the victims of excessive familiarity with the third Gospel. But then,—although we are ready to make every allowance that we possibly can for memories so singularly constituted, and to imagine a set of inattentive scribes open to inducements to recollect or imagine instead of copying, and possessed of an inconvenient familiarity with one particular Gospel,—it is clear that our complaisance must stop somewhere. Instances of this kind of licence at last breed suspicion. Systematic ‘assimilation’ cannot be the effect of accident. Considerable interpolations must of course be intentional. The discovery that Cod. D, for example, introduces at the end of St. Luke v. 14 thirty-two words from St. Mark’s Gospel (i. 45-ii. 1, ὁ δὲ ἐξελθών down to Καφαρναούμ), opens our eyes. This wholesale importation suggests the inquiry,—How did it come about? We look further, and we find that Cod. D abounds in instances of ‘Assimilation’ so unmistakably intentional, that this speedily becomes the only question, How may all these depravations of the sacred text be most satisfactorily accounted for? [And the answer is evidently found in the existence of extreme licentiousness in the scribe or scribes responsible for Codex D, being the product of ignorance and carelessness combined with such looseness of principle, as permitted the exercise of direct attempts to improve the sacred Text by the introduction of passages from the three remaining Gospels and by other alterations.]

§ 3.

Sometimes indeed the true Text bears witness to itself, as may be seen in the next example.

The little handful of well-known authorities (אBDL, with a few copies of the Old Latin, and one of the Egyptian Versions

The alleged evidence of Origen (iv. 453) is nil; the sum of it being that he takes no notice whatever of the forty words between ὄψεσθέ με (in ver. 16), and τοῦτο τί ἐστιν, (in ver. 18).

CHAPTER IX.

CAUSES OF CORRUPTION CHIEFLY INTENTIONAL.

III. ATTRACTION.

§ 1.

THERE exist not a few corrupt Readings,—and they have imposed largely on many critics,—which, strange to relate, have arisen from nothing else but the proneness of words standing side by side in a sentence to be attracted into a likeness of ending,—whether in respect of grammatical form or of sound; whereby sometimes the sense is made to suffer grievously,—sometimes entirely to disappear. Let this be called the error of Attraction. The phenomena of ‘Assimilation’ are entirely distinct. A somewhat gross instance, which however has imposed on learned critics, is furnished by the Revised Text and Version of St. John vi. 71 and xiii. 26.

‘Judas Iscariot’ is a combination of appellatives with which every Christian ear is even awfully familiar. The expression Ἰούδας Ἰσκαριώτης is found in St. Matt. x. 4 and xxvi. 14: in St. Mark iii. 19 and xiv. 10: in St. Luke vi. 16, and in xxii. 31 with the express statement added that Judas was so ‘surnamed.’ So far happily we are all agreed. St. John’s invariable practice is to designate the traitor, whom he names four times, as ‘Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon;’—jealous doubtless for the honour of his brother Apostle, ‘Jude (Ἰούδας) the brother of James

St. Luke vi. 16; Acts i. 13; St. Jude 1.

But in the two places of St. John’s Gospel which remain to be noticed, viz. vi. 71 and xiii. 26, instead of ‘Judas Iscariot the son of Simon,’ the Revisers require us henceforth to read, ‘Judas the son of Simon Iscariot.’ And why? Only, I answer, because—in place of Ἰούδαν Σίμωνος ἸσκαριώΤΗΝ (in vi. 71) and Ἰούδᾳ Σίμωνος ἸσκαριώΤΗ (in xiii. 26)—a little handful of copies substitute on both occasions ἸσκαριώΤΟΥ. Need I go on? Nothing else has evidently happened but that, through the oscitancy of some very early scribe, the ἸσκαριώΤΗΝ, ἸσκαριώΤΗ, have been attracted into concord with the immediately preceding genitive ΣΙμωΝΟC . . . So transparent a blunder would have scarcely deserved a passing remark at our hands had it been suffered to remain,—where such bêtises are the rule and not the exception,—viz. in the columns of Codexes B and א. But strange to say, not only have the Revisers adopted this corrupt reading in the two passages already mentioned, but they have not let so much as a hint fall that any alteration whatsoever has been made by them in the inspired Text.

§ 2.

Another and a far graver case of ‘Attraction’ is found in Acts xx. 24. St. Paul, in his address to the elders of Ephesus, refers to the discouragements he has had to encounter. ‘But none of these things move me,’ he grandly exclaims, ‘neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy.’ The Greek for this begins ἀλλ᾽ οὐδενὸς λόγον ποιοῦμαι where some second or third century copyist (misled by the preceding genitive) in place of λόγοΝ writes λόγοΥ with what calamitous consequence, has been found largely explained elsewhere

Above, pp. 28-31.

St. Paul in a certain place (2 Cor. iii. 3) tells the Corinthians, in allusion to the language of Exodus xxxi. 12, xxxiv. 1, that they are an epistle not written on ‘stony tables (ἐν πλαξὶ λιθίναις),’ but on ‘fleshy tables of the heart (ἐν πλαξὶν καρδίας σαρκίναις).’ The one proper proof that this is what St. Paul actually wrote, is not only (1) That the Copies largely preponderate in favour of so exhibiting the place: but (2) That the Versions, with the single exception of ‘that abject slave of manuscripts the Philoxenian [or Harkleian] Syriac,’ are all on the same side: and lastly (3) That the Fathers are as nearly as possible unanimous. Let the evidence for καρδίας (unknown to Tischendorf and the rest) be produced in detail:—

In the second century, Irenaeus

753 int.

In the third century, Orison seven times

ii. 843 e. Also int. ii. 96, 303; iv. 419, 489, 529, 558.

In the fourth century, the Dialogus

Ap. Orig. i. 866 a,—interesting and emphatic testimony.

CHAPTER X.

CAUSES OF CORRUPTION CHIEFLY INTENTIONAL.

IV. OMISSION.

[WE have now to consider the largest of all classes of corrupt variations from the genuine Text

It will be observed that these are empirical, not logical, classes. Omissions are found in many of the rest.

§ 1.

Omissions are often treated as ‘Various Readings.’ Yet only by an Hibernian licence can words omitted be so reckoned: for in truth the very essence of the matter is that on such occasions nothing is read. It is to the case of words omitted however that this chapter is to be exclusively devoted. And it will be borne in mind that I speak now of those words alone where the words are observed to exist in ninety-nine MSS. out of a hundred, so to speak;—being away only from that hundredth copy.

Now it becomes evident, as soon as attention has been called to the circumstance, that such a phenomenon requires separate treatment. Words so omitted labour prima facie under a disadvantage which is all their own. My meaning will be best illustrated if I may be allowed to adduce and briefly discuss a few examples. And I will begin with a crucial case;—the most conspicuous doubtless within the whole compass of the New Testament. I mean the last twelve verses of St. Mark’s Gospel; which verses are either bracketed off, or else entirely severed from the rest of the Gospel, by Tischendorf, Tregelles, Alford and others.

The warrant of those critics for dealing thus unceremoniously with a portion of the sacred deposit is the fact that whereas Eusebius, for the statement rests solely with him, declares that anciently many copies were without the verses in question, our two oldest extant MSS. conspire in omitting them. But, I reply, the latter circumstance does not conduct to the inference that those verses are spurious. It only proves that the statement of Eusebius was correct. The Father cited did not, as is evident from his words

Last Twelve Verses of St. Mark’s Gospel, chapter v, and Appendix B.

On the other hand, one and that the least faulty of the two MSS. witnessing for the omission confesses mutely its error by leaving a vacant space where the omitted verses should have come in; whilst the other was apparently copied from an exemplar containing the verses

See Dr. Gwynn’s remarks in Appendix VII of The Traditional Text, pp. 298-301.

CHAPTER XI.

CAUSES OF CORRUPTION CHIEFLY INTENTIONAL.

V. TRANSPOSITION, VI. SUBSTITUTION,
AND VII. ADDITION.

§ 1.

ONE of the most prolific sources of Corrupt Readings, is Transposition, or the arbitrary inversion of the order of the sacred words,—generally in the subordinate clauses of a sentence. The extent to which ‘this prevails in Codexes of the type of BאCD passes belief. It is not merely the occasional writing of ταῦτα πάντα for πάντα ταῦτα,—or ὁ λαὸς οὗτος for οὗτος ὁ λαός, to which allusion is now made: for if that were all, the phenomenon would admit of loyal explanation and excuse. But what I speak of is a systematic putting to wrong of the inspired words throughout the entire Codex; an operation which was evidently regarded in certain quarters as a lawful exercise of critical ingenuity,—perhaps was looked upon as an elegant expedient to be adopted for improving the style of the original without materially interfering with the sense.

Let me before going further lay before the reader a few specimens of Transposition.

Take for example St. Mark i. 5,—καὶ ἐβαπτίζοντο πάντες,—is unreasonably turned into πάντες και ἐβαπτίζοντο; whereby the meaning of the Evangelical record becomes changed, for πάντες is now made to agree with Ἱεροσολυμῖται, and the Evangelist is represented as making the very strong assertion that all the people of Jerusalem came to St. John and were baptized. This is the private property of BDLΔ.

And sometimes I find short clauses added which I prefer to ascribe to the misplaced critical assiduity of ancient Critics. Confessedly spurious, these accretions to the genuine text often bear traces of pious intelligence, and occasionally of considerable ability. I do not suppose that they ‘crept in’ from the margin: but that they were inserted by men who entirely failed to realize the wrongness of what they did,—the mischievous consequences which might possibly ensue from their well-meant endeavours to improve the work of the Holy Ghost.

[Take again St. Mark ii. 3, in which the order in πρὸς αὐτὸν, παραλυτικὸν φέροντες,—is changed by אBL into φέροντες πρὸς αὐτὸν παραλυτικόν. A few words are needed to explain to those who have not carefully examined the passage the effect of this apparently slight alteration. Our Lord was in a house at Capernaum with a thick crowd of people around Him: there was no room even at the door. Whilst He was there teaching, a company of people come to Him (ἔρχονται πρὸς αὐτὸν), four of the party carrying a paralytic on a bed. When they arrive at the house, a few of the company, enough to represent the whole, force their way in and reach Him: but on looking back they see that the rest are unable to bring the paralytic near to Him (προσέγγισαι αὐτῷ

προσέγγισαι is transitive here, like ἐγγίζω in Gen. xlviii. 10, 13: 2 Kings iv. 6: Isaiah xlvi. 13.

CHAPTER XI (continued).

CAUSES OF CORRUPTION CHIEFLY INTENTIONAL.

VI. SUBSTITUTION.

§ 4.

[ALL the Corruption in the Sacred Text may be classed under four heads, viz. Omission, Transposition, Substitution, and Addition. We are entirely aware that, in the arrangement adopted in this Volume for purposes of convenience, Scientific Method has been neglected. The inevitable result must be that passages are capable of being classed under more heads than one. But Logical exactness is of less practical value than a complete and suitable treatment of the corrupted passages that actually occur in the four Gospels.

It seems therefore needless to supply with a scrupulousness that might bore our readers a disquisition upon Substitution which has not forced itself into a place amongst Dean Burgon’s papers, although it is found in a fragmentary plan of this part of the treatise. Substituted forms or words or phrases, such as ΟC (ὅς) for θ̄c̄ (Θεός)

See the very learned, ingenious, and satisfactory disquisition in The Revision Revised, pp. 424-501.

CHAPTER XI (continued).

CAUSES OF CORRUPTION CHIEFLY INTENTIONAL.

VII. ADDITION.

§ 5.

[THE smallest of the four Classes, which upon a pure survey of the outward form divide among themselves the surface of the entire field of Corruption, is that of Additions

B has 536 words added in the Gospels: א, 839: D, 2,213. Revision Revised, pp. 12, 13. The interpolations of D are notorious.

CHAPTER XII.

CAUSES OF CORRUPTION CHIEFLY INTENTIONAL.

VIII. GLOSSES.

§ 1.

‘GLOSSES,’ properly so called, though they enjoy a conspicuous place in every enumeration like the present, are probably by no means so numerous as is commonly supposed. For certainly every unauthorized accretion to the text of Scripture is not a ‘gloss’: but only those explanatory words or clauses which have surreptitiously insinuated themselves into the text, and of which no more reasonable account can be rendered than that they were probably in the first instance proposed by some ancient Critic in the way of useful comment, or necessary explanation, or lawful expansion, or reasonable limitation of the actual utterance of the Spirit. Thus I do not call the clause νεκροὺς ἐγείρετε in St. Matt. x. 8 ‘a gloss.’ It is a gratuitous and unwarrantable interpolation,—nothing else but a clumsy encumbrance of the text

See The Traditional Text, pp. 51-52.

[Glosses, or scholia, or comments, or interpretations, are of various kinds, but are generally confined to Additions or Substitutions, since of course we do not omit in order to explain, and transposition of words already placed in lucid order, such as the sacred Text may be reasonably supposed to have observed, would confuse rather than illustrate the meaning. A clause, added in Hebrew fashion

St. Mark vi. 33. See The Traditional Text, p. 80.

be hardly wanted, must not therefore be taken to be a gloss.]

Sometimes a ‘various reading’ is nothing else but a gratuitous gloss;—the unauthorized substitution of a common for an uncommon word. This phenomenon is of frequent occurrence, but only in Codexes of a remarkable type like BאCD. A few instances follow:—

1. The disciples on a certain occasion (St. Matt. xiii. 36), requested our LORD ‘to explain’ to them (ΦΡΑCΟΝ ἡμῖν, ‘they said’) the parable of the tares. So every known copy, except two: so, all the Fathers who quote the place,—viz. Origen, five times

iii. 3 e: 4 b and c: 442 a: 481 b. Note, that the ῥῆσις in which the first three of these quotations occur seems to have been obtained by De la Rue from a Catena on St. Luke in the Mazarine Library (see his Monitum, iii. i). A large portion of it (viz. from p. 3, line 25, to p. 4, line 29) is ascribed to ‘I. Geometra in Proverbia’ in the Catena in Luc. of Corderius, p. 217.

,—Basil

ii. 345.

,—J. Damascene

ii. 242.

. And so all the Versions

The Latin is edissere or dissere, cnarra or narra, both here and in xv. 15.

. But because B–א, instead of φράσον, exhibit ΔΙΑCΑΦΗCΟΝ (‘make clear to us’),—which is also once the reading of Origen

iv. 254 a.

, who was but too well acquainted with Codexes of the same depraved character as the archetype of B and א,—Lachmann, Tregelles (not Tischendorf), Westcott and Hort, and the Revisers of 1881, assume that διασάφησον (a palpable gloss) stood in the inspired autograph of the Evangelist. They therefore thrust out φράσον and thrust in διασάφησον. I am wholly unable to discern any connexion between the premisses of these critics and their conclusions

In St. Matthew xiii. 36 the Peshitto Syriac has ‘declare to us’ and in St. Matthew xv. 15 the very same words, there being no various reading in either of these two passages.

The inference is, that the translators had the same Greek word in each place, especially considering that in the only other place where, besides St. Matt. xiii. 36, v. 1., διασαφεῖν occurs, viz. St. Matt. xviii. 31, they render διεσάφησαν by = they made known.

Since φράζειν only occurs in St. Matt. xiii. 36 and xv. 15, we cannot generalize about the Peshitto rendering of this verb. Conversely, is used as the rendering of other Greek words besides φράζειν, e.g.

of ἐπιλύειν, St. Mark iv. 34;

of διερμηνεύειν, St. Luke xxiv. 27;

of διανοίγειν, St. Luke xxiv. 32 and Acts xvii. 3.

On the whole I have no doubt (though it is not susceptible of proof) that the Peshitto had, in both the places quoted above, φράσον.

N.B. The Cureton and Lewis have, in St. Matt. xiii. 36,		} =	Peshitto.
in  ”  xv. 15,	”
in  ”  xviii. 31, for the διεσάφησαν, ,

The Cureton (Lewis defective) has a word often used in Syriac for ‘shew,’ ‘declare.’ [Rev. G. H. Gwilliam.]

.

2. Take another instance. Πυγμῇ,—the obscure expression (Δ leaves it out) which St. Mark employs in vii. 3 to denote the strenuous frequency of the Pharisees’ ceremonial washings,—is exchanged by Cod. א, but by no other known copy of the Gospels, for πυκνά, which last word is of course nothing else but a sorry gloss. Yet Tischendorf degrades πυγμῇ and promotes πυκνά to honour,—happily standing alone in his infatuation. Strange, that the most industrious of modern accumulators of evidence should not have been aware that by such extravagances he marred his pretension to critical discernment! Origen and Epiphanius—the only Fathers who quote the place—both read πυγμῇ. It ought to be universally admitted that it is a mere waste of time that we should argue out a point like this

In St. Mark vii. 3, the translators of the Peshitto render whatever Greek they had before them by , which means ‘eagerly,’ ‘sedulously’; cf. use of the word for σπουδαίως, St. Luke vii. 4; ἐπιμελῶς, St. Luke xv. 8.

The Root means to ‘cease’; thence ‘to have leisure for a thing’: it has nothing to do with ‘Fist.’ [Rev. G. H. Gwilliam.]

.

§ 2.

A gloss little suspected, which—not without a pang of regret—I proceed to submit to hostile scrutiny, is the expression ‘daily’ (καθ᾽ ἡμέραν) in St. Luke ix. 23. Found in the Peshitto and in Cureton’s Syriac,—but only in some Copies of the Harkleian version

Harkl. Marg. in loc., and Adler, p. 115.

: found in most Copies of the Vulgate,—but largely disallowed by copies of the Old Latin

Viz. a b c e ff² l q.

: found also in Ephraem Syrus

Ὀφείκει ψυχή, ἐν τῷ λόγῳ τοῦ Κυρίου κατακολουθοῦσα, τὸν σταυρὸν αὐτοῦ καθ᾽ ἡμέραν αἴρειν, ὡς γέγραπται· τοῦτ᾽ ἔστιν, ἑτοίμως ἔχουσα ὑπομένειν διὰ Χριστὸν πᾶσαν θλῖψιν καὶ πειρασμόν, κ.τ.λ. (ii. 326 e). In the same spirit, further on, he exhorts to constancy and patience,—τὸν ἐπὶ τοῦ Κυρίου θάνατον ἐν ἐπιθυμίᾳ πάντοτε πρὸ ὀφθαλμῶν ἔχοντες, καὶ (καθὼς εἴρηται ὑπὸ τοῦ Κυρίου) καθ᾽ ἡμέραν τὸν σταυρὸν αἴροντες, ὅ ἐστι θάνατος (ii. 332 e). It is fair to assume that Ephraem’s reference is to St. Luke ix. 23, seeing that he wrote not in Greek but in Syria; and that in the Peshitto the clause is found only in that place.

,—but clearly not recognized by Origen

Ἄκουε Λουκᾶ λέγοντος,—i. 281 f. Also, int. iii. 543.

: found again in אAB and six other uncials,—but not found in CDE and ten others: the expression referred to cannot, at all events, plead for its own retention in the text higher antiquity than can be pleaded for its exclusion. Cyril, (if in such a matter the Syriac translation of his Commentary on St. Luke may be trusted,) is clearly an authority for reading καθ᾽ ἡμέραν in St. Luke ix. 23

Pp. 221 (text), 222, 227.

; but then he elsewhere twice quotes St. Luke ix. 23 in Greek without it

ii. 751 e, 774 e (in Es.)—the proof that these quotations are from St. Luke; that Cyril exhibits ἀρνησάσθω instead of ἀπαρν. (see Tischendorf’s note on St. Luke ix. 23). The quotation in i. 40 (Glaph.) may be from St. Matt. xvi. 24.

. Timotheus of Antioch, of the fifth century, omits the phrase

Migne, vol. lxxxvi. pp. 256 and 257.

. Jerome again, although he suffered ‘quotidie’ to stand in the Vulgate, yet, when for his own purposes he quotes the place in St. Luke

After quoting St. Mark viii. 34,—‘aut juxta Lucam, dicebat ad cunctos: Si quis vult post me venire, abneget semetipsum; et tollat crucem suam, et sequetur me.’—i. 852 c.

This is found in his solution of XI Quaestiones, ‘ad Algasiam,’—free translations probably from the Greek of some earlier Father. Six lines lower down (after quoting words found nowhere in the Gospels), Jerome proceeds:—‘Quotidie credens in Christum tollit crucem suam, et negat seipsum.’

,—ignores the word. All this is calculated to inspire grave distrust. On the other hand, καθ᾽ ἡμέραν enjoys the support of the two Egyptian Versions,—of the Gothic,—of the Armenian,—of the Ethiopic. And this, in the present state of our knowledge, must be allowed to be a weighty piece of evidence in its favour.

But the case assumes an entirely different aspect the instant it is discovered that out of the cursive copies only eight are found to contain καθ᾽ ἡμέραν in St. Luke ix. 23

This spurious clause adorned the lost archetype of Evann. 13, 69, 346 (Ferrar’s four); and survives in certain other Evangelia which enjoy a similar repute,—as 1, 33, 72 (with a marginal note of distrust), 131.

. How is it to be explained that nine manuscripts out of every ten in existence should have forgotten how to transmit such a remarkable message, had it ever been really so committed to writing by the Evangelist? The omission (says Tischendorf) is explained by the parallel places

They are St. Matt. xvi. 24: St. Mark viii. 34.

. Utterly incredible, I reply; as no one ought to have known better than Tischendorf himself. We now scrutinize the problem more closely; and discover that the very locus of the phrase is a matter of uncertainty. Cyril once makes it part of St. Matt. x. 38

i. 597 c (Adorat.)—elsewhere (viz. i. 21 d: 528 c: 580 b: iv. 1058 a; v². 83 c) Cyril quotes the place correctly. Note, that the quotation found in Mai, iii. 226, which Pusey edits (v. 418), in Ep. ad Hebr., is nothing else but an excerpt from the treatise de Adorat. 528 c.

. Chrysostom twice connects it with St. Matt. xvi. 24

In his Commentary on St. Matt. xvi. 24:—Διὰ παντὸς τοῦ βίου τοῦτο δεῖ ποιεῖν. Διηνεκῶς γάρ, φησι, περίφερε τὸν θάνατον τοῦτον, καὶ καθ᾽ ἡμέραν ἕτοιμος ἔσο πρὸς σφαγήν (vii. 557 b). Again, commenting on ch. xix. 21,—Δεῖ προηγουμένως ἀκολουθεῖν τῷ Χριστῷ· τουτέστι, πάντα τὰ παρ᾽ αὐτοῦ κελευόμενα ποιεῖν, πρὸς σφαγὰς εἶνα ἕτοιμον, καὶ θάνατον καθημερινόν (p. 629 e):—words which Chrysostom immediately follows up by quoting ch. xvi. 24 (630 a).

. Jerome, evidently regarding the phrase as a curiosity, informs us that ‘juxta antiqua exemplaria’ it was met with in St. Luke xiv. 27

i. 949 b,—‘Quotidie (inquit Apostolus) morior propter vestram salutem. Et Dominus, juxta antiqua exemplaria, Nisi quis tulerit crucem suam quotidie, et sequutus fuerit me, non potest meus esse discipulus.’ —Commenting on St. Matt. x. 38 (vol. vii. p. 65 b), Jerome remarks,—‘in alio Evangelio scribitur,—Qui non accipit crucem suam quotidie’: but the corresponding place to St. Matt. x. 38, in the sectional system of Eusebius (Greek and Syriac), is St. Luke xiv. 27.

. All this is in a high degree unsatisfactory. We suspect that we ourselves enjoy some slight familiarity with the ‘antiqua exemplaria’ referred to by the Critic; and we freely avow that we have learned to reckon them among the least reputable of our acquaintance. Are they not represented by those Evangelia, of which several copies are extant, that profess to have been ‘transcribed from, and collated with, ancient copies at Jerusalem’? These uniformly exhibit καθ᾽ ἡμέραν in St. Luke ix. 23

Viz. Evan. 473 (2^po).

. But then, if the phrase be a gloss,—it is obvious to inquire,—how is its existence in so many quarters to be accounted for?

Its origin is not far to seek. Chrysostom, in a certain place, after quoting our Lord’s saying about taking up the cross and following Him, remarks that the words ‘do not mean that we are actually to bear the wood upon our shoulders, but to keep the prospect of death steadily before us, and like St. Paul to “die daily”

ii. 66 c, d.

.’ The same Father, in the two other places already quoted from his writings, is observed similarly to connect the Saviour’s mention of ‘bearing the Cross’ with the Apostle’s announcement—‘I die daily.’ Add, that Ephraem Syrus

See above, p. 175, note 2.

, and Jerome quoted already,—persistently connect the same two places together; the last named Father even citing them in immediate succession;—and the inference is unavoidable. The phrase in St. Luke ix. 23 must needs be a very ancient as well as very interesting expository gloss, imported into the Gospel from 1 Cor. xv. 31,—as Mill

Proleg. p. cxlvi.

and Matthaei

N. T. (1803), i. 368.

long since suggested.

Sincerely regretting the necessity of parting with an expression with which one has been so long familiar, we cannot suffer the sentimental plea to weigh with us when the Truth of the Gospel is at stake. Certain it is that but for Erasmus, we should never have known the regret: for it was he that introduced καθ᾽ ἡμέραν into the Received Text. The MS. from which he printed is without the expression: which is also not found in the Complutensian. It is certainly a spurious accretion to the inspired Text.

[The attention of the reader is particularly invited to this last paragraph. The learned Dean has been sneered at for a supposed sentimental and effeminate attachment to the Textus Receptus. He was always ready to reject words and phrases, which have not adequate support; but he denied the validity of the evidence brought against many texts by the school of Westcott and Hort, and therefore he refused to follow them in their surrender of the passages.]

§ 3.

Indeed, a great many ‘various readings,’ so called, are nothing else but very ancient interpretations,—fabricated readings therefore,—of which the value may be estimated by the fact that almost every trace of them has long since disappeared. Such is the substitution of φεύγει for ἀνεχώρησεν in St. John vi. 15;—which, by the way, Tischendorf thrusts into his text on the sole authority of א, some Latin copies including the Vulgate, and Cureton’s Syriac

Lewis here agrees with Peshitto.

: though Tregelles ignores its very existence. That our Lord’s ‘withdrawal’ to the mountain on that occasion was of the nature of ‘flight,’ or retreat’ is obvious. Hence Chrysostom and Cyril remark that He ‘fled to the mountain.’ And yet both Fathers (like Origen and Epiphanius before them) are found to have read ἀνεχώρησεν.

Almost as reasonably in the beginning of the same verse might Tischendorf (with א) have substituted ἀναδεικνύναι for ἵνα ποιήσωσιν αὐτὸν, on the plea that Cyril

iv. 745.

says, ζητεῖν αὐτὸν ἀναδεῖξαι καὶ βασιλέα. We may on no account suffer ourselves to be imposed upon by such shallow pretences for tampering with the text of Scripture: or the deposit will never be safe. A patent gloss,—rather an interpretation,—acquires no claim to be regarded as the genuine utterance of the Holy Spirit by being merely found in two or three ancient documents. It is the little handful of documents which loses in reputation,—not the reading which gains in authority on such occasions.

In this way we are sometimes presented with what in effect are new incidents. These are not unfrequently discovered to be introduced in defiance of the reason of the case; as where (St. John xiii. 24) Simon Peter is represented (in the Vulgate) as actually saying to St. John, ‘Who is it concerning whom He speaks?’ Other copies of the Latin exhibit, ‘Ask Him who it is,’ &c.: while אBC (for on such occasions we are treated to any amount of apocryphal matter) would persuade us that St. Peter only required that the information should be furnished him by St. John—‘Say who it is of whom He speaks.’ Sometimes a very little licence is sufficient to convert the oratio obliqua into the recta. Thus, by the change of a single letter (in אBX) Mary Magdalene is made to say to the disciples ‘I have seen the Lord’ (St. John xx. 18). But then, as might have been anticipated, the new does not altogether agree with the old. Accordingly D and others paraphrase the remainder of the sentence thus,—‘and she signified to them what He had said unto her.’ How obvious is it to foresee that on such occasions the spirit of officiousness never know when to stop! In the Vulgate and Sahidic versions the sentence proceeds, ‘and He told these things unto me.’

Take another example. The Hebraism μετὰ σάλπιγγος φωνῆς μεγάλης (St. Matt. xxiv. 31) presents an uncongenial ambiguity to Western readers, as our own incorrect A.V. sufficiently shows. Two methods of escape from the difficulty suggested themselves to the ancients:—(a) Since ‘a trumpet of great sound’ means nothing else but a loud trumpet,’ and since this can be as well expressed by σάλπιγγος μεγάλης, the scribes at a very remote period are found to have omitted the word φωνῆς. The Peshitto and Lewis (interpreting rather than translating) so deal with the text. Accordingly, φωνῆς is not found in אLΔ and five cursives. Eusebius

In Ps. 501.

, Cyril Jerus.

229 and 236.

, Chrysostom

vii. 736: xi. 478.

, Theodoret

ii. 1209.

, and even Cyprian

269.

are also without the word. (b) A less violent expedient was to interpolate καὶ before φωνῆς. This is accordingly the reading of the best Italic copies, of the Vulgate, and of D. So Hilary

577.

and Jerome

i. 881.

, Severianus

Ap. vi. 460.

, Asterius

Ap. Greg. Nyss. ii. 258.

, ps.-Caesarius

Galland. vi. 53.

, Damascene

ii. 346.

and at least eleven cursive copies, so read the place.—There can be no doubt at all that the commonly received text is right. It is found in thirteen uncials with B at their head: in Cosmas

ii. 261, 324.

, Hesychius

Ap. Greg. Nyss. iii. 429.

, Theophylact

i. 132.

. But the decisive consideration is that the great body of the cursives have faithfully retained the uncongenial Hebraism, and accordingly imply the transmission of it all down the ages: a phenomenon which will not escape the unprejudiced reader. Neither will he overlook the fact that the three ‘old uncials’ (for A and C are not available here) advocate as many different readings: the two wrong readings being respectively countenanced by our two most ancient authorities, viz. the Peshitto version and the Italic. It only remains to point out that Tischendorf blinded by his partiality for א contends here for the mutilated text, and Westcott and Hort are disposed to do the same.

§ 4.

Recent Editors are agreed that we are henceforth to read in St. John xviii. 14 ἀπο4ανεῖν instead of ἀπολέσθαι:—‘Now Caiaphas was he who counselled the Jews that it was expedient that one man should die’ (instead of ‘perish’) for the people.’ There is certainly a considerable amount of ancient testimony in favour of this reading: for besides אBC, it is found in the Old Latin copies, the Egyptian, and Peshitto versions, besides the Lewis MS., the Chronicon, Cyril, Nonnus, Chrysostom. Yet may it be regarded as certain that St. John wrote ἀπολέσθαι in this place. The proper proof of the statement is the consentient voice of all the copies,—except about nineteen of loose character:—we know their vagaries but too well, and decline to let them impose upon us. In real fact, nothing else is ἀποθανεῖν but a critical assimilation of St. John xviii. 14 to xi. 50,—somewhat as ‘die’ in our A.V. has been retained by King James’ translators, though they certainly had λέσθαι before them.

Many of these glosses are rank, patent, palpable. Such is the substitution (St. Mark vi. 11) of ὃς ἂν τόπος μὴ δέξηται ὑμᾶς by אBLΔ for ὃσοι ἂν μὴ δέξωνται ὑμᾶς,—which latter is the reading of the Old Latin and Peshitto, as well as of the whole body of uncials and cursives alike. Some Critic evidently considered that the words which follow, ‘when you go out thence,’ imply that place, not persons, should have gone before. Accordingly, he substituted ‘whatsoever place’ for ‘whosoever

The attentive student of the Gospels will recognize with interest how gracefully the third Evangelist St. Luke (ix. 5) has overcome this difficulty.

’: another has bequeathed to us in four uncial MSS. a lasting record of his rashness and incompetency. Since however he left behind the words μηδὲ ἀκούσωσιν ὑμῶν, which immediately follow, who sees not that the fabricator has betrayed himself? I am astonished that so patent a fraud should have imposed upon Tischendorf, and Tregelles, and Lachmann, and Alford, and Westcott and Hort. But in fact it does not stand alone. From the same copies אBLΔ (with two others, CD) we find the woe denounced in the same verse on the unbelieving city erased (ἀμὴν λέγω ὑμι̂ν, ἀνεκτοτερον ἔσται Σοδόμοις ἤ Γομόρροις ἐν ἡμέρᾳ κρίσεως, ἤ τῇ πόλει ἐκείνῃ). Quite idle is it to pretend (with Tischendorf) that these words are an importation from the parallel place in St. Matthew. A memorable note of diversity has been set on the two places, which in all the copies is religiously maintained, viz. Σοδόμοις ἤ Γομόρροις, in St. Mark: γῇ Σοδόμων καὶ Γομόρρων, in St. Matt. It is simply incredible that this could have been done if the received text in this place had been of spurious origin.

§ 5.

The word ἀπέχει in St. Mark xiv. 41 has proved a stumbling-block. The most obvious explanation is probably the truest. After a brief pause

Augustine, with his accustomed acuteness, points out that St. Mark’s narrative shews that after the words of ‘Sleep on now and take your rest,’ our Lord must have been silent for a brief space in order to allow His disciples a slight prolongation of the refreshment which his words had already permitted them to enjoy. Presently, He is heard to say,—‘It is enough’—(that is, ‘Ye have now slept and rested enough’); and adds, ‘The hour is come. Behold, the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners.’ ‘Sed quia commemorata non est ipsa interpositio silentii Domini, propterea coartat intellectum, ut in illis verbis alia pronuntiatio requiratur.’—iii². 106 a, b. The passage in question runs thus;—Καθείδετε τὸ λοιπὸν καὶ ἀναπαύεσθε. ἀπέχει· ἦλθεν ἡ ὥρα· ἰδοὺ. κ.τ.λ..

, during which the Saviour has been content to survey in silence His sleeping disciples;—or perhaps, after telling them that they will have time and opportunity enough for sleep and rest when He shall have been taken from them;— He announces the arrival of ‘the hour,’ by exclaiming, ‘Ἀπέχει,—‘It is enough;’ or, ‘It is sufficient;’ i.e. The season for repose is over.

But the Revisers’ of the second century did not perceive that ἀπέχει is here used impersonally

Those who saw this, explain the word amiss. Note the Scholion (Anon. Vat.) in Possinus, p. 321:—ἀπέχει, τουτέστι, πεπλήρωται, τέλος ἔχει τὸ κατ᾽ ἐμέ., Last Twelve Verses, p. 226, note.

. They understood the word to mean ‘is fully come’; and supplied the supposed nominative, viz. τὸ τέλος

I retract unreservedly what I offered on this subject in a former work (Last Twelve Verses, &c., pp. 225, 226). I was misled by one who seldom indeed misleads,—the learned editor of the Codex Bezae (in loco).

. Other critics who rightly understood ἀπέχει to signify ‘sufficit,’ still subjoined ‘finis.’ The Old Latin and the Syriac versions must have been executed from Greek copies which exhibited,— ἀπέχει τὸ τέλος. This is abundantly proved by the renderings adest finis (f),—consummatus est finis (a); from which the change to ἀπέχει τὸ τέλος ΚΑΙ ἡ ὥρα (the reading of D) was obvious: sufficit finis et hora (d q); adest enim consummatio; et (ff² venit) hora (c); or, (as the Peshitto more fully gives it), appropinquavit finis, et venit hora

So Peshitto. Lewis, venit hora, appropinquat finis. Harkleian, adest consummatio, venit hora.

. Jerome put this matter straight by simply writing sufficit. But it is a suggestive circumstance, and an interesting proof how largely the reading ἀπέχει τὸ τέλος must once have prevailed, that it is frequently met with in cursive copies of the Gospels to this hour

απεχει. Vg. sufficit. + το τελος, 13, 69, 124, 2^Pe, c^ser, 47, 54, 56, 61, 184, 346, 348, 439. d, q, sufficit finis et hora. f, adest finis, venit hora. c, ff², adest enim consummatio, et (ff² venit) hora. a, consummatus est finis, advenit hora. It is certain that one formidable source of danger to the sacred text has been its occasional obscurity. This has resulted,—(1) sometimes in the omission of words: Δευτερόπρωτον. (2) Sometimes in substitution, as πυγμῇ. (3) Sometimes in the insertion of unauthorized matter: thus, τὸ τέλος, as above.

. Happily it is an ‘old reading’ which finds no favour at the present day. It need not therefore occupy us any longer.

As another instance of ancient Glosses introduced to help out the sense, the reading of St. John ix. 22 is confessedly ἵνα ἐάν τις αὐτὸν ὁμολογήσῃ Χριστόν. So all the MSS. but one, and so the Old Latin. So indeed all the ancient versions except the Egyptian. Cod. D alone adds εἶναι: but εἶναι must once have been a familiar gloss: for Jerome retains it in the Vulgate: and indeed Cyril, whenever he quotes the place

iii. 105: iv. 913. So also iv. 614.

, exhibits τὸν Χριστὸν εἶναι. Not so however Chrysostom

vi. 283.

and Gregory of Nyssa

i. 307.

.

§ 6.

There is scarcely to be found, amid the incidents immediately preceding our Saviour’s Passion, one more affecting or more exquisite than the anointing of His feet at Bethany by Mary the sister of Lazarus, which received its unexpected interpretation from the lips of Christ Himself. ‘Let her alone. Against the day of My embalming hath she kept it.’ (St. John xii. 7.) He assigns to her act a mysterious meaning of which the holy woman little dreamt. She had treasured up that precious unguent against the day,—(with the presentiment of true Love, she knew that it could not be very far distant),—when His dead limbs would require embalming. But lo, she beholds Him reclining at supper in her sister’s house: and yielding to a Divine impulse she brings forth her reserved costly offering and bestows it on Him at once. Ah, she little knew,—she could not in fact have known,—that it was the only anointing those sacred feet were destined ever to enjoy! . . . . In the meantime through a desire, as I suspect, to bring this incident into an impossible harmony with what is recorded in St. Mark xvi. 1, with which obviously it has no manner of connexion, a scribe is found at some exceedingly remote period to have improved our Lord’s expression into this:—‘Let her alone in order that against the day of My embalming she may keep it.’ Such an exhibition of the Sacred Text is its own sufficient condemnation. What that critic exactly meant, I fail to discover: but I am sure he has spoilt what he did not understand: and though it is quite true that אBD with five other Uncial MSS. and Nonnus, besides the Latin and Bohairic, Jerusalem, Armenian, and Ethiopic versions, besides four errant cursives so exhibit the place, this instead of commending the reading to our favour, only proves damaging to the witnesses by which it is upheld. We learn that no reliance is to be placed even in such a combination of authorities. This is one of the places which the Fathers pass by almost in silence. Chrysostom

viii. 392.

however, and evidently Cyril Alex.

iv. 696.

, as well as Ammonius

Cramer’s Cat. in loc.

convey though roughly a better sense by quoting the verse with ἐποίησε for τετήρηκεν. Antiochus

1063.

is express. [A and eleven other uncials, and the cursives (with the petty exception already noted), together with the Peshitto, Harkleian (which only notes the other reading in the margin), Lewis, Sahidic, and Gothic versions, form a body of authority against the palpable emasculation of the passage, which for number, variety, weight, and internal evidence is greatly superior to the opposing body. Also, with reference to continuity and antiquity it preponderates plainly, if not so decisively; and the context of D is full of blunders, besides that it omits the next verse, and B and א are also inaccurate hereabouts

E.g. ver. 1. All the three officiously insert (ὁ Ἰησοῦς, in order to prevent people from imagining that Lazarus raised Lazarus from the dead; ver. 4, D gives the gloss, ἀπὸ Καρυώτου for Ἰσκαρίωτης; ver. 13, spells thus,—ὡσσανά; besides constant inaccuracies, in which it is followed by none. א omits nineteen words in the first thirty-two verses of the chapter, besides adding eight and making other alterations. B is far from being accurate.

. So that the Traditional text enjoys in this passage the support of all the Notes of Truth.]

In accordance with what has been said above, for Ἄφες αὐτήν· εἰς τὴν ἡμέραν τοῦ ἐνταφιασμοῦ μου τετηρήκεν αὐτό (St. John xii. 7), the copies which it has recently become the fashion to adore, read ἄφες αὐτήν ἵνα . . . τηρήσῃ αὐτό. This startling innovation,—which destroys the sense of our Saviour’s words, and furnishes a sorry substitute which no one is able to explain

‘Let her alone, that she may keep it against the day of My burying’ (Alford). But how could she keep it after she had poured it all out?—’Suffer her to have kept it against the day of My preparation unto burial’ (McClellan). But ἵνα τηρήσῃ could hardly mean that: and the day of His ἐνταφιασμός had not yet arrived.

,—is accepted by recent Editors and some Critics: yet is it clearly nothing else but a stupid correction of the text,—introduced by some one who did not understand the intention of the Divine Speaker. Our Saviour is here discovering to us an exquisite circumstance,—revealing what until now had been a profound and tender secret: viz. that Mary, convinced by many a sad token that the Day of His departure could not be very far distant, had some time before provided herself with this costly ointment, and ‘kept it’ by her,—intending to reserve it against the dark day when it would be needed for the ‘embalming’ of the lifeless body of her Lord. And now it wants only a week to Easter. She beholds Him (with Lazarus at His side) reclining in her sister’s house at supper, amid circumstances of mystery which fill her soul with awful anticipation. She divines, with love’s true instinct, that this may prove her only opportunity. Accordingly, she ‘anticipates to anoint’ (προέλαβε μυρίσαι, St. Mark xiv. 8) His Body: and, yielding—to-an overwhelming impulse, bestows upon Him all her costly offering at once! . . . How does it happen that some professed critics have overlooked all this? Any one who has really studied the subject ought to know, from a mere survey of the evidence, on which side the truth in respect of the text of this passage must needs lie.

§ 7.

Our Lord, in His great Eucharistic address to the eternal Father, thus speaks:—I have glorified Thee on the earth. I have perfected the work which Thou gavest Me to do’ (St. John xvii. 4). Two things are stated: first, that the result of His Ministry had been the exhibition upon earth of the Father’s ‘glory

Consider ii. 11 and xi. 40: St. Luke xiii. 17: Heb. i. 3.

’: next, that the work which the Father had given the Son to do

Consider v. 36 and iv. 34.

was at last finished

Consider St. John xix. 30. Cf. St. Luke xxii. 37.

. And that this is what St. John actually wrote is certain: not only because it is found in all the copies, except twelve of suspicious character (headed by אABCL); but because it is vouched for by the Peshitto

Lewis, ‘and the work I have perfected’: Harkleian, “because the work, &c., “because’ being obelized.

and the Latin, the Gothic and the Armenian versions

The Bohairic and Ethiopic are hostile.

: besides a whole chorus of Fathers; viz. Hippolytus

i. 245 (= Constt. App. viii. i; ap. Galland. iii. 199).

, Didymus

P. 419.

, Eusebius

M^cell p. 157.

, Athanasius

i. 534.

, Basil

ii. 196, 238: iii. 39.

, Chrysostom

v. 256: viii. 475 bis.

, Cyril

iii. 542: iv. 954: v¹. 599, 601, 614: v². 152.—In the following places Cyril shews himself acquainted with the other reading,—iv. 879: v¹. 167, 366: vi. 124.

, ps.-Polycarp

Polyc. frg. v (ed. Jacobson).

, the interpolator of Ignatius

Ps.-Ignat. 328.

, and the authors of the Apostolic Constitutions

Ap. Gall. iii. 215.

: together with the following among the Latins:—Cyprian

P. 285.

, Ambrose

ii. 545.

, Hilary

Pp. 510, 816, 1008. But opere consummato, pp. 812, 815.—Jerome also once (iv. 563) has opere completo.

, Zeno

Ap. Gall. v. 135.

, Cassian

P. 367.

, Novatian

Ap. Gall. iii. 308.

, certain Arians

Ap. Aug. viii. 622.

, Augustine

iii². 761: viii. 640.

.

But the asyndeton (so characteristic of the fourth Gospel) proving uncongenial to certain of old time, D inserted καὶ. A more popular device was to substitute the participle (τελειώσας) for ἐτελείωσα: whereby our Lord is made to say that He had glorified His Father’s Name ‘by perfecting’ or ‘completing’—‘in that He had finished’—the work which the Father had given Him to do; which damages the sense by limiting it, and indeed introduces a new idea. A more patent gloss it would be hard to find. Yet has it been adopted as the genuine text by all the Editors and all the Critics. So general is the delusion in favour of any reading supported by the combined evidence of אABCL, that the Revisers here translate—‘I glorified Thee on the earth, having accomplished (τελειώσας) the work which Thou hast given Me to do:’ without so much as vouchsafing a hint to the English reader that they have altered the text.

When some came with the message ‘Thy daughter is dead: why troublest thou the Master further?’ the Evangelist relates that Jesus ‘as soon as He heard (εὐθέως ἀκούσας) what was being spoken, said to the ruler of the synagogue, Fear not: only believe.’ (St. Mark v. 36.) For this, אBLΔ substitute ‘disregarding (παρακούσας) what was being spoken’: which is nothing else but a sorry gloss, disowned by every other copy, including ACD, and all the versions. Yet does παρακούσας find favour with Tischendorf, Tregelles, and others.

§ 8.

In this way it happened that in the earliest age the construction of St. Luke i. 66 became misapprehended. Some Western scribe evidently imagined that the popular saying concerning John Baptist,—τί ἄρα τὸ παιδίον τοῦτο ἔσται, extended further, and comprised the Evangelist’s record,:—καὶ χεὶρ Κυρίου ἦν μετ᾽ αὐτοῦ. To support this strange view, καί was altered into καὶ γὰρ, and ἐστὶ was substituted for ἦν. It is thus that the place stands in the Verona copy of the Old Latin (b). In other quarters the verb was omitted altogether: and that is how D, Evan. 59 with the Vercelli (a) and two other copies of the Old Latin exhibit the place. Augustine

v. 1166.

is found to have read indifferently—‘manus enim Domini cum illo,’ and ‘cum illo est’: but he insists that the combined clauses represent the popular utterance concerning the Baptist

Ibid. 1165 g, 1165 a.

. Unhappily, there survives a notable trace of the same misapprehension in א–BCL which, alone of MSS., read καὶ γὰρ . . . ἦν

Though the Bohairic, Gothic, Vulgate, and Ethiopic versions are disfigured in the same way, and the Lewis reads ‘is.’

. The consequence might have been anticipated. All recent Editors adopt this reading, which however is clearly inadmissible. The received text, witnessed to by the Peshitto, Harkleian, and Armenian versions, is obviously correct. Accordingly, A and all the uncials not already named, together with the whole body of the cursives, so read the place. With fatal infelicity the Revisers exhibit ‘For indeed the hand of the Lord was with him.’ They clearly are to blame: for indeed the MS. evidence admits of no uncertainty. It is much to be regretted that not a single very ancient Greek Father (so far as I can discover) quotes the place.

§ 9.

It seems to have been anciently felt, in connexion with the first miraculous draught of fishes, that St. Luke’s statement (v. 7) that the ships were so full that ‘they were sinking’ (ὥστε βυθίζεσθαι αὐτά) requires some qualification. Accordingly C inserts ἤδη (were ‘just’ sinking); and D, παρα τι (‘within a little’): while the Peshitto the Lewis and the Vulgate, as well as many copies of the Old Latin, exhibit ‘ita ut pene.’ These attempts to improve upon Scripture, and these paraphrases, indicate laudable zeal for the truthfulness of the Evangelist; but they betray an utterly mistaken view of the critic’s office. The truth is, βυθίζεσθαι, as the Bohairic translators perceived and as most of us are aware, means ‘were beginning to sink.’ There is no need of further qualifying the expression by the insertion with Eusebius

Theoph. 216 note: ὡς κινδυνεύειν αὐτὰ βυθισθῆναι.

of any additional word.

I strongly suspect that the introduction of the name of ‘Pyrrhus into Acts xx. 4 as the patronymic of ‘Sopater of Beraea,’ is to be accounted for in this way. A very early gloss it certainly is, for it appears in the Old Latin: yet, the Peshitto knows nothing of it, and the Harkleian rejects it from the text, though not from the margin. Origen and the Bohairic recognize it, but not Chrysostom nor the Ethiopic. I suspect that some foolish critic of the primitive age invented Πύρου (or Πύρρου) out of Βεροιαῖος (or Βερροιαῖος) which follows. The Latin form of this was ‘Pyrus

Cod. Amiat.

,’ ‘Pyrrhus,’ or ‘Pirrus

g,—at Stockholm.

.’ In the Sahidic version he is called the ‘son of Berus’ (υἱὸς Βεροῦ),—which confirms me in my conjecture. But indeed, if it was with some Beracan that the gloss originated,—and what more likely?—it becomes an interesting circumstance that the inhabitants of that part of Macedonia are known to have confused the p and b sounds

Stephanus De Urbibus in voc. Βέροια.

. . . . This entire matter is unimportant in itself, but the letter of Scripture cannot be too carefully guarded: and let me invite the reader to consider,—If St. Luke actually wrote Σώπατρος Πύρρου Βεροιαῖος, why at the present day should five copies out of six record nothing of that second word?

CHAPTER XIII.

CAUSES OF CORRUPTION CHIEFLY INTENTIONAL.

IX. CORRUPTION BY HERETICS.

§ 1.

THE Corruptions of the Sacred Text which we have been hitherto considering, however diverse the causes from which they may have resulted, have yet all agreed in this: viz. that they have all been of a lawful nature. My meaning is, that apparently, at no stage of the business has there been mala fides in any quarter. We are prepared to make the utmost allowance for careless, even for licentious transcription; and we can invent excuses for the mistaken zeal, the officiousness if men prefer to call it so, which has occasionally not scrupled to adopt conjectural emendations of the Text. To be brief, so long as an honest reason is discoverable for a corrupt reading, we gladly adopt the plea. It has been shewn with sufficient clearness, I trust, in the course of the foregoing chapters, that the number of distinct causes to which various readings may reasonably be attributed is even extraordinary.

But there remains after all an alarmingly large assortment of textual perturbations which absolutely refuse to fall under any of the heads of classification already enumerated. They are not to be accounted for on any ordinary principle. And this residuum of cases it is, which occasions our present embarrassment. They are in truth so exceedingly numerous; they are often so very considerable; they are, as a rule, so very licentious; they transgress to such an extent all regulations; they usurp so persistently the office of truth and faithfulness, that we really know not what to think about them. Sometimes we are presented with gross interpolations,—apocryphal stories: more often with systematic lacerations of the text, or transformations as from an angel of light.

We are constrained to inquire, How all this can possibly have come about? Have there even been persons who made it their business of set purpose to corrupt the [sacred deposit of Holy Scripture entrusted to the Church for the perpetual illumination of all ages till the Lord should come?]

At this stage of the inquiry, we are reminded that it is even notorious that in the earliest age of all, the New Testament Scriptures were subjected to such influences. In the age which immediately succeeded the Apostolic there were heretical teachers not a few, who finding their tenets refuted by the plain Word of God bent themselves against the written Word with all their power. From seeking to evacuate its teaching, it was but a single step to seeking to falsify its testimony. Profane literature has never been exposed to such hostility. I make the remark in order also to remind the reader of one more point of [dissimilarity between the two classes of writings. The inestimable value of the New Testament entailed greater dangers, as well as secured superior safeguards. Strange, that a later age should try to discard the latter].

It is found therefore that Satan could not even wait for the grave to close over St. John. ‘Many’ there were already who taught that Christ had not come in the flesh. Gnosticism was in the world already. St. Paul denounces it by name

ψευδωνύμου γνώσεως 1 Tim. vi. 20.

The ‘grievous wolves’ whose assaults St. Paul predicted as imminent, and against which he warned the heads of the Ephesian Church

Acts xx. 29.

No sooner do we find ourselves out of Apostolic lines and among monuments of the primitive age than we are made aware that the sacred text must have been exposed at that very early period to disturbing influences which, on no ordinary principles, can be explained. Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Origen, Clement of Alexandria,—among the Fathers: some Old Latin MSS.

Chiefly the Low Latin amongst them. Tradit. Text. chap. vii. p. 137.

Let me however at the risk of repeating what has been already said dispose at once of an uneasy suspicion which is pretty sure to suggest itself to a person of intelligence after reading what goes before. If the most primitive witnesses to our hand are indeed discovered to bear false witness to the text of Scripture,—whither are we to betake ourselves for the Truth? And what security can we hope ever to enjoy that any given exhibition of the text of Scripture is the true one? Are we then to be told that in this subject-matter the maxim ‘id verius quod prius’ does not hold? that the stream instead of getting purer as we approach the fountain head, on the contrary grows more and more corrupt?

CHAPTER XIV.

CAUSES OF CORRUPTION CHIEFLY INTENTIONAL.

X. CORRUPTION BY THE ORTHODOX.

§ 1.

ANOTHER cause why, in very early times, the Text of the Gospels underwent serious depravation, was mistaken solicitude on the part of the ancient orthodox for the purity of the Catholic faith. These persons, like certain of the moderns, Beza for example, evidently did not think it at all wrong to tamper with the inspired Text. If any expression seemed to them to have a dangerous tendency, they altered it, or transplanted it, or removed it bodily from the sacred page. About the uncritical nature of what they did, they entertained no suspicion: about the immorality of the proceeding, they evidently did not trouble themselves at all. On the contrary, the piety of the motive seems to have been held to constitute a sufficient excuse for any amount of licence. The copies which had undergone this process of castigation were even styled ‘corrected,’—and doubtless were popularly looked upon as ‘the correct copies’ [like our ‘critical texts’]. An illustration of this is afforded by a circumstance mentioned by Epiphanius.

APPENDIX I.

PERICOPE DE ADULTERA.

I HAVE purposely reserved for the last the most difficult problem of all: viz. those twelve famous verses of St. John’s Gospel (chap. vii. 53 to viii. 11) which contain the history of ‘the woman taken in adultery,’—the pericope de adultera, as it is called. Altogether indispensable is it that the reader should approach this portion of the Gospel with the greatest amount of experience and the largest preparation. Convenient would it be, no doubt, if he could further divest himself of prejudice; but that is perhaps impossible. Let him at least endeavour to weigh the evidence which shall now be laid before him in impartial scales. He must do so perforce, if he would judge rightly: for the matter to be discussed is confessedly very peculiar: in some respects, even unique. Let me convince him at once of the truth of what has been so far spoken.

It is a singular circumstance that at the end of eighteen centuries two instances, and but two, should exist of a considerable portion of Scripture left to the mercy, so to speak, of ‘Textual Criticism.’ Twelve consecutive Verses in the second Gospel—as many consecutive Verses in the fourth—are in this predicament. It is singular, I say, that the Providence which has watched so marvellously over the fortunes of the, Deposit,— the Divine Wisdom which has made such ample provision for its security all down the ages, should have so ordered the matter, that these two co-extensive problems have survived to our times to be tests of human sagacity,—trials of human faithfulness and skill. They present some striking features of correspondence, but far more of contrast,—as will presently appear. And yet the most important circumstance of all cannot be too soon mentioned: viz. that both alike have experienced the same calamitous treatment at the hands of some critics. By common consent the most recent editors deny that either set of Verses can have formed part of the Gospel as it proceeded from the hands of its inspired author. How mistaken is this opinion of theirs in respect of the ‘Last twelve verses of the Gospel according to St. Mark,’ has been already demonstrated in a separate treatise. I must be content in this place to deal in a far less ceremonious manner with the hostile verdict of many critics concerning St. John vii. 53–viii. 11. That I shall be able to satisfy those persons who profess themselves unconvinced by what was offered concerning St. Mark’s last twelve verses, I am not so simple as to expect. But I trust that I shall have with me all candid readers who are capable of weighing evidence impartially, and understanding the nature of logical proof, when it is fully drawn out before them,—which indeed is the very qualification that I require of them.

And first, the case of the pericope de adultera requires to be placed before the reader in its true bearings. For those who have hitherto discussed it are observed to have ignored certain preliminary considerations which, once clearly apprehended, are all but decisive of the point vat issue. There is a fundamental obstacle, I mean, in the way of any attempt to dislodge this portion of the sacred narrative from the context in which it stands, which they seem to have overlooked. I proceed to explain.

APPENDIX II.

CONFLATION AND THE SO-CALLED NEUTRAL TEXT.

SOME of the most courteous of our critics, in reviewing the companion volume to this, have expressed regret that we have not grappled more closely than we have done with Dr. Hort’s theory. I have already expressed our reasons. Our object has been to describe and establish what we conceive to be the true principles of Sacred Textual Science. We are concerned only in a secondary degree with opposing principles. Where they have come in our way, we have endeavoured to remove them. But it has not entered within our design to pursue them into their fastnesses and domiciles. Nevertheless, in compliance with a request which is both proper and candid, I will do what I can to examine with all the equity that I can command an essential part of Dr. Hort’s system, which appears to exercise great influence with his followers.

§ 1.

CONFLATION.

Dr. Hort’s theory of ‘Conflation’ may be discovered on pp. 93-107. The want of an index to his Introduction, notwithstanding his ample ‘Contents,’ makes it difficult to collect illustrations of his meaning from the rest of his treatise. Nevertheless, the effect of Conflation appears to be well described in his words on p. 133:—‘Now however the three great lines were brought together, and made to contribute to a text different from all.’ In other words, by means of a combination of the Western, Alexandrian, and ‘Neutral’ Texts—‘the great lines of transmission . . . to all appearance exclusively divergent,’—the ‘Syrian’ text was constructed in a form different from any one and all of the other three. Not that all these three were made to contribute on every occasion. We find (p. 93) Conflation, or Conflate Readings, introduced as proving the posteriority of Syrian to Western . . . and other . . . readings.’ And in the analysis of eight passages, which is added, only in one case (St. Mark viii. 26) are more than two elements represented, and in that the third class consists of ‘different conflations’ of the first and second

Dr. Hort has represented Neutral readings by α, Western by β, as far as I can understand, ‘other’ by γ, and ‘Syrian’ (= Traditional) by δ. But he nowhere gives an example of γ.

Perhaps I may present Dr. Hort’s theory under the form of a diagram:—

Our theory is the converse in main features to this. We utterly repudiate the term Syrian’ as being a most inadequate and untrue title for the Text adopted and maintained by the Catholic Church with all her intelligence and learning, during nearly fifteen centuries according to Dr. Hort’s admission: and we claim from the evidence that the Traditional Text of the Gospels, under the true name, is that which came fresh from the pens of the Evangelists; and that all variations from it, however they have been entitled, are nothing else than corrupt forms of the original readings. Our diagram in rough presentation will therefore assume this character:—

It should be added, that w, x, y, z, &c., denote forms of corruption. We do not recognize the ‘Neutral’ at all, believing it to be a Caesarean combination or recension, made from previous texts or readings of a corrupt character.

The question is, which is the true theory, Dr. Hort’s or ours?

The general points that strike us with reference to Dr. Flores theory are:—

(1) That it is very vague and indeterminate in nature. Given three things, of which X includes what is in Y and Z, upon the face of the theory either X may have arisen by synthesis from Y and Z, or X and Z may owe their origin by analysis to X.

(2) Upon examination it is found that Dr. Hort’s arguments for the posteriority of D are mainly of an internal character, and are loose and imaginative, depending largely upon personal or literary predilections.

(3) That it is exceedingly improbable that the Church of the fourth and fifth centuries, which in a most able period had been occupied with discussions on verbal accuracy, should have made the gross mistake of adopting (what was then) a modern concoction from the original text of the Gospels, which had been written less than three or four centuries before; and that their error should have been acknowledged as truth, and perpetuated by the ages that succeeded them down to the present time.

But we must draw nearer to Dr. Hort’s argument.

He founds it upon a detailed examination of eight passages, viz. St. Mark vi. 33; viii. 26; ix. 38; ix. 49; St. Luke ix. 10; xi. 54; xii. 18; xxiv. 53.

1. Remark that eight is a round and divisible number. Did the author decide upon it with a view of presenting two specimens from each Gospel? To be sure, he gives four from the first two, and four from the two last, only that he confines the batches severally to St. Mark and St. Luke. Did the strong style of St. Matthew, with distinct meaning in every word, yield no suitable example for treatment? Could no passage be found in St. John’s Gospel, where not without parallel, but to a remarkable degree, extreme simplicity of language, even expressed in alternative clauses, clothes soaring thought and philosophical acuteness? True, that he quotes St. John v. 37 as an instance of Conflation by the Codex Bezae which is anything but an embodiment of the Traditional or ‘Syrian’ Text, and xiii. 24 which is similarly irrelevant. Neither of these instances therefore fill up the gap, and are accordingly not included in the selected eight. What can we infer from this presentment, but that Conflation’ is probably not of frequent occurrence as has been imagined, but may indeed be—to admit for a moment its existence—nothing more than an occasional incident? For surely, if specimens in St. Matthew and St. John had abounded to his hand, and accordingly Conflation’ had been largely employed throughout the Gospels, Dr. Hort would not have exercised so restricted, and yet so round a choice.

2. But we must advance a step further. Dean Burgon as we have seen has calculated the differences between B and the Received Text at 7,578, and those which divide א and the Received Text as reaching 8,972. He divided these totals respectively under 2,877 and 3,455 omissions, 536 and 839 additions, 2,098 and 2,299 transpositions, and 2,067 and 2,379 substitutions and modifications combined. Of these classes, it is evident that Conflation has nothing to do with Additions or Transpositions. Nor indeed with Substitutions, although one of Dr. Hort’s instances appears to prove that it has. Conflation is the combination of two (or more) different expressions into one. If therefore both expressions occur in one of the elements, the Conflation has been made beforehand, and a substitution then occurs instead of a conflation. So in St. Luke xii. 18, B, &c., read τὸν σῖτον καὶ τὰ ἀγαθά μου, which Dr. Hort

Introduction, p. 103.

GENERAL INDEX.

A

א or Sinaitio MS., 2, 196.

Accident, 8; pure A., 24-35.

Addition, 266-7, 270.

Ages, earliest, 2.

Alexandrian error, readings, App. II. 268, 284.

Alford, passim.

Ammonius, 200.

Antiquity, our appeal always made to, 194-5.

Apolinarius, or -is (or Apoll.), 224, 257.

Arians, 204, 218.

Assimilation, 100-127; what it was, 101-2; must be delicately handled, 115.

Attraction, 123-7.

B

B or Vatican MS., 2, 8, 196; kakigraphy of, 64 note: virtually with א the ‘Neutral’ text, 282.

Basilides, 195, 197-9, 218 note 2.

Blunder, history of a, 24-7.

Bohairic Version, 249, and passim.

C

Caesarea, library of, 284.

Cerinthus, 201.

Clement of Alexandria, 193.

Conflation, 266-82.

Correctors of MSS., 21.

Corruption, first origin of, 3-8; classes of 8-9, 23; general, 10-23; prevailed from the first, 12; the most corrupt authorities, 8, 14; in early Fathers, 193-4.

Curetonian Version, passim. See Traditional Text.

Cursive MSS., a group of eccentric, 282; Ferrer group, 282.

D

D or Codex Besse, 8.

Δ, or Sangallensis, 8.

Damascus, 5.

Diatessarons, 89, 96-8, 101. See Tatian.

Doxology, in the Lord’s Prayer, 81-8.

E

Eclogadion, 69.

Epiphanius, 205, 211-2.

Erasmus, 10.

Error, slight clerical, 27-32.

Euroclydon, 46.

Evangelistaria (the right name), 67.

F

Falconer’s St. Paul’s voyage, 46-7.

Fathers, passim; earliest, 193.

Faustinus, 218.

Farrar group of Cursives, 282.

Field, Dr., 28 note 5, 30 and note 2.

G

Galilee of the Gentiles, 4-5.

Genealogy, 22. See Traditional Text.

Glosses, 94-5, 98, 172-90; described, 172.

Gospels, the four, probable date of, 7.

Guardian, review in, Pref., 150-2, 283 note.

Gwilliam, Rev. G. H., 115 note.

H

Harmonistic influence, 89-99.

Heracleon, 190, 202, 204, 225 note 2.

Heretics, corruptions by, 199-210; not always dishonest, 292; very numerous, 199 &c.

Homoeoteleuton, 36-42; explained, 8.

INDEX II.

PASSAGES OF THE NEW TESTAMENT DISCUSSED.

Index of Scripture References