E. Mitchell (1896) and Royse (2008) on homoeoteleuton

Because of the sometimes shocking lack of skill exhibited by 19th century textual critics in being able to recognize rather compelling homoeoteleuton (h.t.) errors, one gets the impression that they were wholly ignorant of them, or else had no real grasp of how to go about finding and positively identifying them.

We suspect that there is some kernel of truth to the overwhelming incompetence of textual critics, particularly in the period between 1830 to 1880, encompassing the labours of Lachmann, Tregelles, Tischendorf, Alford & Hort. 

In particular, the many apologists and promoters of the 'new text-critical methods' seem perpetually unable to comprehend the ramifications of their own words.  It appears that they readily lifted explanations and descriptions of the text-critical process (repeatedly), and yet failed to see the consequences of their own statements.

Another case in point here is Edward Mitchell, author of The Critical Handbook of the Greek NT (Harper, 1896).  This is again not a true handbook at all, for it does not train, equip, or even introduce the actual methods of TC in a way that would enable someone to reliably practice it.   Instead it is a reassuring promotional introduction to the popular (by the 1890s) views of Lachmann, Tregelles, Tischendorf and Hort.   Although providing several pages on TC methods, it lacks even proper illustrations of popular canons.

It also misleads badly as to the applicability of various rules.  When Mitchell turns to various TC problems, we find the following seemingly reasonable and sensible statement:

" para. 9.  The Nature of Various Readings

Since no manuscripts are extant which date earlier than the 4th century, it is obvious that all now existing are the result of transcriptions from previous copies, and are liable to such variations and imperfections as are incident to all copies...

...

3.  Frequently a clause is lost by what is called homoeoteleuton (Grk: ομοιοτελευτον), where two clauses happen to end with the same word, and the transcriber's eye passes from one to the other.  Omissions from this cause occur in the Sinaitic MS in the New Testament - according to Scrivener, no fewer than one 115 times - though many of them are supplied by a later hand."

Clearly Mitchell shows himself well aware of the potential problem of h.t. errors in even the most ancient manuscripts, like Aleph  and B.   Yet, happily and uncritically following the claims of Lachmann, Tregelles, and Hort, Mitchell sees no conflict at all between this observation (above) and his third Textual-Critical Canon (p. 122 fwd):

"3.  We may next mentions the canon of Griesbach, Brevior lectio praeferenda est verbosiori, 'The briefer reading must be preferred to the longer.'   The reasonableness of this rule results from the tendency of scribes to incorporate marginal notes or fuller parallel passages, or to amplify OT quotations.  And yet it must be modified by the consideration that words and clauses are sometimes omitted to remove difficulties (see Bengel's canon, 2. above), or through Homoeoteleuton. [!!]"

It is glaringly obvious that Mitchell has no clue about the ramifications of his statements here, or else he is engaging in some kind of deception.


First of all, he misquotes Griesbach, for Griesbach's 'canon' is actually much larger and more complex than stated here.  This is because it was originally given with many limitations and explanations which reveal its unsuitableness and inapplicability to most Variation Units.   This has been noted and expounded by others, including Royse, recently:

Royse on Griesbach's canon  < - - Click here.

Secondly, If his words above are to have any connection to reality, then Hort's text and the whole methodology of elevating "Prefer the Shorter Reading" to a universal canon must be rejected as naive and unrealistic.

The question remains, whether popularizers like Mitchell (and the promoters of the Revised Version etc.) were just dutifully copying what real textual critics had written, or they really understood what they were saying, and thus were engaging in a kind of Orwellian 'newspeak'.


mr.scrivener

Homoeoteleuton blunders from UBS infect the New Vulgate!

Ron Conte Jr. this summer completed an evaluation of the UBS text and its negative impact on the NV (New Vulgate) Latin edition.   He lists several key points online here:

 "I was dismayed and appalled by the decisions of the editors of the Nova Vulgata, especially to abandon the Latin scriptural tradition approved by the Council of Trent, and adopt in its place the critical Greek text of Matthew by the (Protestant) United Bible Societies. The UBS text, and the NV as well, omits over one hundred words from the Gospel, found in the Latin Vulgate, includes at least a couple of whole verses.

See the article for more critical comments about the NV.

Its clear that some honest Roman Catholic scholars at least have noted in detail exactly what is wrong with the UBS text, and the devastating impact on Bible texts and translations it has had for the last 50 years.

Conte uses the following abbreviations:

CV - Clementine Vulgate
NV - Nova Vulgata from vatican.va
FS - Fischers Stuttgart edition (1975)
TR - Textus Receptus
MT - Majority Text (Hodges/Farstad, 1982)
UBS - 4th ed. 1993



Among the many flaws of the UBS text, Conte lists the following homoeoteleuton errors in UBS erroneously followed by the editors of the NV (new Vulgate version):


Matthew:

5:44 - NV omits 'do good to those who hate you', also omits 'and slander you', in accord with UBS, contrary to CV, FS, TR, MT.

 12:47 - NV changes 'seeking you' to 'seeking to speak with you', in accord with the Greek.

 15:6 - NV omits 'or his mother' and changes 'commandment of God' to 'word of God' in accord with UBS Greek, contrary (on both points) to CV, FS, TR, MT.

15:8 -   Again, it is clear that the NV rephrases the Vulgate to agree with the UBS Greek, even when the TR and MT agree with the Latin. There is a basis in both the Latin and Greek scriptural traditions to retain the Vulgate wording, and yet it is cast aside, making the NV a Latin version of the UBS Greek. The result is not very useful, since if a scholar wants to consult the UBS text, he would certainly prefer to look at the Greek text itself, rather than a Latin rendering of it. 

"Also, ...   the NV departs from the Latin scriptural tradition, substituting the Greek wording of the UBS text, so that the decision of Trent on the place that the Latin text has in the Church cannot be applied to the NV."

"The reader may also have noticed by now that the Stuttgart text in Latin does not usually edit the CV to conform to the Greek. Rather, the Stuttgart text (FS) is a moderate edit of the Vulgate. The editors of FS Matthew clearly had in mind to keep to the Latin scriptural tradition, or at least to recapture the essence of Saint Jerome's Latin Vulgate. Their editorial decisions in Matthew have kept the Latin text distinct from the Greek text, like two different co-equal witnesses to the truth of the Gospel. By comparison, the Nova Vulgata has subjugated the Latin scriptural tradition entirely to the Greek, like a slave to a master. The Stuttgart edit is what the Nova Vulgata should have been."

18:11 -  NV omits verse 11, in accord with UBS, contrary to CV, FS, TR, MT.

20:16 -  NV omits 'For many are called, but few are chosen' in accord with UBS, contrary to CV, FS, TR, MT.

 23:14 - NV and FS omit verse 14, in accord with UBS, contrary to CV, FS, TR, MT. ( MT has verses 13 and 14 transposed.)

 26:3 - NV changes the Latin word 'atrium' to the word 'aulam' (a Latin word derived from Greek), in accord with the Greek text.

27:35 - NV and FS omit the portion of the verse stating that this event of dividing his garments fulfills the prophecy of the Old Testament, in accord with UBS and MT, but contrary to CV and TR.

 The NV would be no worse in its text if the project had been done by the Protestant scholars at the UBS. In fact, the FS is the work of a group of mostly Protestant scholars at the German Bible Society, and even they have seen fit to retain the CV test of Matthew in the vast majority of cases. So a group of Protestant scholars has created a Latin Bible, the Stuttgart edition of the Vulgate, which retains the Latin scriptural tradition and which generally follows the CV reading. But a group of Catholic monks, at a Benedictine monastery -- a monastery associated in past times with Saint Jerome---, who were given the task of updating the CV, have completely abandoned the Latin scriptural tradition, and have caused the NV to conform slavishly and unthinkingly solely to the Protestant UBS Greek text. If I did not know better, I would conclude that the monks of that monastery were Protestants, and that the editors of the FS were Catholics."

 Final Comments

" ...The Greek critical text of the United Bible Societies has the indisputable advantage of making the entire Bible thinner, lighter, and less expensive to publish. But the Latin and the other Greek texts have the advantage of not deleting words from inspired and inerrant Divine Revelation. The reader will have to decide for himself which advantage is to be preferred.

While it is certainly true that we must never add words to Sacred Scripture, we are also morally obligated not to delete words from Sacred Scripture."

 - exerpted from Problems with the NV in Matthew,  

Ronald L. Conte Jr. (June 18, 2010)

Textual Critics' Report Card (Part 2) - Updates

We have added Wordsworth, Tischendorf's 8th edition, Alford, and von Soden, and cleaned up Nazaroo's previous chart (see his previous post here):

Click to Enlarge:

Also, by treating Matthew 27:35 as a probable interpolation (int.) on other textual grounds (i.e., its not supported by any credible text-type), we have been able to re-evaluate the scores for better accuracy, with some expected results:

---

Winners:

Hodges/Farstad and Robinson/Pierpont now score highest, with Scholz being penalized slightly for relying upon the Latin support without sufficient warrant.

The caution and experience of Bloomfield, Wordsworth, Duncan, Griesbach and Schott continue to keep them in good stead.    All these critics score nearly 90% or above on correctly detecting homoeoteleuton errors (and avoiding a false h.t. positive).

---

Borderline Failures:

Tischendorf's 7th edition gains some points, but still scores him barely enough for a passing grade, catching about half the potential h.t. readings correctly.  he could have scored higher by flipping a coin!

Alford likewise scores dismally, having bought into the "ancient MSS are best" theory, but his good sense prevents him from total failure.

---

Shabby Performances:

Tregelles, Lachmann and Merk remain in the high 30s, for the following reasons: Tregelles' caution and good sense prevent his faulty method from leading him into the worst blunders.   Lachmann's poor theory is thankfully hindered by ignorance of actual variant readings, and Merk's indiscriminate favoring of the Vulgate helps him squeak out of a few more mistakes than expected.

---

Catastrophes:

Tischendorf's 8th edition is quite a face-plant, losing over 30 points from his previous attempt.  F.H.A. Scrivener's and E. Miller's assessment of Tischendorf's abandonment of caution in favor of the readings of his newly discovered Aleph are amply confirmed.

Von Soden is a sad failure, with his trust in 19th century canons leading him into darkness and grave errors in spite of his careful collation of the Byzantine minuscules.

Nestle/Aland and Hort score slightly better, their irrational preference for the shorter text actually giving them the correct answer on one false positive.

Generally speaking, the Roman Catholic editors score higher by simply relying on the Vulgate rather than having a superior method or skill.
Hort and the Germans score the worst, buying into Lachmann's naive theories about how to correct and publish a critical text.

mr.scrivener

The new SBL Text and Hort (continued)

Here is a chart for Matthew listing significant omissions by both Hort and the SBL Greek NT:

Click to Enlarge

The same is true of Mark as well:  Here both W/H and SBL are in column 1, and the type of error is listed in column 2

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Homoeoteleuton & modern English versions

We noted that most modern versions are now done in cooperation with the Roman Catholic church, and that they have instructed that all translations, Catholic and Protestant, be based on the UBS4 critical Greek Text.  A quick check of the most popular English translations confirms almost complete conformity with UBS4, even and especially regarding the 75 known probable h.t. omissions found in the Alexandrian texts.

Click to Enlarge

Each of the three popular modern versions slavishly follows UBS4, with the result that they have wrongly omitted text 66-71 times out of 75.   That is, they are all in serious error over 90% of the time.

Christians are probably better off with a New King James or equivalent text, if they want a modern version without so many mistaken deletions of text.

peace
Nazaroo

Modern Critical Texts & Homoeoteleuton

Click to Enlarge

Here is a chart showing the main omissions in Matthew, with homoeoteleuton errors marked in green.  Alongside are the major Greek New Testaments, with their readings and formats:

om    = text is omitted
om/u = omitted and omission is Undocumented.
h.t.    = homoeoteleuton omission
[sb]    = single brackets indicating doubt
[[db]] = double brackets means editors think text is spurious addition.

 One can see that not only do most modern critical Greek texts follow Hort's text closely, they also copy most of his mistaken judgments regarding homoeoteleuton errors, apparently oblivious to the destructive consequences for the NT text.

peace
Nazaroo