Luke 24:32 - An h.t. Comedy from P75 and friends

P75- (Luke 24:31-50) Click to Enlarge

What...even the oldest papyri guilty of frequent homoeoteleuton?
Who knew?

                           ... και ειπον προς 

αλληλους ουχι η καρδια ημων και

ομενη ην εν ημιν ως ελαλει ημιν 

εν τη οδω και ως διηνοιγεν ημιν 

τας γραφας...

In hindsight, who would be surprised by the slew of h.t. errors that sprang up around this unfortunate world cluster in the Egyptian, the Old Latin, geo. etc.

Even UBS2 walks away from this minefield, and follows the Traditional text, which is supported as follows:
א (A K) L P W X Δ Θ Π Ψ 0196 f1 f13 28 33 565 700 892 1010(marg) 1071 1079 1195 1216 1230 1241 1242 1253 1344 1365 1546 2148 2174 Byz (majority of MSS) Lect, it-f Syr-p/h/pal Cop-sa/bo Arm Eth Diat. Origen-gr/lat

P75 (late 2nd, early 3rd century) seems to have made the first small fumble,
although the Old Latin readings are impossible to date at this point:

                           ... και ειπον προς 

αλληλους ουχι η καρδια ημων και

ομενη ην εν ημιν ως ελαλει ημιν 

εν τη οδω  και  ως διηνοιγεν ημιν 

τας γραφας...

The short burst of text in the master, "ΗΗΝ ΕΝ ΗΜΙΝ"
was an easy double-take, and "εν ημιν" vanished quietly.
As expected, Codex B follows the transmitted Alexandrian line faithfully.
Codex D (and its bilingual opposing page, it-d) also perpetuates this ancient error.  Origen witnesses to it, and the later georgian translation copies it.

it-aur & the Latin Vulgate (Jerome 394 A.D.) seem to have consciously deleted the second ημιν apparently in an attempt to fix a longstanding variant.

Finally, the Old Latin (?) MSS it-a/b/ff2/l/r1 delete ως ελαλει ημιν in a second independent h.t. blunder:

                             ... και ειπον προς 

αλληλους ουχι η  καρδια ημων  και

ομενη ην εν ημιν ως ελαλει ημιν 

εν  τη οδω  και  ως  διηνοιγεν ημιν 

τας γραφας...

These errors are so short that they are likely not to be line-ends but embedded homoeoteleuton cases mid-line in wider and older master-copies.

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

Click to Enlarge

Matthew 5:44 - When Good h.t. Errors go Bad...

A quick look at the surrounding text explains easily how this early pair of omissions arose:

Matthew 5:44-45 - Double Homoeoteleuton Blunder

Click to enlarge

.........................................εγω  δε  λεγω   5:44

υμιν  αγαπατε  τους   εχθρους  υμων 

ευλογειτε τους καταρωμενους υμας 

καλως ποιειτε τους μισουντας υμας   (29-30 cpl)

και προσευχεσθε υπερ των 

επηρεαζοντων υμας 

καιδιωκοντων υμας  (15-16 cpl)  5:45 
οπως γενησθε υιοι του
πατρος υμων του εν ου-
ρανοις οτι τον ηλιον
αυτου ανατελλει επι πο-
νηρους και αγαθους και
βρεχει επι δικαιους και
αδικους...

It appears likely that these two early omissions occurred separately, but close together in the copying stream.   The width of the master-copy was probably about 29-30 cpl for the first omission to pop up, with both a similar ending and an unfortunate similar beginning of the next line, either of which alone could have caused an omission, but with both could have doubled the probability.  Interestingly, seven different letter alignments with the same column width would generate the exact same omission.

The close proximity may be a coincidence,  and one omission may have reinforced the credibility of the other as an original reading.  

"But I say to you, love your enemies, 

bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, 

and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you,"

The real problem here is not accounting for the omission, but accounting for its perpetuation.  But the difficulty of the message with the included phrases is more than enough to create a powerful attraction for the shorter reading, especially in manuscripts prepared for public reading.  Why give possible eavesdropping spies and enemies fodder for further abuse or accusations?

The inclusion of the material, by any sensible standard is "the more difficult reading" in terms of the criterion of embarrassment etc. 

This is a classic case of errors which arose by accident receiving an undeserved circulation in the name of later, more sophisticated expediency by orthodox editors consciously striving to produce the most 'appropriate' text under early circumstances of persecution and outsider hostility.

 

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Omit Both Phrases: אB f1 it-k syr-c/s cop-sa/bo Origen

Include Both: D* D-cor K L W Δ Θ Π f13 28 33 565 700 892 1009 1010 1079 1195 1216 1241 1242-c 1365 1546 1646 2148 2174 Byz/Maj  (Majority of MSS) Lect. it-c/d/f/h Syr-h/pal Goth arm eth geoA(B) Apost. Const., Chrysost.  etc.

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Steven Avery notes the following:


Dean John Burgon (by posthumous editor Edward Miller) wrote quite a bit about Matthew 5:44 here:

The Causes of the Corruption of the Traditional Text (1896) p. 144-153
http://books.google.com/books?id=c3VCAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA144

Burgon is mostly discussing the external evidences, emphasizing the massive Greek support, and a lot of detail on the early church writers.

Shalom,
Steven Avery

Codex Bezae - Luke 22:19b-20 - Massive Eye-Skip

One of the most remarkable things about the Lukan Omissions found in the last chapters is that they are all multiples of 22 letters, suggesting the original master-copy from which the error-prone text was made had a layout of 22 characters per line (cpl).

Click to Enlarge: Backbutton returns here

Already some 4 of these omissions have been noted in the literature as probable homoeoteleuton errors (Luke 4:5, 9:55-6, 11:54, 24:42) , and so the remaining 3 cases look strongly like similarly simple Eye-Skips by the very same scribe who generated the others.  This now lost copy, forming one of the common ancestors for Bezae (and perhaps some early Syriac and OL copies), seems to have been responsible for a number of errors which crept into the copying streams at various points.

Luke  22:19b-20

152 letters:        22 cpl

το υπερ υμων διδομενον του- το ποιειτε εις την εμην ανα- μνησιν ωσαυτως και το ποτη- ριον μετα το δειπνησαι λεγ- ων τουτο το ποτηριον η και- νη διαθηκη εν τω αιματι μου το υπερ υμων εκχυνομενον

Hort [[DB]] /    SBL [SB]

mr.scrivener

Vaticanus Singulars - Steven Avery's Research

I take the liberty of quoting Steven Avery's recent post on FightingFundamentalForums for review by those interested in h.t. questions, and the quality and nature of Codex Vaticanus 1209 (B).   Steven here in turn quotes an early examination of B by an editor of the British Quarterly Review:



"Perhaps the earliest article that saw the Vaticanus printing and recognized the corruption was also in the British Quarterly Review, back in 1858. Remember, this is before the strange Hortian theories of a pure Vaticanus, simply the observations of men of sense and intelligence and discernment.

================================================

British quarterly review - Vol 28 - (October, 1858)
http://books.google.com/books?id=fwcYAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA315
p. 315-332

Art. II.— Vetus et Novum Testamentum, ex antiquissimo Codice Vaticano. Edidit ANGELUS MAIUS, S.R.E. Card. Romae. Joseph
Spithöver. 1857. 5 vols. 4to.

At last, this long-expected work, which has, for the last twenty years, sorely tried the patience of the Biblical scholars of Europe and America, has made its appearance. The Vatican codex—the queen of MSS.—to inspect which Bentley, Tischendorf, Tregelles, and many others, have made journeys to Rome—is no longer a sealed book, an unknown volume. (p. 315)

================================================

On p. 320 is discussed Luke 2:14, Mark 3:29 and Luke 8:54, Matthew 6:13 and Luke 11:2, then the ending of Mark and the blank page, the blank page being new information. Then John 1:18 and John 5:3-4, the Pericope Adultera and Acts 8:37, Acts 20:28 and 1 Peter 3:15.

... It now remains to mention one or two characteristic features of the MS. which the publication of its text will be the means of making generally known.

One thing which is very observable, in turning over the pages of this magnificent edition, is the vast number of mistakes which the original copyist has committed—that is to say, the very frequent substitution of one word for another, as the result of sheer carelessness. There is a notion very widely diffused amongst students of the Greek Testament that these most ancient MSS. of the sacred volume, so beautifully written in large uncial letters, are as much distinguished by their correctness as they are by their antiquity. The publication of the text of the famous Vatican codex is likely to scatter to the winds all such enthusiastic ideas ... (p.321-322)

The verses he then discusses as "carelessness of the original writer" are Mark 1:24, Mark 13:13, Luke 16:12, Acts 4:25, 1 Peter 2:1, 2 Peter 2:13 (2 errors), John 3:3, 1 Corinthians 1:2, Philippians 2:1, Romans 14:18, Jude 1:21, Romans 5:1 and Galatians 6:10.

Then he goes into the "most numerous class of blunders .. interchange of the personal pronouns" .. 2 Corinthians 1:6, 1:21 (twice) 5:12, "and so on throughout the copy"

Notwithstanding thee numerous errors we have already referred to, the omissions of the copyist still remain to be noticed; and this fault, of passing by what should be inserted, is undoubtedly the characteristic feature of this ancient MS. (p. 323 underlining added)

Examples are given at Mark 6:17, Mark 10:29, Mark 15:4, Luke 19:25, John 1:4, John 1:13 , John 3:34, John 4:3 (the last few were corrected by the original scribe in the margin).

Now in all these examples nothing can be plainer than that the transcriber of the Vatican codex accidentally, and by oversight, omitted to insert the words in question; and then, either discovered his error at the time, or else on reading through the MS. observed the deficiencies. In some cases half a verse is thus left out, and afterwards supplied in the margin, as at Acts xxiii. 28, where six words are wanting in the text, and afterwards added; —viz., κατήγαγον αὐτὸν εἰς τὸ συνέδριον αὐτῶν. (p. 323-324)

Let us stop for a minute. Are you getting the picture ? We have a blunderama scribe working on the Vaticanus NT. And yes, discussing the omissions ... the scribe would catch some of the blunders and place the real Bible text in the margin. Yet what does that tell you about the hundreds of other places of minority and ultra-minority abbreviated text ? Simple logic says that the scribe's proclivity for missing text, by lack of skill, or homoeoteleuton, or rushing, or any one of a number of possibilities, also was in play for a great many of those dozens to hundreds of other omissions. So if there are weak omissions, and there are hundreds to thousands overall, many very significant .. the exemplar of the scribe can only take some of the blame. The Vaticanus scribe caused much of the problem.

This is important, deep, fundamental to understanding why the modern versions have their corrupt, abbreviated text.

Let's take a break for a bit, and I hope we are all learning from the history and the study.

Psalm 119:140
Thy word is very pure:
therefore thy servant loveth it.

Shalom,
Steven Avery 

___________________________________

Hats off to Steven for digging out this early material.

Peace

Nazaroo