Codex א: Singulars - h.t. List from A.C. Clark (1914)

Chapter IV (p. 24 fwd) in A.C. Clark's book, The Primitive Text of the Gospels and Acts (1914) is not only loaded with a startlingly large list of rarely mentioned h.t. errors, (critics who push the WH text rarely call attention to the faults of  /B), but he shows how investigation into the column-width of the master-copy provides additional confirmation and insight into the h.t. process.

Clark explains:

"[Sinaiticus] is written in four columns with 48 lines per page and an average of 13-14 letters to the line. [this column-width is important for what follows] ...
The  internal evidence shows that א is derived from an ancestor with an average of 10-12 letters per line.

Examples:

Luke 11:1 διδαξον ημας προσευχεσθαι, καθως και Ιωαννης εδιδαξε τους μαθητας αυτου.  omit και Ιωαννης (10 letters) - א .
The words are necessary to the sense, since John has not been mentioned previously.

John 19:23  και εποιησαν τεσσαρα μερη εκαστω στρατιωτη μερος και τον χιτωνα ην δε ο χιτων αρραφος ... omit  και τον χιτωνα (12 letters) - א .


Sometimes we have multiples of the same unit in immediate proximity, e.g.;

Mark 13:8   

εγερθησεται γαρ 

εθνος επι εθνος 

 και βασιλεια

 επι βασιλεια- (ν)

εσονται σεισμοι 

κατα τοπους και 

 εσονται  λιμοι 

και ταραχαι αρ

χαι ωδινων ταυ-

τα...

 (1)  omit   επι βασιλεια- (11 letters) - א .

 (2)  omit  κατα τοπους  και εσονται  λιμοι  (22 letters) - א .

(homoeoteleuton).'

Clark gives over a dozen more examples, all multiples of similar line-lengths:

Jn 12:31 - omit   νυν ο αρχων του κοσμου τουτου  (24 letters) - א 
Jn 3:20-21 - omit   ουκ ... το φως και  (22 letters) - א 
Jn 3:20-21 - omit   ο δε ...τα εργα αυτου  (57 letters) - א 
The omissions [above] are due to the coincidence of h.t. with line division.  We may assign to this ancestor such short omissions as:

(10 letters, h.t. )  Matt. 23:35 - omit   [...Ζαχαριου]  υυ Βαραχιου    - א 
(12 letters, h.t. )   Mk 12:25 - omit   ουτε γαμουσιν   - א
(13 letters, h.t. )   Lk 12:18  - omit   [...α μου] και τα αγαθα μου    - א 

 "There is however, the possibility that there is a larger unit representing an intermediate ancestor.  We must therefore, take into consideration omissions of 14-19 letters.  The cases I have noticed are:

(14 letters, h.t.   - א )   Matt 28:3
(15 letters, h.t.   - א )   Matt. 16:9
                             Luke 6:14
(16 letters, h.t.   - א  )   Jn  1;25
                             Jn  8:20
(17 letters, h.t.   - א  )   Jn 17:17
(18 letters, h.t.   - א )   Matt. 27:56
                             Mark 10:33
 (19 letters, h.t.   - א )  Matt 7:27




 (20 letters, h.t.   - א )  Mk 12:30
 (21 letters, h.t.   - א )  Matt 19:18
                             Luke 8:47
 (22 letters, h.t.   - א )  Matt 27:52
                             Luke 16:16
                             John  3:20
 (24 letters, h.t.   - א )  Matt. 25:43
                             Mark 6:4
                             John 12:31
 (27 letters, h.t.   - א )  Luke 12:37
 (28 letters, h.t.   - א )  John 6:55
 (29 letters, h.t.   - א )  John 4:45
                             John 16:17
 (30 letters, h.t.   - א )  Matt 5:45
                             John 4:4
 (32 letters, h.t.   - א )  Matt 13:39
                             John  5:26
 (33 letters, h.t.   - א )  John  6:39                    
 (35 letters, h.t.   - א )  Matt. 10:39
 (42 letters, h.t.   - א )  Luke 17:9
 (43 letters, h.t.   - א )  Matt. 9:15
                             John  15:10
 (44 letters, h.t.   - א )  Matt. 15:18-19
 (45 letters, h.t.   - א )  Luke 12:52
 (47 letters, h.t.   - א )  Mark 6:8
 (54 letters, h.t.   - א )  Luke 10:32
                             Luke 14:15
 (57 letters, h.t.   - א )  John 3:21
 (60 letters, h.t.   - א )  Matt. 5:19
 (61 letters, h.t.   - א )  Mark 6:28
 (64 letters, h.t.   - א )  Luke 17:35
 (71 letters, h.t.   - א )  Matt. 26:62-63
                             John 16:15
 (84 letters, h.t.   - א )  Mark 10:35-37
 (92 letters, h.t.   - א )  Mark 1:32-34
 (101 lett.,   h.t.   - א )  John 20:5

 (192 lett.,   h.t.   - א )  John 19:20
 

A.C. Clark (1914) on homoeoteleuton (Pt. 2)

Continuing from A.C. Clark's first book, The Primitive Text of the Gospels and Acts (Oxford, 1914):

"Chapter 1 (p. 1fwd):

'I referred to homoeoteleuton as a frequent cause of omission.  The word strictly means similarity of termination, but it is often used for any similarity, e.g., at the beginning of words, which would more appropriately be called homoeoarcton, or for the repetition of the same word (repetitio or geminatio [=dittography]).  In all such cases, the copyist was liable to pass from one similar word to the other, omitting the intervening words [and one copy of the doubled word].   The most frequent cause of omission is the repetition of the same word. 

...

I now proceed ...to outline the method which should be followed by anyone who embarks upon a similar inquiry.  The first task is to ascertain the content of a line in the archetype.  For this purpose 'telescoped' lines are of primary importance.  In all probability the common unit will be at once revealed.  The next step is to tabulate the omissions of the rival families, arranging them in order of magnitude.  It will then appear when multiples of a unit figure among the omissions.  The separate families should be treated in the same manner. 

The information thus acquired must be combined with that furnished by transpositions, dislocations, migratory variants, and corruptions of all kinds.   The most minute flaws are often the most important for the purposes of investigation. 
Above all the inquirer must not shrink from the labor of counting the letters.  No shorter method, such as that of numbering the lines of a printed text, can have any cogency which is possessed by the actual figures. 

I have seldom carried out a long numeration without being richly rewarded.  I imagine the reason to be that in the long passages occasional irregularities correct each other, and the average remains clearly visible.  Also, it is only in them that we can hope to find indications of the longer divisions, viz. columns, pages, and folios in the archetype.'

 Chapter 2 (p. 11 fwd)

"...I thought it well to prepare myself by making some examination of the Oxyrhynchus papyri.  ...I had to satisfy myself whether the lines exhibit regularity in content similar to the Old Latin MSS.  I found that this was so.  The papyri are of all shapes and sizes, sometimes written in long lines, but more commonly in columns of various breadth.  Sometimes they contain some 40 letters or more to the line, sometimes about 35, more frequently about 28, 24, or 22, very frequently 16-19, while a fair number, ...are written in very narrow columns, averaging 10-12 letters, or even less.  In all, however, although abnormally long or short lines occur, the general average soon asserts itself. 

...

In my work upon Latin MSS, I have found that where there are two or more columns in a codex, the tendency is for one column to be squeezed.  If there are three columns, it is generally the middle one that suffers; if there are two, the column on the left is often a little broader than the one on the right.  

The papyri are particularly free from abbreviations apart from a particular class, viz., nomina sacra.  ...

Also some of the Uncials, especially B and D, are chary in the use of abbreviations beyond IS XS THS PNA OUNOS PR US ANOS.  However on the whole, the bulk of the evidence is on their employment, and, as I do not wish to avail myself  of any license, I have treated this as normal.   There is some uncertainty as to the use of letters to express numerals.  ... The Uncials vary greatly in this respect.  On the whole it seems safest to suppose that the numerals were written in full, but the other possibility has to be taken into account.   

On examining the papyri I found many phenomena similar to those which I had observed in Latin MSS. "

Whitney on h.t. errors (part 2) - Codex Vaticanus 1209

Again, on p. 27 of his introduction, Whitney shows that Codex B is no less rife with homoeoteleuton errors than Sinaiticus:

Codex B:  Mark 

 1:9 [and] it came to pass...
2:12  '...and glorified God, [saying,] "We never..." ' etc. (OL b follows!)
4:16  "These...are they that are sown upon the rocky ledges, [who,]
         when they have heard..." etc.

7:15   "..that defile [the] man..."  reading now "that defile a man."  This is a common error of B's.  In 12:30, this MS stands alone omitting the article 3 times!

10:46    ['And they come to Jericho.']

14:24    'And he said [unto them], "This is..." etc.
14:32   "Sit ye [here], while I pray..." 
15:12   "What then [will ye that] I shall do with [him whom] 
            ye call the King of the Jews?"
15:34   "My God, [my God,] why hast thou forsaken me?" (either edited or omitted accidentally as h.t.)

mr.scrivener

Alford (1863) on H.T. in Tischendorf

In his prolegomena, Alford (1863) brings attention to an omission by Tischendorf (7th ed.), which is according to Alford an h.t. error:

"His [Tisch.] adoption of readings was not always distinguished by watchfulness to detect trips [eye-skips] of transcribers, as e.g. in John 6:51, where the homoeoteleuton  δωσω ... δωσω was obviously the first source of confusion:  see also Luke 24:51-52. ..." (Alford, The Greek Text, Vol. 1, p. 77 para.I.)

This reading is not even noted in UBS4, which leaves the surrounding variants without proper explanation.  Merk (9th ed. 1964), based on von Soden, gives in the notes:

| εστιν Ta(in) B L 579 D 1071 251 850s lat pl. syv sa+] + ην εγω δωσω rel. f q sypih ar gg bo |

Nestle (24th ed. 1960) gives:

⸂ του εμου א  a e r1 sys-s ; T |  ⸀ ζησεται P66 B C Hesch.pm; W | 
:. Kai comm |  ⸉ 5-9 1-4 א  m Tert; Th-r1 |  ⸆ ην εγω δωσω Hesch. Θ pl f q; h-rs


These are a little more informative apparatus but still terse.


Hodges/Farstad also add a note, while retaining the longer text:


⸂ 1-4, 8-13 P66 (P75vid) B C versus Maj; (8-12, 1-4 א ). 
 - Which is perhaps more readable.

 The traditional text runs:

                                            ... εγω
ειμι ο αρτος ο ζων ο εκ του ουρα-
νου καταβας εαν τις φαγη εκ του-
του του αρτου ζησεται εις τον αιω
να και ο αρτος δε ον εγω δωσω
η σαρξ μου εστιν ην εγω δωσω
υπερ της του κοσμου ζωης...
 
Although the text as it stands is not a 'pure' homoeoteleuton case, it seems clear there was an error of omission loosely based on similar endings or phrases.   Here probably Alford is right, in preferring the Majority text, even though he himself favours the Uncial texts most of the time.


mr.scrivener

Codex א: Singulars - List from Godet (1864)

Here is another list of Singular Readings from Codex Sinaiticus, courtesy of Godet (transl. from the French).   Most of these were quickly identified as homoeoteleuton and similar errors by Godet himself, following Tischendorf and other textual critics:

From:  Classic Commentary Library

Commentary on the Gospel of John, Vol.2: ch6-end
by Godet

Footnotes starting on page 17

John's Gospel  (ch. 6 to end)

5:26      Aleph (א) omits “you seek me”
5:38-39 Aleph (א) , C  omits “sent me...sent me”
5:22     Aleph (א) omits ”on account of this”
7:50     Aleph (א) omits “came to him by night”
8:20     Aleph (א) omits “teaching in the temple”
8:35     Aleph (א) , X, Γ,  omits “the son remains forever”
9:21     Aleph (א) omits “ask him”
9:38-39a Aleph (א) omits the whole verse
10:42     Aleph (א) omits “in the place”
12:31     Aleph (א) omits “now is the judgment of the world”
15:10     Aleph (א) omits “if...my love”
16:15     Aleph (א) omits the whole verse
16:17     Aleph (א) omits “micron …. palin
17:17     Aleph (א) omits “thy word is truth”
18:32     Aleph (א) omits “had spoken”
19:20-21 Aleph (א) omits the whole verse as far as 21 Alla (1 ½ vs. missing)
20: 4       Aleph (א) omits “and the other disciple”
20:5b-6  Aleph (א) omits whole verse
12: 20     Aleph (א) omits “akoluthontaos”

Most of these are both singular and plain h.t. errors.

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