THE OLD MSS. (Continued)
This week we will continue our look at the Textus Receptus. I have used the terms �Textus Receptus� and �Traditional Text� nearly interchangeably. This may seem somewhat confusing. But, the two are nearly interchangeable. The Textus Receptus is a collation of the Traditional Text. It is not, of itself, the Traditional Text; but it is a rendition of that text.
Muddled enough?
The Traditional Text is that text which bears the imprint of both history (@ 95% of the extant manuscript evidence, the writings of the church fathers, and the lectionaries of the early churches) and the blessing of God upon it. The Textus Receptus is an edition of that text. The term �Textus Receptus� has come to stand for any one (or all) of the several Greek editions edited about the time of the Protestant Reformation. Although the several editions of the Textus Receptus were the base Scripture of the Reformation, this edition was, itself, a nearly photostatic copy of the God preserved Traditional Text. This text was the fuel that ran the engine of the Reformation.
The above is why Fuller (Which Bible?) was able to say, �One need not believe in the infallibility of Erasmus, or his sanctity, or even his honesty, because he merely followed the type of text which was dominant.�
Again, as I�ve stated earlier, many have claimed that Erasmus had very few manuscript copies on which he based his edition. But, this is not necessarily true. Not only did Erasmus had many manuscripts at his disposal as he edited, he also had copious notes on many other manuscripts. He traveled extensively throughout Europe and sought out whatever manuscripts were available in the areas he traveled. His edition was, therefore, backed by an extensive array of manuscript evidence.
It is also true, as Burton (Let�s Weigh The Evidence) points out, that Erasmus �...opposed Jerome�s translation [the Roman Vulgate] in two vital areas.� The first of these was that Erasmus �...detected that the Greek text had been corrupted as early as the fourth century.� This is important in our present discussion because the two primary manuscripts on which the eclectic texts of today are based, Aleph and B, are both of fourth century manufacture.
The second point noted by Burton is that Erasmus differed on the translation of several passages of import to the claimed authority of the Roman Church.
�He [Erasmus] also differed with Jerome on the translation of certain passages which were vital to the claimed authority of the Roman Catholic Church. Jerome rendered Matthew 4:17 thus: �Do penance, for the kingdom of Heaven is at hand.� Erasmus differed with: �Be penitent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.��
Burton also informs us that �Erasmus was also a staunch defender of both Mark 16:9-20 and John 8:1-12.�
As to the edition of the Textus Receptus most used by the translators of the King James Bible, Fuller (Which Bible?) tells us that �...persecution at Paris and solicitation of Farel caused Calvin to settle at Geneva, where with Beza, he brought out an edition of the Textus Receptus.�
This edition of Beza was the primary copy consulted by the translating committee of the King James Bible. But, they went beyond this. The translating committee had many more manuscripts than just this. They also had the English renditions which had gone before them. As a matter of fact, the King James Bible is not a new English language translation from the seventeenth century. The purpose of the King James translating group was to revise and update as needed.
This is a major difference in the King James Bible and the modern day English language translations. These newer versions have cast aside the preserved Text in favor of an eclectic text which represents the �consensus� of opinion among the various translation committees. These newer translations are not based on the Traditional Text. They share one common conviction. They believe that the true text was somehow lost about the fourth century A.D. and only recovered through the work of pious men in the last century and a half.
In essence, they believe in a lost gospel, a God Who was either weak in that He lost control of His Word, or a capricious God Who willingly withheld His inspired Words from the churches Jesus founded, for a period of nearly fifteen hundred years. They also strongly believe that they are the arbitrators of what God probably said. Even in their arrogance to deny God the power to preserve His Own Words, they do not claim to have the faithfully preserved Words of the original manuscripts even today. In the bottom line of their arguments we can have no truly inspired Scripture because we cannot know what the Scripture was which was originally inspired of God.
Next week, God willing, we will begin to examine the fact that, almost without fail, the modern versions do not rely on the preserved Traditional Text nor the Textus Receptus.
8 September 2006
THE OLD MSS. (Continued)
This past week I was being interviewed by a local newspaper about my new book. My membership in the Dean Burgon Society came up in the conversation. As I was talking about this I realized, once again, that most of the public does not understand that the King James Bible and the newer English language versions are not based on the same textual foundation.
For the overwhelming majority of Christians in our day, they go to a bookstore to buy a copy of �The Bible� and have no inkling that there is a vast difference between the time, and God, honored King James Bible and the newer versions which have jettisoned the God preserved Traditional Text in favor of an eclectic text based on the whims of the various translating committees. These committees will pick and choose which reading to incorporate into their base texts with no consideration of the great bulk of the evidence.
Somehow, these learned critics have only one seemingly incontestable rule on which to base their work. They discount the possibility that the God of Glory would have preserved His Words to mankind.
Burton (Let�s Weigh the Evidence) makes the case that the Textus Receptus is but a starting point on a journey into fiction for these translation committees.
�The modern versions had to use the Textus Receptus, since it contains the majority of surviving Greek manuscripts. The problem is that when the Textus Receptus disagreed with the Vaticannus or the Sinaiticus, they preferred these corrupted manuscripts over the Textus Receptus.�
Once again I should mention that the Textus Receptus is an edition of the Traditional Text. I will often use the terms interchangeably, even though this is not technically correct, because of their vast similarity.
The Traditional Text has to be the starting point for any translating committee of the New Testament. Between 85% and 95%, depending on which source is consulted, of the extent evidence from antiquity (manuscripts, lectionaries, the writings of the church fathers, early translations, etc.) follows the wording to the Traditional Text - of which the Textus Receptus is representative.
But, with an operating faith which says that God could not, or did not, preserve His Words, the translation committees will have a bias that the Scripture is simply another book from antiquity.
These modern day translation committees expect that the words of the originals have been corrupted by time. In view of this belief, these committees will search for what they consider to be the oldest possible textual evidence and base their findings upon this. The two oldest, found in the margins of even our King James Bibles as disputing passages because �the oldest and best manuscripts do not agree,� are the Vaticannus and the Sinaiticus.
The problem with these two witnesses, old though they be, is that they are themselves corrupted copies. As Dr. Waite, of The Bible for Today notes, not only do these two disagree with the Traditional Text in thousands of places, they also disagree between themselves over three thousand times in the Gospel accounts alone.
The very fact that these two witnesses have survived for as long as they have is a testament to their corrupt nature. The manuscript copies of antiquity were used, and reused, until they were worn out. Then, like our modern flags, they were ceremonially burned. Other copies were taken in the many persecutions and burned. The fact that these two were not �used up,� or �burned up,� is alone enough to cast doubt upon them.
Also, it must be noted that these two copies both came from Egypt. Their linguistic lineage connects them to the Scriptorium of Alexandria and the corrupting influence of Origen, the heretic.
Many of our new discoveries of works such as �The Gospel of Judas,� and �The Gospel of Thomas,� are also found in Egypt. These works are clearly of Gnostic origin. This Gnostic influence has also found its way into the works of B and Aleph.
One evidence of this is the deletion of the ending of the Gospel of Mark where the reference to the physical resurrection of Jesus Christ is omitted among the corrupted manuscripts. Although there are very few manuscripts which do not contain this passage, and this passage was quoted by Irenaeus in about 120 A.D., the modern translation committees have cast serious doubt to the readership of this passage. Other church fathers also quote this passage as genuine.
The extreme weight of evidence speaks for this passage. But, the bulk of the evidence is ignored by those whose predisposition is to replace the wording they believe has not been preserved by the Hand of God. This is because, as mentioned above, the Bible is treated as just another book from antiquity. Error is assumed. Thus, the older readings are preferred.
The big problem with this idea that the earlier readings are preferred is that these, B and Aleph, are not the oldest readings. The writings of the church fathers predate them as do some of the early translations.
Fuller (True or False) also argues against reliance upon these early �witnesses.�
�As said of the two false witnesses that came to testify against Christ, so it may be said of these witnesses [B and Aleph] who are brought forward at this late day to testify against the Received Text, �But neither so did their witness agree together.��
Besides the witness of history against these two witnesses, which are the foundation upon which the newer translations are almost without exception based, there are theological problems in placing reliance upon them.
These newer translations, based in a denial of a preserved Scripture, argue against faith in the Word of God. Because of the modern translation omissions and footnote readings which tend to cast doubt upon the testimony of Scripture to the Truth of God, they claim to tell the Gospel message in a clear manner when they actually wound that message in the mistelling.
The argument against the newer translations is not in their effort to update the language of the Scripture for a modern age. It is that they update a pseudo Scripture and jettison the true, preserved Words of God. They make addition and deletion based upon the theological belief that God has not preserved His Word to man. That weakens the entire structure of our Christian faith as a faith founded upon that message.
The chief agreement among these newer translations is that they stand against the true text and lead into doubt those who would trust them.
Next week we will begin, God willing, to look at some of the voices which are hostile witnesses against the Traditional Text and the Textus Receptus
15 September 2006
THE OLD MSS. (Continued)
We have discussed the fact that the modern English translations of the Scripture do not, almost without exception, use the God preserved Traditional Text as a base from which to complete their work. This practice began in the work of Westcott and Hort and their English Revised Version of 1881.
These two me, Drs. Westcott and Hort, had a bias that God had not preserved His Word. They felt that the true text had been lost somewhere around the fourth century and replaced with an �official ecclesiastical version� by one of the church councils. In recent history this theory has been predominate among church writers. The argument that a church council had officially revised the Word is no longer in vogue. But, the argument that the true text had been lost is still held by many, including many fundamentalist, professional church people.
This same argument has been picked up by man secular people. While moving on to other subject matter, even the (I feel blasphemous) Dan Brown book, The Di Vinci Code, accepts this theory. Other arguments from secular thinking, and some religious thinking, have also incorporated this theory into making a case for the canonization of some of the Gnostic writings. The feeling among many of these is that there was a �church bias� against these Gnostic influences which caused an official repudiation of the Gnostic works and a sanitizing of the New Testament accounts to remove these influences.
Such thinking normally seems to equate the Roman Church as the �official� church of all Christianity. Such, of course, is not the case. The Roman Church is only a branch, I believe an apostate branch, which has grown alongside the true churches of Jesus.
I have a grape arbor in my back yard. It has produced some very good grapes in the past. But, somewhere in the past couple of years a strain of wild grapes has invaded by vine of good grapes. There just isn�t much point in going into the back yard for grapes anymore. For the most part the bad have overcome the good grapes. This is somewhat what I view as the influence of the Roman Church. The Vine of the true churches of Jesus was established. With the acceptance of governmental influence, and protection, provided by Constantine, those vines were invaded with a �wild� strain which changed them from producing the sweet fruit of the Spirit and infested them with the corrupt fruit of worldly power. The sacred was overcome as the people of the churches began an infatuation with the secular. We can look at modern political dalliances by many of the churches and church people of our own day and see with alarm the repeating of this historical occurrence in our own day!
But, not all of the churches were so affected. Jesus made the promise that the churches He established would not be defeated. He made the guarantee of their permanent existence. And, exist they have, throughout history even unto this time.
The fact is that even such a critic of the Traditional Text as Dr. Hort could not deny that Jerome�s (331-420 AD) edition of the second Latin Vulgate (early 5th century), as flawed as it was, had some influence from the True Text. Hills (The King James Version Defended) notes that, according to Hort, one of the Greek Manuscripts which Jerome used was closely related to Codex A, which is of the Traditional text-type.
The timing of this is important since the two primary manuscripts used by the modern day English translations date from the 4th century. This would mean that, while gathering much of his information from the Alexandrian deposits, Jerome was able to access the same Traditional Text which the Apostles originally penned under inspiration.
Next week, God willing, we will begin to look at the voice of Origen in the translations of this day.
22 September 2006
THE OLD MSS. (Continued)
Call me lazy if you want, but this week I am not going to make very many comments of my own during our study.
We are told that the Alexandrian family of manuscripts, birthed by the critical work of Origen, are superior to the Traditional Text because they predate the Traditional Text. We are told, by the critical works of the day, that these Alexandrian texts are of a more pure variety because they were not influenced by the �mistakes, additions and omissions� of the Traditional Text.
The truth? Even Origen, the early heretic, will often use readings which are distinctively of the Traditional Text. Still, some will argue that Origen never makes use of the Traditional readings where they are in disagreement with the Western and Alexandrian text types. However, as Hills (The King James Version Defended) observes, Origen did use the uniquely Traditional �vinegar� (Matthew 27:34) in his reply to the pagan philosopher Celsus.
Since this is a distinctive reading from the Traditional Text, this is just one more instance where it is shown that the Traditional Text is the early text of antiquity. Our argument that Origen, rather than preserving a �pure� text was actually engaged in polluting that preexisting text as he fashioned the newer Alexandrian text to fit his own theological bias.
Now, I do have to argue with myself in the paragraph second above. The Traditional text is not in disagreement with the Western and Alexandrian text types. As the template is the Traditional Text, the Western and Alexandrian are in disagreement with it!
Hills continues:
�...contrary to the assertions of the naturalistic critics, the distinctive readings of the Traditional (Byzantine) Text were known to Origen, who sometimes adopted them though perhaps not usually. Anyone can verify this by scanning the apparatus of Tischendorf. For instance, in the first 14 chapters of the Gospel of John (that is, in the area covered by Papyrus 66 and Papyrus 75) out of 52 instances in which the Traditional Text stands alone, Origen agrees with the Traditional Text 20 times and disagrees with it 32 times. These results make the position of the critics that Origen knew nothing of th traditional Text difficult indeed to maintain.�
There are some who would argue that the agreements of Origen with the Traditional Text are not his own. Some of the critics would argue that those agreements are the changes made by later copyists. Once again Hills, weighs in on the subject.
�Certainly it seems a very unsatisfactory was to account for the phenomena which appear in the first 24 chapters of John. In these chapters 7 out of 20 �distinctly� Traditional readings which occur in Origen occur also in Papyrus 66 and / or Papyrus 75. These 7 readings at least must have been Origen�s own readings, not those of the scribes who copied Origen�s works, and what is true of these is probably true of the other 13, or at least most of them. Thus it can hardly be denied that the Traditional Text was known to Origen and that it influenced the wording of his New Testament quotations.�
The argument that the texts of Origen is a �pure� text uninfluenced by the Traditional Text is false. What is not false is the obvious manipulations of this Traditional Text by the critical pen of Origen and his successors in the Alexandrian school.