Revisiting the Fiasco called The Passion Translation

Mike Winger and Minor Prophets have been make a very thorough examination -- more like a dissection -- of Brian Simmon’s writing published under the name "The Passion Translation."  Here's a repetition of what I wrote about it in 2018.  

            Those who have viewed a video of Brian Simmons’ appearance on the television program That’s Supernatural! will already be aware of Brian Simmons’ description of his call to translate the Bible.  He claimed the following:

            ● Jesus told him to translate the Bible,
            ● Jesus told him he would help Brian translate the Bible,
            ● Jesus promised to provide secrets about the Hebrew language, and
            ● Brian received downloads when Jesus breathed on him.

Brian Simmons

This sort of testimony is taken seriously by many members of the New Apostolic Reformation, a loose network of congregations characterized by charismatic doctrine.  (If you can recollect the “Toronto Blessing” and the “Brownsville Revival,” you may get some idea of the NAR’s  theological roots.)  The NAR’s leaders affirm that the church today should be led, not by elders and deacons, but by people holding the offices of apostle and prophet (whether male or female).   The NAR also teaches that prophets receive new revelation from God which supplements the written Word of God.  They also put an emphasis on what they consider to be miraculous gifts, such as the reception of knowledge that is naturally unattainable, supernatural healings (including raising the dead – Simmons himself claims to been instrumental in the resurrection of a dead baby), speaking in tongues, and other phenomena (one example described by Simmons is the time he walked into a grocery store and everyone he met collapsed onto the floor). 

Charismatic doctrines are advocated throughout The Passion Translation, because it is not just a translation; it is more like a Charismatic Study Bible with its own running commentary in the form of Simmons’ abundant notes and book-introductions (which in some cases are longer than the books they accompany).  To an extent, TPT resembles some medieval manuscripts in which the Scripture-text is framed on every page by a lot of commentary – with the exception that whereas the medieval commentary-material tended to restate earlier patristic comments, The Passion Translation’s notes – often more lengthy than the books they accompany – consistently promote the teachings of the New Apostolic Reformation.

            One does not get far into the New Testament before it becomes apparent what one is facing in Simmons’ work.  In a note attached to Matthew 1:17, Simmons explains why, in Matthew’s genealogy, there are 41, rather than 42, generations.  Is Matthew simply counting the last unit of generations inclusively?  No; Simmons does not offer such mundane possibilities; the missing generation, he explains, is the church:  “Jesus gave birth to the forty-second generation when he died on the cross, for out of his side blood and water flowed.  Blood and water come forth at birth.  The first Adam “birthed” his wife out of his side, and so Jesus gave birth to his bride from his wounded side.” 

            This sort of thing is pervasive in the notes of The Passion Translation.  Some interpretations that Simmons offers are merely his own allegorical notions – for example, he comments on Mary’s words in John 2:2-3, “Interpreting Mary’s words for today we could say, “Religion has failed, it has run out of wine.””  Others are adamant endorsements of the teachings of the New Apostolic Reformation network. 

Perfectly ordinary and legitimate comments appear too – but some of Simmons’ notes only make sense if the reader really, really, wants them to make sense; for instance, in a note to John 2:20, where the Jewish leaders mention that it had taken 46 years to build the temple, Simmons comments, “Our bodies (temples) have forty-six chromosomes in every cell.” 

Another example:  Simmons’ note for Mark 1:9 – a straightforward statement that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee to be baptized by John in the Jordan river – is as follows:  “It is possible to translate the Aramaic as “Then one day Jesus came from victorious revelation” to be baptized by John.  The word Nazareth can mean “victorious one,” and the word Galilee can be translated “the place of revelation.”  Simmons’ ability to squeeze metaphorical meanings out of plain statements in this way knows no bounds.  Many of the notes are like this, offering spiritual lessons that, good or bad, were never in the minds of the New Testament authors. 

            If the doctrinal bias of the notes were the only problem with Simmons’ work, TPT would be no worse than a Charismatic Study Bible or commentary-set.  But in many passages, Simmons’ theological views have colored the translation.  In sync with the NAR’s custom of giving leadership roles to women (including the office of apostle), Simmons has taken inexcusable liberties with some passages that pertain to the role of women and wives:

● First Corinthians 14:34 has been mangled:

            “The woman should be respectfully silent during the evaluation of prophecy in the meetings.  They are not allowed to interrupt, but are to be in a support role, as in fact the law teaches.”  The italicized phrase “during the evaluation of prophecy in the meetings” is just something Simmons threw in there.  And a lengthy note attached to 14:35 begins as follows:  “One interpretation of this passage is that Paul is quoting from a letter written by the Corinthians to him.  They were the ones saying a woman should remain silent and Paul is responding to their questions.  In other words, they were imposing a rule in the church that Paul refutes in v. 36.”

            ● Ephesians 5:22 is also mangled.  Instead of saying, “Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord,” Simmons translates the end of verse 21 as “be supportive of each other in love,” and then proceeds to rewrite verse 22 to say, “For wives, this means being devoted to your husbands like you are tenderly devoted to our Lord.”  This is quite politically correct, but it does not correspond to what Paul wrote.  

            ● First Timothy 2:11-12 is hopelessly adulterated in Simmons’ work:  “Let the women who are new converts be willing to learn with all submission to their leaders and not speak out of turn.  I don’t advocate that the newly converted women be the teachers in the church, assuming authority over the men, but to live in peace.”  Simmons attempts to excuse his additions by claiming, in prolonged notes, that he is merely making clear what was implicit in the early church, but this is pure subterfuge; Paul explains the basis for his position in the following verses.  Simmons has blended his commentary into the text of Scripture. 

The NAR believes that the office of apostle should be occupied in the present time.  Accordingly, in Matthew 10:2, Simmons has added the word “first” – “Now, these are the names of the first twelve apostles” – although there is nothing to support the word “first” in the Greek text.    

            So have no illusions about the nature of The Passion Translation:  it is not just a loose translation.  Its notes, which are many – the TPT New Testament is more annotation than translation – constitute a commentary designed to promote the doctrines of the NAR, and its text has been tweaked to decrease the extent to which a formal rendering of the text would challenge NAR beliefs. 

Brian Simmons may believe with full sincerity that the NAR’s doctrines are correct – but that does not excuse the many points in The Passion Translation where he has tampered with the text in such a way as to make it say things that the original text does not really say.

So far I have only described The Passion Translation’s origins and its doctrinal bias.  The remaining distinctive feature of Simmons’ work – its unusual New Testament base-text – is in some ways more concerning.   

Simmons draws his competence into question when he makes statements such as this one (from the book-introduction to Matthew):  “In AD 170 Eusebius quoted Irenaeus as saying, “Matthew published his gospel among the Hebrews in their own language, while Peter and Paul in Rome were preaching and founding the church” (Eusebius, Historia Ecclesiastica III. 24:5-6 and V. 8, 2.).”  The problem is that Eusebius wrote in the early 300s; Irenaeus, not Eusebius, is the writer who wrote in the 170s.  

            Nor does it help Simmons’ credibility when one reads, in a note on John 3:13, his claim that “Most Greek manuscripts read “the Son of Man who came from heaven.””  This is completely false; most Greek manuscripts support the reading, “the Son of Man who is in heaven.”  Similarly Simmons claims, in a note on Mark 9:29, that “Many reliable Greek texts leave out “fasting,”” whereas in real life only a few Greek manuscripts omit this word.

Some folks might conclude that such simple mistakes imply that Jesus was not helping Simmons write his notes, and that Simmons’ claim about receiving downloads from heaven is either a delusion or chicanery.  But in the NAR, just as prophets who make false predictions are still considered prophets, translators and commentators get to make elementary chronological errors and still be taken seriously.     

            Now let’s take a closer look at the New Testament base-text that Simmons used for TPT. 

            Simmons’ notes refer repeatedly to “Hebrew Matthew,” and this text is cited in his notes over a hundred times.  “Hebrew Matthew,” however, is nothing more than Shem-Tob (as Simmons himself affirms in his note on Matthew 2:6) – a late medieval text assembled by Judaic opponents of Christianity in the 1300s, mainly reworking the meaning of the Vulgate text of that time, with unusual readings shared by the earlier Liège Harmony (from the late 1200s), a harmonization of the four Gospels written in the Middle Dutch dialect, in which some Diatessaronic readings are embedded. 

            What Simmons treats as if it is the original Hebrew text of Matthew (and greater in authority than all Greek manuscripts) is actually a medieval text used by opponents of the gospel, and its unique features, other than echoes of the Diatessaron and a few stray Old Latin readings, are not ancient at all.  We are looking here at a text that post-dates Charlemagne.  Unfortunately, when Simmons made TPT, he was apparently convinced that Shem-Tob is a very ancient text.  That false assumption is in play throughout his work.

            Another false assumption seems to be in play as well:  the idea that the Peshitta – a Syriac translation, probably made in the late 300s – is from the first century rather than the fourth century.   The phrase “As translated from the Aramaic” appears in Simmons’ notes over 400 times.  Simmons has somehow convinced himself that the Peshitta is better than the Greek text in hundreds of passages.  A close study of Simmons’ notes indicates that he believes that the Gospel of Matthew was initially written in Aramaic (the sentence in which Simmons put Eusebius in the year 170 is part of Simmons’ defense of this belief).  This is the only plausible explanation for the following renderings in Simmons’ translation of Matthew:

            ● Matthew 5:4a – “What delight comes to you when you wait upon the Lord!” –   “As translated from the Hebrew Matthew,” Simmons explains in a note, defending his decision to set aside the Greek text, which means, “Blessed are those who mourn.”       

            ● Matthew 8:6, 8:9, 8:13 – “son” – This is, in the Aramaic sources Simmons has relied upon, an attempted harmonization to the similar account in John 4:47-53.  The Greek text, as Simmons admits in his notes, means “servant.”

            ● Matthew 12:12 – “it’s always proper to do miracles” – The Greek text, as Simmons admits in his notes, only refers to doing good; there is no reference to miracles.    

            ● Matthew 19:16a – “Then a teenager approached Jesus and bowed before him” – this harmonization based on Mark 10:17 is not based on Greek manuscripts, but was “translated from the Hebrew Matthew,” i.e., the medieval Shem-Tob text.

            ● Matthew 19:16b – “and bowed before him, saying, Wonderful teacher” – Simmons, rather than translate the Greek text, translated the word tawa “from the Aramaic.”

            ● Matthew 19:24 (and Mark 10:25 and Luke 18:25) – “In fact, it’s easier to stuff a heavy rope through the eye of a needle than it is for the wealthy to enter into God’s kingdom realm!”  Simmons explains why he had led away the camel:  “This could be an instance of the Aramaic text being misread by the Greek translators as “camel” instead of “rope.”” 

            ● Matthew 20:29 – “As Jesus approached Jericho” – The Greek text means just the opposite, “As Jesus left Jericho.”  Simmons’ note displays his openness to the idea that the Shem-Tob text existed in the first century.

            ● Matthew 21:37 – “Perhaps with my own son standing before them they will be ashamed of what they’ve done.” – This paraphrase has been allowed to usurp the Greek text, which simply means, “They will respect my son.”

            ● Matthew 27:9 – “This fulfilled the prophecy of Zechariah” – Simmons flatly rejects the Greek text which refers to the prophet Jeremiah, stating, “The Greek manuscripts incorrectly identify the prophecy as from Jeremiah.”  Rather than perceive a loose thematic parallel to passages in Jeremiah, Simmons has set aside the Greek text and translated from the medieval Shem-Tob.

            ● Matthew 27:43b – “let’s see if it’s true, and see if God really wants to rescue his ‘favorite son’!” – This is a drastic departure from the Greek text, in which Jesus’ detractors finish the verse by saying, “for he said, ‘I am the Son of God.’”

                       

This sort of thing is not limited to the text of Matthew.  Simmons departs from the Greek text  on many occasions, and in almost every book of the New Testament – even in Second Peter, Third John, Jude, and Revelation – books which were not even initially part of the Peshitta. 

For example, in Second Peter 1:4, Simmons has set aside the “us” found in the Greek text (ἡμῖν) and replaced it with “you.”  In Jude verse 9, Simmons rendered Michael the archangel’s words as “”The Lord Yahweh rebuke you,” although the Greek text (Κύριος) only justifies the word “Lord.”

            And in the book of Revelation, Simmons has replaced Jesus’ familiar words, “I am the Alpha and the Omega” with “I am the Aleph and the Tav” in 1:8, and again in 21:6, and again in 22:13.  Other departures from the Greek text occur in Revelation 6:9, 7:17, 11:7 (Simmons:  “the beast that comes up from the sea” – Greek text:  “the beast that comes up from the bottomless pit” (ἀβύσσου)), 11:15, 15:3, and 21:2.                           

            And there is a yet more disturbing aspect to Simmons’ work.  Contrary to the impression given at The Passion Translation’s website, which explicitly states that Simmons used the 27th edition of the Nestle-Aland compilation, and which also explicitly states that The Passion Translation follows the practice of excluding passages such as Matthew 17:21, 18:11, Mark 9:44, Mark 9:46, Mark 15:28, and Acts 8:37, all of those verses are in the text of the copy of The Passion Translation that I received.  It is quite obvious that Simmons’ New Testament base-text diverges from the Nestle-Aland compilation at many points. 

It is equally obvious that Simmons did not consistently follow the Byzantine Text, for he turns Amos into an ancestor of Christ in Matthew 1:10, and does not describe Jesus as Mary’s firstborn son in Matthew 1:25, and in Mark 1:2 he attributes a prophecy to Isaiah (although in his annotation on Mark 1:2, Simmons states, “This line is a quotation from Ex. 23:20 and Mal. 3:1”).  What was the determining factor in his textual decisions? 

It appears that where the Nestle-Aland compilation and the Byzantine Text disagree, the Aramaic text often cast a deciding vote – and, as we have seen, in some cases, it was allowed to outweigh them both.  But what Aramaic, or Syriac, text was Simmons using?  For just as there are different compilations of the Greek text, there are different compilations of the Peshitta, and there are also the Harklean Syriac, the Philoxenian Syriac, and the Palestinian Aramaic to consider. 

            A modicum of online research into this question led me to the website of Andrew Chapman, who showed concisely but clearly that Simmons has utilized – among other resources – the work of Victor N. Alexander. 

 

Victor Alexander's
English translation of
the Aramaic text

            I will spare you, reader, the details of Andrew Chapman’s investigations, and cut to the chase.  (You can read about some of them at http://theriveroflife.com/2017/03/23/brian-simmons-claims-to-be-translating-from-the-aramaic-the-ten-cases-in-summary/ .)  It seems apparent that Simmons has been relying on English translations of the Peshitta, rather than directly consulting Aramaic sources.  This seems irrefutable when one looks at the anomalies in the translation made by Victor Alexander, and sees the same, or very similar, anomalies in Simmons’ work.  Here are a few:

            ● Galatians 1:4a – Simmons:  “He’s the Anointed Messiah who offered himself as the sacrifice for our sins!”  Alexander:  “He who sacrificed himself on behalf of our sins.”  (The Greek text simply says that he gave himself for our sins; the explicit reference to sacrifice-offering implies a link between Alexander’s translation and Simmons.)

            ● Galatians 2:10 – Simmons (in Letters from Heaven, as cited by Chapman):  “that I would be devoted to the poor and needy”  Alexander:  “That we may devote ourselves to the needy alone.”  (The Greek text refers to remembering the poor; the shared reference to being devoted to the poor implies a link between Alexander’s work and Simmons.  This passage has been altered and presently refers to remembering the poor and needy.) 

            ● Galatians 3:3b – Simmons (in Letters from Heaven, as cited by Chapman):  “Why then would you so foolishly turn from living in the Spirit to becoming slaves again to your flesh?”  Alexander:   “Did you become so foolish that while before, the Spirit abided in you, you have now become the slaves of the flesh?”  (The Greek text refers to finishing in the flesh; the shared reference to becoming slaves implies a link between Alexander’s work and Simmons.  This passage has been altered in TPT and presently loosely conforms to the Greek text.

            ● Galatians 3:19 – Simmons (in Letters from Heaven, as cited by Chapman):   “It remained in force until the Joyous Expectation was born to fulfill the promises given to Abraham.”  Simmons  included a note to explain the unusual rendering:  “The Joyous Expectation is translated literally from the Aramaic.”  Consulting Alexander’s translation, Chapman saw no such rendering, but in a footnote there is a reference to the phrase, “to whom were directed the joyous expectations.”  (Again, TPT has been improved in this passage.  What does this imply about the validity of that deleted note?)

(Dependence upon Victor Alexander’s work also explains Simmons’ mangling of Ephesians 5:22; inasmuch as Alexander put “be devoted to your husbands” in Ephesians 5:22.) 

            The thing to see here is Chapman’s data implies that Simmons’ “downloads” have required revision and correction due in part to his dependence, not upon supernatural revelation, but upon a flawed English translation of the Syriac New Testament.  On one hand, revision is a natural step in translation-work; on the other hand, these particular corrected renderings reveal that there has obviously been quite a heavy dependence upon English resources, which is a different impression than one is likely to get from The Passion Translation’s website and promotional materials.     

            Simmons’ use of Victor Alexander’s translation – particularly in light of the many passages in TPT where the Aramaic text usurps the Greek text of the New Testament – is extremely problematic.  This should be evident to anyone who is aware of who Victor N. Alexander is.  In addition to having translated parts of the Peshitta into English, Victor Alexander directed the film The Red Queen, which might motivate anyone to think twice about relying on his work for any sacred purpose. 

            In addition, Victor Alexander has expressed some anomalous views: 
            ● “The original language of the Scriptures was not Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek.”

            ● “My translation has produced the best version of the New Testament.”

            ● “All the articles on the Internet regarding the Original Scriptures are inaccurate.”

            ● “All the Western theological seminaries are a joke.”

            ● In his translation, “Thousands of passages have been clarified.”

            ● In his translation, “Major concepts have been restored for the first time.”
            ● And:  “It’s finally possible to interpret the Scriptures correctly and reconcile the tenets of the five major religions: Western Christianity, Modern Judaism, Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism. It's now possible to return to one conception of what the Scriptures are all about.”

Toxic syncretism could hardly make itself more obvious. 

Surely Simmons rejects Alexander’s opinions, and undoubtedly Simmons would be shocked if he ever were to watch even a snippet of Alexander’s surreal films – and yet it seems undeniable that he has relied on Alexander’s translation of the Peshitta while preparing The Passion Translation.  A complete repudiation of everything based on Alexander’s work, it seems to me, is necessary before the English Scripture-text in TPT can be considered in any way a legitimate translation.  All of the passages in which the Shem-Tob text and the Peshitta have usurped the Greek text need to be repaired.

I do not mean that without the bits that have no Greek support, the TPT New Testament would be a good translation; there are plenty of passages I have not mentioned in which Simmons has unnecessarily resorted to paraphrase.  But purging TPT of its deviations from the Greek text of the New Testament would be a good and necessary first step toward making its Scripture-text a legitimate translation. 

Here are some other reviews and critiques of The Passion Translation:

Ruslan KD - THIS Popular Bible Translation is DECEIVING Christian Celebrities (Added in 2024)

What's Wrong With The Passion "Translation" (by Andrew Wilson)

Endorsements for The Passion Translation

George Athas Reviews TPT Song of Songs

The Passion "Translation" of Romans:  Problems and Questions (by Lionel Windsor)

The Passion Translation:  the Bible of Bethel and NAR (by Sara Boyd)

A New Apostolic Reformation Bible:  The Passion Translation (from 2013, at The Berean Call)

Know who made your Bible translation and who compiled its base-text.

Readers are encouraged to explore the embedded links in this post to find additional resources.

Quotations attributed in this review to The Passion Translation are from The Passion Translation®.  Copyright © 2017, 2018 by BroadStreet Publishing ® Group, LLC.  Used by permission.  All rights reserved.

Read the Fine Print: The KJV and the Byzantine Text

             Many champions of the King James Version emphasize that before the Reformation ever began, the Textus Receptus was the most widely used text throughout Christendom, and that this shows the fulfillment of a divine promise that God would preserve what he revealed in his word – both in terms of its promises (keeping his word), and in terms of its verbal expression – in each generation for his people.  But this is wrong.

            The Textus Receptus – defined as the Greek base-text of the 1611 Authorised Version – has over a thousand readings that are not majority readings, and some readings in the TR  (such as variants in Acts 9:5-6, Luke 2:22 and Eph. 3:9) have very little valid manuscript support – none at all, in the case of Acts 9:5-6.  At such points, what is printed in the Textus Receptus was never the ordinary text of the ordinary church.

            The Westminster Confession of Faith has been used as the basis for regarding both the Textus Receptus and the Byzantine Text (which is very similar to the Textus Receptus without its minority readings) as the  New Testament in Greek that God, “by his singular care and providence kept pure in all ages.”  “The text that the formulators affirmed was, historically, the Textus Receptus.   But we should be aware of how the Received Text was received – as a somewhat fluid quantity.  Consider, in selected segments, how the KJV’s Preface The Translators to the Reader describes various English translations that includes Tyndale’s and the Geneva Bible:

Segment 1:  “We do not deny, nay we affirm and avow, that the very meanest translation of the Bible in English, set forth by men of our profession, (for we have seen none of theirs of the whole Bible as yet) containeth the word of God, nay, is the word of God. As the King’s speech, which he uttereth in Parliament, being translated into French, Dutch, Italian, and Latin, is still the King’s speech, though it be not interpreted by every Translator with the like grace, nor peradventure so fitly for phrase, nor so expressly for sense, everywhere. For it is confessed, that things are to take their denomination of the greater part; and a natural man could say, Verum ubi multa nitent in carmine, non ego paucis offendor maculis, etc. A man may be counted a virtuous man, though he have made many slips in his life, (else, there were none virtuous, for in many things we offend all) [James 3:2] also a comely man and lovely, though he have some warts upon his hand, yea, not only freckles upon his face, but also scars.”

             “Things are to take their denomination of the greater part.” – And the Textus Receptus was
much more pure than impure.  The KJV’s translators, though, must have understood that it did not need to be absolutely pure to be sufficiently pure enough to be considered the word of God, even with textual variations of the kind exhibited in the early English versions prior to 1611.  So although, in Romans  12:11, Tyndale used a Greek text that differed from the KJV’s base-text, this did not disqualify Tyndale’s version - “Applye youre selves to ye tyme” – from being considered the word of God.   Nor did his version of Acts 13:33 –  in which Peter is depicted quoting from the first psalm, rather than the second – condemn Tyndale’s entire New Testament as something impure and unfit to use.  Small variants – characterized as “warts,” and “freckles” and “scars” – even if they  change the meaning of a sentence, were not thought to disqualify a text, provided that it was harmonious with the general message of the New Testament. 

Segment 2:  “No cause therefore why the word translated should be denied to be the word, or forbidden to be current, notwithstanding that some imperfections and blemishes may be noted in the setting forth of it. For what ever was perfect under the Sun, where Apostles or Apostolic men, that is, men endued with an extraordinary measure of God's spirit, and privileged with the privilege of infallibility, had not their hand?”

            Again we see that “some imperfections and blemishes” in other versions of the New Testament made by Protestants did not disqualify them from being considered the word of God.  If the KJV’s translators did not regard those features as fatal, why do KJV-Onlyists insist that deviations from the Textus Receptus are fatal?  Particularly where the KJV echoes a minority reading, some deviations are improvements, resembling more accurately the text written by inspired authors. 

Segment 3:   “The like we are to think of Translations. The translation of the Seventy dissenteth from the Original in many places, neither doth it come near it, for perspicuity, gravity, majesty; yet which of the Apostles did condemn it? Condemn it? Nay, they used it, (as it is apparent, and as Saint Jerome and most learned men do confess) which they would not have done, nor by their example of using it, so grace and commend it to the Church, if it had been unworthy the appellation and name of the word of God.”

            Thus the KJV’s Preface not only affirmed the historical reality of the Septuagint (that is the “translation of the Seventy” referred to), but even grant it status as the word of God in spite of obvious deviations in meaning from the original Hebrew text.  The cry of “Ad Fontes” is thus balanced by the understanding that what the apostles used, the apostolic church may use also.  When a modern translation such as the NET prefers a reading in the Septuagint over the Masoretic Text, it is not necessarily a disqualifying feature.   (The Eastern Orthodox churches to this day appraise the Septuagint as their authoritative text, comparable to how Roman Catholics appraised the Vulgate as their canonical standard.)  Rather than the novel and extreme all-or-nothing approach of KJV-Onlyists, the KJV’s translators subscribed to the belief that a degree of variation did not disqualify a translation.

Available on Amazon 

           When the alternative to the KJV were limited mainly to the Living Oracles, the Revised Version, the American Standard Version, the Revised Standard Version, the New American Standard Version, and the New International Version (1984) – some fans of the KJV could validly argue that these versions were not to be used on the grounds that their New Testament base-text was Alexandrian, not Byzantine (and thus not the same text that was “kept pure in all ages.”  Already in 1982, though, the New King James Version entered the market, and now there are other English New Testaments that are Byzantine-based such as the Eastern Orthodox Bible’s New Testament and the English Majority Text Version (EMTV) and the World English Bible and the Modern Literal Version and the Text-Critical English New Testament.  If the translators of the KJV were alive today, they would probably consider these versions the word of God just as they considered the versions by Wycliffe and Cranmer and the Geneva Bible to be the word of God.  King James Version Onlyism, as a dogma, is not justifiable.

 

 

 

The Russians Are Coming! 091 and Much More

As Katie Leggett recently reported, the Russian Library of the National Academy of Sciences in Saint Petersburg has released a collection of 35 manuscripts and made a collection of most of them available to view online.   The oldest along them is 091, a fragment of the Gospel of John from the 500s.   The minuscules are GA 1338, 1826, 1858, 2159, 2267, 2269, 2273, 2274, 2275,  2311, 2500, 2534, 2535, 2536, and 3003.  The lectionaries are l 623, l 840, l 844 (from 861) , l 1431, l 1432, l 1481, l 1483, l 1484, l 1485, l 1485 (900s), l 1486, l 1487, l 1488, l 1488, l 1841, l 1842, l 1843 (1000s), l 1844, l 1845, l 1846, l 2344, l 2344.

Let’s meet the new image from 091 today.  091’s text is officially a representative of the Alexandrian text-type (“Category II” according to K. Aland).  Let’s test that with this portion.  Transposing the Byzantine Text of John 6:38-42 over the fragment, its text looks very Byzantine!  091 reads εκ, not απο, in v. 38.  But it agrees with P66 P75 B A D L W in the non-inclusion of πατρός after πέμψαντος με in v. 39.  (Sinaiticus is something of a train wreck here due to the scribe’s parableptic mistake skipping from the πέμψαντος με in v. 39a to the same words at v. 39b.) 

If this fragment were all of 091 we had, it could be classified as Byzantine as readily as Alexandrian.

Review: New Testament Textual Criticism for the 21st Century

Charles L. Quarles

The Director of the Caskey Center for Biblical Text and Translation, in Wake Forest, South Carolina USA, has given the public a new resource that promises to shine a bright light on a field that is often overlooked and minimized in modern Christian academia.  Resisting the temptation to treat the field as a mere branch of apologetics, Dr. Charles L. Quarles efficiently presents in 161 pages the purposes, materials, and methods used in the field of New Testament textual criticism, and gives readers examples of his own detailed analysis in three specific textual contests (Matthew 16:2b-3, John 1:18, and Colossians 1:12) and invited consideration of many more (without gauging importance according to their length) such as those in Matthew 19:4, Mark 7:2, Luke 7:31, John 8:20, Romans 14:19, Hebrews 10:38, and James 1:12.  No variants from the Petrine Epistles, Jude, or Revelation are covered.

Quarles’ volume has much less well-masked propaganda that Metzger & Ehrman’s obsolete The Text of the New Testament:  Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration.  Whereas Metzger adhered to the untenable theory of the Lucianic recension for his entire academic career, Quarles appears up-to-date and does not suffers from an excess of Hort-echoing like his predecessor.  Rather than badger his readers with reminders of how awful the Textus Receptus and the Byzantine Text are supposed to be, Quarles reports that Western Christian academia in general has treated the case for Byzantine Priority with relative disinterest so far. 

Unfortunately he seems to have assumed, in the course of Part One, some points that he himself acknowledges as tentative by the end of the book.  For example he asserts that “no satisfactory explanation for this disappearance [ i.e., the disappearance of predominantly Byzantine manuscripts prior to Chrysostom] has been offered,” but this is not true:  the simple historicity of the enforcement of Roman policies under Decius, and again under Diocletian, resulted in the destruction of Christian writings of all kinds.  This, and the effects of humidity upon papyrus everywhere, except in Egypt’s exceptionally dry conditions, explains the lack of early Byzantine manuscripts outside Egypt.  

In addition, while patristic evidence is lacking for sustained strings of distinct Byzantine readings in patristic writings, that is due to (1) the tendency of the Byzantine, Alexandrian, and Western transmission-lines to agree, and (2) the absence of patristic ante-Nicene evidence from many locales where the Byzantine Text dominated soon afterward.  Are we so fixated on the Egyptian text, merely because the writing-materials have endured thanks to the dry weather of Egypt, that  in the middle of the doctrinal disputes of the second half of the 300s the Gothic version and the Peshitta arose brimming with novel readings and that the churches, rather than protest and riot,  welcomed the novelties and tossed aside the texts handed down to them by their persecuted predecessors?  Liturgical adjustments aside, such a wholesale replacement seems unlikely.

Back to the book though:  the last section of Part 1 superbly reviews the tools for New Testament textual criticism, sampling the best parts of the author’s earlier 40 Questions About the Text and Canon co-written with L. Scott Kellum.  New features in the Nestle-Aland compilation such as the blank diamond (♦) are included.  Online tools are also described and links are given to the Institute for New Testament Textual Research in Muenster, Germany, the Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts in Texas, the International Greek New Testament Project, and the Center for New Testament Textual Studies at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, and more.

The second part is a delightfully balanced presentation about how to evaluate external and internal evidence, blended with an investigation into Matthew 18:15.  Quarles is a strong advocate for Hort’s dictum that “Knowledge of documents should precede final judgment upon readings,” and he appeals to it repeatedly.  He very candidly acknowledges however that the foundation of Hort’s transmission-model – that the Byzantine text emerged as a combination of the Alexandrian and Western text-types – was incorrect:  “Text critics have recognized that the old text-type approach is problematic and must be abandoned.”    Without the acceptance of text-types Hort’s model cannot exist.

Instead of shifting the text-critical train into reverse and shouting a loud apology to Western Christendom for leading to public down the wrong path by a phantom theory for generations, though, Quarles proceeds to make a case for retaining the popular “reasoned eclectic” approach which happens to produce the same results as Hort’s approach 99% of the time.  Nevertheless he affirms that “The testimony of multiple witnesses is usually more trustworthy than the testimony of a single witness” – and (with the Tyndale House GNT and the SBLGNT) recommends ἀμάρτήσῃ εἰς σέ in Matthew 18:15.  

Over and over the reader is shown that it is crucial to engage one’s intelligence when weighing internal considerations against each other.  Nevertheless, while Quarles’ most detailed analysis is made to three small contests in Part Three, he expresses his position about many others as if they are fully settled, content to leave some details vague and some assertions unbalanced in the interest of brevity.  For instance regarding the contest between ΘΣ and ΟΣ  in First Timothy 3:16 he states, “The reference to Jesus’ incarnation in the verse understandably prompted a Christian scribe to mistakenly read the Ο as a Θ.”  It is equally understandable however that any scribe could in a moment of carelessness fail to add the crossbar, just as people writing by hand have  occasionally failed to cross the lowercase “t” and thus wrote about limes instead of times.

An interesting development in the evaluation of internal evidence is that conflations are downplayed; consideration of scribal subvocalization is given as much emphasis.  A degree of subjectivity is likely to be unavoidable when readers attempt to apply Quarles’ cogent-sounding statement (p. 89), “Textual critics should prefer readings that initially seem difficult but make better sense after further study.”   How difficult does a reading need to be before it merits being rejected as a palpable mistake?  The reading τῆς Ἰουδαίας in Luke 4:44 is used as an example of a superficially difficult reading – but not a very persuasive one inasmuch as the longevity of the writing-materials seems to have been given too much weight (i.e., the age of the ancestor shared by Α D Byz 700 Vulgate Peshitta it^a it^e it^aur Syriac Harklean^margin  Armenian Georgian Ethiopic was not necessarily later than the shared ancestor of P75 01 03 019 032 892 Sahidic).    A reading may be intelligently salvageable without this becoming commendable.  I wonder what Quarles does with the readings of 01 in Matthew 13:35 and Luke 1:26.

Without telling Quarles’ conclusions about Matthew 16:2b-3 and John 1:18 and Colossians 1:12 in Part Three, I am confident that there is plenty to both dismay and delight readers whether they favor the readings of supermajorities or tiny minorities of witnesses. 

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Repeatedly I was confronted by a candid regret that more research needs to be done in specific areas of research – the same sort of plea that John Burgon made over 120 years ago.  The dating of the supplemental pages of 032 is particularly significant, and Quarles’ observations should be considered through the lens of what Ulrich Schmid wrote in his chapter “Reassessing the Palaeography and Codicology of the Freer Gospel Manuscript” on pp. 227-249 of The Freer Biblical Manuscripts (2006 ed. Larry W. Hurtado).

The Appendices must not be overlooked, especially III (Problems with the Text-type Approach) – which tends to show that the problem is by no means fatal to the apparoach but comes down to an over-reliance on statistics, but that is something to explore elsewhere) and IV (Thoroughgoing Eclecticism, eulogizing the great J. K. Elliott).  The glossary, though, is too short. 

In conclusion, Quarles has provided an helpful and intriguing and up-to-date introduction to the field of New Testament textual criticism that raises as many little questions as it resolves – and that is not a bad thing. 

A few closing points:

On p. 79 the reinforcement of 03’s text is attributed to a “10^th- or 11^th- century scribe” but the basis for this date is not given; I suggest that a date several centuries later is plausible.

On page 31 in a footnote, “305” should read instead “304.”

On p. 65 all mention of the forgery 2427 should be removed.

Revelation 20:5 - A New Attempt to Change A Doctrinally Significant Text

The first half of Revelation 20:5 has been part of the English text of the book as long as the English text of Revelation has existed – until now.  It appears the same in the Byzantine Text and Textus Receptus:  οἱ λοιποὶ τῶν νεκρῶν οὐκ ἔζησαν ἄχρι τελεσθῇ τὰ χίλια ἔτη.   The meaning is plain:  “But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished.”

A quick review of Bible Gateway shows that English versions including the KJV, ESV, NKJV, NIV, NET, WEB, NASB, NRSV, NLT, CSB, CEV, and EHV include the entire verse. 

The first half of 20:5 is missing, though, in Codex Sinaiticus and in an interesting array of minuscules:   61 82 93 141 177 201 218 325 452 456 498 522 808 1424 1719 1734 1780 1795 1849 1852 1872 2030 2048 2053 2062 2138 2256 2350 2377 2494 2495 2582 2672 2681 2845 2847 2886 2917 and 2921.

Victorinus of Pettau (Ptuj in Slovenia) quoted the full text of 20:5 in a commentary composed around 260.  At the New Advent website his comments can be read in English:

“[20:4] And I saw thrones, and them that sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them; and I saw the souls of them that were slain on account of the testimony of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast nor his image, nor have received his writing on their forehead or in their hand; and they reigned with Christ for a thousand years.

[20:5] The rest of them lived not again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. There are two resurrections. But the first resurrection is now of the souls that are by the faith, which does not permit men to pass over to the second death. Of this resurrection the apostle says: If you have risen with Christ, seek those things which are above.

[20:6] Blessed and holy is he who has part in this resurrection: on them the second death shall have no power, but they shall be priests of God and Christ, and they shall reign with him a thousand years. I do not think the reign of a thousand years is eternal; or if it is thus to be thought of, they cease to reign when the thousand years are finished. But I will put forward what my capacity enables me to judge. The tenfold number signifies the decalogue, and the hundredfold sets forth the crown of virginity.  For he who shall have kept the undertaking of virginity completely, and shall have faithfully fulfilled the precepts of the decalogue, and shall have destroyed the untrained nature or impure thoughts within the retirement of the heart, that they may not rule over him, this is the true priest of Christ, and accomplishing the millenary number thoroughly, is thought to reign with Christ; and truly in his case the devil is bound.”

The loss of οἱ λοιποὶ τῶν νεκρῶν οὐκ ἔζησαν ἄχρι τελεσθῇ τὰ χίλια ἔτη is explained by one of the most common scribal accidents:  a scribe’s accidental omission of material when his line of sight shifted from letters in his master-copy to the same (or similar) letter recurring further along in the text.  Anyone can see how such an accident, technically called parablepsis, occurred when a scribe’s line of sight jumped from the χιλια ετη at the end of 20:4 to the identical letters in this middle of verse 5:

⁴και ειδον θρονους και εκαθισαν επ αυτους και κριμα εδοθη

αυτοις και τας ψυχας των πεπελεκισμενων δια την μαρτυριαν

ιυ και δια τον λογον του θυ και οιτινες ου προσεκυνησαν

τω θηριω ουτε την εικονα αυτου και ουκ ελαβον το χαραγμα

επι το μετωπον αυτων και επι την χειρα αυτων

και εζησαν και εβασιλευσαν μετα του χυ [τα] χιλια ετη

⁵και οι λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ εζησαν αχρι τελεσθη τα χιλια ετη

αυτη η αναστασις η πρωτη . . . .

 

I note that in the UBS GNT 1966, there was no apparatus entry for Revelation 20:5, and in the UBS GNT 4^th edition, likewise, there was no apparatus entry for Revelation 20:5.   It is exasperating to see such a shift in the new compilation, particularly when no new pertinent external evidence has appeared.  I recommend that from now on translators of Revelation should use Wayne Mitchell's The Greek New Testament, 4th edition, or the Robinson-Pierpont Byzantine Textform, and set aside the unstable UBS compilation.   

 

 

 

 

 

Anomalies in Codex Beratinus (043)

Codex Beratinus (043), a copy of the Gospels of Matthew and Mark from the 500s, is semi-famous as the most unique of the Purple Uncials (022, 023, 042, and 080).  It is officially categorized as Byzantine (Category V) but its editor Pierre Batiffol noticed that its text is more accurately described as Mixed. 

Codex Beratinus contains only the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Mark, with several considerable lacunae (Matthew 1:1-6:3, 7:26-8:7, 18:23-19:3, and Mark 14:62-end). The codex contains 190 extant parchment leaves measuring 31.4 × 26.8 cm, or approximately the same size as those of Codex Alexandrinus, and have two columns per page, with 17 lines per page,^[1] in characters larger than the script in Codex Alexandrinus^[2] in 8-12 letters per line, applied in silver ink.^[3] The title and the first line in Mark are written in gold.^[4] The writing is continuous in full lines without stichometry. Quotations from the Old Testament are marked with an inverted comma (<).  

The text is divided according to the κεφαλαια (chapters) and according to the Ammonian Sections (smaller than κεφαλαια). On the left margin are inserted the numerals of the κεφαλαια and above the pages are inserted the τιτλοι (titles) of the κεφαλαια. The numerals of the Ammonian sections are given on the left margin, and a references to the Eusebian Canons were added by a later hand in the 8th century. A note in the manuscript states that the loss of the other two Gospels is due to "the Franks of Champagne", i.e. some of the Crusaders, who may have seen it while at Patmos, where it was believed formerly to have been.^[5]

The text of the codex is generally of the Byzantine text-type, but it contains the long Western addition after Matthew 20:28, occurring also in Codex Bezae:^[6] Aland gave it the following textual profile: 131¹, 83^1/2, 11², 18^s.^[1]

"But seek to increase from that which is small, and to become less from which is greater. When you enter into a house and are summoned to dine, do not sit down at the prominent places, lest perchance a man more honorable than you come in afterwards, and he who invited you come and say to you, "Go down lower"; and you shall be ashamed. But if you sit down in the inferior place, and one inferior to you come in, then he that invited you will say to you, "Go up higher"; and this will be advantageous for you."^[5]

In Matthew 21:9, the following interpolation occurs, shared only with syr^cur:^[6]

και εξελθον εις υπαντησιν αυτω πολλοι χαιροντες και δοξαζοντες τον θεον περι παντων ων ειδον

And many went out to meet him; all who were seeing [him] round about were rejoicing and glorifying God.

In Matthew 27:9, in the phrase επληρωθη το ρηθεν δια Ιερεμιου του προφητου (fulfilled what was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet) the word Ιερεμιου (Jeremiah) is omitted, as in Minuscule 33, a, b, syr^s, syr^p, and cop^bo.^[7]

In Matthew 27:16 it has additional reading ος δια φονον και στασιν ην βεβλημενοις εις φυλακην (who for murder and insurrection had been thrown in prison).^[8]

In Matthew 27:35, it includes ἵνα πληρώθη τὸ ῤηθὲν διὰ τοῦ προφήτου, Διεμερίσαντο τὰ ἱμάτια μου ἑαυτοῖς καὶ ἐπὶ τὸν ἱματισμὸν μου ἔβαλον κλῆρον along with 0250, 037, 038, 1424, 1582, 124, 348, 788, 1279, 1579, and 517.

This is a unique manuscript with an interesting textual ancestry.  It merits a lot more attention that it typically receives from researchers who belittle manuscripts with an essentially Byzantine text.