Two months
ago (April 2018) we met Codex
Sangallensis (a.k.a. Codex Δ (Delta), or 037), an important manuscript of
the Gospels, in which the Greek text is accompanied by an interlinear Latin
translation. (This Latin text is known
as VL (Vetus Latina) 77.) Today, let’s
get to know Codex Δ’s sibling: Codex
Boernerianus (a.k.a. Codex Gp or 012), made in the 800s. It is a copy of the Epistles of Paul (not
including Hebrews), and is named after the German scholar Christian Frederick
Boerner (1685-1753), who loaned it to his contemporary Richard Bentley. It has been cited in compilations of the
Greek New Testament ever since the 1752 edition by
Johann Jakob Wettstein.
 |
| Romans 12:7-16 in Codex 012, with verse-numbers superimposed, and unusual readings framed (Yellow: 12:11) (Orange: 12:14) |
Photographs of 012
were made in 1909, and that was a fortunate event, because a few decades later in
1945, during World War II, the manuscript was severely damaged when the city of
Dresden (where it was kept) was bombed.
The photographs
of the pages from 1909 can be viewed online at the website of the Saxon State
and University Library at Dresden
The text of
012 is not Alexandrian. It is usually
categorized as “Western.” A list of its
idiosyncratic itacisms would be extremely long and wearisome; it is as if much of
the Greek text has been deliberately written in what seemed to a copyist (not
necessarily the copyist of 012, but a copyist somewhere in its text’s
transmission-line) to be phonetic spelling.
Here is a sample of 012’s other (not itacisms) readings from Romans chapter
12:
3 – 012 repeats τὸ ἀγαθὸν, a case of dittography.
3 – 012 skips παρ’ ὃ δεῖ φρονεῖν, a case of parablepsis (the
copyist’s line of sight drifted from the final letters of the preceding word
ὑπερφρονεῖν to the same letters that occur a little later in the text).
4 – 012 begins the verse with ωσπερ instead of καθάπερ.
5 – 012 does not have the word ἐσμεν.
8 – 012 does not have ειτε at the beginning of the verse.
8 – 012 repeats εν τη after παρακαλων (another case of
dittography).
9 – 012 reads μεισουντες instead of αποστυγουντες.
11 – 012 reads καιρω (“time”) instead of Κυρίω
(“Lord”). This variant is old; Jerome
alluded to it in his Epistle 27, To Marcella),
and, if Rufinus did not expand on the comments of Origen when he (Rufinus)
translated his (Origen’s) commentary on Romans, then Origen, in the first half
of the 200s, was also aware of this variant. Ambrosiaster, too, shows an awareness of this
reading; he even prefers it, proposing that it was meant to convey the same
idea as Ephesians 5:16. It was later
adopted by the scholar Stephanus in his 1550 edition of the Greek New Testament
– a clear example of the variations among different compilations that
circulated in the 1500s, showing that Stephanus and Beza did not unthinkingly
reproduce the work of Erasmus.
13 – 012 reads μνίαις instead of χρείαις.
14 – 012 skips the words τους διώκοντας ὑμᾶς εὐλογειτε, a
case of parablepsis in which the copyist’s line of sight drifted from the
εὐλογειτε at the beginning of the verse to the same word a little later in the
text.
17 – 012 has an extra phrase, ου μονον ενώπειον του Θυ
αλλα κει, so as to make the sentence read, “Give careful thought to do
what is right not only in the sight of
God but also in the sight of all men.”
The Greek text has been conformed to the Vulgate, in which this part of
the verse is made to resemble Second Corinthians 8:21.
21 – 012 reads απο instead of υπο.
The text of 012 is almost famous (or infamous) for moving First
Corinthians 14:34-35 to a location after verse 40. Here are some other anomalous readings of 012
in First Corinthians 14:
1 – 012 reads Αιώκεται instead of Διώκετε. Apparently somewhere along the line, a
copyist misread his exemplar, confusing the similar letters Α (alpha) and Δ (delta).
2 – 012 reads γλώσσαις instead of γλώσσῃ.
4 – 012 adds Θυ after εκκλησείαν, yielding the
reading, “builds up the church
of God
5 – 012 reads αλλειν instead of λαλειν, a case of letter-transposition.
7-9 – 012 does not have the word τοις, and reads γνώσθη
instead of γνώσθησεται. It also reads
γλώσσ instead of γλώσσης in v. 9, as if copied verbatim from a damaged exemplar.
10 – 012 does not have τοσαυτα at the beginning of the
verse.
10 – 012 adds εστιν after αφωνον.
10 – 012 reads γινώσκω instead of ειδω.
21 – 012 reads ετεραις γλώσσαις instead of
ετερογλώσσαις.
22 – 012 reads πιστοις instead of πιστεύουσιν.
23 – 012 does not include ουν.
29 – 012 reads ανακρινέτωσαν instead of διακρινέτωσαν.
37 – 012 reads εστειν instead of εστιν (or εισιν) εντολη.
The oddities of the text of 012 are
myriad. Perhaps this is due to three
factors in its textual ancestry: a
copyist who did not hesitate to conform the Greek text so as to make its meaning
agree more closely with his Latin Text, and a copyist who was nearly illiterate
in Greek and who attempted to copy his exemplar’s contents mechanically, and a copyist
who attempted to spell the Greek text in a somewhat phonetic way. As a result, Codex Boernerianus (along with its
very close relative Codex Augiensis) is perhaps the most unreliable of all
Greek manuscripts of the Pauline Epistles.
Readers of the Nestle-Aland Novum Testamentum Graece may be
interested to know that the Nestle-Aland apparatus’ record of the readings of
012 is occasionally in error. For
example, as
Reuben Swanson reported, in Galatians 1:8
012 clearly reads ευαγγελιζαηται, not ευαγγελιζηται. Swanson also reported that the N-A apparatus
is wrong in Galatians
4:25; the reading from Codex 012 should be η συνστοιχουσα τη. (But not, contra
Swanson, συνστοιχουσα δε.) Swanson
listed other miscitations of Codex 012 in the Nestle-Aland apparatus in I Cor.
1:15, 1:22, 1:29, 3:1, 3:2, 3:3, 3:12, etc., etc. – not less than 50 imprecise
or erroneous citations in just the first 10 chapters of First Corinthians.
No description of Codex
Boernerianus would be complete without mentioning the short
Irish poem which appears in the lower margin of folio 23r (below the text
of First Corinthians 2:9b-3:3a).
It runs as follows:
Téicht doróim mór saido beic torbai · INrí chondaigi [n
(with deletion-marks)] hifoss manimbera / latt ni fog bai ·
Mór báis morbaile mór coll ceille mór
mire · Olais airchenn
teicht doécaib · Beith fo étoil maíc
Maire ·
Not being fluent in medieval Irish, I am dependent on other
sources when I say that that means something
like this:
To go to Rome
Unless you bring here the thing (or, the King) you seek, you
do not find it (or, Him).
[It is] Much foolishness, much frenzy, much nonsense, much
craziness –
For surely you have set out for death,
displeasing the Son of Mary.
That these
lines are written in Irish strongly suggests that Codex Boernerianus was made
by Irish monks at the
monastery of Saint Gall (in modern-day Switzerland
The story goes that Conlaeth,
in the year 519 or 520, wanted to visit Rome (perhaps to study advancements in
metallurgical artwork, a craft
in which he was gifted, or perhaps to replace his priestly wardrobe, which
had been sold or traded in service of the poor) but Saint Bridgit refused to bless
his plan, and warned him against leaving.
As Saint Bridgit had predicted, the journey turned out to be fatal to
Conlaeth, who, after departing, was eaten by wolves while still in Ireland
Two other
items of interest in Codex Boernerianus are (1)
the intriguing title of “The Beginning of the Epistle to the Laodiceans” after
the text and closing-title of Philemon, which is followed immediately not by
the patchwork composition presented in some Latin manuscripts as the Epistle from
Paul to the Laodiceans, but instead by (2)
several
pages of a Latin commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, written by a scribe
who used every square inch of the page.
Readers are encouraged to explore the embedded links in this
post, which will lead to additional resources.
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