Second Peter 1:10 - Grace By Faith - Confidence By Works

             A variant in Second Peter 1:10 – one that is undetectable in the SBL-GNT – shows that some scribes were not immune to contributing to the role of human effort in maintaining salvation.  During the Protestant Reformation, the Byzantine Greek text of this chapter was used to show that Peter, like Paul, affirmed that the salvation comes as a gift of God (1:2), and that nothing we do can ever add to what Christ has done, as the Spirit impels each faithful individual to diligently pursue virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love.  But long before Martin Luther was born, a form of verse 10 existed which emphasized that good works contribute to the confidence of this soul.

Papyrus 72

             The Byzantine text of Second Peter and the modern text of NA/UBS read precisely the same.  In the Harklean Group – a small cluster of medieval manuscripts – there is a longer reading.  Before telling you what it is, the significance of the Harklean Group should be understood.  Why are these relative few, relatively late, manuscripts important?  Because they echo, in the General Epistles, a form of text that is virtually as early as our earliest surviving manuscripts of that category of books.  That is, although the manuscripts in the Harklean Group (GA 429 614 1505 1611 2138 2412 and 2495, with core members listed in boldprint) are medieval, they echo an ancient ancestor.  (The term “Harklean” is due to the close agreement between their text and a text used as an exemplar by Thomas of Harkle when he revised the Syriac Peshitta around the year 616 using Greek copies at the Enaton monastery that was near Alexandria, Egypt.)

          

Jude v. 3 in Sinaiticus

            How ancient?  Consider the text of Codex Sinaiticus (ﬡ, 01) in the third verse of the Epistle of Jude:  after the normal mention of the salvation common among believers, it adds “και ζωης” (“and life”).    The inclusion of σωτηρίας is established via its inclusion in P72, 02 (Alexandrinus), 03 (Vaticanus), 018 020 049 056 0142 and the overwhelming majority of minuscules including 1 6 18 69 81 323 630 1739 and the family 35 and Textus Receptus forms of the text.  However the Harklean Group members 1611 2138 1505 2495 uniquely do not include σωτηρίας and have (after κοινης ημων in 1611 2138, and after κοινης υμων in 1505 2495) ζωης.  This evidence implies that prior to the production of Sinaiticus in the mid-300s, a scribe had an exemplar with σωτηρίας and an exemplar with ζωης and, rather than choose between the two, embraced them both and created the longer reading, a conflation, displayed in Sinaiticus.

Second Peter 1:10 in Sinaiticus

          In Second Peter 1:10 the Harklean Group also supports, after σπουδάσατε, the words ἵνα διὰ τῶν καλῶν ἔργων βεβαίαν ὑμῶν τὴν κλῆσιν καὶ ἐκλογὴν ποιεῖσθε.  The words in bold print mean “through good works.”  The form of Second Peter 1:10 is supported by the Vulgate – Codex Amiatinus reads “Quapropter fratres magis agite ut per bona opera certam vestram vocationem et electionem faciatis:  haec enim facientes non peccabitis aliquando.”  Διὰ τῶν καλῶν ἔργων is also read by Sinaiticus and is supported by Lectionary 60 and the Sahidic, Armenian, and the Harklean Syriac versions.  

            Considering the diversity of witnesses for both readings this contest is much closer than the UBS Committee’s “A” rating would suggest.   I regard the shorter reading as original, and the early expansion as an example of the Western tendency to over-emphasize the meaning of the adequately clear original.  But if one were to prefer the longer reading as original – which, as far as I know, only Lachmann and diehard champions of the Vulgate have done – then we are looking at a reading which scribes in more than one transmission-line excised due to a desire to discourage the interpretation the idea that good works are necessary for assurance of salvation.