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
“[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 . . . .
3 comments:
I support the longer reading that includes the first half of verse 5. The physical evidence strongly points to an accidental omission.
When you look at the Greek text, the identical endings of verse 4 and the missing phrase, "χίλια ἔτη", create a textbook example of a visual copying error. It is highly improbable that a later scribe would invent an addition that perfectly mimics the ending of the previous verse. You can clearly see that the omission in manuscripts like Codex Sinaiticus represents a simple human mistake rather than the absence of the original text. Textual scholars like Bruce Metzger affirm this phrase as original based on this exact mechanical evidence.
Yes, the omission of Rev. 20:5 evidently came from parablepsis. It is one of the few major blemishes that affected the large M(K) family in Revelation. Other minuscules that drop it are 2030 2062 2494.
All the manuscripts with the omission that are listed in this blog post are from M(K) except for the following: Aleph 2030 2053 2062 2256 2350 2377 2582 2681 2886 2917. All of these are "unclassified manuscripts" (not in the Koine or the Andreas or the Complutensian groups). Becasue they have the omission, they are probably related to the M(K) group to some degree, unless parablepsis occurred more than once.
The content of Victorinus' commentary is interesting because it is what we would call basically amillennial, whereas most early Christian writers were close to what we call basically premillennial (technically chiliastic; cf. writings by the author of the epistle of Barnabas, Papias, Polycarp, Justin Martyr, Melito, Irenaeus, Theophilus, Tertullian, and Hippolytus of Rome; after that in the early third century anti-chiliastic writings appear by Clement of Alexandria, Caius, and Origen). However, are we looking at what Victorinus originally wrote or what his commentary was revised to be by someone who objected to what he originally wrote? K. H. Schwarte writes:
"Commentarius in apocalypsin (in apoc.), composed soon after the Valerian persecution, therefore ca. 260. The original version was published 1895/1916; known earlier and transmitted in older mss. is the revision (in language and content) of the original that Jerome undertook ca. 400 (additions from Tyconius and replacement of the chiliastic with a spiritualizing interpretation of the thousand-year reign [Rev 20]). Two later versions of Jerome's recension differ chiefly in the text of Rev that is used." (Dictionary of Early Christian Literature, p. 596) Quoted at https://www.earlychristianwritings.com/victorinus.html .
A short biography of Victorinus of Poetovio or Pettau notes that "He is one of the earliest church fathers to give any indication against Chiliasm, though he still respects the gathering of the church to Judea. Moreover, his remarks on the twentieth chapter of the Apocalypse stand in contradiction to his commentary on the seventh millennium given in his work On the Creation of the World, possibly indicating a redaction in his Commentary on the Apocalypse, or a change of opinion." https://www.ccel.org/ccel/victorinus .
It does seem as if his surviving works do not have a consistent interpretation of revelation, suggesting that perhaps his commentary in the blog has been heavily revised. But even if it the chiliastic commentary was replaced by anti-chiliastic commentary, it still means that Victorinus had originally written something about Revelation 20:5, so the verse was in Revelation in the AD 200s.
Thanks Matthew B I'll tweak the post to include your data
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