The Vocabulary of Mark 16:9-20

           “The vocabulary and style of verses 9-20 are non-Markan (e.g., ἀπιστέω, βλάπτω, βεβαιόω, ἐπακολουθέω, θεάομαι, μετὰ ταῦτα, πορεύομαι, συνεργέω, ὕστερον are found nowhere else in Mark; and θανάσιμον and τοῖς μετ’ αυτοῦ γενομένοις, as designations of the disciples, occur only here in the New Testament.”  Thus wrote Bruce Metzger in his Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (p. 125, Ó 1971 by the United Bible Societies, Stuttgart, Germany). 

          Throughout Metzger’s Textual Commentary, signs of his reliance upon Hort’s Notes on Select Readings (1881) can be detected; for example, Hort wrote that “the petty historical difficulty mentioned by Marinus as to the first line of v. 9 could never have suggested the substitution of 4 colourless lines for 12 verses rich in interesting material” (p. 44) and Metzger has merely paraphrased this (in TCGNT p. 126) as “No one who had available as the conclusion of the Second Gospel the twelve verses 9-20, so rich in interesting material, would have deliberately replaced them with four lines of a colorless and generalized summary.”

          Metzger parroted Hort a little.  More recent commentators have parroted Metzger a lot, as if the first point he makes about vocabulary is  very cogent, sufficient to settle the question about whether or not Mark wrote 16:9-20.  For example, after making a lengthy quotation from Metzger, Matt Slick wrote in 2008, “In the last 11 verses under discussion there are 17 “new” words that don’t occur in the entire gospel of Mark.  It appears that someone wrote the ending of Mark and added it to the gospel because the style is different, and the vocabulary is different.”

          But Metzger never told his readers how many once-used words readers ought to expect in a twelve-verse segment of the Gospel of Mark.  This situation was remedied in 2019 by Karim al-Hanifi in the brief essay, The end of an argument on the ending of Mark, (available at Academia.edu).  Al-Hanifi identified 696 words that Mark uses only once in Mark 1:1-16:8.  Bruce Terry, defining a “once-used word” more strictly, put the total at 555 once-used words.  Using the lower total, if we divide 555 once-used words into 659 verses (rejecting, with the Nestle-Aland compilation, Mark 7:16, 9:44, 9:46, 11:26, and 15:28, just to keep things simple) that’s an average of .84 once-used words in each verse.  So in a typical twelve-verse segment of Mark, it should not be unusual at all to find 8 once-used words.   Using Al-Hanifi’s tally, we should expect an average of .95 once-used words in each verse, averaging 11-12 once-used words in each 12-verse segment.

          There are quite a few 12-verse segments of Mark in which the rate of once-used words is significantly higher than eight, and higher than 12.  This list is based on Al-Hanifi’s essay:

          Mark 1:1-12:  17 once-used words

          2:16-27:  18 once-used words

          4:13-24:  16 once-used words

          4:25-36:  16 once-used words

          4:37-5:7:  17 once-used words

          6:49-7:4:  17 once-used words

          7:5-16:  15 once-used words

          7:17-28:  21 once-used words

          11:31-12:9:  16 once-used words (9 of which are in 12:1!)

          12:34-13:1:  19 once-used words

          13:14-25:  21 once-used words

          13:26-37:  16 once-used words

          13:38-14:12:  20 once-used words

          14:37-48:  19 once-used words

          15:13-24:  23 once-used words

          15:25-36:  15 once-used words

          15:37-16:1:  24 once-used words

 

Here are the top nine 12-verse segments of Mark, ranked in a most-non-Markan-words contest:

j 15:37-16:1:  24 once-used words

k 15:13-24:  23 once-used words

l 7:17-28:  21 once-used words

m 13:14-25:  21 once-used words

n 13:38-14:12:  20 once-used words

o 12:34-13:1:  19 once-used words

p 14:37-48:  19 once-used words

q 2:16-27:  18 once-used words

r 16:9-20:  18 once-used words

 

          The number of once-used – or, in Metzgerian spin-language, “non-Markan” words – in Mark 16:9-20 is high, but not remarkably or exceptionally high.  Mark 16:9-20 finishes the Most “Non-Markan”-Words contest in eighth or ninth place. 

          Mark 16:9-20 does have a few vocabulary-related features that don’t look fully consistent with the syntax used in Mark 1:1-16:8.  Perhaps the most notable example is the use of ἐκείνη (16:10), κἀκεῖνοι (16:11, 13), ἐκείνοις (16:13), and ἐκεῖνοι (16:20) all appearing as pronouns in 16:10, 11, and 13.  But κἀκεῖνον also appears in Mark 12:4-5 as a pronoun, twice.   This seems within the expressive range of any writer.  Plus, before we define “Markan style” and declare that Mark was capable of this expression but not that one, we should remember that it is not as if we are examining the style of War and Peace;  we only have 16 chapters from Mark.   

          Let’s look at some other objections:

          · Is it a glaring absence, as Travis Williams has alleged, for Mark 16:9-20 not to contain the words εὐθύς (“immediately”) and the πάλιν (“again”)?  Not the least little bit!  As Bruce Terry has pointed out, it is not just Mark 16:9-20 that does not employ εὐθύς and πάλιν; the last 53 verses of Mark do not employ them.  Terry divided the text of Mark 1:1-16:8 into 650 sets of 12 consecutive verses, and found that over 57% of such sets contain neither εὐθύς nor εὐθέως, and 61% do not have πάλιν.  More than 35% do not contain εὐθύς nor εὐθέως nor πάλιν.  “It is hardly an objection,” Terry writes, “to say that the last twelve verses are in the same category with more than one-third of the sets of twelve consecutive verses in the rest of the book.”

          · Is it inconsistent for an author to write πρώτη σαββάτων in 16:9, having used μιᾶς σαββάτον in 16:2?  I suspect that if Mark 16:9 had employed μιᾶς σαββάτον, the objection would automatically be raised that a mimic has imitated Mark’s language.  Casual variations of this sort are natural and we observe them in other places in Mark.  For instance, Mark states in 5:2 that the demoniac came ἐκ τῶν μνημείων, and then Mark uses different wording almost immediately in  5:3 and 5:5 (τοῖς μνήμασιν).  Similarly, Luke wrote ἐν τῷ σάββατῷ and ἐν τοῖς σάββασιν and τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τοῦ σαββάτου (cf. Lk. 13:10-16).

          · Is it inconsistent to write πορεύεσθαι three times (in verses 10,12, and 13), rather than to employ a compounded word (such as ἐκπορεύσθαι)?   John Burgon addressed this objection over a century ago.  The appearance of the uncompounded words in verses 10, 12, and 13 is unique, but the word involved is also very common (like the English word “go”).  “Unless the Critics are able to shew me which of the ordinary compounds of πορεύομαι S. Mark could possible have employed for the uncompounded verb [Burgon then lists each passage where  a form of πορεύομαι is used] their objection is simply frivolous.”

          · Is it inconsistent to use ἐθεάθη in 16:11 and θεασαμέοις in 16:14, rather than other terms (forms of ὁράω and βλέπω) that could have been used instead?  Again, this objection existed in Burgon’s day, and Burgon covered it thoroughly (on pp. 156-158 of The Last Twelve Verses of the Gospel According To S. Mark Vindicated, etc., 1871).  Comparable usages of unique verbiage that could be replaced with an author’s more ordinary vocabulary appear in the other Gospels too.  That Mark should use a special term to convey what were special encounters is not at all surprising.

          · Is it inconsistent to refer to Jesus’ followers in 16:10 as “those who had been with Him” (τοις μετ’ αυτου γενομένοις)?   A few moments’ thought should be sufficient for anyone to realize that the new phrase is called for by new circumstances.  On earlier occasions, Jesus’ followers had been with Him; no reason yet existed to refer to them as “those who had been with Him.”  Also, Mark uses similar language in 5:40 (τους μετ’ αυτοῦ).  The words τοις μετ’ αυτου γενομένοις would not and could not describe Jesus’ followers in the Gospel of Mark until 14:50.  Similarly, Mark simply had no previous occasion to use terms such as ἔνδεκα (“eleven”) and θανάσιμον (“deadly thing”).

           The following points supportive of Markan authorship of 16:9-20 should not be ignored:

          (1) Mark’s fondness for presenting things in groups of three is exhibited by the arrangement of three appearances of Christ after His resurrection (to Mary Magdalene, to the two travelers, and to the eleven, with ἐφάνη or ἐφανερώθη used each time).

          (2) Mark employs the terms ἀναστῆναι (8:31, 9:10), ἀναστῇ (9:9), and ἀναστήσεται (9:31, 10:34) to refer to Christ’s resurrection, although other terms could have been used.  The use of Ἀναστὰς in 16:9 is thus a Markan feature.

          (3) Mark uses the word πρωϊ (in 1:35, 11:20, 13:35, 15:1, 16:2) more frequently than the other Gospel-writers.  Its presence in 16:9 supports Markan authorship.

          (4) The words in 16:15 – πορευθέντες εἰς τὸν κόσμος ἅπαντα κηρύξατε τὸ εὐαγγέλιον (“Go into all the world, preach the gospel”) resemble the words in Mark 14:9 – κηρυχθῇ τὸ εὐαγγέλιον εἰς ὅλον τὸν κόσμος (“the gospel shall be preached into all the world”).

          (5) The term σκληροκαρδίαν (“hard-heartedness”) in 16:14 is somewhat uncommon, but it also appears in Mark 10:5.

          (6) Κτίσει is more Markan than it is anything else in the four Gospels (besides 16:15, forms of this word appear in Mark 10:6 and 13:19).

          (7) Κατακριθήσεται (“shall be condemned”) is Markan; cf. κατακρινοῦσιν in 10:33 and κατέκριναν in 14:64.

          (8) The appearance of ἀρρώστους in 16:18 is Markan; cf. ἀρρώστοις in  Mark 6:5 and ἀρρώστους in 6:13.

          (9) Πανταχοῦ (“everywhere”) in 16:20 is Markan, at least in the Alexandrian Text, appearing in Mark 1:28.  (A related term, either πάντοθεν or πανταχόθεν, is used in Mark 1:45.) 

           Sometimes this sneaky objection is made:  If Matthew and Luke possessed copies of Mark with 16:9-20, why didn’t they use its contents?  Let’s imagine that Mark 16:9-20 contained strong parallels with Matthew 28 and Luke 24.  The deduction by champions of the Alexandrian Text would have been automatic:  whoever created such an ending for the Gospel of Mark must have derived the parallels from Matthew and Luke!         

          This objection puts Mark 16:9-20 in a no-win scenario:  when Mark 16:9-20 doesn’t have strong parallels in Matthew 28 and Luke 24, it means that Mark 16:9-20 is spurious; yet had Mark 16:9-20 been brimming with strong parallels in Matthew 28 and Luke 24, this, too, would mean that Mark 16:9-20 is spurious!   The objection amounts to mere rhetoric.   

          The point should be raised though, that we should expect to see strong sustained parallels with Matthew or Luke or both in any ending composed to conclude the Gospel of Mark.  Since we see no such thing in Mark 16:9-20, the reasoning of Metzger on this particular point is cogent:  “It is unlikely that the long ending was composed ad hoc to fill up an obvious gap” (Textual Commentary, p. 125).    No one, trying to compose an ending for the Gospel of Mark, would write what is seen in Mark 16:9-20; the natural option would be, instead, to follow the narrative structure of Matthew 28:9-11 and 28:16-20.    

          The internal vocabulary-based evidence is is consistent with the hypothesis I have advocated in Authentic:  The Case for Mark 16:9-20:  Mark himself was permanently interrupted midway through 16:8, and his colleagues in Rome, before making any copies of Mark’s Gospel-narrative, completed his otherwise unfinished work by appending verses 9-20, having drawn them from Mark’s own writings.  As part of the text as it existed at the point when and where the production of the text in the ancestor of all copies ceased, and before the transmission of the text began, Mark 16:9-20 should be regarded as canonical and authoritative by all Christians.

Mark 16:9-20 Is Being Misrepresented. It Must Be Easter!

            Today is the first day after Easter 2020.   Happily, most journalistic outlets seem to have decided against publishing attacks on the passages of Scripture that affirm the bodily resurrection of Christ (or on the reliability of the Bible in general) – with one exception:  Bonnie Kristian’s article “Coronavirus and the mystery of St. Mark’s Easter story” was published in The Week, and on the Yahoo! News website.

            Kristian, a graduate of Bethel Seminary, targeted Mark 16:9-20 as part of her Easter celebration.  She attempted to draw a parallel between the fear that was felt by the women in Mark 16:8 and the fear that is felt by some people about the COVID-19 pandemic.  The same sort of parallel could be made using the fearfulness that is mentioned in Mark 16:5, or Luke 24:4-5, or John 20:19 – but Mark 16:8 was chosen instead, apparently so that Kristian could encourage readers to erase Mark 16:9-20 from the authoritative text, spreading some false claims along the way, such as the following:

● The KJV was translated from Latin rather than Hebrew and Greek.  That claim is false, and it has already been withdrawn from the article in The Week.  The Week regrets the error.

● In many ancient manuscripts of Mark, the Gospel ends at 16:8.   Today, the surviving text ends at the end of verse 8.  In real life, the number of Greek manuscripts of Mark that end the text there is three. The number of Latin manuscripts that end the text there:  one. The number of Syriac manuscripts that end the text there:  one.  The number of Greek manuscripts in which support for Mark 16:9-20 has survived is 1,640.  (This includes important ancient Greek manuscripts such as Codices A, C, D, W, etc.)   The number of Latin and Syriac manuscripts that include Mark 16:9-20 is in the thousands.  In addition to Gospel-manuscripts, Mark 16:9-20 is also prominently featured in hundreds of lectionaries, such as Sinai MS Gr, 212.

● Most modern translations, if they have verses 9-20, “add a preface stating it isn’t present in many of the best ancient manuscripts of Mark.”  This is false.  Most recent translations add a footnote, but when I consult the BibleGateway website, only the NIV and ESV appear to have a heading-note prefacing Mark 16:9, and it does not say what Kristien says.  There’s a reason for that:  two is not many.  

            The ESV’s heading-note stating that “Some of the earliest manuscripts” do not include verses 9-20 is not very accurate:  how many Greek manuscripts are in that “Some”?  The answer is, as already mentioned, is three.  One is GA 304, a medieval non-continuous commentary-manuscript.  Codex Sinaiticus (À, with replacement-pages at the end of Mark) is one of the two earlier ones, and Codex Vaticanus (B, with an entire blank column after the column in which Mark 16:8 appears) is the other.  

            Heading-notes and footnotes are brief by nature, and the point could be argued that a heading-note cannot be expected to mention Sinaiticus’ replacement-pages, or Vaticanus’ blank column.  But what keeps the note from being precise by referring to “Two” early Greek manuscripts instead of “Some”?  I hope it does not sound conspiratorial to mention one possibility:  the editors did not want readers to easily notice the narrowness of the thread from which their favored variant hangs.

● The KJV “includes uncritically a 12-verse ending.”  This is a technically ignorant statement – that is, Kristian has no special knowledge or insight about the critical research that went into the KJV; she simply does not know how much critical investigation into the question was made by the KJV’s translators.  Kristian says the KJV adopted Mark 16:9-20 “uncritically” but she did not mention any of the printed editions of the Greek New Testament that were issued in the 1500s – perhaps because she is unaware of their existence, thinking that the KJV was based on Latin instead.  I suspect that she is equally oblivious to the early patristic support of Mark 16:9-20 supplied by writers such as Irenaeus (in 180), Jerome (383), Augustine (400), Ambrose (385), Aphrahat (337), Ephrem Syrus (360) and Patrick (450) (to name just a few).  (For if she had known about them, it would have been deceptive to avoid mentioning them.  Surely, undoubtedly, The Week only misled its readers due to ignorance, not due to intent.) 

            There is still time for The Week to undo some of the damage its carelessly written article has done – although, alas, when misinformation is spread so irresponsibly, correcting it all is like trying to capture all of the coronavirus that a carrier has been sharing with family and friends over a weekend.

            There’s a lesson that may be learned from this:  if you read anything about the ending of the Gospel of Mark in a journal of any kind around Easter-time, and it does not mention that only three Greek manuscripts out of over 1,600 end the text at 16:8, and it does not mention that Irenaeus quoted Mark 16:19, and it does not mention Codex B’s blank space, know that you are reading propaganda, not a balanced report.

P.S.  N.T. Wright, this was partly your fault.  Fix your book!

P.P.S.  My research-book Authentic:  The Case for Mark 16:9-20 is available at Amazon as a Kindle e-book for 99 cents.   It can also be downloaded from Academia.edu for free.  Also, I will be glad to try to send a free digital copy to those who contact me and request it. 

Readers are invited to double-check the data in this post.

Christmas Combat: Luke 2:1-18 in Codex Bezae

            It’s time for another round of hand-to-hand combat!  Since it’s almost Christmastime, our combatants will square off in Luke 2:1-18, a passage which contains the accounts of the birth of Christ and the angels’ visit to the shepherds who were keeping watch over their flocks.  The competitors in today’s contest are the famous Codex Bezae (D, 05) – which nowadays is usually assigned to the early 400s – and GA 2370, a remarkably small minuscule Gospels-manuscript from the late 1000s, one of several Greek New Testament manuscripts at the Walters Art Museum (the manuscript is also known as Walters 522). 

            Before proceeding, let’s consider a few details about 2370:

            ● 2370 is a nearly complete copy of the four Gospels; the last verse on its last (damaged) page is John 21:3.

            ● The story of the adulteress is included (7:53 begins on page-view 521, numbered as fol. 253 at the top and as 248 at the bottom).  However, the pages from 247a (numbered as 242 at the bottom) (beginning in John 6:32) to 261 are secondary; the main copyist’s work resumes on 262a (page-view 539) in Jn. 10:14.  A few of the secondary pages were inserted upside-down.

            ● Each Gospel is accompanied by a picture of the Evangelist, and an icon-like headpiece.  For Mark, the headpiece is a portrait of Christ (with hardly any pigment surviving); for Luke, the headpiece is an icon representing the birth of John the Baptist; Zachariah stands in the margin, and Luke is represented in the initial.  For John, the full-page portrait shows John dictating to Prochorus, and the headpiece is a portrait (fairly intact) of Christ.

            ● A detailed description of 2370 can be found in Georgi R. Parpulov’s Catalogue of Greek Manuscripts at the Walters Art Museum, which the author dedicated to the memory of his beloved grandfather, Konstantin Tzitzelkov.

            This contest may provide a convenient test of the idea that the oldest a manuscript is, the better its text tends to be.  If the assigned production-dates for these two manuscripts are correct, then the copyists in the transmission-line of GA 2370 had more than twice as much time as the copyists of in the transmission-line of Codex D to make additions, omissions, and other mistakes in the text.  Let’s compare their contents and see which text is more accurate, using as our standard of comparison the Tyndale House Greek New Testament.

            As in earlier rounds of Hand-to-Hand Combat, a few ground rules are in play.  A point is assigned to each manuscript for each non-original letter in its text, and a point is also assigned to each manuscript for each original letter that is absent from its text.  Transpositions are mentioned, but do not result in any points unless there is an actual loss of a letter or letters.  Nomina sacra (i.e., sacred-name contractions) and other contractions in and of themselves are not considered variants, unless the contraction is of a word that is not in the original text. Movable-nu differences are not noted in this comparison.

Luke 2:1-18 in GA 2370

1 – no variants

2 – has η after αυτη (+1)

3 – has ιδιαν instead of εαυτου (+5, -6)

4 – no variants

5 – has μεμνηστευμένη instead of εμνηστευμενη (+1)

5 – has αυτου instead of αυτω (+2, -1)

5 – has γυναικι before ουση (+7)

5 – has εγκύω instead of ενκύω (+1, -1)

6 – no variants

7 – has τη before φατνη (+2)

8 – no variants

9 – has ιδου before αγγελος (+4)

10 – no variants

11 – no variants

12 – does not have και before κείμενον (-3)

13 – no variants

14 – has ευδοκια instead of ευδοκιας (-1)

15 – has και οι ανθρωποι after αγγελοι (+13)

15 – has ειπον instead of ελάλουν (+5, -7)

16 – has ηλθον instead of ηλθαν (+1, -1)

17 – has διεγνώρισαν instead of εγνώρισαν (+2)

18 – no variants

            Thus, when we look over 2370’s text and compare it to the Tyndale House edition of the Greek New Testament, as if the Tyndale House edition is the original text, 2370’s text of Luke 2:1-18 contains 45 non-original letters, and is missing 20 original letters, for a total of 65 letters’ worth of scribal corruption.  

            Now let’s look at the same passage in Codex Bezae, which is estimated to be at least 500 years older than GA 2370.  In a couple of places, there is a correction in the manuscript; to keep things simple I removed these variants from consideration after making mention of them.

Luke 2:1-18 in Codex Bezae (D, 05)

1 – no variants

2 – transposes to εγενετο απογραφη πρωτη

3 – has πατριδα instead of πολιν (+6, -4)

4 – has Ναζαρεθ instead of Ναζαρετ (+1, -1)

4 – has Ιουδα instead of Ιουδαίαν (-3)

4 – has καλειτε instead of καλειται (+1, -2)

4 – transposes the last phrase of v. 4 and the first phrase of v. 5

5 – has απογράψεσθαι instead of απογράψασθαι (+1, -1)

6 – has ως instead of εγενετο before δε (+2, -7)

6 – has παρεγείνοντο instead of εν τω ειναι αυτους εκει after δε (+12, -19)

6 – has ετελέσθησαν instead of επλήσθησαν (+4, -3)

7 – no variants

8 – has δε after ποιμενες instead of και before ποιμενες (+2, -3)

8 – has χαρα ταυτη instead of χωρα τη αυτη (+1, -2) [correction in MS]

8 – has τας before φυλακας (+3)

9 – has ϊδου before αγγελος (+4)

9 – does not have κυρίου (ΚΥ) after δοξα (-6, or -2 if counted as contracted sacred name)

10 – has υμειν instead of υμιν (+1)

10 – has και before εσται (+3)

11 – has υμειν instead of υμιν (+1)

12 – has υμειν instead of υμιν (+1)

12 – has εστω after σημειον (+4)

12 – does not have και κείμενον (-11)

13 – has στρατειας instead of στρατιας (+1)  

13 – has αιτουντων instead of αινουντων (+1, -1) [correction in MS]

15 – no variants

15 – moves οι αγγελοι to follow απηλθον

15 – has και οι ανθρωποι before οι ποιμενες (+13)

15 – has ειπον instead of ελάλουν (+5, -7)

15 – has γεγονως instead of γεγονος (+1, -1) [correction in MS]

15 – has ημειν instead of ημιν (+1)

16 – has ηλθον instead of ηλθαν (+1, -1)

16 – has σπευδοντες instead of σπευσαντες (+2, -2)

16 – has ευρον instead of ανευρον (-2)

16 – does not have τε before Μαριαμ (-2)

16 – has Μαριαν instead of Μαριαμ (+1, -1)

17 – does not have τουτου (-6)

18 – has ακουοντες instead of ακουσαντες (+1, -2)

18 – has εθαυμαζον instead of εθαυμασαν (+2, -2)

            Thus, when we look over Codex D’s text of Luke 2:1-18, and compare it to the Tyndale House edition of the Greek New Testament, as if the Tyndale House edition is the original text, D’s text of this passage contains 76 non-original letters, and is missing 86 original letters, for a total of 162 letters’ worth of scribal corruption.  

            Can we make the score – only 65 letters’ worth of corruption in 2370’s transmission-line over 900 years, but 162 letters’ worth of corruption in Codex D’s transmission-line over 350 years! – a little closer by removing trivial spelling-related variants from consideration?  If we overlook the variant-units that involve  the spelling of Ναζαρετ in verse 4, καλειται in verse 4, εγκύω in verse 5, απογράψασθαι in verse 5, the corrected reading in verse 8, υμιν in verses 10, 11, and 12, στρατιας in verse 13, the corrected readings in verses 13 and 15, ημιν in verse 15, ηλθαν in verse 16, Μαριαμ in verse 16, and εθαυμασαν in verse 18, Codex D’s text of Luke 2:1-18 still contains 62 non-original letters, and is still missing 74 original letters, yielding a total of 136 letters’ worth of scribal corruptions.

            Thus we see that 2370, a medieval minuscule that is not mentioned in the textual apparatuses of the Nestle-Aland, UBS, or Tyndale House compilations (or any other textual apparatus that I know of), contains a text of Luke 2:1-18 that is, at minimum, twice as accurate as the text of Luke 2:1-18 in Codex Bezae.

            In addition, in at least four places in this passage, I suspect that the Tyndale House edition of the Greek New Testament contains a corruption. 

            ● First, the spelling of ενκύω (εγκύω in NA, in Tregelles, in Scholz, in Baljon, in Souter, in Holmes’ SBLGNT, and in Byz) in 2:5:  what justifies the adoption of this anomaly?

            ● Second, there is the contest involving the final word of Luke 2:14.  Regarding this I have offered an analysis previously, vindicating the reading ευδοκια which is the basis for the phrase (and carol-lyric) “Peace on earth, good will to men.” 

            ● Third, in verse 9, ἰδού is broadly attested by A D Κ Θ Byz 157 1424 OL Vulgate Pesh, and should be retained.  Contrary to Metzger’s proposal that it is difficult to imagine why copyists would have omitted “behold,” it is not hard at all to reckon that they felt over-beholden, in light of the recurrence of the same term in v. 10 (and in 1:20, 1:31, 1:36, 1:38, 1:44, 1:48, and in 2:25).  The word ἰδού is omitted in 2:25 by D and N; it is also omitted by D in 6:23, 7:12, and 8:41, 9:39 (where ℵ also omits), 10:25, 23:15, and 24:13.  The same phenomenon is on display at Lk. 17:21 and 19:19 in 157, and at 22:21 in f¹³, and at 23:29 in P75, D, and f¹³, and in 24:49 in P75 and D.  (Readers may also compare how the word “Behold” has disappeared from some English versions, even though ἰδού remains in their base-text.)        

            ● Fourth, in verse 15, it is easy to notice that the words καὶ οἱ ἄνθρωποι are vulnerable to accidental parableptic loss, situated between οἱ ἄγγελοι and οἱ ποιμένες, especially when ἄνθρωποι is written in contracted form (και οι ανθοι οι).  Tregelles included these words in his Greek New Testament, albeit in brackets.  Burgon’s brief comments on this passage (in Causes of Corruption, page 36) remain forceful. 

           Finally, especially in light of the approach of the Christmas season, a feature in 2370 draws our attention:  the headpiece for the Gospel of Matthew is a Nativity icon – or what is left of one.   Mary and the baby Jesus are depicted in the center of the picture; when the icon was pristine, the red paint around Mary represented her red bed-mattress. Joseph and other characters are also in the picture.  Above the picture is the heading for the lection assigned to the Sunday before Christmas (for the Holy Fathers).  In the outer margin next to the main picture are representations of Abraham and David.  This small manuscript was apparently used by some very devout readers, whose kisses gradually took away most of the pigment.      

Readers are invited to double-check the data in this post.  

           

Parablepsis: When Nothing Is Something

             Parablepsis is what happens when a copyist’s line of sight drifts from one word or set of letters in his master-copy to the same (or similar) word or set of letters a little further along in his master-copy, accidentally skipping the words or letters in between.  When manuscripts share arrays of short readings that look like they were caused by parablepsis, it’s reasonable to posit a relationship of some sort between the manuscripts with those short readings.  Before looking into that further, let’s take a look at four examples of parablepsis that appear in the Gospel of Matthew in one of the most important manuscripts we have:  Codex Sinaiticus. 

● Matthew 7:27 – In the description of the fall of the house of the foolish builder, the scribe’s line of sight drifted from ποταμοὶ καὶ to ἄνεμοι καὶ, accidentally losing the phrase about the blowing winds.  The scribe of minuscule 579 made the same mistake in verse 25.  Another Alexandrian manuscript’s scribe made a worse mistake:  the scribe of minuscule 33 skipped from the words τη οικία ἐκείνη (“that house”) in verse 25 to to the same words in verse 27, skipping verse 26 entirely and producing a Greek sentence which says that when storms came to the wise man’s house, it fell with a great crash!

● Matthew 9:15 – The scribe of À skipped from the word νυμφίος at the end of Jesus’ question to the recurrence of the same word, losing the phrase “But days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them.” 

● Matthew 13:39 – The scribe of À skipped from the letters ο δε after διάβολος to the similar letters οι δε before θερισται, thus missing the phrase “the harvest is the end of the age.” 

● Matthew 21:19 – The scribe of À did not write the word ευρεν (“found”) between the word ουδεν and the word εν.  The omission could have been elicited by either homoioteleuton (“same endings” or by homeoarcton (“same beginnings”). 

            As far as I know, Codex Sinaiticus is the only manuscript that has all four of these readings.  If we were to find another manuscript, and all we knew about it was that it contained these three exact readings, I would strongly suspect that it was extremely closely related to Codex Sinaiticus.   As Kirsopp Lake wrote, “Whereas agreement in a correct reading is no criterion of similarity of origin, agreement in erroneous readings is a very good criterion.”  The odds seem extremely low that two copyists would make the same series of parableptic errors.  The thing to see is that by observing readings in manuscripts that can be accounted for by parablepsis, we can deduce that the manuscripts that share those readings are related to one another.

            Consider Matthew 12:47:  this verse is not in the English Standard Version, because the editors of the ESV relied so heavily on the Alexandrian Text.  But the absence of this verse is elegantly accounted for as a parableptic error; an early copyist’s line of sight jumped from the word λαλησαι (“to speak”) at the end of verse 46 to the same word at the end of verse 47, losing the words in between, which constitute verse 47.  Are the manuscripts that lack verse 47 closely related?  While there are a smattering of unrelated manuscripts that do not include this verse, the major Greek manuscripts for non-inclusion are Sinaiticus, Vaticanus, Codex L, and Codex Γ, and although Codex Γ’s text is Byzantine, the other three are flagship manuscripts of the Alexandrian Text.  Even Codex Γ reveals the influence of Alexandrian manuscripts in its ancestry; it includes a rare interpolation in Matthew 27:49 that is also attested by À, B, and L. (For more about Mt. 12:47, see this post.)  The ESV really should put this verse back in the text where it belongs.

            Now let’s aim this principle at some readings in the Byzantine Text that are shorter than their rival readings in the Alexandrian Text.  There are hundreds of such readings; here I will briefly focus on just 20 – five from each Gospel.

● Matthew 10:8 – If the text originally read Ασθενουντας θεραπεύετε νεκρους εγείρετε λεπρους καθαρίζετε (Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers), the shorter Byzantine reading can be accounted for by a parableptic error from -ετε to -ετε. 

● Matthew 13:40 – If the text originally read κατακαίεται, an accidental skip from κα- to κα- would account for the Byzantine reading.

● Matthew 19:24 – If the text originally read πλούσιον εισελθειν εις την βασιλείαν του θεου, a parableptic error from εισ- to εις could elicit the loss of the intervening letters, eliciting further the movement of εισελθειν to the end of the verse.     

● Matthew 24:38 – If the text originally read εν ταις ημέραις εκείναις, an accidental skip from –αις to –αις could result in the loss of the word εκείναις.

● Matthew 27:40 – If the text originally read και κατάβηθι, an accidental skip from κα- to κα- could result in the loss of the word και.

● Mark 2:21 – If the text originally read απ’ αυτου, an accidental skip from α- to α- could result in the loss of απ’.

● Mark 3:28 – If the text originally read και αι, an accidental skip from -αι to αι could result in the loss of αι.

● Mark 4:18 –If the text originally read ουτοί εισιν οι τον, an accidental skip from ο- to ο- could result in the loss of ουτοί εισιν.

● Mark 12:8 – If the text originally read εξέβαλον αυτον, an accidental skip from -ον to ον could result in the loss of αυτον.

● Mark 14:21 – If the text originally read Οτι ὁ μεν, an accidental skip from Ο- to ὁ could result in the loss of Οτι.

● Luke 11:20 – If the text originally read εγω εκβαλλω, an accidental skip from ε- to ε- could result in the loss of εγω.

● Luke 19:4 – If the text originally read εις το εμπροσθεν, an accidental skip from ε- to ε- could result in the loss of εις το.

● Luke 20:19 – If the text originally read εφοβήθησαν τον λαόν, an accidental skip from -ν to –ν could result in the loss of τον λαόν.    

● Luke 22:18 – If the text originally read απο του νυν απο, an accidental skip from απο to απο could result in the loss of απο του νυν.

● Luke 22:30 – If the text originally read τραπέζης μου εν τη βασιλεία μου, an accidental skip from μου to μου could result in the loss of εν τη βασιλεία μου.  (Many Byzantine manuscripts, including manuscripts used to form the Textus Receptus, have the longer reading here.)

● John 1:19 – If the text originally read οτε απέστειλαν προς αυτον οι, an accidental skip from

-ν to -ν could result in the loss of προς αυτον.

● John 1:50 – If the text originally read οτι ειπόν σοι, οτι ειδον, an accidental skip from -ι to -ι could result in the loss of οτι.

● John 4:3 – If the text originally read και απηλθεν παλιν εις την Γαλιλαίαν, an accidental skip from -ν to –ν could result in the loss of παλιν.

● John 11:30 – If the text originally read αλλ’ ην ετι εν τω τόπω, an accidental skip from ε- to ε- could result in the loss of ετι.

● John 21:21 – If the text originally read Τουτον ουν ιδων ο Πέτρος, an accidental skip from -ν to -ν could result in the loss of ουν.   

            There are many more textual contests in the New Testament in which (a) the Byzantine Text has a reading that is shorter than its rival Alexandrian reading, and (b) the shorter reading can be accounted for as a result of parablepsis.  For example, in the Byzantine Text, James 4:12 does not have the words και κριτής (“and Judge”), a short reading which can be explained if the verse originally began with Εις εστιν νομοθέτης και κριτης and an accidental skip was made from the -της at the end of νομοθέτης to the -της at the end of κριτης. 

From all this, we should draw two conclusions:

(1)  If is acknowledged that, say, half of these short Byzantine readings are the result of parablepsis, then unless we assume that scribes independently made the same mistake at the same point in the text ten times – which seems highly improbable – then they must echo an earlier ancestor-manuscript in which the text of these passages had been shortened via parableptic error. 

(2) Textual critics should use manuscript-evidence that represents different text-types, not just the Byzantine Text.  This is the only way to detect (and remedy) parableptic errors in which some text was lost but a sensible sentence was formed nevertheless.  It appears that most Byzantine Gospels-manuscripts are descended from a master-copy or master-copies in which some small snippets of the text have been lost via parablepsis.  It also appears, from other research, that most Alexandrian Gospels-manuscripts are descended from a master-copy or master-copies in which much more text has been lost via parablepsis.  To depend too heavily on one form of the text, merely because its oldest representatives lasted longer in Egypt’s low-humidity climate, or upon another form of the text, because it has circulated in a much higher number of manuscripts, is not our best option.