Minuscule 490: Remarkably Unremarkable!

            One of the most ordinary Gospels-manuscripts you will ever see is minuscule 490, housed at the British Library (catalogued as B.L. Additional MS 7141 – formerly listed as minuscule 574).  It has some decoration – all in red pigment – and headpieces before the beginning of each Gospel, but there are no Evangelists’ portraits; no multi-color initials – nothing particularly eye-catching.  Let’s take a closer look, though, to see if there is GA 490 has anything interesting textually.

            Like a lot of other medieval Gospels manuscripts, 490 does not begin immediately with the Gospels’ text:  first there is Eusebius’ letter Ad Carpianus, explaining how to make use of the Eusebian Canon-tables and Sections.  (in 490, the letter is framed within a quatrefoil frame, on four pages, sort of like the format in GA 114.  The quatrefoil is barbed on the first and last page of Ad Carpianus (written in red).  On the second and third pages of Ad Carpianus, the quatrefoil is accompanied by drawings of four birds.  The next eight pages contain the Canon-tables themselves.  Next comes the list of 68 kephalaia (chapters) for the Gospel of Matthew. 

 

The first headpiece in 490.

On fol. 8, the text of Matthew begins, written in two columns (27 lines per column), below a leafy headpiece that fills about half the page.  There is a sketch of an antelope in the margin alongside the headpiece.  Except for the initial “B,” which is drawn in red, resembling a stylized vine, the changed when the Scriptural text begins; everything up to this point is red; the text after this point (except initials) is brown.  (Section-numbers and Canon-numbers, titloi, chapter-numbers, and the lectionary apparatus (dividing the text into lections for the Synaxarion) are in the margins in red.) 

On 10r, Matthew 2:11 reads εἰδον (“saw”), like most manuscripts, disagreeing with Stephanus’ ευρον (“found”). 

On 10v we see that sacred names are not contracted with 100% consistency; in Matthew 3:2, ουρανων (“of heaven”) is spelled in full.  On 58r, κυριε (“Lord”) is written in full in Matthew 27:63, where the Pharisees address Pilate.

On 11r, “and fire” is not included at the end of Matthew 3:11.  

On 14r, an incipit-phrase, ειπεν ο Κς (“The Lord said”) is written in the margin alongside the beginning of Matthew 5:31.

On 15v, Matthew 6:13 includes the doxology of the Lord’s Prayer.

On 21v, a small cross has been drawn in the margin alongside Matthew 9:36.
On 26r and 26v, the copyist worked around a hole in the parchment.  (Similarly, the copyist avoided writing on a small tear in the parchment later in Matthew 12:45 and 12:50, and on folio 36.)  More small holes and tears appear further along in the manuscript.

On 40v, Matthew 20:16b is included in the text, at the end of a lection.

On 47v, alongside Matthew 24:1, the small cross (with dots, arranged ⁜) appears again.

On 53v, the lectionary apparatus (written in this instance in different ink) includes, after Matthew 27:39, instructions for the lector to jump to Luke.

On 57r, Matthew 27:35b is not in the text.

On 59v, the text of Matthew ends in the first column; the closing title is written in red.

After Mark’s kephalaia-list, the text of Mark begins on 61r; a red headpiece fills part of the first column.  Mark 1:2 reads “in the prophets.”
On 61v, Mark 1:16 reads αμφίβληστρα 

On 64r, Mark 2:17 ends with “to repentance,” at the end of a lection.

On 73v, Mark 7:16 is in the text, at the end of a lection.

On 78r, Mark 9:29 includes “and fasting.”

On 83r, a cross is sketched in the margin alongside Mark 11:27.

On 92r, Mark 15:28 is not included.  On 92v, a note in the lower margin introduces the tenth of the 12 Passion-lections.

On 93v, Mark 16:9 includes ο Ις (“Jesus”) after Αναστας (“Rising”).

The text of Mark ends on 94r; the kephalaia-list for Luke begins in the second column of the page.

The text of Luke begins on 95r. 

On 106r, a cross is sketched in the margin alongside Luke 5:27. 

On 106v, Luke 6:1 includes δευτεροπρώτω.

On 111r, Luke 7:31 does not include “And the Lord said.”

On 116v, Luke 9:23 includes “daily” (καθ’ ἡμέραν)

On 118v, ως καὶ Ἡλίας ἐποίησε (“as Elijah also did”) is included in Luke 9:54, filling exactly one line.  In Luke 9:55-56, the last part of verse 55 and all of verse 56 are present.

On 124r, Luke 11:54 includes ζητουντες and ινα κατηγορήσωσιν αυτου.

On 128r, Luke 13:19 includes μέγα (agreeing with P45 Byz A W Pesh).

On 134r, Luke 17:9 includes ου δοκω.

On 136v, in Luke 18:24, περίλυπον γενόμενον is included.

On 140v, in Luke 20:23, τί με πειράζετε is included.

On 144v, in Luke 22:31, ειπε δε ο Κς is included.

On 145r, Luke 22:43-44 is included.  A lectionary note in 22:45, after μαθητας, in different writing, mentions the jump to Matthew (cf. 53v).

On 147r, Luke 22:17 is included.

On 147v, Luke 23:34b is included.  In the lower margin, there is a note to introduce the eighth Passion-lection (Lk. 23:32-49).  

On 148v, in Luke 24:1, καί τινες συν αυταις is included.

On 150r, before Luke 24:36, ⁜ appears in the text.

The text of Luke concludes on 151r in the first column.  The chapter-list for John, in red, occupies the second column.

The text of John begins on 152r.  A three-sided frame surrounds the book’s title in the headpiece in the first column.

On 153r, John 1:29 has ὁ Ιωάννης after βλεπει.

On 158v, John 4:42 includes ὁ Χς.

On 159v, John 5:3b-4 is included.  Verse 4 begins αγγελος γαρ κυ, agreeing with A K L Δ.

On 162v, in John 6:22, εκεινο εις ὁ ενέβησαν οι μαθηται αυτου is included.

On 166v, in John 7:46, ως ουτος ὁ ανος is included, occupying a single line.

On 167r, John 8:12 follows 7:52 without interruption on the same line.  The pericope adulterae is completely absent.

On 169r, in John 8:59, διελθων δια μέσου αυτων και παρηγεν ουτως is included.

On 175r, John 12:1 includes ὁ τεθνηκώς.

On 182v, in John 16:16, οτι υπάγω προς τον πρα is included.

On 188v, before John 19:25, ⁜ appears in the text. 

On 192v, the text of John ends in the first column.  In John 21:23, τι πρός σε is included. The line-length slightly decreases, vortex-style, for 12 lines.  There is a simple decoration to indicate the end of the book but there is no closing book-title or subscription. 

            The text of GA 490 is an exceptionally pure – that is, unmixed – Byzantine Text.  It was skillfully written.  (Perhaps it was made “in house” at a monastery; there are no stichoi-notes.)  Except for the non-inclusion of the pericope adulterae, it is very similar to the Gospels-text in the 1982 Hodges-Farstad Greek New Testament According to the Majority Text.  Movable-nu is very often dropped.  At random, I picked page 270 of the Hodges-Farstad text (containing Luke 21:7-18) to compare to 490.  In Luke 21:7-18, I found exactly one difference between Hodges-Farstad and 490:  in verse 7, 490 has μέλλει instead of μέλλη. 
            Incipit-phrases are not present in the main lectionary apparatus, but some have been added in secondary, scrawled margin-notes for the 12 Passion-time lections.

            Because 490’s text is so similar to the standard Byzantine text, the most unusual thing about it may be the titles of the four Gospels:  the headpiece to Matthew introduces all four Gospels in its central quatrefoil:  ΣΥΝ ΘΩ ΕΥΑΓΓΕΛΙΟΝ ΤΩΝ ΤΕΣΣΑΡΩΝ  ΕΥΑΓΓΕΛΙΣΤΩΝ.  Four circles, within the four corners of the headpiece, contain four segments of the title for the Gospel of Matthew:  ΕΚ ΤΟΥ + ΚΑΤΑ + ΜΑΤ + ΘΑΙΟΝ.

            Mark’s title:  ΕΥΑΓΓΕΛΙΟΝ ΕΚ ΤΟΥ ΚΑΤΑ ΜΑΡΚΟΝ

            Luke’s title:  ΕΥΑΓΓΕΛΙΟΝ ΕΚ ΤΟΥ ΚΑΤΑ ΛΟΥΚΑΝ

Claudius James Rich

            John’s title:  ΕΥΑΓΓΕΛΙΟΝ ΕΚ ΤΟΥ ΚΑΤΑ ΙΩΑΝΝΗΝ ΑΓΙΟΥ

           

            It is unusual to see ΕΚ ΤΟΥ in the titles in a continuous-text manuscript.  It is not unique – Codex L also has “ΕΚ ΤΟΥ” in its title for Matthew, and 1241’s title for Matthew includes ΣΥΝ ΘΕΩ.  Chief members of family 13 (and 1071) also have εκ του in at least one Gospel-title.  It is not easy to intuit the reason for these unusual titles.  Perhaps the person who added the titles in the headpieces was used to putting titles in lectionaries.

           

            Another thing about 490 worth noticing is that it came to light back in the 1820’s as part of the collection of antiquities left by Claudius James Rich (1787-1821), a notable British scholar who traveled widely in the Middle East.

Interview with Maurice Robinson - Part 3

RP2005

          Today we conclude our interview with Dr. Maurice Robinson, one of the compilers of the Byzantine Textform.

Q:  Dr. Robinson, what would you say to someone who said, “I want to follow the Majority Text, but I want to follow the majority text in manuscripts up to the year 900, and set aside the late manuscripts, most of which are Byzantine”?

Robinson:  Should others desire to adopt a different type of Byzantine preference theory, they certainly are welcome to do so. Clearly, a theory for the Gospels based on a Byzantine uncial consensus (e.g., that of A E F G H K M S U V Ω, and parts of W) would approximate closely the results obtained when the wider minuscule consensus is included.
          The problem would be more severe, however, in the Acts and Epistles, where the available uncial manuscripts are fewer, particularly those of Byzantine type that predate the 9th century.  The consensus base for those New Testament books would seem to require inclusion of later minuscule testimony, else the resultant text of those New Testament books will be less Byzantine than what the similar process might produce among the Gospels.  Further, the situation in Revelation would be far worse, since the competing Byzantine groups there primarily depend upon minuscules made after the 800’s (generally representing the Majority-Andreas and Majority-Koine forms of the text) — leave these out of consideration, and it would be difficult to say what the resultant text might become (most likely quite non-Byzantine in nature).

          For the Gospels, a pre-9th century Byzantine consensus would be as strong and even more viable than portions of the Hodges-Farstad theory where they appealed to less-than-Byzantine minority groups to settle instances of textual division; certainly such a method also would be far more reasonable than adopting a recensional form of text found only among late manuscripts (such as the Family 35 subgroup).  Other possible approaches that would result in a basically Byzantine form of text could include following the archetype of Family Π/Ka or (perhaps with less likelihood of success) von Soden’s K1 group. From my perspective, however, none of these alternatives appear superior to the present Byzantine-priority hypothesis, methodology, and obtainable results.

Q:  Any comments on Nestle-Aland 28?

Robinson:  Particularly I am disappointed with one aspect of the new format, namely the editors’ decision to eliminate mention of fluctuating degrees of minority Greek manuscript support for variant readings (the “pc” and “al” designations). This move leaves users of the NA28 apparatus unclear as to the relative amount of support a given variant reading might have, and – even worse – readers might presume that only the manuscripts cited for a particular NA28 reading actually support such – and this even though the editors explicitly claim the new format supposedly should prevent such.

          Although the editors claim that “pc and al cannot be used in a precisely defined way, because full collation of all the manuscripts would yield more witnesses for known variants,” such special pleading appears peculiar, particularly when the full collation data of Text und Textwert are compared against readings designated pc or al in the former NA27 apparatus.  The Text und Textwert data regularly validate the propriety of the pc and al designations within a concise, more limited apparatus. From my perspective, those designations ought to be reinstated in future NA editions, along with re-inclusion of at least some of the previous consistently cited witnesses from NA26/27 that no longer appear in NA28.

        On a positive note, the new typeface is nice, and the NA28 regularization of some orthographic forms was long overdue. Similarly, I consider the elimination of conjectural suggestions from the apparatus beneficial, although an appendix listing the more important of these could be informative in terms of understanding scholarly views on the matter.

Q:  In the approach you describe in “The Case for Byzantine Priority,” a prohibition on conjectural emendation is Rule #1. What do you think of NA28’s introduction of a conjectural emendation into the text of Second Peter 3:10?

Robinson:  Given that the UBS/NA editions long have had a conjecture at Acts 16:12, the inclusion of a new conjecture at Second Peter 3:10 (dating from at least the time of Tischendorf — see his 8th edition’s apparatus) is unsurprising, particularly since the basic Alexandrian reading in that location — found in the main text of previous critical editions dating back to Tregelles and W-H — simply makes no good sense (kai ta en auth erga eureqhsetai, literally “and the works in her shall be found”). The point is well illustrated in the translational circumlocutions that appear among those English versions based on the critical text.  Consider the following, grouped according to how they render eureqhsetai:

Lexham:     “and the deeds done on it will be disclosed.”

HCSB:       “and the works on it will be disclosed.”

NRSV:       “and everything that is done on it will be disclosed.”

NIV:          “and everything done in it will be laid bare.”

NET:          “and every deed done on it will be laid bare.”

CEB:          “and all the works done on it will be exposed.”

ESV:          “and the works that are done on it will be exposed.”

GW:           “and everything that people have done on it will be exposed.”

ISV:           “and everything done on it will be exposed.”

NCV:         “and everything in it will be exposed.”

TEV:          “with everything in it will vanish.”

NIrV:         “God will judge the earth and everything done in it.”

Mess:         “and all its works exposed to the scrutiny of Judgment.”

NLT:          “everything on it will be found to deserve judgment.”

Voice:        “and all the works done on it will be seen as they truly are.”

NAB:         “and everything done on it will be found out.”

         Of these, only the Roman Catholic New American Bible comes close to the base meaning of the problematic construction. So certainly, the NA28 conjectural inclusion of ouk before eureqhsetai makes far better sense without requiring alteration of the proper meaning of the word in the process (thus NA28 in conjecture: “shall [not] be found”). The proposed conjecture, therefore, is quite good, and similar in quality to what Rendel Harris suggested for First Peter 3:19, where the main text en w kai should be supplemented by the conjectural addition of Enwc (thereby reading, “in which also Enoch”) — a brilliant conjecture; yet equally without manuscript evidence, and equally recognized by most scholars as non-original, just as they ought to regard the current NA28 conjecture at Second Peter 3:10.

          Put simply, researchers — particularly those involved in the study and use of actual manuscript testimony — should not invent or prefer readings that have no known existence among the Greek manuscript base merely because such might “make better sense” than an otherwise problematic preferred reading (not that I consider eureqhsetai to be original over against the Byzantine katakahsetai, but obviously the critical text editors do so presume). As I recently commented on the Evangelical Textual Criticism blog,

The problem I have with conjectural readings is not restricted to a priori concerns related to a Byzantine Priority or majority text position, but rather as ultimately involving transmissional considerations; i.e., any conjectured reading — assuming such supposedly to be more reasonable than what appears among the existing witnesses — would have to explain transmissionally how and why such would utterly disappear from our known transmissional history. Were such conjectures actually superior to all extant alternatives, I would consider their lack of perpetuation to be inexplicable.

Q:  Could you briefly explain how the NA28 has many conjectural emendations if one considers short series of variant-units instead of just single variant-units?

Robinson:  I have already written extensively on the so-called “zero-support” verses in the Nestle-Aland editions, both in a published essay in Translating the New Testament: Text, Translation, Theology and in a subsequent ETS presentation in 2012. 

          To summarize: if individual variant support in NA27 is considered in a linear manner (i.e., the stated documentary support for an entire verse containing at least two variant units, when reduced to its combined joint agreement), at least 105 whole verses exist in the critical text that apparently lack any actual existence in the form published, whether from any Greek manuscript, ancient version, or patristic source. In those instances, the result obviously becomes de facto conjecture.
          In my follow-up paper, I examined two-verse segments in NA27 using the same criteria, and found an additional 210 similar portions of text that again as published lack attestation from any known witness (suffice it to say that among the manuscripts comprising the Byzantine Textform, such never occurs in relation to passages of similar length). Note that the same findings apply to the NA28 edition as well, since its main text and apparatus support basically remain the same.

The Greek New Testament
for Beginning Readers

Q:  Could you explain again why Revelation is so different in the Hodges-Farstad compilation?

Robinson:  Although more differences appear between H-F and RP in Revelation than elsewhere in the New Testament, they are not that extensive as when either text is compared against the Old Uncial form of the critical editions. Rather, the primary differences between the Byzantine form of text in H-F and RP mainly involve H-F utilizing a particular stemmatic approach that prefers a minority Byzantine subgroup that they considered original – a group that at times represents less than 30% of the Byzantine manuscripts of that book. In contrast, RP2005 presents a non-stemmatic model representing a general consensus among the two primary Byzantine groups within that book.

          Where these two groups divide, RP generally follow the Majority-Koine group except where a significant number of its manuscripts align with the Majority-Andreas group – this because the Majority-Andreas group appears to reflect a single archetype derived from the Andreas commentary that usually accompanies those particular manuscripts.

Q:  It was recently acknowledged by a textual critic from Dallas Theological Seminary that “many” people subscribe to the Byzantine Priority school.  Besides you, who are these people?

Robinson:  What Dallas critic might have suggested such (I speak as a fool)?  I would prefer to say that many have a preference for a text similar to the Byzantine who might claim to be majority or Byzantine supporters, but who speedily dissent from such whenever the Byzantine Textform departs from their favored Textus Receptus/KJV type of reading.

            Beyond Pierpont and myself, among those who are not TR/KJV partisans but who favor some form of the Byzantine text (not necessarily agreeing with our specific theory or methodology nor resultant form of the text) would include Hodges and Farstad, John Wenham, Jakob van Bruggen, Peter Johnston, Harry Sturz, Wilbur Pickering, Paul Anderson, Thomas Edgar, James Davis, Donald Brake, Timothy Friberg (not all still living) and others, including several more Europeans along with many of my own students.  Not all of these have published in relation to textual matters, and thus some names may be unfamiliar; yet in general they remain pro-Byzantine to some degree.  There also are numerous laypeople that have communicated with me or these others over the years who hold to some sort of Byzantine or majority text position, but I only mention here a few who have published within academia.

Q:  Finally:  in NA28, in Second Peter 2:18, the editors rejected oligws and adopted ontws, even though the adoption of oligws had previously been given an “A” ranking (as if the editors were certain that it was correct).  Any idea how that happened?

Robinson:  The answer apparently is the “wag the dog” influence of CBGM and little else; this particularly in view of Metzger’s previous strong defense of oligws in his Textual Commentary. I also note that in the process UBS5 lowered the rating from “A” to “C” – again without providing any particular reason or justification for such.  Nice that they here adopted a Byzantine reading, but clearly not for the same reason that I would do so.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts.

 — end of interview — 

Links:  Part One.  Part Two.

Interview with Maurice Robinson, Part 1

Dr. Maurice Robinson

        This week at The Text of the Gospels, Dr. Maurice Robinson of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary (in Wake Forest, NC) joins us for an interview about the Byzantine Text.  He is known to many as one of the compilers of The New Testament in the Original Greek – Byzantine Textform.   Thanks for accepting my invitation, Dr. Robinson.

Robinson:  I am pleased to have this opportunity to respond to various questions.

Q:  Let’s jump right in.  The Robinson-Pierpont text, the Hodges-Farstad Majority Text, and Wilbur Pickering’s family-35 text are all presented as representations of the Byzantine text.  How different from one another are these compilations?

Robinson:  All three differ approximately 6 to 7 percent from what appears in the Nestle-Aland/UBS critical text, and represent forms of the Byzantine text that vary due to differing theoretical and methodological approaches.  Were I to estimate the degree of difference between any of these basically Byzantine editions, it would probably be only about one-half percent in any paired comparison, given that these all agree in relation to the vast bulk of the NT where the Byzantine Textform basically remains undivided.
          I would not label these other editions “Byzantine-priority,” however, since their underlying methodology allows for some minority group (i.e., far from dominant) Byzantine readings at various points of Byzantine division, whether based on stemmatic preferences (H-F) or by following a minority subgroup within the Byzantine mass (Family 35).  These alternative theories and methods might reflect a general “Byzantine preference,” but they do not in all instances reflect the prevailing agreement reflective of a basic consensus of all Byzantine manuscripts.

Q:  Can you provide a few differences between RP2005 and the BGNT that have an impact on translation?

Robinson:  I really haven’t had any need to compare RP2005 against the Family 35/Kr type of text since no individual Byzantine minority subgroup is determinative in establishing a general consensus text within a Byzantine-priority approach.  While the BGNT does not directly note the differences between the two editions, Pickering’s closely related Family 35/Kr edition does footnote differences between his text and RP2005 (along with various other editions).  I have also seen an English-based list of “clearly translatable differences” that exist “between Kx and Kr/f35” that likely covers most of these variations — but even then, almost all of these are extremely minor in nature, especially when involving word order, synonym substitution, or inclusion/exclusion of short words.

Q:  What is the single biggest difference, outside the pericope adulterae, in the Gospels?

Robinson:  Among the more meaningful instances of inclusion/exclusion between the two texts, consider Luke 22:47, where RP2005 ends the verse with “and he drew near to Jesus to kiss him,” but where Kr/Family 35 adds the harmonization (from Matthew 26:48 and Mark 14:44), “For he had given them this sign, ‘Whomever I should kiss, he it is’” — a reading that according to von Soden is supported among the primary bulk of Byzantine manuscripts (Kx) only in the proportion 1:12, even though thoroughly present among the much later and revisionary Kr group of manuscripts.
          I would suggest such an expansion to be secondary, and not only on external but on transmissional grounds:  had such a lengthy phrase originally been present, no good reason would exist for its omission among the bulk of remaining Byzantine manuscripts (including many much earlier than those comprising Family 35/Kr); further, an original lack of such a phrase readily could impel later revisers to insert such in order to harmonize with the remaining synoptic gospels.

Q:  Several English translations based on the Byzantine Text have been made.  Do you have a favorite?

Robinson:  Most of these translations you speak of are electronic in nature, and readily available on the internet. Of these, the English Majority Text Version (EMTV), based on the Hodges-Farstad Interlinear, and the World English Bible (WEB), based on an updated and textually adjusted form of the 1901 ASV, probably are among the better renderings, although I often might differ regarding the translation of certain words and phrases (just as with most published English translations).

Q:  Do you think there is a potential market in the near future for an English translation based on the Byzantine Text?

Robinson:  Indeed I long have held that there is a significant market for a Byzantine-based formal-equivalence English translation, and I would strongly support publishers who might see fit to develop and market such, who might even be willing to adapt existing translations such as the NASV, NKJV, or ESV to an alternate Byzantine edition that could be marketed alongside their current holdings based on the critical text or TR.  Even beyond that, I would strongly support a new, committee-based, formal equivalence translation from the Byzantine Textform that could be published and marketed in hard copy, and thereby fulfill the original desire of Hodges and Farstad regarding both the NKJV and HCSB — intentionally sidetracked along the way by their respective publishers.
          As an aside, I suggest that the ESV committee severely errs in now declaring their current translational form to be a “permanent text edition.”  That procedure guarantees an eventual extinction or readership departure from the ESV as (1) the English language or syntactical understanding might change, and (2) particularly where the ESV critical text base might require alteration due to new textual theories or discoveries (one need only consider what changes CBGM might require in future NA/UBS editions — changes which all other translations based on the critical text will accept and follow, but apparently not the ESV).

Q: How do you resolve variant-units where there is no strong majority?

Robinson:  The easiest answer is this:  where the Byzantine Textform is sharply divided, one obviously cannot appeal solely to external testimony in order to establish the most plausible original reading. Resolution of intra-Byzantine division requires consideration of internal evidence as such might relate to the various readings found among the Byzantine witnesses at those points (several such internal evidence principles are mentioned in “The Case for Byzantine Priority”).

Q: Are the rest of us putting the books of the New Testament in the wrong order?

Robinson:  Based on what appears among the earlier manuscripts, this most definitely is the case. The RP2005 text reflects that early order, where Acts is immediately followed by the General Epistles, then the Pauline Epistles (in which Hebrews divides the church letters from those to individuals), and then Revelation.
          The RP2005 arrangement of the NT books is not new; the same order appears in Tischendorf, Tregelles, Westcott-Hort, and von Soden, and remains far more historically based and thematically logical than the familiar but later ordering that derives more from Latin and TR traditions than anything else.

Q:  In “The Case for Byzantine Priority” you state, “Whenever possible, the raw number of MSS should be intelligently reduced.” How would you reply to a proposal to boil down the weight of the copies of Theophylact’s Gospels-text to the weight of their archetype, seeing that the various Byzantine subtypes can be grouped “according to their hypothetical archetypes”

Robinson:  Regarding the Theophylact manuscripts, my PA collation data suggests that the Theophylact commentary along with its quoted biblical text jointly derive from a common archetype.  That base tends to prevail among nearly all Theophylact manuscripts, and thus the multiplicity of Theophylact manuscripts (approximately 125) really says little or nothing beyond the text of its original archetype.

Q:  Do you mean that just as we tend not to count individual copies of the Vulgate, we should not count individual copies of clearly identifiable Byzantine sub-groups?

Robinson:  Regarding the various Byzantine subtypes, those with relatively limited support almost certainly derive from their own separate sub-archetypes characterized by their differences from the primary majority bulk of Byzantine documents. This is not to say that their existence is of no value, but that whatever presence a particular Byzantine subgroup might have would represent only the limited degree of popularity that specific line of transmission represents (this in terms of copying frequency and historical preservation).

Q:  If someone were to compile the text via a mathematical formula, adopting whatever reading was favored by a majority of archetypes (not just text-types, but also Byzantine sub-groups) and base-texts of early versions rather than by a majority of manuscripts, wouldn’t the resultant compilation differ at some points from the Byzantine Textform?

Robinson:  Obviously, the RP text offers no “mathematical formula,” but only a basic transmissional consensus approach. Thus I would not recommend a “majority of archetypes” methodology to replace the general consensus found amid the mass of Byzantine manuscripts.  Indeed, were some “majority of archetypes” method to be followed (whether limiting the sub-archetypes to Byzantine or otherwise), the resultant text necessarily would differ at various points from the prevailing consensus that represents the dominant line of Byzantine transmission.

Q: Even though you state in “The Case for Byzantine Priority” that “Manuscripts still need to be weighed and not merely counted,” it has been claimed that the Byzantine Priority view seeks to establish the text by “counting manuscripts.” What do you say in response?

Robinson:  By its very nature, the Byzantine Textform in its aggregate does represent the vast numerical majority of manuscripts; therefore “number” is one component within Byzantine-priority theory, but hardly the sole element (even Burgon suggested seven different data categories to be necessary for establishing the text). Within Byzantine-priority theory, transmissional factors are far more significant than mere number, as even Scrivener had suggested.
          Compare a parallel example: were one to advocate a theory of “Alexandrian-priority” or “Western-priority,” intending to establish a putative archetype of those forms of text from its extant representatives, “number” alone would not be the primary factor. The published research of Heimerdinger and Rius-Camps in relation to their view of “Western priority” demonstrates the point.  Similarly, claims of mere “nose-counting” reflect a gross over-simplification and offer little more than a misleading caricature of the more thorough and reasonable case being advocated.

Q: Can internal evidence ever overrule the external evidence when over 95% of the manuscript-evidence is in agreement? Is there any reading in the Byzantine Textform that you can identify as a case where this has happened?

Robinson:  The short answer is no, and that specifically because of the nature of Byzantine-priority. Put simply, one cannot be consistent in advocating a valid form of Byzantine-priority (or even Alexandrian-priority) while rejecting the dominant consensus of that text-type. While some might prefer a more general “Byzantine-preferred” position and thereby feel free to depart the Byzantine at various points on the basis of external or internal considerations (e.g., united versional or patristic testimony differing from the Byzantine, or internal criteria considered strong enough to override any external consensus), the resultant theory and praxis no longer would be “Byzantine-priority,” but a less-than-exclusive “Byzantine-preference” or even some sort of “Equitable Eclecticism.”
          I do not suggest, however, that internal criteria are invoked only where the Byzantine Textform is sharply divided and they are neglected where the mass of Byzantine manuscripts agree. Rather, internal criteria can and should be utilized in every instance of variant reading, either to confirm and defend the external data (when basically united) or to assist in determining the best reading where the Byzantine manuscripts are seriously divided). This is specifically what Dan Wallace has suggested Byzantine or majority text supporters should do, and is the intent of the Textual Commentary I currently am working on (two years in, with many more to go given that more than 3000 variant units need to be discussed).

(To be continued)

END OF PART ONE