Manetti and the Greek New Testament

Giannozzo
Manetti

         Giannozzo Manetti (1396-1459) is not mentioned in either Metzger’s The Text of the New Testament or in Aland & Aland’s The Text of the New Testament.  But all students of the field of New Testament textual criticism should learn his name.  It was Manetti, a generation before Erasmus, who completed the first Latin translation of the New Testament (since the time of Jerome) that was based primarily on Greek manuscripts. 

         Born into a wealthy family in the city of Florence, Italy, Manetti was taught by the famous historian (and Chancellor of Florence) Leonardo Bruni, and was trained in classical Latin and Greek.  Manetti was committed to the principle of ad fontes before it was cool:   he learned Hebrew in order to produce a Latin translation of the Psalms, and defended his renderings against anticipated objections from fans of the traditional Vulgate in a detailed five-volume work titled Apologeticus.   He also wrote On Human Worth and Excellence, in which he maintained that human beings are creatures of dignity and quality.

          Shortly after the fall of Constantinople in 1453, Manetti began his work on a Latin translation of the New Testament. Because much of Manetti’s library was donated to the Vatican (he had been friends with Pope Nicholas V in his youth), we can identify exactly which Greek manuscripts he used as his sources.  They reside to this day in the Vatican Library: 

          Pal.Gr. 171 (GA 171), which is a full Greek New Testament (including Revelation), Pal. Gr. 189, (GA 156) a Greek Gospels-MS (with illustrated headpieces before each Gospel; the text on the last page of John is cruciform and is followed by generous liturgical appendices), and Pal. Gr. 229 (a diglot, Greek-Latin, manuscript of the Gospels.  A supplemental Latin manuscript also used by Manetti was Pal. Lat.18, containing a Vulgate text of the Old Testament and New Testament.

           Two copies of Manetti’s Latin translation of the New Testament are also at the Vatican Library:  First is Pal. Lat. 45, which presents a straightforward Latin text.  The attribution to Manetti can be seen before each Gospel:  Matthew on fol. 1r, Mark on fol. 21r  (where it can be seen that Manetti rendered his Greek text in Mark 1:2 as “est in prophetis,” unlike the Vulgate’s “est in Esaia propheta.”), Luke on fol. 33v, and John on fol. 55v.

Annet den Haan

          Second is Urb. Lat. 6, a more ornate copy, produced after Manetti’s death. 

           Two modern-day researchers, Annet den Haan and David Marsh, have made major contributions to a revival of interest in Manetti’s translation-work.  Marsh has written a detailed biography of Manetti, available from Harvard University Press.  Annet den Haan of Utrecht University has become a one-woman encyclopedia of all things related to Giannozzo Manetti, and has made many of her articles and essays available at Academia.edu for free.  Additional information about Manetti, his writings, and his manuscripts can be found at this link. 

Hand To Hand Combat: Sinaiticus vs. 162 in Matthew 9:1-17

             Today, let's look at the text of Matthew 9:1-17 in two manuscripts – the famous Codex Sinaiticus, and the little-known medieval minuscule 162, a copy of the Gospels which is housed in the Vatican Library as Barb. Gr. 449.

            According to the colophon that appear after the end of John, 162 was finished by a scribe named Manuel in 1153.  Its text is primarily Byzantine, but it has some unusual readings, the best-known of which is in Luke 11:2:  instead of saying, “Your kingdom come,” it says. “Let your holy Spirit come (upon us) to cleanse us” – a reading which is also supported by GA 700, and was known to Gregory of Nyssa. 

            In Tertullian’s composition Against Marcion, Book 4, Part 26, the author asks several rhetorical questions which seem to be drawn from a sequence of phrases in Luke 11, indicating that this reading was in the text used by Tertullian:

             First, “To whom can I say, “Father”? 

            Next, “Of whom can I ask for His Holy Spirit?”

            Next, “Whose kingdom shall I wish to come?” 

            Next, “Who shall give me my daily bread?”. 

            Next, “Who shall forgive me my trespasses?” 

            And next, “Who shall not allow us to be led into temptation?”. 

This indicates that a textual variant consisting of a request for the Holy Spirit to come and cleanse us, in Luke 11:2, although supported among Greek manuscripts  by only 700 and 162, was known to Tertullian in the second century.

           162 can be viewed page by page at the website of the Vatican Library.  Here is a selective index:   

Ad Carpianus begins

Eusebian Canons begin

Icon of Matthew

Matthew 1:1

Matthew 9:1

Matthew 16:1

Matthew 22:1

Matthew 25:1

Matthew 28:16-20 (cruciform)

Mark 1:9-1:18 

Mark 1:18-27

Mark 1:1 (w/icon headpiece)  

Mark 6:1

Mark 9:1

Mark 14:1

Luke 1:1 (w/icon headpiece)  

Luke 4:1

Luke 6:1

Luke 11:1

Luke 11:2     

Luke 15:1 

Luke 20:1 

John 1:1 (w/icon headpiece)

John 5:1

John 7:53 

John 14:1  

John 18:1  

John 20:1  

John 21:25

 

Now let’s see how accurate the text of Matthew 9:1-7 in 162 is compared to the same passage in the Tyndale House Greek New Testament.

1 –  162 has ὁ Ις­ after εμβας (+3)

1 – 162 has το after εις (+2)

1 – 162 has διεπέρασε instead of διεπέρασεν (-1)

2 – 162 has κλινης instead of κλεινης (-1)

2 – has ειπε instead of ειπεν (-1)

2 – 162 has αφεωνται instead of αφίενται (+2, -2)

2 – 162 has σου (+3)

4 – 162 has ιδων instead of ειδως (+1, -2)

4 – 162 has υμεις after τί (+5)

4 – has ενθυμεισθαι instead of ενθυμεισθε (+2, -1)

5 – 162 has αφεωνται instead of αφίενται (+2, -2)

6 – 162 has κλινην instead of κλεινην (-1)

7 – no variations

8 – 162 has εθαυμασαν instead of εφοβήθησαν (+5, -6)

9 – 162 has Ματθαιον instead of Μαθθαιον (+1, -1)

10 – no variations

11 – 162 has ειπον instead of ελεγον (+3, -4)

12 – 162 has ὁ Ις­ before ακουσας (+3)

12 – 162 has αυτοις after ειπεν (+6)

13 – 162 has ελεον instead of ελεος (+1, -1)

13 – 162 has εις μετάνοιαν (+12)

14 – 162 contracts Ιωάννου to Ιω

14 – has νηστευουσι instead of νηστευουσιν (-1)

15 – no variations

16 – no variations

17 – 162 has απολουνται instead of απολλυνται (+1, -1)

 

So, compared to the Tyndale House compilation, 162 has 51 non-original letters in Matthew 9:1-17, and is missing 25 original letters, for a total of 76 letters’ worth of corruption.  If we set aside orthographic variants, the following remain: 

1 –  162 has ὁ Ις­ after εμβας (+3)

1 – 162 has το after εις (+2)

2 – 162 has αφεωνται instead of αφίενται (+2, -2)

2 – 162 has σου (+3)

4 – 162 has ιδων instead of ειδως (+1, -2)

4 – 162 has υμεις after τί (+5)

5 – 162 has αφεωνται instead of αφίενται (+2, -2)

8 – 162 has εθαυμασαν instead of εφοβήθησαν (+5, -6)

11 – 162 has ειπον instead of ελεγον (+3, -4)

12 – 162 has ὁ Ις­ before ακουσας (+3)

12 – 162 has αυτοις after ειπεν (+6)

13 – 162 has ελεον instead of ελεος (+1, -1)

13 – 162 has εις μετάνοιαν (+12).

 

And thus, with orthographic variants set aside, 162 has 48 non-original letters in Matthew 9:1-17, and is missing 17 original letters, for a total of 65 letters’ worth of corruption.

Now let’s compare the text of Matthew 9:1-17 in Codex Sinaiticus to the same passage in the Tyndale House Greek New Testament.

SINAITICUS: MATTHEW 9:1-17 compared to Tyndale House GNT.

1 – no  variations

2 – À has κλινης instead of κλεινης (-1)

2 – À has ειδων instead of ιδων (+1)

3 – no variations

4 – À has ϊδων instead of ειδως (+1, -2)

4 – (À has a spelling-correction in καρδι{αι}ϲ but it may have been made during production)

5 – À does not have και after εγειρε (-3)

6 –  À has εχι instead of εχει (-1)

6 – À has κλινην instead of κλεινην (-1)

6 – À has πορευου instead of υπαγε (+7, -5)

7 – no variations

8 – no variations

9 – À does not have εκειθεν (-7)

9 – À does not have και after λεγομενον (-3)

9 -  has λεγι instead of λεγει (-1)

9 – has ακολουθι instead of ακολουθει (-1)

9 – À has ηκολουθει instead of ηκολούθησεν (+2, -4)

10 – À does not have εγένετο αυτου before ανακειμενω (-12)

10 – has ανακειμενω instead of ανακειμενου (+1, -2)

10 – does not have και before ιδου (-3)

10 – À does not have ελθοντες (-8)

10 – has ϲυνανεκιντο instead of ϲυνανεκειντο (-1)

10 – À has μαθητεϲ instead of μαθηταιϲ (+1, -2)

11 – no variations

12 – À has χριαν instead of χρειαν (-1)

12 – has ϊατρω instead of ϊατρου (+1, -2)

13 – À has μαθεται instead of μαθετε (+2, -1)

14 – À has ημιϲ instead of ημειϲ (-1)

14 – (À has πολλα, added by a corrector, in the side-margin)

15 – À is missing ελευσονται δε ημέραι οταν απαρθη απ αυτων ὁ νυμφίος (-43)

16 – À has παλεω instead of παλαιω (+1, -2)

16 – has αιρι instead of αιρει (-1)

16 - À does not have αυτου before απο (-5)

16 – À has γεινεται  instead of γινεται (+1)

17 – À has αλλ instead of αλλα (-1)

17 – À does not have βάλλουσιν (-9)

17 – À has βλητεον after καινουϲ (+7) 

Thus, compared to the text of Matthew 9:1-7 in the Tyndale House Greek New Testament, the text written by the main scribe of Sinaiticus contains 25 non-original letters, and is missing 104 original letters, for a total of 129 letters’ worth of corruption.    

If we take orthographic variants out of the picture, the accuracy of the text written by  Sinaiticus’ main scribe improves:

4 – À has ϊδων instead of ειδως (+1, -2)

5 – À does not have και after εγειρε (-3)

6 – À has πορευου instead of υπαγε (+7, -5)

9 – À does not have εκειθεν (-7)

9 – À does not have και after λεγομενον (-3)

9 – À has ηκολουθει instead of ηκολούθησεν (+2, -4)

10 – À does not have εγένετο αυτου before ανακειμενω (-12)

10 – does not have και before ιδου (-3)

10 – À does not have ελθοντες (-8)

14 – (À has πολλα from a corrector but this correction may have been made after production)

15 – À is missing ελευσονται δε ημέραι οταν απαρθη απ αυτων ὁ νυμφίος (-43)

16 - À does not have αυτου before απο (-5)

17 – À does not have βάλλουσιν (-9)

17 – À has βλητεον after καινουϲ (+7) 

 

So, with orthographic variants set aside (even ϊατρω in verse 12), the text of Sinaiticus has 17 non-original letters, and is missing 103 original letters, for a total of 120 letters’ worth of corruption.  The text of Matthew 9:1-17 written by the main scribe of Codex Sinaiticus is far less accurate than the text of 162, even with orthographic variants removed from consideration – and the comparison is not close.

But the work of the main scribe is not the only factor to consider when it comes to Codex Sinaiticus, because this manuscript had a proof-reader, who often served as a fellow-scribe (even replacing some pages of the manuscript where the main scribe had committed some particularly egregious error).  It is not always easy to tell the difference between the work of this corrector – working before the manuscript had left its scriptorium – and some later correctors.  But my impression is that the main corrector of Codex Sinaiticus was responsible for the following corrections:

● He added, in the upper margin, for verse 10, the εγένετο αυτου that is missing in the main text.

● In the lower margin, he added verse 15’s missing ελευσονται δε ημέραι οταν απαρθη απ αυτων ὁ νυμφίος.  

(I attribute the addition of ελθοντες to a later corrector, and the change in verse 10 from τελωνε to τελωναι I treat as a self-correction by the main scribe.)

With the proof-reader’s input taken into consideration, Sinaiticus’ testimony is much improved:  upon leaving the scriptorium, and setting  aside orthographic variants, the codex contained 17 original letters in Matthew 9:1-17, and was missing 48 original letters, for a total of 65 letters’ worth of corruption.

So which manuscript’s text of Matthew 9:1-17 is better?  The spelling of the main scribe of Sinaiticus is obviously atrocious, but if we set orthographic variants aside, Sinaiticus' accuracy improves substantially.  And if we do not ignore the work of the proof-reader of Codex Sinaiticus, then Codex Sinaiticus’ text of Matthew 9:1-17 has a total of 65 letters’ worth of corruption – meaning that in terms of letters’ worth of non-orthographic corruption, the amount of corruption in Matthew 9:1-17 in À and the amount of corruption in 162 are exactly the same.

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

           

           

  

 

More Combat: Papyrus 75 vs. Codex A

            The lopsided victory of minuscule 1324 over Codex Bezae in the previous contest has provoked some stunned members of the audience to clamor for more hand-to-hand combat – and I am pleased to say that a sensational heavyweight match awaits you today, ladies and gentlemen!  In the same arena, Papyrus 75 is about to face Codex Alexandrinus. 

            Papyrus 75 is undoubtedly the most textually significant Greek Gospels-manuscript to be discovered in the past eighty years.  When its text of Luke (most of chapters 3-24) and John (most of chapters 1-15) was first brought to light in 1952 as part of the Bodmer Papyri collection (XIV-XV), Papyrus 75 was assigned a production-date in the early 200’s (and even a production-date in the late 100’s was not considered out of the question). 

            Its discovery had a significant impact on English translations:  until the discovery of Papyrus 75, the majority of the small group of scholars responsible for compiling the base-text of the New Testament for the Revised Standard Version (first published in 1946) had been persuaded by Hort’s arguments about Western Non-Interpolations, and had therefore not included several phrases and verses in Luke 24.  The force of the early support that Papyrus 75 gave to those omitted phrases and verses – specifically

            ● the words “of the Lord Jesus” in 24:3,

            ● the words “He is not here!  He is risen!” in 24:6,

            ● all of Luke 24:12,

            ● the words, “and said to them, ‘Peace unto you’” in 24:36,

            ● all of Luke 24:40, and  

            ● the words, “and they worshipped Him” in 24:52 –

seemed too much to resist.  Rather than appear to refuse to let evidence get in the way of a good theory, the omitted portions of Luke 24 were restored to the text by the time the New Revised Standard Version was released in 1989.  (This may say something about the instability of the compilers’ text-critical method as much as it says anything about Papyrus 75.)  Today, in the English Standard Version, those passages all appear in the text without even a footnote to remind people that they were ever removed before Papyrus 75 was known. 

            Such is the hard-hitting power of our first combatant, Papyrus 75, which in 2007 became part of the collection in the Vatican Library.

            Facing Papyrus 75 in today’s contest is a manuscript that needs no introduction:  Codex Alexandrinus has long been hailed as one of the most important manuscripts of the New Testament.  Its production-date is generally assigned to the early 400’s.  Codex A, also known as 02, is not a complete New Testament (it is missing Matthew 1:1-25:6, and some pages in John).  Its Gospels-text is often described as basically Byzantine, and in Acts and the Epistles it is often described as basically Alexandrian, but there are quite a few divergent readings.  For the book of Revelation, Codex Alexandrinus is widely considered the best extant manuscript (far superior to Codex Sinaiticus). 

            Codex Alexandrinus was not available to European scholars until 1627, when it was presented as a gift from Cyril Lucar, the Orthodox Patriarch of Constantinople, to king Charles I of England.  It immense value was soon recognized.  In the early 1700’s, when the innovative researcher Richard Bentley (1662-1742) was not exposing literary forgeries, editing classical works, preaching, or corresponding with Isaac Newton, he studied Codex Alexandrinus assiduously.  On one occasion (specifically, on October 23, 1731), he rescued the manuscript from a fire.  Bentley considered Codex A the best New Testament manuscript in the world. 

A replica of Papyrus 75's
text of Luke 8:19-25.
See the digital photo at the
Vatican Library's website.

  

            Papyrus 75 shall go first in today’s contest.  Here is a comparison between Luke 8:19-25 in Papyrus 75 and in the Nestle-Aland Novum Testamentum Graece, 27th edition: 

19 – no variants.

20 – P75 reads απηγγελλη instead of απηγγελη (+1)

20 – P75 does not have σου after μητηρ (-3)

21 – P75 reads αυτον after προς instead of αυτους (+1, -2)

22 – P75 does not have αυτος after the first και (-5)

22 – P75 reads ανεβη instead of ενεβη (+1, -1)

23 – P75 transposes to εις την λιμνην ανεμου (transposition) [The parchment is damaged here but there is no discernible reason to suspect a variant within the word λιμνην.]

24 – no variants.

25 – P75 does not have και υπακουουσιν αυτω (-18)

            Thus, the text of Luke 8:19-25 in Papyrus 75 contains 3 non-original letters, and is missing 29 original letters, for a total of 32 letters’ worth of corruption.  Removing minor orthographic variants from the equation, Papyrus 75 contains 1 non-original letters, and is missing 28 original letters, for a total of 29 letters’ worth of corruption.

            That’s pretty good!  If minuscule 1324 were Papyrus 75’s opponent in today’s contest, 1324 would lose. 

            Now Codex Alexandrinus steps into the ring.  Let’s see how its text of Luke 8:19-25 – written down about 200 years after Papyrus 75 was produced – compares:

19 –  Codex A reads Παρεγένοντο instead of Παρεγένετο (+2, -1)

20 – Codex A reads Καὶ before ἀπηγγέλη instead of δὲ after it (+3, -2)

20 – Codex A reads λέγοντων after αὐτῷ (+8)

20 – Codex A reads σε θέλοντες instead of θέλοντες σε (transposition)

21 – no variants.

22 – no variants.

23 – no variants.

24 – Codex A reads ἐγερθεὶς instead of διεγερθεὶς (-2)

25 – no variants.

            Codex A thus has 13 non-original letters, and is missing 5 original letters, yield a total of 18 letters’ worth of corruption. 

            Winner:  Codex A.

Some Post-Fight Analysis:  Annual Corruption Rates

            Let’s step back from the individual combatants for a minute and see what the results of this little contest might say about the transmission-lines that they represent.

            On the basis of this small sample, let’s make some calculations with the following premises in play:
            ● The production-date of the Gospel of John is A.D. 90.
            ● The Gospel of Luke has 1,151 verses.
            ● The Gospel of John has 879 verses.
            ● Papyrus 75 was made in 225.
            ● Codex A was made in 400.
            ● The results in Luke 8:19-25 are typical throughout the text of Luke and John.

            With these assumptions in place, the annual corruption rate of each manuscript’s transmission-line can be calculated.  In the course of 135 years, the copyists in P75’s transmission-line introduced 29 letters’ worth of corruption in six verses.  Thus, on average (relying on this small sample), the copyists in Papyrus 75’s transmission-line introduced .215 letters’ worth of corruption each year, in each six-verse segment of Luke and John.  Since there are 338 six-verse segments in Luke and John, a total of 72.6 letters’ worth of corruption each year is implied.  At that rate, by the time Papyrus 75 was made, its text of Luke and John would be expected to contain 9,800 letters’ worth of textual corruption.

            Meanwhile, in Codex A’s transmission-line – the transmission-line which perpetuated Codex A’s essentially Byzantine text of the Gospels – only 18 letters’ worth of corruption was introduced in Luke 8:19-25 in the course of 310 years, yielding an annual corruption rate per six verses of .058 letters per year.  Calculating that much corruption in each six-verse segment of Luke and John, the copyists in Codex A’s ancestry introduced 19.6 letters of corruption in the text of Luke and John each year, on average, which means that by the time Codex Alexandrinus was made, its text of Luke and John would be expected to contain 6,077 letters’ worth of corruption.
            In other words, based on the performance of the copyists in these two manuscripts’ transmission-lines in this particular passage, the expectation that Codex A, rather than Papyrus 75, will have a more faithful text at any given point, is entirely justified, even though Codex A’s text’s transmission-line is over twice as long (310 years) as that of Papyrus 75 (135 years).

            Finally, it should be noticed that the non-inclusion of και υπακουουσιν αυτω in Luke 8:25 is attested not only by Papyrus 75 but also by Codex Vaticanus, which confirms (along with an abundance of other rare agreements) a rather close historical relationship between the two.  That is, they share the same transmission-line.  If the annual corruption rate of Papyrus 75’s transmission-line were extended to the year 325 (i.e., if the Alexandrian copyists continued to add 72.6 letters’ worth of corruption to the text of Luke and John each year, up to the approximate production-date of Codex Vaticanus), then by 325, the text of Luke and John in the Alexandrian transmission-line at the time when Codex Vaticanus was made would have contained 17,061 letters’ worth of corruption.  Thus, in the text of Luke and John, almost three times as much corruption would be in Codex B’s transmission-line when Codex B was made, as would be in Codex A’s transmission-line when Codex A was made.

_______________

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

Fact-checking Wallace: GA 138

            “Second, the scribe might simply place an asterisk or obelisk in the margin, indicating doubt about these verses.  Such a symbol is found in at least five manuscripts.”  So goes a claim made by Daniel Wallace in his chapter of Perspectives on the Ending of Mark:  4 Views.  Wallace was describing two ways in which “some doubts about the authenticity of the LE” [“LE” meaning Mark 16:9-20, the Longer Ending] are indicated by copyists – the first way being the inclusion of a note.  

            Wallace’s statement runs parallel to a claim popularized by the late Bruce Metzger in his A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament:  “Not a few manuscripts which contain the passage have scribal notes stating that the older Greek copies lack it, and in other witnesses the passage is marked with asterisks or obeli, the conventional signs used by copyists to indicate a spurious addition to a document.”

            Metzger’s vagueness is remarkably unhelpful; the members of the jury are left to wonder about how many manuscripts constitute “not a few,” and the little detail about the identity of those “other witnesses” – manuscripts without notes, but with asterisks or obeli – is not provided.

            Dr. Wallace, however, gave specifics:  in a footnote, Wallace listed the five manuscripts to which he referred:  “MSS 138, 264, 1221, 2346, and 2812, listed on 407 in Markusevangelium, ANTF 27.  Parker, Living Text, 127, adds 137 to this list.”

            With the addition of minuscule 137, the list of manuscripts which are claimed to have a simple asterisk accompanying Mark 16:9-20 to express scribal doubt about the passage reaches a total of six.  Page-views of all six of these manuscripts are online.  Let’s have a look!  Today we will consider the first manuscript in the list, GA 138.

Use this embedded link
to see the page-view with
Mark 16:9 in GA 138
at the Vatican Library.

            GA 138 is at the Vatican Library, catalogued as Vat. Gr. 757.  It is a commentary-manuscript in which the text is written segment by segment, with the commentary interspersed between segments of text.  The text of chapter 16 of Mark begins on page-view 156, where 16:1-5 is presented as a segment of text (accompanied in the margin by diple-marks), identified in the margin as section #231.  (These sections are the Eusebian Sections, used in the Eusebian Canons.)  It is followed by commentary.  On the next page, after the rest of the commentary on 16:1-5, the text of 16:6-8 is presented (accompanied in the margin by diple-marks, and identified as sections #232 and #233).  This, too, is followed by commentary (some of which is based on Eusebius’ comments in Ad Marinum). 

            On the next page, as the commentary continues, the left margin of the writing is disrupted, but no text is lost; it appears that the copyist was avoiding a flaw in the parchment.  On the ninth line, the text of Mark 16:9 begins.  In the outer left margin there is a single asterisk, and diple-marks accompany the text of Mark 16:9-14. 

            After 16:14, the commentary continues, and when one examines the last five lines of the commentary on Mark 16:9-14, one finds the portion of the Catena in Marcum (a commentary, much of which consists of a compilation of extracts from various authors such as Origen and Chrysostom, attributed to Victor of Antioch) in which the commentator responds to a claim which was mentioned (but not approved) by Eusebius of Caesarea in his composition Ad Marinum, to the effect that verses 9-20 are not often encountered.  The commentator’s note begins in Greek with the words Παρὰ πλείστοις ἀντιγράφοις οὐ κεῖται: 

“In many copies, the rest does not appear there in the Gospel of Mark, for certain persons have thought it to be spurious.” [Or perhaps this last phrase means, “and because of this, certain persons have thought it to be spurious.”] “But we, from accurate copies – having found it in many of them, corresponding to the Palestinian Gospel of Mark  – have, as truthfulness requires, also included the account of the resurrection of the Master, after ‘for they were afraid.’”  

            (If one were to take in hand John Burgon’s 1871 book The Last Twelve Verses of Mark Vindicated, and turn to Appendix E, one would find this entire note, in Greek, with an apparatus indicating textual variations extracted from an assortment of manuscripts that contain the Catena in Marcum.)               

            After that, the text of Mark 16:15-18a (θανάσιμόν τι) completes the rest of the page.  On the next page, Mark 16:18b-20 is written (with diple-marks in the margin), followed by commentary.

            Plainly, GA 138 does not have “a simple asterisk.”  GA 138 contains the Catena in Marcum, including the note that affirms the presence of Mark 16:9-20 in many copies and in a Palestinian manuscript of Mark that was considered particularly accurate.  The asterisk in the margin alongside the beginning of Mark 16:9-20 is a side-effect of the non-inclusion of the passage in the Eusebian Canons; it does not express scribal doubt; it denotes the beginning of the section for which there was no Section-number.           

            Next:  Fact-checking Wallace about GA 264 and 1221.

____________

Quotations from Perspectives on the Ending of Mark: 4 Views © 2008 Broadman & Holman Publishers, All rights reserved.

A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament is © 1971 by the United Bible Societies.  All rights reserved.

First-century Mark: More Information!

Will something like this
(a model of what a first-century
fragment with text from Mark 1
might be like) be published soon?

            Remember the announcement in 2012 about the existence of a first-century manuscript-fragment from the Gospel of Mark?  Here we are five years later, and after various rumors have come and gone, it has still not been published.  This has led some folks to suspect that the announcement might have been premature, or that the dating must be wildly inaccurate, or even that it was all some sort of groundless claim. 

            However, footage of a discussion between Scott Carroll and Josh McDowell from 2015, provided by Hezekiah Domowski, was found by Elijah Hixson, and was recently described by Peter Gurry at the Evangelical Textual Criticism blog. 

            We already had the means to deduce – if one is willing to take the reports about the fragment at face value – that that the papyrus fragment is very early (possibly from the first century), and that it probably contains text from Mark chapter 1, and that Dirk Obbink was probably involved in analyzing its contents, and that Scott Carroll had seen the fragment. 

            Now some of the “probably” factor seems to be diminished.  We also learn in this video that the Green Collection does not have the manuscript, or, at least, that Scott Carroll was confident that someone else owned it in 2015.

            I made a full transcript of the discussion between Scott Carroll and Josh McDowell, and then checked it against the transcript made by Peter Gurry.  I have added a few embedded links and pictures.  Here it the transcript: 

McDowell:  How was it discovered, and who –

Carroll:  I can give you some basic information.  It’s in the process –

McDowell:  He’s limited on what he can share, because it’s being published right now and all, and the owner of it might want to remain anonymous, et cetera.  So he’s limited on what he can share with us.

Carroll:  Correct.  These things are tricky.  I first worked with the papyrus in 2012; so, it was discovered earlier than that.  It wasn’t discovered by me.  Although the group that’s working on its publication did some [??] – it’s very tempting, when you get the press, and Fox News, and other press agencies are after [it?]; you want to get information on it, and some stuff was leaked, and they contacted me, I think, about a year ago, wanting some definitive information on how it was extracted from a mummy-covering.  And I was not involved in that process.

            When I saw it, I can tell you, it was relaxed, which means it was flat.  If it had been extracted – if it was extracted from a context like that, there’s no evidence of it, to me.  It looks like it was just a text that was found.  Now, a lot of the texts that come to light in this kind of context, like, if I went back to the picture, and we looked at the pile, you can see that a lot of this stuff has white on it; and that’s, like, the residue of the plaster.  So these things came from mummy-coverings.

McDowell: Isn’t that interesting.  I thought it was [??] –  

Carroll:  No, no.  So, they probably were in a burial-setting, or something like that, and over time, it just separated, one from another, but we can look and it was originally part of it.  Now, this Mark may have been in that kind of context; I’m not sure.

            I saw it in, at Oxford University, at Christ Church College, and it was in the possession of an outstanding and well-known, eminent classicist.  I saw it again in 2013.  There were some delays with its purchasing.  And I was working at that time with the Green Family Collection, which I had the privilege of organizing and putting together for the Hobby Lobby family, and hoped that they would, at that time, acquire it.  And they delayed, and didn’t.  We were preparing an exhibit for the Vatican Library, and I wanted this to be the showpiece in that exhibit. 

McDowell: Why wouldn’t?

Carroll:  I know; wouldn’t that have been awesome?  But it was not the timing, and so it was passed on, and delayed.  It has since been acquired.  I can’t say by whom.  It is in the process of being prepared for publication.  And what’s important to say –

McDowell:  What does that mean?  ‘The process of being prepared’?  What does that mean?

Carroll:  It’s a lengthy process.  Actually, going through – especially with this, because it’s gonna get – it’s gonna go out there, and there are gonna be people immediate trying to tear it down, questioning its provenance, where it came from, what it dates to – especially the date.  So they want an ironclad argument on the dating of this document, so that it won’t be – um, they have a responsibility to do that.  This is going to be very critical, and raise – it’ll be a major flashpoint in the media when this happens.

McDowell:  Who’s the main person responsible in the publishing [process?]?

Carroll:  Well, the most important person of note is Dirk Obbink, who is –

McDowell:  This is a lot more information than we heard last time.

Carroll:  Yeah, it is.  Dirk Obbink is an outstanding scholar; he’s one of the world’s leading specialists on papyri. He directs the collection – for students who are in here, you may remember hearing the word ‘Oxyrhynchus’ Papyri – he is the director of the Oxyrhynchus papyri.  I can’t speak to his own personal faith position; I don’t think he would define himself as an evangelical in any sense of the word, but he is not – he doesn’t have a derogatory attitude at all.  He’s a supportive person.

            He specializes in the dating of handwriting.  And as he was looking at the – both times I saw the papyrus, it was in his possession – so, it was at Oxford, at Christ Church, and actually on his pool-table, in his office, along with a number of mummy-heads.  So, you have these mummy-heads –

McDowell:  So you played pool –

Carroll:  No.  And, you’ve got that document there, and that’s the setting – it’s kind of surreal.  And Dirk, Dirk was wrestling with dating somewhere between 70 A.D. and 120, 110, 120.

McDowell:  That early?

Carroll:  Yes, A.D.

McDowell;  Whoa.  That’s [??] an old manuscript. And Mark!

Carroll:  Mark is one that the critics have always dated late, so this is, like, I can hear their arguments being formulated now.  So this is what the later authors were quoting.

McDowell:  Folks, make sure:  that is all tentative.  And you may say that, right?”

Carroll:  Yeah, yeah.

McDowell:  That is just an assumption in there.  So don’t go out and say, “There’s a manuscript dated 70 A.D.”  How long do we have to wait, probably, to know specifically?

Carroll:  “I would say, in this next year, all right.  Any delays that are going to happen over the next couple of months are delays with the publisher to publish this.  If the route is to go to a major journal, they’ll of course want it to happen quickly, but there’ll be some delays through the whole academic process and all. 

McDowell:  So keep that in mind; that, don’t go out and say, well, Dr. Scott Carroll says it’s dated between 70 A.D. – we don’t really know yet.  But those are probably the parameters for it.  But it will be – now this is my opinion – the oldest ever discovered.

Carroll:  Yeah; I think this without question.  With manuscripts, um, the Rylands John fragment, it’s always like, 115 through 140 or maybe even later than that; so it’s kind of pushed to around the middle of the second century.  This is gonna be earlier than that; textbooks will change with this discovery.

McDowell:  So When this hits the media, you will hear about it.

Carroll:  Yes, you will.

McDowell:  It’ll be on every program.  So, be careful about what you share from tonight.  It’s good to be able to be updated and to hear [??]; I didn’t know that.  [Changing the subject:]  What is one of the most significant discoveries that have been made in the last four or five years?

And there the video ends.