Another Misleading Footnote - First Nations Version

           This is not a review of the First Nations Version of the New Testament, the work of translators such as Terry Wildman and Gordon Campbell, Alvin Deer, Antonia Belindo, Bryan Jon Maciewski and others which was released in 2021.  Today I want to simply point out that despite being recommended by scholars such as Matthew Schlimm (University of Dubuque Theological Seminary) and  L. Daniel Hawk (Ashland Theological Seminary), the First Nations Version perpetuates false information in its footnote at the end of Mark 16:8.  

The footnote says, "Most ancient manuscripts end at this verse.  Some others include verses 9-20 as we have in this translation."

            The problem is that only two ancient Greek manuscripts end the text of Mark at the end of 16:8.  And the "some" is over 1,650 Greek manuscripts.  In addition, earlier witnesses such as Tatian's Diatessaron and Irenaeus (in about 180) support the inclusion of verses 9-20; Irenaeus explicitly cited Mark 16:19 in his third book of Against Heresies.

            I don't know why it seems so hard for some people to write an accurate footnote.  The possibility occurs to me that if they were accurate and let readers know how lopsided the external evidence is in favor of including Mark 16:9-20, readers would stop trusting the scholars who want to erase the passage from the Gospel of Mark.  I suspect that some people are rejecting Mark 16:9-20 not because of the evidence but because they don't like what this Scripture says - they don't like the idea that baptism normally is a step into salvation instead of a consequence of salvation; they want Jesus to say "He who believes and is saved shall be baptized" instead of "He who believes and is baptized shall be saved."  Or perhaps they don't like reading an endorsement of glossolalia from the lips of Jesus because they believe that sort of thing isn't for modern-day Christians.  Whatever the reason, the headings and footnotes in a lot of modern versions at Mark 16:9 are pitiful.  A half-truth is a whole lie.  FIX YOUR FOOTNOTES, Bible publishers.  Crossway and Holman and Zondervan, I'm talking to you.  You can do it if you want to.

Irenaeus and Mark 16:19

            Irenaeus.  Ever hear of him?  You won’t see his name mentioned in the NET’s notes about Mark 16:9-20, or in footnotes about Mark 16:9-20 in the ESV, NLT, CSB, NIV, NKJV, and NRSV.  (The footnote-makers for all these versions seem to have had a strange aversion to mentioning patristic evidence, even when it is earlier than the earliest extant manuscripts of the text being supplemented.)  Irenaeus was a very important patristic writer.  Born around 120, Irenaeus grew up in the city of Smyrna in Asia Minor, and he reports that in his youth he heard the teachings of Polycarp (who had, in turn, been a companion of Papias, and had heard John).   When we walk with Irenaeus, so to speak, we are chronologically barely two generations away from the apostles themselves.

            Irenaeus went on to serve as a presbyter at Lyons (Lugdunum), in Gaul, around 170.  In 177, Irenaeus visited Rome, where he advised Eleutherius about how to deal with Montanism.  When he returned from Rome to Lugdunum, Irenaeus found that in his absence, the church there had been the target of persecution.  Many Christians had been martyred, including Blandina and the church’s bishop, Pothinus.  Irenaeus was chosen to take Pothinus’ place as bishop, an office in which he remained for the remainder of his life.

            As bishop of Lyons, Irenaeus would later counsel Victor of Rome in 190 regarding the Quartodeciman Controversy, recommending the allowance of liberty regarding how to settle a question related to the church’s liturgical calendar which had not been settled in earlier times.  But Irenaeus best-known work is one he composed earlier, in five books:  Against Heresies, in which he exposed the errors of various false teachers, including Marcion. 

            Irenaeus tells his readers when he composed Book Three of Against Heresies, in chapter three, paragraph 3:  it was during the same time that Eleutherius was presiding at Rome, i.e., approximately between 174 and 189. 

            Irenaeus explicitly quotes Mark 16:19 in Book 3 of Against Heresies (in chapter 10, paragraph 5), stating, “Also, towards the conclusion of his Gospel, Mark says: ‘So then, after the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven, and sits on the right hand of God.’”  This portion of Against Heresies in extant only in Latin (as “In fine autem euangelii ait Marcus: Et quidem Dominus Iesus, postquam locutus est eis, receptus est in caelos, et sedet ad dexteram Dei.”

            Dr. Craig Evans, in 2013, claimed (in the Holman Apologetics Commentary) that “it is far from certain that Irenaeus, writing c. 180, was acquainted with Mark’s so-called Longer Ending,” apparently imagining that the Latin translator of Against Heresies “may have incorporated this verse from much later manuscripts.”   Dr. Evans is wrong.  In real life, not only is there no evidence that the Latin translation of Book 3 has been interpolated at this point, but there is clear evidence against the idea.  Irenaeus’ use of Mark 16:19 in Book 3 of Against Heresies is mentioned in Greek in a marginal notation that appears in several copies of the Gospel of Mark, including GA 1582, 72, and the recently catalogued 2954.

The margin-note about Irenaeus' quote of Mark 16:19.
Viewable at the British Library's website.

            Page-views of GA 1582 and GA 72 are online.  GA 1582 is a core representative of family 1 (which would be better-named “family 1582”), a small cluster of MSS which can be traced back an ancestor-MS made in the 400s.  The margin-note says, “Irenaeus, who lived near the time of the apostles, cites this from Mark in the third book of his work Against Heresies.”  (In Greek:   Ειρηναιος ο των αποστόλων πλησίον εν τω προς τας αιρέσεις Τριτωι λόγωι τουτο ανήνεγκεν το ρητον ως Μάρκω ειρημένον.)  Thus there should be no doubt that the Greek text of Against Heresies Book 3 known to the creator of this margin-note contained the reference to Mark 16:19.  Dr. Craig Evans is invited to retract his statement.

            The copy of Mark used by Irenaeus in Lyon, had it survived, would have been older than Codex Vaticanus by a minimum of 125 years.  In addition, Irenaeus was familiar with the text of Mark used in three locales – Asia Minor, Lyons, and Rome (the city where the Gospel of Mark was composed); yet, although he comments on a textual variant in Revelation 13:18 (in Against Heresies Book 5, ch. 29-30) - a passage from a book written a few decades before Irenaeus was born - he never expresses any doubt whatsoever about Mark 16:19.  It may be safely concluded that Irenaeus knew of no other form of the Gospel of Mark except  one that contained Mark 1:1-16:20. 

            As a secondary point, evidence of Irenaeus’ familiarity with Mark 16:9-20 might also be found in Against Heresies Book Two, chapter 32, paragraphs 3-4 (which was quoted by Eusebius of Caesarea in Church History 5:7).  Close verbal connections are lacking here (Irenaeus does not say, in Book Two at this point, that he is referring specifically to what Mark wrote; he points false teachers to “the prophetical writing”), but thematic parallels abound:  Irenaeus states:

            “Those who are truly his disciples, receiving grace from him, do in his name (cf. Mk 16:17) perform [signs], so as to promote the welfare of others, according to the gift which each one has received from him. For some do certainly and truly drive out devils (cf. Mk. 16:17), so that those who have thus been cleansed from evil spirits frequently both believe, and join themselves to the church (cf. Mk. 16:16).

            Others have foreknowledge of what is to come.  They see visions, and utter prophetic expressions.  Yet others heal the sick by laying their hands upon them, and they are made whole (Cf. Mk. 16:18).

          Yea, moreover, as I have said, even the dead have been raised up, and  have stayed among us for many years. And what shall I more say? It is not possible to name the number of the gifts which the church, throughout the whole world (cf. Mk. 16:15), has received from God, in the name of Jesus Christ.”

          Irenaeus concludes Book 2, chapter 32 (which can be read in English at the New Advent website) by stating the the Christian church, “directing her prayers to the Lord . . .and calling upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, has been accustomed to work miracles for the advantage of mankind, and not to lead them into error,” in contrast to the false teachers Simon, Menander, and Carpocrates.

          If there are to be English Bible-footnotes about Mark 16:9-20 (a passage which is attested in all Greek manuscripts of Mark (over 1,650) except two - GA 304 should no longer be considered a legitimate witness to the non-inclusion of vv. 9-20), they should certainly mention the testimony of Irenaeus.  The present footnotes in the ESV, NIV, NLT, CSB, and NASB (to name a few), like the notes in the NET,  do not give readers an accurate picture of the evidence regarding Mark 16:9-20, and, imho, seem designed (by selecting which witnesses are allowed to speak, and which witnesses are silenced) to provoke doubts about the passage.  One could almost think that the footnote-writers did not want readers to know about the evidence for Mark 16:9-20 from the 100s.

 

 

Bible Footnotes and the Byzantine Text

             Do the text-related footnotes in the NIV, CSB, NLT, and NKJV give an accurate picture of the differences between the Byzantine Text and the Alexandrian Text?  No, they do not.  Readers should not treat the text-related footnotes in those Bibles as if they fully denote the differences between the Byzantine Text and the primarily Alexandrian Nestle-Aland/United Bible Societies compilation.  To illustrate this, let’s look into the textual disagreements between the Byzantine Text and the Nestle-Aland compilation in the book of Ephesians.  

             If one were to take in hand the NIV, one might say, “Hmm; only one footnote in Ephesians mentions a difference in manuscripts; that must be the only textual variant in this book. Those copyists were phenomenally accurate.”

            A reader of the ESV might say, "Hmm; only two footnotes in Ephesians mention a disagreement in the manuscripts; those copyists were extremely accurate.”

            Reading the CSB or NLT, one might conclude, “Hmm; eight footnotes in Ephesians mention a difference in manuscripts.  I guess the manuscripts of Ephesians are all alike except for that.”

            Reading, instead, the NKJV, readers could understandably think, “Hmm; fifteen footnotes in Ephesians refer to differences in the manuscripts.  That’s remarkably uniform considering how long the text was transmitted in handwritten copies.”

            The NKJV’s text-related footnotes point out three differences between the Textus Receptus and the Majority (Byzantine) Text, and 12 differences between the Byzantine Text (including the Textus Receptus) and the primarily Alexandrian Nestle-Aland compilation.  Thus, readers who get their idea of the contents of Greek New Testament manuscripts from footnotes in major English translations could understandably conclude that there are only 12 differences in Ephesians between the Nestle-Aland compilation and the Byzantine Textform. 

            Readers who look into the text in more detail by studying the United Bible Societies’ Greek New Testament could also conclude that there are only 23 significant variant-units in Ephesians, because only 23 variant-units are in the UBS apparatus.  If, instead, they read the Tyndale House edition of the Greek New Testament,they might think that there are only 21 significant variant-units in Ephesians (because only 21 variant-units are covered in Ephesians its apparatus).    

            Here are the textual variant-units that the NKJV tells its readers about: 

            ● 1:14 – Byz reads “who” while NA reads “which.”

            ● 3:9 – NA does not include the phrase “through Jesus Christ.”

            ● 3:14 – NA does not include the phrase “of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

            ● 4:6 – At the end of the verse, NA does not include “us” before “all.”  (The Textus Receptus reads “you all.”)

            ● 4:9 – NA does not include “first” before “descended.”

            ● 4:17 – NA does not include “the rest of.”

            ● 5:5 – NA reads “For know this” instead of “For this you know.”

            ● 5:9 – NA reads “fruit of the light.”  Byz and the Textus Receptus (supported here by Papyrus 46) read “fruit of the Spirit.”

            ● 5:21 – NA reads “fear of Christ.”  Byz reads “fear of God.”

            ● 5:30 – NA does not include “of His flesh, and of His bones.”

            ●  6:9 – NA reads “He who is both their Master and yours” instead of “your own Master also.”

            ● 6:12 – NA reads “rulers of this darkness” instead of “rulers of the darkness of this age.”

            It would require a deliberate effort on the part of an interpreter to perceive a significant difference of meaning in some of these twelve cases of different wording.  In other cases, though – especially 3:9b and 3:14 and 5:9 and 5:30 – I would say that the differences in wording are likely to yield some differences of exegesis; preachers are not likely to treat the different readings in those four passages as if they are saying the same thing. 

            The NKJV’s footnotes, however, do not inform readers of the full extent of the significant differences between the Byzantine Text and the primarily Alexandrian Nestle-Aland compilation.  Not even close.  When one takes in hand the Robinson-Pierpont Byzantine Textform and consults its text-related footnotes, it becomes obvious that there are more than 12 passages where the Byzantine Textform and the Nestle-Aland compilation diverge.  The actual number of differences between the Byzantine text and the Nestle-Aland text in Ephesians is 93.

            If we start with that 93 and consider bracketed readings in the Nestle-Aland compilation to be merely unstable, but still in the text, and if we set aside the variants in 3:2 and 4:21 which are a matter of different divisions of letters into words (in both places, Byz = εἴγε, NA = εἴ γε), then 11 differences can be removed from consideration, thus lowering the number of differences to 82.

            If we further eliminate from consideration transpositions of words which, while changing the wording, do not materially affect the meaning – such as the transposition in 1:1 where the Byzantine Text says “Jesus Christ” and the N-A compilation says “Christ Jesus” – then another nine differences may be set aside as trivial, yielding now a total of 73.

            Continuing to filter out trivial variants, if we collect differences which are matter of orthography (spelling), such as αλλα versus αλλ’ in 4:29 and 5:29 and 6:4, we can set aside variants in 3:13 (εκκακειν versus εγκακειν), 3:16 (δωη versus δῷ), 4:2 (πραότητος versus πραΰτητος), 6:6 (οφθαλμοδουλείαν versus οφθαλμοδουλίαν), and even 6:17 (δέξασθαι versus δέξασθε), reducing the number of non-trivial disagreements to 65.

            Some of those 65 disagreements are too minor to have an impact on the meaning of the text, but the following do have such an impact:

            ● 1:6 – the small difference here (εν η versus ης) is the difference between “in which He made us accepted” and “which He lavished upon us.”

            ● 1:14 – the difference between ος and ο is the difference between “who is” and “which is.”  (This variant is not stable in the N-A compilation.)

            ● 1:16 – The Byzantine reading υμων makes explicit what is implied in the N-A text.

            ● 1:18 – The Byzantine Text has “and” after “calling.”

            ● 1:20 – The difference here is the difference between “seated” and “having seated.”

            ● 2:1 – The longer Alexandrian reading here ends the verse with “your sins.”

            ● 2:17 – The longer Alexandrian reading here consists of a repetition of the word “peace,” so as to read, “Peace to you [who are] far off and peace to those [who are] near.”

            ● 2:19 – The longer Alexandrian reading consists of a repetition of the word “are,” so as to read, “you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but are fellow citizens . . . .”

            ● 3:3 – The Byzantine reading means “He made known to me,” whereas the Alexandrian reading means “was made known to me.”

            ● 3:6 – The Byzantine text says “His promise.”  The Alexandrian text does not say “His.”

            ● 3:6 – The longer Alexandrian reading says “in Christ Jesus” instead of “in Christ.”

            ● 3:8 – The Byzantine reading means “among the nations,” the Alexandrian reading, without εν, means “to the nations.”

            ● 3:9 – The Byzantine reading affirms that God created all things through Jesus Christ.  The Alexandrian reading only says that God created all things.

            ● 3:14 – The Byzantine text has the phrase “of our Lord Jesus Christ.”  The Alexandrian text does not.

            ● 3:21 – The longer Alexandrian reading adds “and” between “church” and “Christ Jesus,” whereas the Byzantine reading, without και, means “in the church by Christ Jesus.”

            ● 4:6 – The Byzantine Text means “us all.”  The Alexandrian Text only says “all.”

            ● 4:8 – The Byzantine Text has “and” before “He gave gifts to men.”

            ● 4:9 – The Byzantine Text says that He descended first.

            ● 4:17 – The Byzantine Text says “as the rest of the Gentiles.”  The Alexandrian Text only says “as the Gentiles.”

            ● 4:28 – The longer Alexandrian reading, besides changing the word-order, includes “own,” so as to say, “producing with his own hands what is good.”

            ● 4:32 – The Byzantine Text says “us.”  The Alexandrian Text (and the Textus Receptus) says “you.”

            ● 5:5 – The Byzantine Text says “For this you know.”  The Alexandrian Text says “For know this.” (Byz:  εστε.  Alex.:  ιστε)

            ● 5:9 – The Byzantine Text (henceforth “Byz”) says “fruit of the Spirit.”  The Alexandrian Text says “fruit of the light.” 

            ● 5:17 – Byz says “understanding,” whereas the Alexandrian reading is a command, “understand.”

            ● 5:19 – The longer Alexandrian reading includes εν (“in”) before “psalms.”

            ● 5:22 – Byz says “submit yourselves.”  The Alexandrian text does not (implying a re-application of the same verb from the previous verse).

            ● 5:24 – Byz says “Husbands, love your own wives.”

            ● 5:28 – The longer Alexandrian reading includes “also” before “husbands.”  

            ● 5:29 – Byz says “even as the Lord does for the church.”  The Alexandrian Text says “even as Christ does for the church.”

            ● 5:30 – Byz includes the phrase, “of His flesh, and of His bones.”  The Alexandrian Text does not.

            ● 5:31 – Byz says “his” after “father.”  The Alexandrian text does not.

            ● 6:9 – The longer Alexandrian reading says “both their Master and yours.”  Byz says “your own Master” (the “your” is plural).

            ● 6:10 – Byz includes the words “my brothers.”  The Alexandrian text does not.  

            ● 6:12 – Byz refers to “the rulers of the darkness of this age.”  The Alexandrian reading refers to “the cosmic powers of darkness.” (Cf. CSB.)

            ● 6:16 – The Alexandrian text begins the verse with εν, so as to say “In all circumstances.”  Byz begins the verse with επι, so as to say, “Above all.”

            ● 6:24 – Byz closes the book with “Amen.”

           

            Thus, in terms of differences in the Greek base-text that have an impact on the wording in English, there are 36 textual disagreements between the Byzantine Text and the Alexandrian Text that have an impact on English wording.  It may be safely concluded that the 15 textual footnotes in Ephesians in the NKJV (and the eight textual footnotes in the CSB and NLT, and the two in the ESV, and the one textual footnote in the NIV) do not remotely approach a full presentation of the significant differences between the Alexandrian and Byzantine Texts. 

What about the textual apparatus in the Nestle-Aland Novum Testamentum Graece?   James White, in 1993 (in the 29th minute of this audio), claimed the following:   “I wish people would take the time, even if you don’t buy it, to go by a Christian bookstore and pick up the Nestle-Aland text, the UBS, now fourth edition that just came out.  Look at the text, and look at the bottom of the page.  Anyone who has these critical texts has all the readings of the manuscripts right there in front of them.  When I look at a passage, I can tell you exactly what any of the manuscripts in the various manuscript – all through the Byzantine tradition, so on and so forth – what they read, due to the tremendously advanced, very wisely put together textual apparatus at the bottom.  And any reading that is in any of these traditions is found either in the text or in the footnotes.” (emphasis added)

            Sadly, that is not true.  The textual apparatus of the Nestle-Aland compilation fails to report the Byzantine reading in Ephesians 1:20, 2:3, 2:11, 2:12, 2:13, 2:20, 3:6, 3:7, 3:8 (twice), 3:11, 3:12, 3:16 (twice), 4:2, 4:29, 5:3, 5:4, 5:5, 5:24 (twice), 5:27, 5:29, 6:4, 6:6 (twice), 6:8, 6:9 (twice), 6:17, and 6:18.  To restate:  in the Nestle-Aland apparatus, the reading found in the majority of manuscripts of Ephesians is not reported in 30 out of 93 places where the two compilations diverge.   

            White’s comment should be tempered by his subsequent statement in The King James Only Controversy, regarding a Byzantine reading at the end of Acts 22:16 (another reading not reported in the Nestle-Aland apparatus):  “Surely such a reading, despite it probably being secondary, should at least be noted for the sake of all those who wish to do textual studies.”

             Daniel Wallace has also exaggerated the situation, stating, “It is certain that the original wording is found either in the text or in the apparatus.”  But (to give just one example) is it certain that a copyist added the word ἰδίοις in Ephesians 5:24, and utterly inconceivable that a copyist accidentally omitted the word ἰδίοις when his line of sight drifted from the letters οις in the preceding word (τοις) to the same letters at the end of ἰδίοις?  (The NET’s footnotes, by the way, cover 18 variant-units in Ephesians.)   More recently, Wallace wrote (as Maurice Robinson has observed),  “Pragmatically, the wording of the original is to be found either in the text or the apparatus of the Nestle-Aland Greek New Testament. We have the original in front of us; we’re just not sure at all times whether it is above the line or below it.”  This is difficult to take seriously in a world in which nearly one out of three readings that are supported by the majority of Greek manuscripts (in Ephesians) are absent from the Nestle-Aland apparatus.

            The textual footnotes in major English translations of the New Testament only provide mere samples of the differences between the Byzantine/Majority manuscripts and the Alexandrian manuscripts.  Furthermore, even the Nestle-Aland apparatus badly fails to report Byzantine readings.  The only convenient and reliable way to identify the Byzantine-versus-Alexandrian readings is to consult the footnotes in the Robinson-Pierpont Byzantine Textform, also known as The New Testament in the Original Greek (2005).

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

Matthew 12:47 and Homoioteleuton

Matthew 12:45b-50 in the
ESV Reader's Gospels.
Where's verse 47?

           In the English Standard Version, in the passage about the visit of Jesus’ mother and brothers in Matthew 12:46-50, there is a strange feature:  there is no verse 47; it is in the footnotes rather than in the text.  The ESV’s footnote says, “Some manuscripts insert verse 47:  Someone told him, “Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, asking to speak to you” – except in the ESV Reader’s Gospels, which has neither verse-numbers nor footnotes; its text goes directly from the end of verse 46 to the beginning of verse 47.
            In the Christian Standard Bible, meanwhile, Matthew 12:47 is included in the text, and a footnote says, “Other mss omit this verse.”  Before examining the text-critical reasons for the disagreement among these English versions, let’s first consider how inconsistently the CSB describes the manuscripts in its footnotes and headings.  For where its text retains Matthew 12:47, the CSB describes the manuscripts that disagree as merely “Other,” but following Mark 16:8, its editors have added a line (as if to tell the readers where to aim their scissors), and interrupted the text with a heading, “[Some of the earliest mss conclude with 16:8]” – but both notes refer to essentially the same small cluster of manuscripts.

            What manuscripts omit Matthew 12:47?  Primarily Codex Vaticanus, Codex Sinaiticus, Codex Regius (L, 019), Codex Tischendorfianus IV (036, from the 900s), and minuscule 579, allied with the Sahidic version, the Sinaitic Syriac and the Old Latin Codex Bobbiensis.  A few other copies lack Matthew 12:47, but if those four had contained it, their testimony would be considered trivia.

            And of the over 1,600 Greek manuscripts of Mark, two uncials omit Mark 16:9-20:  Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus (and both show signs of their copyists’ awareness of the absent verses, as I have shown already, here and here).  Codex L echoes a later stage of a text used in Egypt; it has the “Shorter Ending” after Mark 16:8, and then verses 9-20), and minuscule 579 also has the “Shorter Ending” between Mark 16:8 and 9 (though, unlike Codex L, without short notes to introduce each ending).  And in the versions, the text of the Sinaitic Syriac stops at 16:8, and the copyist of Old Latin Codex Bobbiensis, after mauling verse 8, included the Shorter Ending, poorly transcribed. 

            The same cluster of witnesses is in view in both cases – but the unsuspecting reader of the Christian Standard Version meets them masked as “Other mss” where their testimony is rejected, and as “Some of the earliest mss” where the passage is bracketed. 

            Now let’s turn back to Matthew 12:47, and see why it is missing not only in the ESV but also in that cluster of manuscripts in which the best Greek uncials and worst Syriac and Latin copies appear to keep close company.  What we have here is a simple case of homoioteleuton (also spelled homoeoteleuton).  Verse 46 ends with the Greek words ζητοῦντες αὐτῷ λαλῆσαι (“seeking to him to speak”), and verse 47 ends with the words ζητοῦντες σοι λαλῆσαι (“seeking to you to speak”).  An early copyist – working at a point in the transmission-stream early enough to be echoed by the Alexandrian branch represented by ﬡ, B, and L, on the one hand, and by the Western branch represented by the Old Syriac and Codex Bobbiensis, on the other – accidentally skipped verse 47 when his line of sight drifted down from the λαλῆσαι at the end of verse 46 to the λαλῆσαι at the end of verse 47.

            It is not hard to see how this happened.  Meanwhile, consider what the ESV’s editors must believe about the transmission of this passage.  If the ESV’s non-inclusion is correct, then the copyists of virtually all other Greek manuscripts – C D W Z Δ Θ 28 33 157 892 (which adds προς αὐτον; see Willker’s comments for details), 1424, the family-1 group, the family-13 group, and well over 1,500 minuscules, and hundreds of lectionaries – and over 10 Old Latin copies (including Codex Vercellensis, from the 370’s), the Vulgate, the Peshitta, the Armenian, Georgian, and Ethiopic versions, and copies cited by patristic writers including Jerome and Augustine (and Augustine cited the verse in two different forms, echoing two different Old Latin transmission-lines), were all using the wrong exemplars at this point.

Another plain case of
homoioteleuton in Codex B.

            I hope my readers will understand by this last paragraph that I am not arguing for the majority reading merely because it is the majority.  Today we know of one early Middle Egyptian manuscript – Mae-2, that is, Codex Schøyen 2650, from the early 300s – which agrees with ﬡ and B in non-inclusion of Matthew 12:47.  But if we had 50 copies in the same transmission-line, the argument would not vary, just as the discovery of 50 more copies of the Vulgate would not make much of an impact.  It is not a matter of number, but of the relative plausibility of the competing models of the text’s transmission-history. 
            The evidence demands that the scribal error that caused the loss of this verse happened very early – early enough to echo in a limited part of the Alexandrian transmission-line, and in a limited part of the Old Latin and Syriac transmission-lines.  But early parablepsis is parablepsis nonetheless.  Matthew 12:47 should be included in the text, and if there is a footnote, let it tell the reader why the verse was lost in the transmission-line of ﬡ and B, instead of just giving enough information to perpetuate confusion.

_______________

The English Standard Version is © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.  Used by permission.  All rights reserved.

The Christian Standard Bible® is Copyright © 2017 by Holman Bible Publishers.  Used by permission.  Christian Standard Bible® and CSB® are federally registered trademarks of Holman Bible Publishers. 

The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® is Copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.  ESV Text edition:  2011.  Used by permission.  All rights reserved.  

Student's Toolkit: When Your Professor Rejects Mark 16:9-20

          How should preachers handle Mark 16:9-20?  Since I regard this passage as sacred Scripture, I encourage them to preach from it.  I also recommend that they point out to their congregations that most English versions have headings or footnotes which state that some manuscripts (or, the two earliest manuscripts) of Mark do not contain these 12 verses.  Then, point out that footnotes have to be concise, and cannot be expected to always adequately describe the evidence.  Sometimes they even contain mistakes, like the notes about Mark 16:9-20 in the NET, the CSB, the ESV (until 2010), and the hyper-paraphrase known as The Message.

Hey NavPress:  are you ever going to
correct this false footnote?

  

          The impression given by vague footnotes changes drastically when the evidence is described in precise terms:  two Greek manuscripts from the 300’s, and one medieval commentary-manuscript, conclude the text of chapter 16 at the end of verse 8; meanwhile over 99% of the Greek manuscripts (over 1,600, including ancient ones, contrary to the footnote in The Message) support these verses.  In addition, patristic writers used these verses as Scripture in the 100’s, including Justin Martyr, Tatian, and Irenaeus, the last of whom specifically quoted Mark 16:19 in Book Three of his composition Against Heresies (c. 180).  

          In a way, the answer to the question, “Is Mark 16:9-20 part of the canon of Scripture?” – Yes, or No – will also answer the question, “Did the early Christian church hand down the Greek text of the New Testament in a form which accurately conveyed the message of the original text?”.  For clearly the presence or absence of these 12 verses changes the narrative quite a bit.  Most folks will grant that since we trust the early leaders of the church where the canon is concerned, we should trust them where the text is concerned as well – not necessarily in fine details (where their own quotations vary), but at least where readings that heavily impact the meaning are concerned.  

          The patristic writers (and anonymous compositions) who show, in one way or another, that they used manuscripts of Mark that included 16:9-20 include Ambrose and Aphrahat and “Apostolic Constitutions” and Augustine and “Acts of Pilate” and “De rebaptismate” and “Doctrine of Addai” and “Enthronement of Michael” and Epiphanius and “Epistula Apostolorum” and Eusebius and Eznik of Golb and Fortunatianus and Fulgentius and Hierocles (a pagan writer) and Hippolytus and Irenaeus and Jerome and John Cassian and Justin Martyr and Leo and Macarius Magnes and  Marcus Eremita and Marinus and “Martyrium Arethae” and Nestorius and Patrick and Pelagius and Peter Chrysologus and Philosturgius and Prosper of Aquitaine and Pseudo-Didymus and Severus of Antioch and Tatian and Tertullian and Vincent of Antioch and Vincentius of Thibaris and Wulfilas – plus several forms of the Old Latin chapter-summaries of Mark, and Syriac section-divisions.  Most people conclude that all this makes it obvious that the people who recognized the New Testament canon also recognized Mark 16:9-20 as Scripture.   

  

          Some seminary professors, however, are not like most people.  What should a seminary student do when a professor denies that Mark 16:9-20 belongs in the Bible – implicitly tipping his hand on the question of whether or not he believes that the Greek-speaking churches handed down the text of the Gospels with sufficient accuracy to preserve the original message without drastic adulteration or loss?  Here are four suggestions.

1.  In the classroom, ask your professor for details about the evidence pertaining to this passage.  If he says things like, “Clement and Origen do not use it,” or, “Eusebius and Jerome say that it was absent from the best copies,” and if his description of the manuscript-evidence is vague, it is safe to deduce that your professor has only a marginal and shallow grasp of the evidence, and that his statements are mere mirrors of Bruce Metzger’s obsolete Textual Commentary which was designed to defend the readings adopted in the UBS Greek New Testament.      

2.  Meet with your professor privately and inquire about how much attention he has given to this textual variant.  It is quite possible that he has never read a single commentary written by an author who defends the passage.  Introduce him to resources that may be new to him, such as Roger Pearse’s Eusebius of Caesarea – Gospel Problems & Solutions (which shows what Eusebius really wrote, instead of just misleading snippets and summaries), and Carl Cosaert’s The Text of the Gospels in Clement of Alexandria (which shows how exceedingly rarely Clement quoted from Mark), and the 2016 edition of my book, Authentic:  The Case for Mark 16:9-20 (which covers external evidence and internal evidence in minute detail).  Nicholas Lunn and David W. Hester, too, have both recently written in favor of this passage.

3.  Treat your professor like he has a brain and is not obligated to conform to groupthink or “conventional wisdom.”  Scholars and teachers should be especially happy when they learn that a position to which they once subscribed is not really sustained by the available evidence – even when abandoning that position means admitting not only that they were wrong, but that the “scholarly consensus” is also wrong.  Your professor probably already has some opinions that are shared by only a small minority of his peers; encourage him to investigate the ending of Mark with the same curiosity that led him to those minority opinions.   

4.  Keep the lines of communication open.  It may seem natural to want to ignore a teacher who advocates the view that practically the entire Christian church outside the borders of Egypt failed to hand down a form of the Greek text of the Gospels that conveyed the meaning of the original text.  However, your professor might gradually realize, if he is encouraged to continue to investigate the subject, that a lack of meaningful peer review has allowed research on the ending of Mark to stagnate (as one can see by observing the many commentaries that simply rephrase Metzger’s words). 

           Your professor may then perceive that the scholarly consensus on this subject has grown unjustifiably entrenched, even though more evidence than ever before has come to light supporting the genuineness of these 12 verses.  With prayerful and gentle but persistent interaction, attempt to guide your professor to a new appreciation for the longstanding ecclesiastical acceptance of a form of the text that includes Mark 16:9-20.  This might even provoke similar journeys regarding other textual variants.        

[This post is intended as a response to a recent post by Danny Akin at the Gospel Coalition blog, and echoes it in some respects for rhetorical effect.]

"Some Manuscripts Say . . ." - The Problem with Footnotes

          Why are the footnotes in most English translations of the New Testament so unhelpfully vague?  “Some manuscripts say this.”  “Other manuscripts say that.”  While some readers may appreciate being notified about the presence of textual variants, the immediate effect of such vague footnotes is to render the passage doctrinally useless, unless both variants mean the same thing.  Furthermore, the use of “some” and “other” to describe manuscript evidence can be highly misleading. 

          Let me show you what I mean by sharing some details about textual variants in four passages from the Gospel of Matthew, and how they are treated in the ESV (English Standard Version) and in the HCSB (Holman Christian Standard Bible).  (Bear in mind that the HCSB is about to be re-issued in a revised form as the Christian Standard Bible, and there is no guarantee that their footnotes will be identical.  The ESV can also change from one edition to another.)  I will first present each passage as it is translated in the New King James Version, just to provide a frame of reference.    

● MATTHEW 12:47

NKJV:  Then one said to Him, “Look, Your mother and Your brothers are standing outside, seeking to speak with You.” 

ESV:  Matthew 12:47 is not included in the ESV.  A footnote states, “Some manuscripts insert verse 47:  “Someone told him, “Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, asking to speak to you.””

HCSB:  And someone told Him, “Look, Your mother and Your brothers are standing outside, wanting to speak to You.”  A footnote says, “12:47 Other mss omit this verse.”

            What has happened is that in an ancestor-manuscript of the three primary Alexandrian manuscripts of this passage – Sinaiticus, Vaticanus, and Codex L (019) – a copyist accidentally skipped from the word λαλησαι at the end of verse 46 to the same word at the end of verse 47, thus losing all the words in between.  The mistake was a relatively early one – impacting not only the Alexandrian Text’s leading witnesses but also an early form of the Syriac text.  However, not only does the longer reading account for the shorter reading in this case, but the external support for the inclusion of the verse is massive and ancient.  It includes almost all Greek manuscripts (not some bare majority, but over 99%, including Codices D and W) and a strong array of Old Latin copies, the Vulgate, and the Peshitta.  In addition, a comparison of two Middle Egyptian evidence may confirm the passage’s vulnerability to accidental loss:  Mae-2 (Schoyen Codex 2650) does not have the verse, but Mae-1 (the Scheide Codex, from c. 400 or slight later) has the verse.  

            Some additional details are worth noting.  In Codex D and some other manuscripts (including L and Θ), the order of the last two words in verse 46 is reversed; this may echo an early copyist’s practical attempt to decrease the perceived risk of losing verse 47 via parablepsis.  In Codex Sinaiticus, the copyist did not only skip all of verse 47 but also the last portion of verse 46, losing the words ζητουντες αυτω λαλησαι (“seeking to speak with Him”).   This level of sloppiness should be a concern.

            Footnotes which do not convey the limited range of the non-inclusion of Matthew 12:47, and which fail to convey the mechanism which accounts for the accidental loss of the verse, are worse than no footnote at all.  It would be better for the compilers of the ESV’s base-text of to acknowledge that their favored manuscripts are defective at this point (as Michael Holmes has done in the SBL-GNT).    

● MATTHEW 13:35a

NKJV:  “that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet,”  

ESV:  “This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet:” –

A footnote states:  “Some manuscripts Isaiah the prophet”

HCSB:  “so that what was spoken through the prophet might be fulfilled:”  (no footnote).  

            In New Testament passages that quote from the Old Testament without naming the specific reference, some copyists were tempted to embellish the text.  We can observe this, for example, in Codex Bezae (D) in Matthew 1:22; the name “Isaiah” is inserted into the text.  We see the same tendency in modern paraphrases; in Eugene Peterson’s The Message, for example, when a New Testament author quotes from the Old Testament, The Message often inserts the name of the Old Testament book, whether it is specified in the Greek text or not. 

            Occasionally, reckless copyists who made such embellishments assigned quotations to the wrong source.  In Codex Sinaiticus, for example, in the margin alongside Matthew 2:5-6, the name “Isaiah” appears in a vertically-written note to identify the prophet whose work is quoted in the text.  The prophet being quoted, however, is Micah, not Isaiah.  A little further along in Codex Sinaiticus, the name “Numbers” appears in a vertically-written note alongside Matthew 2:15, even though the text cited in Matthew 2:15 is Hosea 11:1.       

          The same thing has happened in Codex Sinaiticus in Matthew 13:35, except the embellishment has been inserted directly into the text; Codex Sinaiticus is one of the few manuscripts that reads “Isaiah the prophet” in Matthew 13:35.  This reading was known in the late 300’s by Jerome, who expressed a belief that the passage had previously referred to “Asaph the prophet” and that copyists who did not recognize Asaph’s name changed it to “Isaiah.” 

            The external evidence for the non-inclusion of Isaiah’s name in Matthew 13:35 is enormous and wide-ranging:  it is supported by B, D, W, and by every branch of the Byzantine Text, and by all known Syriac, Latin, Sahidic, and Armenian copies.             

            The attribution of the quotation to Isaiah is an error, and to some textual critics, this makes it likely to be original, on the grounds that it is thus the more difficult reading.  Hort, in 1881, demonstrated his non-belief in inerrancy in his Notes on Select Readings, stating, “It is difficult not to think Ἠσαίου [Isaiah] genuine.”  Eberhard Nestle (the originator of the Nestle-Aland compilation) embraced the erroneous reading in his 1901 Introduction to the Textual Criticism of the Greek New Testament.  On page 251, after acknowledging that this reading was only attested by a smattering of extant manuscripts, but was also mentioned by Eusebius and Jerome (both of whose explicitly rejected it), Nestle wrote, “It was used still earlier by Porphyrius as a proof of Matthew’s ignorance.  It is certainly, therefore, genuine.” 

            Nestle seems to have put a high degree of confidence in the ability of Porphyry to resist the temptation to use scribal mistakes as ammunition for his jibes, and a low degree of confidence in the ability of Christian copyists to simply reproduce the contents of their exemplars.  He does not explain why the same scribes who allowed Jeremiah’s name to stand in Matthew 27:9 (where some initial puzzlement is natural, considering Matthew 27:9-10 is mostly based on Zechariah 11:12-13) found it intolerable to read Isaiah’s name in Matthew 13:35.  The explanation of the evidence is not complex:  the name “Isaiah” crept into the transmission-stream as an early copyist’s erroneous attempt to specify which prophet was being cited – and, when this embellishment was recognized as what it was, it was duly resisted and jettisoned.        

            Footnotes which merely say that “Some manuscripts” have Isaiah’s name in Matthew 13:35 mislead the typical reader twice.  First, the term “some” does not convey that the number of manuscripts which have Isaiah’s name in this verse is very small.  Second, such a footnote fails to inform the reader about the scribal tendency to embellish non-specific references, and to provide names for prophets and other individuals whose names are not supplied in their exemplars.  (Even Papyrus 75, for example, has an embellishment in Luke 16:19, where a name is given to the rich man).  With these two factors in view, the reader is equipped to evaluate the evidence; without them, the sketchy footnotes only succeed in puzzling the reader.

● MATTHEW 14:30a

NKJV:  “But when he saw that the wind was boisterous”

ESV:  “But when he saw the wind” with a footnote:  “Some manuscripts strong wind.”

HCSB:  “But when he saw the strength of the wind” with a footnote: “Other mss read the wind”

            Here the editors of the ESV and the editors of the HCSB disagreed about which reading belongs in the text.  The phrase that is found in almost all Greek manuscripts is βλέπων δε τον ανεμον ισχυρον, but the ESV is based on the text of Codices B, À, and 33, which do not have the word ισχυρον.  The Middle Egyptian Schøyen Codex also supports non-inclusion of this word.  The shorter reading is efficiently explained by the longer reading:  a copyist whose work influenced the exemplars of the Alexandrian Text’s flagship manuscripts carelessly skipped from the letters -ον at the end of ανεμον to the same letters at the end of ισχυρον, accidentally losing the letters in between and thus losing the word ισχυρον. 

            Footnotes which give readers no clue about how the omission originated are not just unhelpful; they raise doubts about the stability of the text even in cases where a little information about word-endings has a strong clarifying effect.  Of course if a translation (in this case, the ESV) has adopted the incomplete text, those who want to maintain its credibility might want to avoid mentioning such inconvenient details. 

● MATTHEW 17:21

NKJV:  “However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.”

ESV:  Matthew 17:21 is not included in the ESV.  A footnote states:  “Some manuscripts insert verse 21:  But this kind never comes out except by prayer and fasting.”

HCSB:  Matthew 17:21 is included in the text, within brackets:  “[²¹However, this kind does not come out except by prayer and fasting.]”

            Out of about 1,700 Greek manuscripts of Matthew 17, almost all of them include verse 21, including the uncial codices D, L, Σ, and W, which represent different transmission-branches or locales.  The verse is also included in most Old Latin copies, and in the Vulgate.  The ESV, however, is based on the Nestle-Aland compilation, which does not include this verse because this verse is not included in Vaticanus and Sinaiticus and a few other witnesses representative of the Alexandrian Text; nor is this verse supported by two representatives of an early Syriac version of the Gospels. 

            Earlier than any of those witnesses, however, were the manuscripts used by Origen in the early 200’s – and Origen quoted this verse in his Commentary on Matthew, in Book 13, chapter 7.  In the mid-300’s, Basil of Caesarea also quoted this verse.  Ambrose of Milan used it, slightly later, in his Epistle 65, part 15.  So did John Chrysostom, in his Homily 57 on Matthew, and Hilary of Poitiers.  It is also included in the Peshitta (with fasting mentioned before prayer).

            Bruce Metzger – one of the compilers of the United Bible Societies’ Greek New Testament – wrote in his influential Textual Commentary that “There is no good reason why the passage, if originally present in Matthew, should have been omitted.”  I must suspect that the UBS committee’s search for a reason for excision was awfully brief, because it is not difficult to perceive that a Christian copyist could easily be alarmed by the thought that readers might conclude that the eternal Son of God needed to fast in order to control fallen angels.  (The same consideration motivated the excision of the words “and fasting” from Mark 9:29 in the Alexandrian Text; the presence of the words in Mark are confirmed, however, not only by almost all manuscripts, but also by Papyrus 45.) 

            In this case, referring to “Some manuscripts” and “Other manuscripts” obscures rather than illuminates the real state of the evidence, in which over 99% of the manuscripts favor the inclusion of the verse, and in which it is cited by patristic sources going back to the early 200’s.  Such vague footnotes do more harm than good.  They provide only an illusion of informing the reader, while failing to share information about meaningful aspects of the relevant evidence, such as the scope and antiquity of the evidence.

            The misleading vagueness in the footnotes for these four passages is typical of the textual footnotes that occur throughout the ESV.  The term “some” is used to describe about a dozen manuscripts, and it is also used to refer to over 1,600 manuscripts.  There is no way to tell from the footnotes what kind of evidence is meant by “some” manuscripts.  No attempt is made to explain to the reader how the reading in the footnote originated.  That is remarkably unhelpful.            

            If the editors of modern English translations wish to turn the margins of our Bibles into a collection of trivia about the mistakes made by ancient copyists, we should at least insist that they present the evidence fairly, instead of inviting readers to look at the manuscript-evidence through lenses that are foggy, distorted, and broken.         

            Textual footnotes should be helpful, concise, and focused.  When early patristic evidence is relevant, it should be mentioned.  (For instance, it is certainly deceptive to tell readers that “The earliest manuscripts” do not include Mark 16:9-20 without mentioning that Irenaeus quoted Mark 16:19 around 180, over a century before the two Greek uncials that omit verses 9-20 were made.)  When a textual variant is supported by fewer than ten Greek manuscripts, or when a variant’s support is almost exclusively from one transmission-branch, the scope of the evidence should be pointed out.  Exactly how to do this, while maintaining conciseness, is a challenge, but it will be far better to undertake that challenge than to continue to distract and puzzle Bible-readers with misleading footnotes.

_______________

The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV) is Copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. 

The Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB) is © Copyright 2000 Holman Bible Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee.

The New King James Version (NKJV) is Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. 

The ESV Study Bible and Mark 16:9-20

As a follow-up to the analysis of the shortcomings of Dr. Bruce Metzger’s comments about the external evidence about the ending of the Gospel of Mark, I have put together a review of some very similar statements about Mark 16:9-20 which are found in the ESV Study Bible. 

The author of the ESV Study Bible’s notes for the Gospel of Mark is listed at the ESV Study Bible's website as Dr. Hans Bayer, a professor at Covenant Theological Seminary (near St. Louis, Missouri).  (Dr. Wayne Grudem is the General Editor.)  Covenant Theological Seminary is a Presbyterian school; its professors annually affirm the Westminster Confession, which includes a statement that the New Testament in Greek was “inspired by God, and, by His singular care and providence, kept pure in all ages.”   However, inasmuch as the Greek text of the New Testament text used by the authors of the Westminster Confession is very different from the base-text of the ESV, it would seem that the purity to which this part of the Westminster Confession refers is being interpreted as basic doctrinal purity, not as textual purity. 

Now let’s consider Dr. Bayer’s note about Mark 16:9-20 in the ESV Study Bible, going point by point.  (The excerpts attributed to Dr. Bayer are from the English Standard Version Study Bible, © 2010 Crossway Bibles (a division of Good News Publishers), Wheaton.  Used for review purposes.  Excerpts from Dr. Bruce Metzger are from A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, © 1971 by the United Bible Societies, Stuttgart.)

Dr. Bayer:  “Some ancient manuscripts of Mark's Gospel contain these verses and others do not, which presents a puzzle for scholars who specialize in the history of such manuscripts.”

If “ancient” manuscripts are defined as manuscripts produced before the death of Charlemagne (in 814), then two ancient Greek manuscripts, one ancient Latin manuscript, one ancient Sahidic manuscript (the production-date of which is far from certain), and one ancient Syriac manuscript do not contain any part of Mark 16:9-20.  All other ancient copies of Mark 16, whether Greek or non-Greek, include at least part of this passage, showing that it was in those copies when they were in pristine condition.  

The two Greek manuscripts that lack Mark 16:9-20 (Vaticanus and Sinaiticus) were both almost certainly produced at Caesarea in the 300s.  As I explained in the survey of Dr. Metzger’s comments, Codex Vaticanus has a distinct blank space after Mark 16:8, as if the copyist did not have access to an exemplar with the passage but nevertheless recollected it and attempted to reserve space for it.  And in Codex Sinaiticus, the text from Mark 14:54-Luke 1:56 is written on replacement-pages; the copyist who made those four pages drastically shifted his rate of letters per columns in order to avoid having a blank column between the end of Mark and the beginning of Luke.  This indicates that the copyists of the only two Greek manuscripts in which Mark ends at 16:8 knew of at least one manuscript, older than the ones they were making, in which the passage was included.

Dr. Bayer:  “This longer ending is missing from various old and reliable Greek manuscripts (esp. Sinaiticus and Vaticanus), as well as numerous early Latin, Syriac, Armenian, and Georgian manuscripts.”

Dr. Bayer’s dependence upon Dr. Metzger is obvious as he describes these pieces of evidence in exactly the same order in which Dr. Metzger described them.  Dr. Bayer, however, has provided his readers with an even more distant and out-of-focus perspective than Dr. Metzger did, with the result that his readers have been given a false impression of the scope of the evidence.  The two Greek manuscripts that Dr. Bayer names (Sinaiticus and Vaticanus) are the only ancient Greek manuscripts of Mark 16 in which the text stops at verse 8.  Now imagine if someone told you, “Various houses in this town are made of brick, especially the homes of Mr. Andrews and Mr. Baker” – and then you found out that the homes of Mr. Andrews and Mr. Baker were the only brick houses in the village.  Would you not feel rather misled?  

The “numerous” Latin manuscripts to which Dr. Bayer refers consist of one copy:  Codex Bobbiensis, which has an anomalous text throughout Mark 16 (regarding which see the pertinent part of the earlier article about Dr. Metzger’s comments.)  The “numerous” Syriac manuscripts to which Dr. Bayer refers consist of one copy:  the Sinaitic Syriac, which shares other unusual readings with Codex Bobbiensis.  The Armenian manuscripts to which he refers are really numerous, but they are medieval; they are not early.  Neither are the two Georgian manuscripts to which he refers. 

Dr. Bayer:  “Early church fathers (e.g. Origen and Clement of Alexandria) did not appear to know of these verses.”

This appears to be a paraphrase of Dr. Metzger’s claim that “Clement of Alexandria and Origen show no knowledge of the existence of these verses.”   Clement hardly quoted from the Gospel of Mark at all, except for one large citation from chapter 10.  Origen, likewise, did not use the Gospel of Mark very much.  See my analysis of Dr. Metzger’s statement for further details.  Also notice that farther along in the same footnote, Dr. Bayer says that many church fathers knew the passage. 

Dr. Bayer:  “Eusebius and Jerome state that this section is missing in most manuscripts available at their time.”

This appears to be another echo of Dr. Metzger’s comments.  The pertinent statement from Eusebius is embedded in his composition Ad Marinum, in which Eusebius, in the course of answering a question about how to resolve a perceived discrepancy between Matthew 28 and Mark 16 regarding the timing of Christ’s resurrection, stated that a person could say that verses 9-20 are not in every single manuscript, or that they are absent from the accurate ones, or from almost all manuscripts.  But after framing all that as something that a person might say, Eusebius proceeded to describe, in considerable detail, how Mark 16:9 could be harmonized  with Matthew 28:1 (and thus retained).  He seems to expect Marinus to take this second approach.  In the course of answering the next question, Eusebius states that “some copies” of Mark mention that Jesus cast out seven demons from Mary Magdalene (a detail stated in Mark only in 16:9), and in his answer to the question after that one, he affirms that the Mary who stands at the tomb in John 20 is the same individual “from whom, according to Mark, He had cast out seven demons.” 

Although one might imagine, based on Dr. Bayer’s vague description of Jerome’s testimony, that Jerome reported the results of his own investigation into how his manuscripts of Mark ended, what we really have in Jerome’s Ad Hedibiam (Epistle 120) is a condensed translation of Eusebius' Ad Marinum.  The third, fourth, and fifth questions in Jerome’s letter to Hedibia are the same as the first, second, and third questions in Eusebius’ letter to Marinus, and Jerome’s answers are based mainly on the answered that Eusebius had supplied.  This is not an independent statement by Jerome; he would not have made this statement if he had not been translating Eusebius’ earlier composition.  Jerome included verses 9-20 in the Vulgate (in 383), and referred to 16:14 in Against the Pelagians when explaining where he had seen the interpolation now known as the Freer Logion.

Dr. Bayer:  “And some manuscripts that contain vv. 9-20 indicate that older manuscripts lack the section.”

Again, this resembles Dr. Metzger’s statement:  “Not a few manuscripts which contain the passage have scribal notes stating that older Greek copies lack it.”  As I have explained elsewhere, this refers to 14 manuscripts (out of over 1,700) which have special annotations about Mark 16:9-20.  The annotations tend to express support for the passage.  In one form (shared by ten manuscripts), the annotation states that although some copies lack the verses, most copies include them, and in another form (shared by three manuscripts), the annotation states that although some copies lack the passage, the ancient copies include it all.  That is the opposite of the impression given by the ESV Study Bible’s note.

Dr. Bayer:  “On the other hand, some early and many later manuscripts (such as the manuscripts known as A, C, and D) contain vv. 9-20, and many church fathers (such as Irenaeus) evidently knew of these verses.”

Dr. Bayer specifically named the two Greek manuscripts in which the text of Mark stops at 16:8, and he reached into the 900s to find versional evidence for that form of the text.  But here as he describes the patristic evidence, he supplied only one specific name.  That is not even-handed treatment of the evidence.  The “many church fathers” to whom Dr. Bayer refers includes the following:  Justin (c. 160), Tatian (c. 172), Irenaeus (c. 184), Epistula Apostolorum (probably; 150-180),Tertullian (probably; 190-205), Hippolytus (c. 220), Vincentius of Thibaris (257), De Rebaptismate (258), Porphyry/Hierocles (anti-Christian writers from 270/303), Acts of Pilate (300s), Marinus (c. 330), Aphraates (335), Wulfilas (c. 350), Ephrem Syrus (c. 360), Ambrose (370’s or 380’s), Philostorgius (c. 380), Epiphanius (c. 385), Old Latin capitula (pre-380’s), the Peshitta (mid-late 300s), Chromatius (c. 380), Apostolic Constitutions (380), De Trinitate (380’s, attributed to Didymus the Blind), Jerome (383), John Chrysostom (probably, c. 407), the author of the Freer Logion (pre-400), Augustine (400), Greek manuscripts cited by Augustine (400), the lectionary-system used by Augustine (early 400s), Macarius Magnes (405), Doctrine of Addai (early 400s; probably a composite of earlier material), Pelagius (c. 410), Patrick (mid-400s), Nestorius (c. 430), Marcus Eremita (435), Peter Chrysologus (453), Eznik of Golb (c. 440), and Prosper of Aquitaine (c. 450).  If the list of patristic writings and manuscripts were extended to the production-date of the Armenian copies that Dr. Bayer described as “early,” it would be increased by dozens and dozens.

Dr. Bayer:  “As for the verses themselves, they contain various Greek words and expressions uncommon to Mark, and there are stylistic differences as well.”

Granting that Mark 16:9-20 contains some stylistic differences from the preceding section, Dr. Bayer’s point about the presence of Greek words “uncommon to Mark” is nullified by the presence of even more Greek words “uncommon to Mark” – that is, used only once in the Gospel of Mark – in another 12-verse section (15:40-16:4), as Dr. Bruce Terry shows in an essay at http://web.ovc.edu/terry/articles/mkendsty.htm .

In addition, the ESV – in a copy that I saw with a 2007 copyright by Crossway – has the following footnote:  “Some manuscripts end the book with 16:8; others include verses 9-20 immediately after verse 8.  A few manuscripts insert additional material after verse 14; one Latin manuscript adds after verse 8 the following:  But they reported briefly to Peter and those with him all that they had been told. And after this, Jesus himself sent out by means of them, from east to west, the sacred and imperishable proclamation of eternal salvation. Other manuscripts include this same wording after verse 8, then continue with verses 9-20."

That footnote is extremely imprecise.  Written accurately, it would go like this:  “Over 1,700 Greek manuscripts include verses 9-20 immediately after verse 8.  Two Greek manuscripts end the book with 16:8; one of them has a prolonged blank space after verse 8.  One manuscript inserts additional material between verse 14 and verse 15.  One Latin manuscript interpolates an ascension-scene between 16:3 and 16:4, removes part of verse 8, and then adds the following:  But they reported briefly to a boy and those with him all that they had been told.  And after this, Jesus appeared and sent out by means of them, from east to east, the sacred and imperishable [proclamation] of eternal salvation, Amen.  Five Greek manuscripts (and versional evidence from Egypt) include similar wording between verse 8 and verse 9; one medieval Greek manuscript has this ending in the margin.

How long will the editors of the ESV and the ESV Study Bible allow their readers to be misled by these inaccurate and misleading notes?