If In Doubt, Sort It Out

 

Curious incidents
in the Byzantine Text.

          “If in doubt, don’t throw it out.”  That is the way in which Dan Wallace has asserted that Byzantine copyists handled the text of the New Testament when they had two exemplars that said two different things.  That is essentially a restatement of the claim made by J. J. Griesbach over 200 years ago:  “Scribes were much more prone to add than to omit.  They hardly ever leave out anything on purpose, but they added much.” 

            That idea – one of the fundamental principles used by textual critics throughout the 1800’s and 1900’s – was effectively erased by the data and analysis which was published by James Royse in 2010 in Scribal Habits in Early Greek New Testament Papyri.  Royse observed that the rate at which the copyists of some early papyri made omissions is higher than the rate at which those copyists made additions; the ratio works out to about 3:2.  This means that scribes were more prone to omit than to add.  Griesbach had it backwards, and everyone who has relied on the validity of the axiom, “Prefer the shorter reading” has had it backwards – including Bruce Metzger.

            It shouldn’t have taken until 2010 for researchers to acknowledge that Griesbach’s claim was standing on thin ice.  (And some already did; in each generation at least a few scholars maintained that the New Testament text’s transmission-history resembled the clothes in a traveling salesman’s suitcase, losing a sock at every hotel.)  To researchers equipped with (mostly) accurate transcripts of Codices Alexandrinus, Vaticanus, Bezae, and Sinaiticus, it should have been clear that if the Byzantine Text originated as an amalgamation of Alexandrian and Western readings, its creators must have frequently rejected the readings in their exemplars.  That is, one can believe Hort’s theory of the Lucianic recension, or one can believe that scribes using more than one exemplar typically expanded the text, but not both. 

            The following readings, all taken from the first five chapters of the Gospel of John, demonstrate this with particular force.  In each case, the Byzantine reading is shorter than a reading found in leading Alexandrian and/or Western witnesses. 

            ● 1:6 – Byz does not read ἦν

            ● 1:19 – Byz does not read πρὸς αὐτον after ἀπέστειλαν

            ● 1:21 – Byz does not read πάλιν after αὐτὸν (cf. Codex Wsupp)

            ● 1:28 – Byz does not read ὁ before Ἰωἀννης

            ● 1:38 – Byz does not prefix μεθ- to ἐρμηνευόμενον

            ● 1:39 – Byz does not read οὖν after ἦλθον

            ● 1:46 – Byz does not read ὁ before Φίλιππος

            ● 1:50 – Byz does not read ὄτι

            ● 2:4 – Byz does not read Καὶ before λέγει

            ● 2:17 – Byz does not read ὄτι after ἐστίν

            ● 3:5 – Byz does not read ὁ before Ἰησοῦς

            ● 3:28 – Byz does not read ὄτι after εἶπον
            ● 4:3 – Byz does not read γῆν before καὶ

            ● 4:3 – Byz does not read πάλιν before εἰς (B^c, À, P66, P75, D, and L all read πάλιν)

            ● 4:5 – Byz does not read τῷ after Ἰακὼβ

            ● 4:14 – Byz does not read ἐγὼ before δώσω (cf. Codex Wsupp) 

            ● 4:15 – Byz does not prefix δι- to έρχομαι

            ● 4:27 – Byz does not read αὐτῷ after εἶπεν

            ● 5:5 – Byz does not read αὐτοῦ after ἀσθενείᾳ

            ● 5:9 – Byz does not read ἐγερθεὶς

            ● 5:10 – Byz does not read καὶ after ἐστιν

            ● 5:10 – Byz does not read σου after κράβαττόν

            ● 5:15 – Byz does not read οὖν after ἀπῆλθεν

            ● 5:19 – Byz does not read τοῦ ἀνθρώπου after υἱὸς

            ● 5:26 – Byz does not read ὁ ζῶν before ἒχει

            ● 5:40 – Byz does not read αἰώνιον after ζωὴν

           

            That’s 26 non-expansions in five chapters, an average of five non-expansions per chapter.  Extrapolating, we might find over 100 such non-expansions in the entire text of John, and over 400 such non-expansions in all four Gospels.  

            (In addition, one might profit from considering all the Byzantine readings that are not significantly longer than their Alexandrian and Western rivals, but are simply different – variants such as the reading ὡσεὶ (instead of ὡς) in John 4:7, and the transposition at the end of John 4:20, and the reading Βηθεσδὰ in John 5:2 (where Vaticanus reads Βηθσαιδὰ, Sinaiticus reads Βηθζαθὰ, and D reads Βελζεθὰ).  

            How can one say that the Alexandrian and Western readings in the listed passages have not been thrown out?  And how can the Byzantine Text, at these points, be considered derivative of text-forms whose readings are rejected?

            Hort’s eight conflations have been used as proof that Byzantine scribes applied the principle, “If in doubt, don’t throw it out.”  Meanwhile, a tour through just the first five chapters of John reveals three times as many instances where, if Byzantine copyists accessed Alexandrian and Western exemplars (as advocates of the Lucianic recension believe that they did) – they must have thrown out Alexandrian or Western readings. 

            This does not mean that as more and more non-Byzantine manuscripts (with non-Byzantine readings) were encountered in the areas now known as Syria, Turkey, Cyprus, and Greece in the 300’s, they had no effect whatsoever on the local text.  This data does not refute the idea that in some passages of the Byzantine Text (I am thinking specifically of some of Hort’s alleged conflations), an early local reading, which once agreed exclusively with either the Alexandrian or Western reading, has been completely supplanted by an expansion that was elicited by the arrival, from another locale, of an attractive rival reading.  (Something similar happened occasionally in the Alexandrian transmission-stream, as Wilbur Pickering has demonstrated; see, for examples, Mark 1:28, John 7:39, Ephesians 2:5, and Colossians 1:12.)  But it does imply that to describe Byzantine scribes as if they never met an expansion they didn’t like is to spread an essentially false characterization.

            The evidence supports instead the position that the typical attitude of Byzantine scribes, when and where they encountered unfamiliar readings from non-local exemplars, was one of caution:  “If in doubt, sort it out.”  Otherwise these 26 short Byzantine readings in John chapters 1-5 would be longer.          

             

Mark 1:41 - Why the NIV is Wrong

          If you read Mark 1:41 in an NIV printed before 2011, and in an NIV made after 2011, you will find two different statements.  The early editions of the NIV say that when a leper approached Jesus seeking to be healed, Jesus was “filled with compassion.”  In 2011, the NIV was revised in order to adopt many of the changes that had been introduced in the discontinued TNIV.  Among those changes was the introduction of a different form of Mark 1:41 which states that Jesus, rather than feeling compassion, became “indignant,” that is, angry.

Mark 1:38-42 in Greek in Codex Bezae (D).
(Verse-numbers and highlight added.)

          Those two different forms of Mark 1:41 – “filled with compassion” versus “indignant” – echo two textual variants.  It’s not as if the translators have emphasized different nuances of the same Greek text.  The Greek base-text of the 2011 NIV is different from the Greek text of the 1984 NIV at this particular point.  The 1984 NIV (and the ESV, NKJV, HCSB, and KJV) reflects the Greek word σπλαγχνισθεις, which is found in a massive majority of Greek manuscripts (including Codex Vaticanus, Codex Sinaiticus, Codex Alexandrinus, and about 1,600 others, plus thousands of non-Greek manuscripts).  But Codex Bezae has a different reading:  οργισθεις.  When we turn to the Latin manuscripts, a mountain of evidence favors misertus, which supports σπλαγχνισθεις.  However, four Old Latin manuscripts support οργισθεις.  One of those four is the Latin text which accompanies the Greek text in Codex Bezae.  Codex Bezae is not only a Greek manuscript; it is Greek-Latin; its text is arranged in alternating pages – a page of Greek text is followed by the same passage in Latin, followed by a page of Greek text, followed by the same passage in Latin, and so forth.

          The reason why the compilers of the NIV’s base-text have rejected the variant that is supported by over 99.99% of the external evidence runs as follows:  copyists were more likely to adjust the text to relieve difficulties, rather than to introduce difficulties.  Codex Bezae’s textual variant in Mark 1:41 is more difficult than its rival, and therefore (it is claimed), it should be preferred.  A typical defense of οργισθεις is built on and around this question:  Which is more likely:  that scribes would be puzzled by “filled with compassion” and would replace it with “angry,” or that scribes would be puzzled by “angry” and would replace it with “filled with compassion”?  And there the question is left, as if this consideration tips the scales.

Mark 1:38ff. in Latin in Codex Bezae (d).
Iratus (angry) is highlighted.

There is, however, more to the story. 

          First, another question should be asked:  if early copyists encountered οργισθεις in their exemplars and thought it was so problematic that it must be changed, then why did they replace it with σπλαγχνισθεις instead of simply omitting the word?  In the parallel-passages in Matthew 8:2-3 and Luke 5:12-13, there is no mention of Jesus becoming filled with compassion.   If a reckless copyist was profoundly puzzled by an exemplar of Mark which read οργισθεις in Mark 1:41, his natural reaction would be to harmonize the verse to the parallel-passages by making a simple excision.  Yet instead of a finding a harmonistic omission, we see σπλαγχνισθεις dominating every Greek transmission-stream, with the exception of Codex Bezae and a few manuscripts which, as a result of harmonization, do not have σπλαγχνισθεις or οργισθεις.  (Minuscule 1358, which has been erroneously cited as support for οργισθεις, is one such manuscript.  According to Jeff Cate, the only Greek manuscripts which are known to display neither σπλαγχνισθεις nor οργισθεις in Mark 1:41 are minuscules 169, 505, 508, 1358, and lectionary 866.  In minuscule 783, an entire line was skipped at the beginning of Mark 1:41, but the error was corrected; σπλαγχνισθεις εκτεινας την χειρα αυτου appears in the margin.)
          Second, we do not encounter a consistent aversion, on the part of copyists, to the notion of Jesus being angry.  In the same manuscript in which we find οργισθεις in Mark 1:41, we even find a harmonization in which Jesus’ anger is emphasized:  in Codex Bezae, the text of Luke 6:10 is supplemented with the words εν οργη, that is, in anger, transplanted from Mark 3:5.  When we consider passages such as Mark 9:19 (where Jesus expresses exasperation), and Mark 10:14 (where Jesus is greatly displeased with His disciples’ actions), and Mark 14:6 (where Jesus curtly corrects His disciples), there is not much evidence to justify the theory that early copyists of the Gospel of Mark were averse to depictions of Jesus’ anger.

          Third, a demonstrable scribal mechanism – one for which there is abundant evidence – accounts for οργισθεις as a creation of a copyist.  As we stand in the vestibule of that subject, let’s ask a question:  how could anyone, in the course of translating the Gospel of Mark into Latin, start with σπλαγχνισθεις and end up with iratus (in anger) rather than misertus (in pity)?  Two theories have been proposed which argue that this happened due to a careless mistake. 

          In the first theory, the Latin text read, Is [i.e., Iesus, contracted as a sacred name] autem miseratus eius, and a copyist accidentally wrote “M” only once instead of twice, producing Is autem is eratus eius.  A subsequent copyist, interpreting the second occurrence of is as a superfluous repetition of Jesus’ contracted name, removed it, thus producing the sentence, Is autem eratus eius, and the shift from eratus to iratus was then merely a matter of orthography. 

          In the second theory (proposed in 1891 by J. Rendel Harris), the Latin text in Codex Bezae descended from a Latin translation which rendered σπλαγχνισθεις by the ambiguous Latin term motus, as if to say that Jesus was “stirred” or “moved.”  This ambiguous term was subsequently replaced, sometimes by misertus and sometimes – erroneously – by iratus.  Harris proceeded to propose that the Greek text in Codex Bezae was conformed to the Latin text alongside it, and that this phenomenon of retro-translation from Latin into Greek is the mechanism that produced the reading οργισθεις. 

          Harris was partly right.  As we proceed to a third (and simpler) explanation of the origin of οργισθεις, it will be worthwhile to notice some examples of the influence of the Latin text of Codex Bezae upon its Greek text.  In his 1891 article, A Study of Codex Bezae, published in Texts & Studies, Harris gave many examples of Latinization in this manuscript’s Greek text.  I will review a few of the many Latinizations that occur in Codex Bezae in the Gospel of Mark.

● Mark 1:10 – The usual reading σχιζομενους (torn) is replaced by ηνυγμενους (opened), based on the Latin apertos (opened). 

● Mark 1:33 – The word αυτον is added, based on the Latin eius.

● Mark 1:38 – The usual reading εχομενας κωμοπολεις (neighboring towns) is replaced by ενγυς κωμας και εις τας πολεις, a loose harmonization to Matthew 9:35, based on the Latin proximos vicos et civitates (nearby towns and cities).

● Mark 2:25 – Codex D adds οντες (were) at the end of the verse, to correspond to the Latin erant (were).

● Mark 3:5a – Instead of the usual reading πωρωσει (hardness), Codex Bezae reads νεκρωσει (deadness), based on the Latin emortua. 

● Mark 3:5b – Codex Bezae ends the verse with ευθεως (immediately), based on the Latin statim (immediately).

● Mark 3:6 – Codex Bezae, instead of stating that the Pharisees took counsel (εποιουν, the Byzantine reading), or that the Pharisees gave counsel (εδιδουν, the reading of B L 565 and a smattering of other manuscripts), says that they undertook counsel (ποιουντες), corresponding to the Latin faciebant.

● Mark 6:20 – Codex Bezae adds the word ειναι (to be) at the end of the verse, corresponding to the Latin esse (to be).

● Mark 6:39 – where the usual text is συμποσια συμποσια (group by group), the Latin text here is secundum contubernia (according to groups), and accordingly the Greek text in Codex Bezae is κατα την συμποσιαν.  This is manifestly a Greek translation of the Latin translation. 

● Mark 7:25 – The usual Greek text has no conjunction, stating that the woman, having arrived, fell at Jesus’ feet.  But in Codex Bezae, the word και (and) has been added, expressing the word et that is found in the Latin text.

Mark 8:1-2a in Codex Bezae.
"TOUTOU" (in the yellow rectangle) was added
to correspond to the Latin parallel.

● Mark 8:2 – Codex Bezae adjusts the Greek text and adds the word τουτου, echoing the Latin text which includes istam.   

● Mark 10:16 – Mark uses the words Και εναγκαλισαμεος αυτα to describe how Jesus took the children in His arms.  The Latin text of Codex Bezae, however, has something very different, as if the Latin translator misconstrued the meaning of εναγκαλισαμεος:  Et convocans eos (“And He summoned them,” or, “And He called them together”).  Accordingly, the Greek text in Codex Bezae has been altered to mean what the Latin mistranslation means:  instead of εναγκαλισαμεος Codex Bezae reads προσκαλεσαμενος.

          Here in Mark 10:16 we have a situation that is very similar to the one we encounter in Mark 1:41:
● Codex Bezae has a reading that no other Greek manuscript has.

● Codex Bezae’s unique Greek reading agrees with its Latin text.

● A relatively rare word is involved.

● The second half of the Greek word in Codex Bezae resembles the second half of the word that is usually found.

          I propose that the phenomenon observed in 10:16 is also at work in 1:41.  An early translator, in the course of translating the Greek text of Mark into Latin, was puzzled by the term σπλαγχνισθεις – at least, at its first occurrence in Mark.  This is understandable, inasmuch as if one were to dissect the word in search of its meaning, one might conclude that it meant that Jesus was “gut-wrenched,” or that he “reacted viscerally.”  As the translator read the surrounding verses for further insight, he found in verse 43 that Jesus gave the healed man a strict order.  So the translator concluded that in this context, σπλαγχνισθεις meant “deeply moved” and that this could validly be rendered into Latin by iratus – dismayed, perturbed, angry. 
          With iratus thus entering the Old Latin transmission-stream, it was almost inevitable that when Greek-Latin codices were made, someone who was more familiar with the Latin text than with the Greek text would adjust the Greek text of Mark 1:41 in order to make it agree with the Latin text.  The result is what we observe in Codex Bezae.    

   

Matthew 10:42 in Codex Bezae.  The yellow rectangle
contains the Greek word for "water"
(a retro-translation of the Latin translation).

      This is not an isolated incident.  Retro-translation occurs all over Codex Bezae.  In Matthew 10:42, where the usual text is ποτηριον ψυχρου (literally, a cup of cold; the presence of a beverage in the cup being implied), Codex Bezae reads ποτηριον υδατος (a cup of water).  That is not an arbitrary paraphrase; it is a retro-translation based on the Latin text.

          When the impact of retro-translation upon the Greek text of Codex Bezae is appreciated, the likelihood that the reading οργισθεις in Mark 1:41 is original effectively falls to zero.  It echoes a mistranslation in the Latin text that accompanied the Greek text in the codex.

          When one sifts through commentaries and articles about Mark 1:41, it is not easy to find any that mention  Codex Bezae’s Latin-based variants.  The authors are, it seems, either unaware of this highly relevant feature of the Greek text in Codex Bezae, or they are afraid to mention it.  Numerous prominent writers and commentators, such as Daniel Wallace, Bart Ehrman, Bill Mounce, Mark Strauss, Ben Witherington, N. T. Wright, and Douglas Moo, have kept this feature of the manuscript (which explains many of its anomalies, including its unique reading in Mark 1:41) a tightly guarded secret.  Not one of them, as far as I can tell, has ever mentioned it in any discussion of Mark 1:41.  If it seems as if there has been some momentum among commentators to prefer the Latinized variant in Mark 1:41, using the excuse that they are preferring the variant that explains its rivals, or that they are preferring the more difficult reading, perhaps it is because there is momentum among commentators to lose touch with (or to never become acquainted with) the special characteristics of the relevant evidence.

          When the impact of retro-translation upon the Greek text of Codex Bezae is appreciated, the likelihood that the reading οργισθεις in Mark 1:41 is original effectively falls to zero.  An incorrect text-critical decision currently mars the English text in the New International Version.  The newly released Common English Bible (CEB) perpetuates the same mistake, stating in Mark 1:41 that Jesus was “Incensed.”  The New International Reader’s Version (NIRV) begins Mark 1:41 with the sentence, “Jesus became angry.”  The Easy-to-Read Version (ERV) distributed by The Bible League begins Mark 1:41 with the sentence, “These last words made Jesus angry” – a paraphrase which is not only based on an erroneous compilation, but also projects a cause-and-effect that has no basis in any Greek text.  

          I appeal to the producers and distributors of the NIV, the NIRV, the CEB, and the ERV to remedy the unfortunate (and, very probably, under-informed) decision that the compilers of their New Testament base-text made in Mark 1:41.  In the meantime, I encourage Bible-readers to detour around those versions, if better options are available, as long as they contain such a prominent mistake that conveys a meaning that is contrary to the meaning of the original text.  


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