The $14,000,000 Manuscript

What sort of manuscript is worth $14,000,000? Apparently, a manuscript like the St. Cuthbert Gospel -- a Latin copy of the Gospel of John, made in the very late 600s (the tendency is to suspect that the MS was made to accompany St. Cuthbert's remains when his remains were transferred to Lindisfarne in 698).

What makes the St. Cuthbert Gospel (also known as the Stonyhurst Gospel, because it was previously housed at Stonyhurst College) valuable to book-value-assessors is... not its text; priceless though the message of the Gospel of John is. It is cherished as being arguably the oldest European-made book in very good condition.

A detailed profile of the St. Cuthbert Gospel's appearance, contents, and history, along with access to digital images of every page, can be found at
http://www.bl.uk/manuscripts/FullDisplay.aspx?ref=add_ms_89000 . The British Library purchased it from its previous owners in 2011 for nine million pounds.

Additional information about the St. Cuthbert Gospel can be found in an essay by Dr. Claire Breay at http://www.bl.uk/whatson/st_cuthbert_gospel.pdf . Dr. Breay is featured in the video about the St. Cuthbert Gospel at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jGJPEXoEX8 .

Luke 17:9: Is the Shorter Reading Correct? I think not.

At the end of Luke 17:9, a textual variant presents a four-way contest between

(1) the Alexandrian Text, which ends with τα διαταχθέντα; (read by B L f¹ 28 157 and supported by it^e and the Palestinian Syriac)

(2) the Western Text, which ends with τα διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ; οὐ δοκῶ (read by D f¹³, and a small group of minuscules, and supported by the Peshitta, the Gothic version)

(3) the Byzantine Text, which ends with τα διαταχθέντα; οὐ δοκῶ

(4) Codex X and 214, 765, and 1612, which read τα διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ; (supported by Cyprian (in Treatise 12, Book 3, chapter 51), it^a (= Codex Vercellensis, produced c. 370), the Sinaitic Syriac, the Curetonian Syriac, the Sahidic version and the Bohairic version)

An anomalous reading appears in 214 and 2522; they have εκεινω in place of τα διαταχθέντα.

Additional details are in Willker’s Textual Commentary on the Greek Gospels, TVU 275 (page 414).

The Armenian and one layer of the Old Georgian support παντα τα διαταχθέντα (agreeing in part with Θ 69 124 1346 and a secondary corrector of À).

The Old Latin e (Codex Palatinus, produced c. 400) seems to agree with B.  

Except for Codex Vercellensis and Codex Palatinus, all the rest of the Old Latin evidence, as far as I can tell, agrees with the Byzantine Text in the inclusion of οὐ δοκῶ.  The Vulgate does, too, reading “Non puto” arranged as the beginning of v. 10.

Nine assorted manuscripts (17, 501, 554, 594, 740, 1208, 1416, and 2127) agree with B.

The George Grey Gospels (1263) is among the small group of (mainly) Byzantine MSS that agree with the Textus Receptus and with D, reading  τα διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ; οὐ δοκῶ.

Codex Sinaiticus isn’t much help, because the copyist accidentally skipped from the διαταχθέντα in verse 9 to the διαταχθέντα in verse 10.  The corrector – who drew his arrows without quite connecting the shaft to the arrowhead – corrected the copyist’s mistake by adding οὐτως και in the text (recycling the υ of υμεις) and placing υμεις οταν ποισηται τα διαταχθέντα υμιν at the foot of the page.  (The correction, except for the itacistic quirk, agrees with B.)  Another corrector “corrected” the correction by adding, above the line (centered over τα), παντα.

Earlier in the verse, the copyist of À omitted το δουλω, which is added in the right margin in small letters (the τ is formed using the last stroke of the preceding ν).

The apparatus in UBS2 listed À and 1010 as if they agreed exactly with B.  In UBS4, À’s parableptic mistake is noted, and 1010 is listed as a witness for διαταχθέντα οὐ δοκῶ.  The apparatus in UBS2 had a separate entry for διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ;.  Also in UBS2, Antiochus (a monk at the St. Saba monastery near Jerusalem in the early 600’s) was listed as a witness for διαταχθέντα οὐ δοκῶ.  In UBS4 Antiochus’ name does not appear as a witness.  In UBS2, the Ethiopic version is listed as a witness for διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ;.  In the apparatus-entry for this variant-unit in UBS4, the Ethiopic version does not appear.  The apparatus in Nestle-Aland 27 lists 2542 as a witness for διαταχθέντα.

Metzger, in A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (p. 166), asserted, “There is no adequate reason which could account for the omission of αὐτῷ or οὐ δοκῶ, if either had been present originally.”  Let’s test that claim.  If οὐ δοκῶ was initially present between τα διαταχθέντα and οὕτως (the first word in v. 10), then a simple parableptic error elicited by homoeoteleuton accounts for the loss; when the copyist’s line of sight drifted from the οὐ in οὐ δοκῶ to the οὕ in οὕτως.  If αὐτῷ; οὐ δοκῶ was initially present between τα διαταχθέντα and οὕτως, there is no simple mechanism to account for the loss of all three words at once.  However, οὐ δοκῶ could be lost via a simple parableptic error, as a copyist’s line of sight drifted from the -ῷ οὐ in αὐτῷ; οὐ δοκῶ to the -ῶ οὕ- in δοκῶ οὕτως.  This would leave αὐτῷ by itself.  This reading has an unusual array of witnesses in its favor, including Cyprian (in Treatise 12, Book 3, chapter 51). 

Here is the English translation of the entire brief chapter from Cyprian, from Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 5, page 547, in which Cyprian quotes Luke 17:7-10 –

“51 - That no one should be uplifted in his labour: 

In Solomon, in Ecclesiasticus: ‘Extol not thyself in doing thy work.’  Also in the Gospel according to Luke:  ‘Which of you, having a servant ploughing, or a shepherd, says to him when he cometh from the field, Pass forward and recline?  But he says to him, Make ready somewhat that I may sup, and gird thyself, and minister to me, until I eat and drink; and afterwards thou shall eat and drink?  Does he thank that servant because he has done what was commanded him?  So also ye, when ye shall have done that which is commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants; we have done what we had to do.’”

As mentioned previously, the reading supported by Cyprian (in which αὐτῷ is supported but not οὐ δοκῶ) is also found, according to the UBS4 apparatus, in it^a, the Sinaitic Syriac, the Curetonian Syriac, the Sahidic version and the Bohairic version.  Thus the oldest Latin evidence – Cyprian and Codex Vercellensis – and the oldest Syriac evidence – the Sinaitic Syriac – agree. 

Codex a – Vercellensis – reads as follows, line by line (from Irici’s 1748 transcription):

“… Num- / quid aget gra- / tias servo / quoniam fe- / cit quae prae- / cepta sunt / ei    sic?  Et / vos cum fece- / ritis quae / praecepta / sunt dicitis / servi inuti- / les sumus / facere feci- / mus.”

The sixth line implies αὐτῷ but not οὐ δοκῶ.  The Latin may be rendered something like this:

“Because the servant has done things that are commanded to him, shall he [i.e., the master] act on his behalf this way? And as for you, when you have done the things which are commanded you, you also are to say, ‘We are unprofitable servants, we have done.’”

Codex e – Palatinus – reads as follows (from Belsheim’s 1896 transcription, page 77):

⁹numquid habet gratiam seruo illi quia fecit quae imperata sunt  ¹⁰sic itaque et uos cum feceritis quae uobis fuerint imperata dicite serui superuacui sumus quod debuimus facere fecimus.
This clearly does not support οὐ δοκῶ.  But it does not absolutely rule out αὐτῷ from e’s base-text. 

So:  to defend the Alexandrian reading as the original text, one has to figure that a copyist added  “οὐ δοκῶ” to answer the rhetorical question of verse 9, and this reading was eventually adopted in the Byzantine text-stream, and meanwhile, in a transmission-stream, or transmission-streams, that affected the text of Cyprian and of the Sinaitic Syriac, another copyist added “αὐτῷ” on the grounds, alleged by Metzger, that τα διαταχθέντα “seemed to cry out for such a complement.”  In addition, at some point prior to the production of Codex D, the two expanded forms of the text met at one table and were both adopted, resulting in the conflated reading, τα διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ; οὐ δοκῶ.   

If, however, τα διαταχθέντα; οὐ δοκῶ is original, then the Alexandrian reading is explained as the result of a parableptic accident, and the reading with αὐτῷ, but not οὐ δοκῶ, is explained as the combination of a Western expansion followed by a parableptic omission.

If τα διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ; οὐ δοκῶ is original, then the reading τα διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ is explained as the result of a parableptic accident in which οὐ δοκῶ was lost.  But there is no obvious mechanism to account for the loss of αὐτῷ in the Alexandrian Text.

Some thoughts:

● Part of Metzger’s claim is not true.  There is an adequate mechanism which could account for the omission of οὐ δοκῶ, namely, simply parableptic error from ΟΥ to ΟΥ-.  Metzger’s theory that οὐ δοκῶ first existed as a “marginal comment that found its way into the Western Text” has no real-life basis.  No copy in any language, as far as I know, has these words in the margin.  

     

● If τα διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ; οὐ δοκῶ is not original, then it is a conflation of two earlier variants, one reading (with Cyprian) αὐτῷ and one reading (with Byz) οὐ δοκῶ.

● The words οὐ δοκῶ do not seem like something that a copyist would casually put into the mouth of Jesus Christ.    

● Inasmuch τα διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ may proceed from τα διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ; οὐ δοκῶ if οὐ δοκῶ is omitted via parablepsis, the apparatus in UBS4 needs to be modified.   The variant διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ; should be given its own listing (as it was in UBS2) instead of being listed as if it exclusively supports διαταχθέντα.  If one assumes that αὐτῷ was deliberately added, then the witnesses that support διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ indirectly support διαταχθέντα, but if one assumes that οὐ δοκῶ was accidentally omitted, then the witnesses that support διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ indirectly support διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ; οὐ δοκῶ.

● If the witnesses for τα διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ are combined with the witnesses for τα διαταχθέντα; οὐ δοκῶ, and with the witnesses for διαταχθέντα αὐτῷ; οὐ δοκῶ, the array of support is very impressive:  A D W Ψ 579 700 892 1010 1071 Byz,  f¹³, almost all Old Latin copies including Codex Vercellensis, Cyprian, Vulgate, Peshitta, Sinaitic Syriac, Curetonian Syriac, the Sahidic version, the Bohairic version, and Augustine.   

● Unless MSS 17, 501, 554, 594, 740, 1208, 1416, and 2127 are supposed to echo a text more ancient that Codices A and D, parableptic losses must have occurred somewhere in their ancestry.

● The Greek support for τα διαταχθέντα is narrow. 

Texts with οὐ δοκῶ or αὐτῷ; οὐ δοκῶ had very wide support in multiple locales.  It looks like the original text read διαταχθέντα; οὐ δοκῶ.  In the Alexandrian text-stream, οὐ δοκῶ was lost via parablepsis (from οὐ to οὕτως in v. 10).  Meanwhile, early in the Western text-stream, αὐτῷ was added, following which οὐ δοκῶ was lost, via a different parableptic error in which a copyist’s line of sight drifted from -ωου to -ωου.

Bible Secrets Revealed: Five Video-Reviews, Episode by Episode

In December 2013, the History Channel released a series called Bible Secrets Revealed.  It was produced by Prometheus Entertainment, under the oversight of Kevin Burns, who has also produced the series Ancient Aliens.  Robert Cargill was a major contributor.  Other contributors included Reza Aslan, Bart Ehrman, Kathleen McGowan, Candida Moss, Chris Keith, Mark Goodacre, Dale Martin, and Jennifer Wright Knust.  Gary Burge was in it, too.  Only the first five episodes have been released in the USA so far, as far as I know.  I’ve prepared video-reviews of episodes 1-5.  Here are links to the video-reviews:

In my response to "Lost in Translation"
I point out some misleading manipulations
of the graphics.

1 - Lost in Translation

2 - The Promised Land 

3 - Forbidden Scriptures

4 - The Real Jesus
5 - Mysterious Prophecies

Acts 27:37 - 276 Souls, or About 76?

Let's briefly leave the Gospels to explore an interesting variant in Acts 27:37.  Did the ship on which Paul and his friends were traveling in Acts 27:37 contain 276 souls, or only about 76?

The Byzantine Text says that a total of 276 souls were aboard the ship: 

HMEQA DE AI PASAI YUCAI EN TW PLOIW DIAKOSIAI EBDOMHKONTA EX.

Codex A says HMEQA DE PASAI YUCAI EN TW PLOIW DIAKOSIAI EBDOMHKONTA PENTE.  (Thus, 275 souls.  The amount is spelled out, not abbreviated.)

According to the apparatus in UBS4, Lectionary 1156 says that the number of souls was 216. 

Vaticanus and the Sahidic version say that a total of “about 76” souls were on board, finishing the verse with WS EBDOMHKONTA EX.

The NET’s editors saw fit to mention this variant, with the note, “One early ms (B) and an early version (sa) read “about seventy-six.”  For discussion of how this variant probably arose, see F. F. Bruce, The Acts of the Apostles, 465.”

When I take in hand – onscreen – F. F. Bruce’s commentary on Acts, on pages 525-526 (the difference is surely only due to different formatting in different editions) I find: 

“The reading of B could be a miscopying of the larger number; PLOIWWSOF [with the OF overlined] for PLOIWSOF [with the OF overlined – although this is an error; the sigma in PLOIWSOF should have been overlined too].  There is no improbability in the larger number (which included the soldiers under the centurion’s command); the ship on which Josephus was bound for Rome in A.D. 63 had about 600 on board (Vita 15).”

Déjà vu.  I’ve read something like that before, in John Burgon’s 1883 book The Revision Revised, on pages 51-53.  Burgon is more verbose than Bruce, but the solution is exactly the same:  “Some II-century copyist connected the last letter of PLOIW with the next ensuing numeral, which stands for 200 (viz. S)); and made an independent word of it, viz. WS – i.e., ‘about.’  But when S (i.e. 200) has been taken away from SOF (i.e. 276), 76 is perforce all that remains.”  And notice the footnote on p. 52 of the same page:  “The number is not excessive.  There were about 600 persons aboard the ship in which Josephus traverses the same waters.  (Life, c. III).” 

I find five interesting features here:

First, it’s interesting to observe how Bruce happened to reach the same conclusion as Burgon, and even use the same example from Josephus, apparently without reading Burgon (whose name, if my electronic search, courtesy of Amazon, is correct, appears nowhere in Bruce’s commentary).  That’s just incredible!  (Naturally, the NET’s note on Acts 27:37 refers readers to Bruce, not to Burgon.) 

Second, it’s interesting to see the close alignment of the base-text of the Sahidic version of Acts to the text of Acts in B.  The replacement of PLOIW_SOF_ with PLOIWWS_OF_ is not the sort of thing that would happen often; this variant is an important genetic marker.

Third, it’s interesting, inasmuch as the UBS4’s apparatus gives this a “B” rating, that someone on the committee must have favored B’s reading, apparently against all other Greek MSS, despite the ease with which B’s reading is accounted for.

Fourth, it’s interesting to see that Lectionary 1156 (Waltz’s data says that it’s from the 1300’s) was even noticed and cited, considering how often readings with continuous-MS-support are completely ignored in the UBS4 apparatus.          

 

Fifth, it’s interesting that UBS4 stretched the evidence beyond its breaking point in an attempt to buttress the testimony of B.  Carroll D. Osburn stated the following in The Text of the Apostolos in Epiphanius of Salamis (2004) in a footnote in Appendix II (page 269) – “Epiphanius is listed in UBS4 as reading “WS EBDOMHKONTA EX Epiphanius ½ (Epiphanius ½ om EX).”  This is misleading.  In one quotation, Epiphanius reads WS EBDOMHKONYA, but in the other WS OGDOHKONTA.  So, Epiphanius reads “70” or “80” souls, but in neither reference does he read WS EBDOMHKONTA EX, as UBS4 indicates.” (Osburn’s work does not build confidence in the UBS4-compilers’ database of citations as far as Epiphanius’ testimony to the text of Acts is concerned.  Osburn lists four corrections to UBS4’s citations of Epiphanius in Acts, one useful addition, and only three correct citations.)

Mark 16:9-20 - Top Ten Trainwrecks

In some previous posts, I’ve addressed the shortcomings regarding Mark 16:9-20 found in Metzger’s Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, and in the NET Bible’s notes, and in the ESV Study Bible.  Here are ten more examples of false claims about Mark 16:9-20 that are being spread online and/or in print.    

(A)  Commentaries written by Clement of Alexandria before 101, by Origen before 200, and by Eusebius in the 200s, confirm that Mark’s text stopped at 16:8. – Stephen M. Miller.  (No commentaries on the Gospel of Mark by these writers are known to exist.  Clement of Alexandria was not even born in 101.  Origen worked in the 200s, not in the 100s.) 

(B)  Mark 16:9-20 was produced by scribes in the Middle Ages. – Bart Ehrman.  (This is simply impossible, because the passage was utilized by dozens of individuals before the fall of the Roman Empire.  Irenaeus, for example, quoted Mark 16:19 around the year 184 - over a century before the production-date of the earliest existing Greek manuscript of Mark 16.) 

(C)  Verses 9-20 are not in any of the great early manuscripts. – William Barclay.  (Barclay, whose commentary-series was very popular, must've thought that there are only two great early Greek manuscripts!)

(D)  No early church fathers indicate awareness of these verses for the first few centuries of Christianity.  They don’t quote from them or comment on them. – H. Walker Evans.  (That's true, if you ignore Justin, Tatian, Epistula Apostolorum, Irenaeus, Hippolytus, De Rebaptismate, Hierocles, Marinus, Eusebius, Ambrose, Epiphanius, Apostolic Constitutions, Pelagius, De Trinitate, Augustine, Macarius Magnes, Marcus Eremita, etc., etc.)

(E)  Mark 16:9-20 is lacking in many of the oldest and most reliable manuscripts. - Norman Geisler.  (This is just a display of ignorance, plain and simple.  Only two old Greek manuscripts end Mark's text at the end of 16:8.)

(F)  Mark 16:9-20 is omitted “in very many Greek manuscripts of the Gospel.” – Wilfrid Harrington.  (Harrington was speaking out of ignorance -- by which I mean that I assume that he was not deliberately lying.  He simply was not aware of the fact that all undamaged Greek manuscripts of Mark 16 except two contain at least part of Mark 16:9-20.  The effect on his readers, unfortunately, is the same either way.)

(G)  Mark 16:9-20 was lacking in “all Greek manuscripts known to Eusebius and Jerome.” – W. R. Telford.  (Obviously Telford either never consulted the writings of Eusebius and Jerome, or else he forgot what he had found.)

(H)  Mark 16:9-20 is absent from Codex Alexandrinus. – Ron Rhodes.  (Probably he meant to refer, instead, to Codex Sinaiticus.  But regardless of how this falsehood originated, it continues to be spread.)

(I)  Mark 16:9-20 is omitted by important Ethiopic codices. – Eugene Nida, Matt Slick and many others.  Nida did not know any better, since he wrote before 1980, when Bruce Metzger published a detailed refutation of this claim -- which, alas, is still being spread in Metzger's own handbook, The Text of the New Testament!  Matt Slick, though, has been informed that every continuous-script Ethiopic manuscript of Mark known to exist contains at least part of Mark 16:9-20.

(J)  “Until you get to about eight- or nine-hundred A.D., you can’t find a manuscript that contains these verses.” – Bob McCartney.  (This ridiculous statement was made in a sermon at the First Baptist Church of Wichita Falls, Texas, in 2011.  Bob McCartney has two graduate degrees; it is hard to say if he spread this falsehood in spite of his training or because of it.)  

All ten of those statements are false, and all ten of those statements can easily be proven to be false.  Furthermore,  some of the authors responsible for those statements know that the statements are false, but allow them to continue to be spread anyway.  Stephen Miller, Bart Ehrman, and Matt Slick, I mean you.  (I suspect that I could include Norman Geisler and Ron Rhodes on the list of those who deliberately spread false information about Mark 16:9-20, too, if they answered the mail I sent to them.)  Matt Slick (supervisor of the pro-Calvinism apologetics-site CARM) has been fully informed that this claim is incorrect, but for years he has continued to spread this false claim at his website.  Let the CARM-visitor beware.

Commentaries must be weighed, not counted.  (Just read Ben Witherington's commentary's one-sided notes on Mark 16:9-20, and compare it to Bruce Metzger's one-sided statements in Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, and tell me how many commentaries you are really reading.)  Following the decades in which distortions and falsehoods about Mark 16:9-20 have been promoted in commentaries, in seminary classrooms, and in pulpits (such as the pulpits of John MacArthur and Alistair Begg), some recent commentators have decided not to comment about Mark 16:9-20 at all.  Perhaps that is better than spreading falsehoods about the passage, as the persons listed above have done -- but let no one doubt that the silence of some members of the current generation of commentators is the child of the lies that were spread by many commentators in previous generations.

Didymus the Blind and the Text of Matthew

Bart Ehrman (in his 1986 book Didymus the Blind and the Text of the Gospels) identified 163 genetically significant textual variant-units in Didymus’ text of Matthew.  In Table 1 (on page 191), Ehrman ranked the witnesses which agree with Didymus’ text according to the percentage of agreements at those points.  Codex A has the highest percentage of agreement:  80%.  Ehrman tossed out that evidence on the grounds that Codex A, due to damage, only attests to 20 genetically significant variants (in Mt. 25:6-28:20). 

However, if Codex A should be ignored on the grounds that the data from Matthew 25:6-28:20 is too small of a sample, then why are 163 short passages from Didymus a large enough sample to demonstrate affinities with manuscripts that contain 1,071 verses? Picture the genetically significant textual variant-units that Ehrman collected as bits of an extremely fragmentary manuscript of Matthew – a manuscript that can be read only at those 163 places. Obviously this represents only a small portion of the text of Matthew; even if every variant-unit collected by Ehrman was an entire verse, the total would be only 15% of the verses in the Gospel of Matthew.

This problem can be approached in terms of variant-units, as well as in terms of verses.  Ehrman completely rejected Codex A’s testimony because, he said on page 190, “It should seem obvious that since A does not preserve even one-eighth of the total number of readings under consideration (20/163), its testimony must be discounted.”  But does Ehrman’s collection of 163 variant-units preserve even one-eighth of the total number of readings under consideration in collations of manuscripts of Matthew?  I sifted through the apparatus of the 27th edition of Nestle-Aland, and noticed that textual variants are listed for at least 765 verses of the Gospel of Matthew.  I did not count the number of individual variant-units that are in the apparatus for Matthew, but I reckon that there are over 1,100 (since, although many verses have no variant-units in the apparatus, many other verses contain more than one variant-unit).  If Codex A’s testimony must be discounted because it contains only 12.2% of the variant-units under consideration when Didymus is the object of the comparison, then shouldn't Didymus’ testimony be discounted because it contains only about 14.8% (163/1,100) of the variant-units under consideration when the entire text of Matthew is the object of the comparison?

Even though Codex A is extant only for Matthew 25:6-28:20, there is no reason to imagine that Didymus’ text of Matthew was block-mixed, as if it aligned with one text-type in the last four chapters but some other text-type in chapters 1-24.  That is, there is no reason to suspect that the 80% agreement between Didymus and Codex A in 25:6-28:20 would disappear if the rest of Matthew was extant in Codex A.

If we were to treat Matthew 25:6-28:20 as a separate book used by Didymus, what text-type would Didymus’ copy of this book have?  Would it be decidedly Alexandrian, or something else?  An easy way to find out is to sift through the data, and compare how often Didymus agrees with Codex A and the Textus Receptus to how often Didymus agrees with Vaticanus and Sinaiticus (the flagship manuscripts of the Alexandrian Text).  Consider the following list:

Places in Matthew 25:6-28:20 Where Didymus Agrees with TR or A or Aleph or B:
(1) 25:6 - Didymus has ECERCESQE - agrees with TR A Aleph B
(2) 25:6 - Didymus has GEGONEN - agrees with TR A Aleph (disagrees with B)
(3) 25:15 - Didymus has IDIAN DUNAMIN - agrees with TR A Aleph B
(4) 25:16 - Didymus has EN - agrees with TR A Aleph B
(5) 25:33 - Didymus has MEN - agrees with TR A Aleph B
(6) 25:33 - Didymus has DEXIWN - agrees with Aleph A (disagrees with TR B)
(7) 25:33 - Didymus has EUWNUMWN - agrees with TR A B (disagrees with Aleph)
(8) 25:41 - Didymus has OI - agrees with TR A (disagrees with Aleph B)
(9) 25:41 - Didymus has POREUESQE - agrees with TR A B (disagrees with Aleph) 
(10) 26:15 - Didymus has PARADWSW - agrees with TR A Aleph B

(11) 26:31 - Didymus has DIASKORPISQHSETAI - agrees with TR (disagrees with A Aleph B) (Ehrman listed this as a Citation “[C]” but not as a Citation taken to be representative of Didymus’ text, and used as a base for collation.)
(12) 26:52 - Didymus has MACAIRH - agrees with A Aleph B (disagrees with TR)  (Ehrman listed this as a Citation “[C]” but not as a Citation taken to be representative of Didymus’ text, and used as a base for collation.)
(13) 26:53 - Didymus has DOKEIS OTI OU DUNAMAI - agrees with TR A Aleph B (There is a blank space in Ehrman’s book where the letter “A” should be.)
(14) 26:53 - Didymus has MOI - agrees with TR A B (disagrees with Aleph)
(15) 26:53 - Didymus has PLEIOUS - agrees with TR A (disagrees with Aleph B)
(16) 26:53 - Didymus has DWDEKA - agrees with Aleph B (disagrees with TR A)
(17) 26:53 – Didymus has LEGIWNWN ANGELWN - agrees with Aleph A (disagrees with TR B)
(18) 27:40 - Didymus has EI TOU QEOU - agrees with TR A Aleph (disagrees with B)  (Ehrman listed this as a Citation “[C]” but not as a Citation taken to be representative of Didymus’ text, and used as a base for collation.)
(19) 27:40 - Didymus has QEOU - agreeing with TR B (disagreeing with Aleph A)  (Ehrman listed this as a Citation “[C]” but not as a Citation taken to be representative of Didymus’ text, and used as a base for collation.)
(20) 28:19 - Didymus has MAQHTEUSATE - agreeing with Aleph A (disagreeing with B TR)

In these 20 units, each pair (TR+A, and Aleph+B) has the potential to score 40 agreements. Which pair scores higher: the Byzantine pair, or the Alexandrian pair?
TR: 15. A: 17. Aleph: 12. B: 12.

Combined total of TR and A = 32/40 = 80%
Combined total of Aleph and B = 24/40 = 60%

We may thus conclude that Didymus’ text of Mt. 25:6-28:20 was significantly more Byzantine than Alexandrian.

If we were to ignore the citations which Ehrman, for whatever reason, did not identify as citations taken to be representative of Didymus’ text, we would be left without #11, #12, #18, and #19, and the list would look like this:

(1) 25:6 - Didymus has ECERCESQE - agrees with TR A Aleph B
(2) 25:6 - Didymus has GEGONEN - agrees with TR A Aleph (disagrees with B)
(3) 25:15 - Didymus has IDIAN DUNAMIN - agrees with TR A Aleph B
(4) 25:16 - Didymus has EN - agrees with TR A Aleph B
(5) 25:33 - Didymus has MEN - agrees with TR A Aleph B
(6) 25:33 - Didymus has DEXIWN - agrees with Aleph A (disagrees with TR B)
(7) 25:33 - Didymus has EUWNUMWN - agrees with TR A B (disagrees with Aleph)
(8) 25:41 - Didymus has OI - agrees with TR A (disagrees with Aleph B)
(9) 25:41 - Didymus has POREUESQE - agrees with TR A B (disagrees with Aleph) 
(10) 26:15 - Didymus has PARADWSW - agrees with TR A Aleph B

(13) 26:53 - Didymus has DOKEIS OTI OU DUNAMAI - agrees with TR A Aleph B (There is a blank space in Ehrman’s book where the letter “A” should be.)
(14) 26:53 - Didymus has MOI - agrees with TR A B (disagrees with Aleph)
(15) 26:53 - Didymus has PLEIOUS - agrees with TR A (disagrees with Aleph B)
(16) 26:53 - Didymus has DWDEKA - agrees with Aleph B (disagrees with TR A)
(17) 26:53 – Didymus has LEGIWNWN ANGELWN - agrees with Aleph A (disagrees with TR B)
(20) 28:19 - Didymus has MAQHTEUSATE - agreeing with Aleph A (disagreeing with B TR)

So with 16 variant-units, each pair (TR+A, and Aleph+B) has the potential to score 32 agreements. Which pair scores higher: the Byzantine pair, or the Alexandrian pair?
TR:  12.  A:  15.  Aleph:  10.  B:  10.

Byzantine:  12+15 = 27/32 = 84%

Alexandrian:  10+10 = 20/32 = 63%

Thus once again, it appears that Didymus’ text of Mt. 25:6-28:20 was significantly more Byzantine than Alexandrian.  Ehrman’s use of the TR, however, introduced an improvable factor into the analysis.  What if the Robinson-Pierpont Byzantine Textform (2005 edition) is put in place of the TR?  In the 20-item list, RP2005 agrees with the TR every time, except in Mt. 28:19.  RP2005 does not have OUN, and thus agrees with Didymus.  With this refinement in the analysis, the comparison looks like this:

RP2005:  13.  A:  15.  Aleph:  10.  B:  10.

Byzantine:  13+15 = 28/32 = 88%

Alexandrian:  10+10 = 20/32 = 63%

Decidedly Alexandrian?? 

It looks like either Didymus used a text of Matthew that was uniquely block-mixed, so as to be primarily Byzantine in chapters 25-28, and something else in chapters 1-25, or else something is very wrong with Ehrman’s analysis.

Did Didymus the Blind Write De Trinitate?

Previously, I sifted through Bart Ehrman's analysis of the Gospels-text of Didymus the Blind, pointing out various shortcomings that render its conclusions extremely out-of-focus.  I also mentioned that Ehrman did not include De Trinitate ("On the Trinity") as part of his analysis, on the grounds that Didymus the Blind was not its author.  Several other scholars consider Didymus the Blind to be the author of De Trinitate.  If they are correct, then Ehrman's analysis must be considered incomplete.     

 

Here are some hurdles that must be surmounted by those who identify Didymus as the author of De Trinitate.  (This list is based on comments in R. P. C. Hanson’s book Search for the Christian Doctrine of God, on pages 653-658; Hanson, in turn, used material from a French-writing scholar named Doutreleau.)  Hanson also observes some weaknesses in Doutreleau’s objections.  Here are the hurdles that Hanson mentioned, accompanied by brief counterpoints, some of which are from Hanson and some of which are from me.

 

(1)  The author of De Trinitate III:16, when commenting on I Tim. 5:6, refers to his previous work on the Holy Spirit, but in Didymus’ On the Holy Spirit, as preserved and translated by Jerome, there is no exposition of I Tim. 5:6.

COUNTERPOINT:  First Timothy 5:6 says, “But she who lives in pleasure is dead while she lives.” Does the author of De Trinitate explicitly say that he commented on I Tim. 5:6 in his work on the Holy Spirit, or does he just say something like, “For my earlier comments about this sort of thing, see my comments in my treatise on the Holy Spirit”?  Is there anything in Didymus’ On the Holy Spirit that, while not explicitly quoting I Tim. 5:6, could be considered to be thematically related to it?  And, did Jerome translate the entire work, or is his translation condensed?)

(2) The author of De Trinitate refers to the “Macedonians,” but in On the Holy Spirit, Didymus refers to this group of heretics as the “Pneumatomachians.”

COUNTERPOINT:  Could Jerome have taken slight liberties with the text of On the Holy Spirit so as to refer to this group by a name which he considered more appropriate than “Macedonians”?  -- Also:  the nomenclature by which some heretics were described back then may have drifted similarly to such nomenclature today (“Mormons” vs. LDS; “Jehovah’s Witnesses” vs. Watchtower Society). An author may arbitrarily use either one on different occasions.)

(3) “Jerome in his account of Didymus does not mention a work on the Trinity by him, though De Trinitate must have been written fairly soon after 381 and Jerome visited Didymus in 386.”

COUNTERPOINT:  In chapter 109 of Viris Illustribus, Jerome, after naming several of Didymus’ commentaries and books, finishes the list by saying, “and many other things, to give an account of which would be a work of itself.  He is still living, and has already passed his eighty-third year.”  Since Jerome stated explicitly that he did not mention “many other” works by Didymus, this objection is extremely light.

(4) “De Trinitate enumerates Zechariah as the last of the Minor Prophets, whereas in the Commentary on Zechariah, Didymus counts him as the eleventh (before Malachi).” 

COUNTERPOINT:  Okay.  I’d like to see the contexts of the two listings.  Is one a chronological listing, and the other a list in order of appearance in a canon-list?  Is one a shortest-to-longest list?  Or are we looking at two canon-lists, and if so, is that a big deal in 381?

(5) “The explanation of the candelabra in Zech. 3:8-4:10 is utterly different in every detail in De Trinitate and Comm. on Zechariah, and the latter does not refer to the treatment of the passage in the De  Trinitate.”

COUNTERPOINT:  Granted, this is a significant difference.  But an author approaching that passage in search of allegorical insights could probably squeeze two very different allegorical insights out of it, depending on what themes he wished to emphasized, or what points he wished to make, on different occasions.

(6) De Trinitate “deploys a full technical vocabulary in dealing with Trinitarian themes,” while in the undisputed works of Didymus, he “uses almost no technical terms at all.” 

COUNTERPOINT:  Okay; I’ll consider this a significant difference.  On the other hand, topics can greatly affect style.  Even text-critics don’t often employ text-critical jargon unless they are writing something related to textual criticism.  Also, Hanson does mention that Didymus “applies homoousios twice to the Son but never to the Spirit.”  Just because Didymus didn’t typically employ terms like “homoousois” and “theotokos” and “isotimia” in works that were not about the Trinity does not mean that they were not in his verbal 
arsenal.

(7) Didymus never quotes pagan poets, but the author of De Trinitate “frequently quotes Homer and the classic Greek poets.”

COUNTERPOINT:  Okay; this is a significant point.

(8) Didymus is “fond of arithmology, i.e. playing around with the significance of numbers,” but De Trinitate “has only two brief excursions into arithmology.”

COUNTERPOINT:  This is a pretty light objection!  An author can’t be expected to use numerically-based illustrations in every single work.  And then, when we see that the author of De Trinitate does this, well, two such uses is just not enough?!

(9) Didymus relies on Origen for a lot of his theology, but De Trinitate “shows no influence from Origen.”

COUNTERPOINT:  Since Didymus had been appointed to lead the school of Alexandria by Athanasius, it would come as no surprise to see that despite admiring Origen’s erudition, and despite learning from Origen’s works, Didymus did not rely on Origen when writing about the Trinity, but took his stand on ground taken by more recent, and more orthodox, movers-and-shakers in the church.

(10) The author of De Trinitate states, in III:1 (784), “I go forward to the next task, trusting that even before I speak I shall receive grace along with the children whom (God) has given to me and 
the children of those children, through whom as long as we live we labor, and indeed also all whom (God) knows.”  Didymus was a monk, and the idea that he had children and grandchildren is unlikely.

COUNTERPOINT:  Hanson wrote, “These ‘children’ could refer to the writer’s disciples, but to call disciples of a later generation or disciples of one’s disciples would be odd.”  Why? To a writer such as Didymus, fond of allegories and such, it seems entirely natural.  This evidence may be easily converted into evidence in favor of Didymusian authorship:  the author says that he is speaking -- i.e., dictating, as Didymus (and others) did -- and by the 380’s, Didymus had worked long enough to see the disciples of his disciples mature.  Didymus was old.  The author of De Trinitate, if he here refers to students of his students, was old.

(11) In De Trinitate II:11 (660), the author writes, “But John too is obvious, as they say, even to a blind man.”  It is unlikely that Didymus the Blind would have used this expression.

COUNTERPOINT:  Why? That Didymus could make an occasional self-referential statement like this does not seem unlikely to me. 

(12) In De Trinitate II:27 (768), the author “urges his readers or disciples to ‘live among books,’” and this, according to Hanson, is “not a likely piece of advice for a blind man to give.” 

COUNTERPOINT:  Why not?  Are we to imagine that Didymus did not realize the advantages that the acquisition of books could provide?  As the author of many books -- which Didymus wanted people to read -- Didymus would be entirely capable of encouraging people to live in the company of books.) (Tangent: didn’t Chrysostom also say this somewhere?)

(13) “And at one point [III:2 (825)], quoting Aquila’s version, the author transliterates the Hebrew word into Greek letters.  We have to ask ourselves whether a blind man is likely to have learnt even the letters of the Hebrew alphabet.”

COUNTERPOINT:  Didymus the Blind’s career is one unlikely accomplishment after another.  Is it likely that a blind man would learn geometry?  Yet the record that he did so is there, along with a report that he learned to read by the use of carved wooden letters. There is nothing in the way of the view that Didymus knew enough Hebrew to be able, with the help of his assistants, to transliterate one Hebrew word into Greek.  A commentator on several Old Testament books (including Psalms) whose erudition was saluted by Jerome would almost inevitably have an awareness of the Hebrew alphabet. 

So:

Out of the 13 objections that Hanson presented, #9-13 seem inconsequential, #2, #3, and #8 seem feathery, #1 and #4 are possibly significant but more info is needed, and only #5, #6, and #7 obviously carry real weight. Focusing on these points, the case that Didymus is not the author of De Trinitate seems, for the moment, to rest on three points:

(1)  The author of De Trinitate and Didymus interpret Zechariah 3:8-4:10 in two very different ways. 
(2)  The author of De Trinitate uses technical jargon about the Trinity, but Didymus hardly ever uses such terms. 

(3)  The author of De Trinitate frequently quotes Homer and other pagan poets, but Didymus never does so.

To me, this is not enough to prove that Didymus is the author.  I am still looking into this question, and at the moment I am leaning toward the position that the evidence that Didymus wrote De Trinitate is stronger than the evidence to the contrary.  Regarding this question, competent scholars have weighed in on opposite sides.  Until it is resolved, and until the utilizations of the Gospels in De Trinitate are analyzed, Ehrman's findings about the textual complexion of Didymus' Gospels-text must be regarded as tentative and incomplete, not only because of the shortcomings in the details of his work that I reviewed earlier, but also because of the possibility that Ehrman's analysis has not taken into account the Gospel-utilizations found in one of Didymus' major works.