Fri May 3 12:35:54 1996
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Date: Fri, 03 May 96 18:06:58 +0100
From: schmiul@uni-muenster.de(Ulrich Schmid)
Subject: Re: Textual Theory
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On Thu, 2 May 1996, Robert B. Waltz wrote:
[quoting Schmid:]
>>Safe for 2.Cor and Col the overall picture is clear: NO OTHER MS
>>is closer to 6 than 1739.
>Interesting. Although, if I read your statement correctly, this is
>only in non-Byzantine readings. Not overall readings.
Correct. There are basically two statistics in _Text und Textwert_.
The _Hauptliste_ where the agreements in non-Majority text readings
are given, and the _Ergaenzungsliste_, where the overall agreements
are given.
>Still, I would make three comments:
>1. The fact that someone else generally agrees with my result
>hardly invalidates my method. :-)
Nobody said that. I was just commenting on Bob' statements on what
_Text und Textwert_ in his opinion could not serve for. The 6-1739
relationship was his example.
>2. If the closest manuscript to 6, in the list of overall
>agreements, is still 1739, it is a very strong argument for
>Broman's contention that the nature of one's sample STRONGLY
>AFFECTS one's results.
In the list of overall agreements 1739 is evidently NOT closest to
6. These results are found in the _Ergaenzungsliste_, where 1739
usually not even found its way into the printed statistics (some 30
closest MSS) related to 6 (the full statistics of the
_Ergaenzungsliste_ as well as the full statistics of the
_Hauptliste_ are available here in Muenster).
>3. The results above are calculated based on PITIFULLY small
>samples. As I recall, _Text und Textwert_ uses only about 250
>readings in the entire Pauline corpus. In individual books there
>are about three readings per chapter. (For instance, I believe
>there are ten readings in Colossians.) This is FAR too small a
>sample to give meaningful results -- especially since 6 has
>Byzantine readings in many of these places.
Well, in the _Hauptliste_ (agreements in non-Majority text
readings) 1739 is closest to 6 (mostly 80% and more agreements). In
the _Ergaenzungsliste_ (overall agreements) 1739 is mostly not
counted under the 30 closest MSS to 6 (around 60% agreements).
>I'm not saying the _Text und Textwert_ data is wrong. But it is
>not sufficient. (I'm not alone in saying this. Eldon Jay Epp has
>made similar comments.)
I do not claim that _Text und Textwert_ data are "sufficent". By
the way, what does "sufficient" really mean in this particular
instance? Sufficient for what purpose? Remember, my initial
question was: "Do the results drawn from _Text und Textwert_with
respect to MSS grouping differ significantly from the results drawn
from the 50 MSS at 550 variation units?" I just wanted to assess
the value and the limits of this published tool of referrence, when
compared to other results. Bob offered up to now no example that
proves his data to be more "sufficient" than the data from _Text
und Textwert_.
What other scholars state in this regard is simply of no value,
_unless_ they prove the results from the data to be inferior when
compared to other samples. I do not say that this might be
impossible, but I need hard facts in order to know the limits of
_Text und Textwert_ and to use it in an appropriate way. I concede
that the handling of _Text und Textwert_ is not very easy, but from
my own experiences it offers more significant results than most
critics expect.
>Try looking at it from the other direction. What manuscript stands
>closest to 1739 in _Text und Textwert_? I think that, in a number
>of the list, it is B. (I could be wrong; I can't check this for a
>few days. But I think I recall that.) Rarely, if ever, does 6 top
>the list. But 6 _is_ a member of family 1739, and B is not. B just
>has a lot more non-Byzantine readings. So the only way I can
>locate
>6 as a member of family 1739 is working from 6's list. We need a
>reciprocal tool. I have one; _Text und Textwert_ doesn't.
If properly used _Text und Textwert_ too has a reciprocal tool.
When compared to 1739, 6 is usually found under the 3 to 20 closest
MSS. When looking at the rare or near singular readings which can
also be done from the _Hauptliste_, then one finds some striking
agreements between 1739 and 6 even in the _Hauptliste_ of 1739,
which automatically would attract the attention of a careful
student.
So, please, before assessing the value of _Text und Textwert_,
when compared to other statistics, use it and find out what can be
achieved. We can, and should, talk about its limits, but only when
carefully examined.
>That's complicated. In Paul, the first witnesses to have a
>_purely_
>Byzantine text are the ninth century uncials. But we see Byzantine
>influence as early as A and C, and quite a bit in the Syriac
>versions.
>It might be worth asking: Does it follow that the Byzantine text
>is the same age in all parts of the scriptures? I don't know.
This is, indeed, a complicated matter. The questions of canonical
status of various parts of the NT as well as the problem of
randomly preserved witnesses are involved. For example in the
General epistles the testimony of Chrysostomos is almost totally
lacking. He is normally held to be to oldest extant witness to a
fully developped Byzantine text, but, as you shurely know, most of
Chrysostomos works are not available in modern critical editions,
and the reliability of the Migne editions is an open question
(though I personally would not be overall pessimistic on this
issue). Even more disturbing, S. New, J. Geerlings, G. Zuntz, and others have
severely challenged the view of a full blown Byz. text in the works of
Chrysostomos even for the Gospels. Nevertheless, looking solely on the
historically settled evidence from the General epistles the full blown Byz. text
seems to be later at date compared to the Byz. text of the Gospels.
When collecting the historically settled evidence from the General
epistles, one finds, apart from some very interesting testimonies
from the Old Latin (sometimes with highly interesting connections
to P 72), simply speaking the older uncials (including few
minuscules like 1739) and the late Byzantine text. But somehow in
between we also find the Harclean Vorlage (105-1611-2138-2495 with
some other MSS more or less connected). The Harklean Vorlage has
roughly speaking two interesting features: a) compared to both, old
uncials and late Byz. text, it shares some very significant
distinct readings, b) again compared to both, it gives
proportionally more readings that are found in the Byz. text than
in the old uncials.
So, it depends on how you look on that. I prefer to arrange the
evidence in the way how it looks like in a historical perspective,
i.e. the Harklean Vorlage testifies to the emergence of the Byz.
text rather than to its full blown existence. But from a
pro-Byzantine viewpoint one may arrange the evidence the other way
round. Though I still hold the latter to be less likely, I think
the ultimate decision on that must be sought by weighing the
evidence. Therefore, I wish to focus on as much "unbiased and intelligent" units
of variation as possible. And to my mind one such thing is the doxology of
Romans.
Concerning the doxology Bob further wrote:
>You have more facts at my disposal than I do. But if Marcion
> didn't make changes to the ending of Romans, nonetheless
>those changes OCCURRED. That still seems to me an easier >explanation for the
phenomena of Romans than Byzantine priority.
Well, if changes occur, one simply has to apply the criteria of our discipline.
The most prominent and valuable is: "That reading is best which best explains
the others". And with respect to the position of the Romans doxology, the
placing after 16,23 simply cannot explain the placing after 14,23 with chapters
15-16 still following. To my mind in this particular instance it is no matter of
"easier explanation", but simply of _no_ explanation, when favoring the postion
after 16,23. Note, we are not dealing here with transriptional matters that are
often unconscious or subconscious phenomena. The changing position of the
doxology involves editorial reasoning, and I simply fail to see any reasoning in
the position of the doxology after 14,23 with chapters 15-16 still following. I
also did not opt for absolute "Byzantine priority", but only for the relative
priority of the reading that is most homogeniously attested by the Byzantine
text, when compared to most of the older witnesses. Nevertheless, I do not
consider the Byz. reading in this peculiar instance as the original reading.
>>[quoting Schmid:]
>>But there is evidence that with respect to the textual >>transmission of the
Pauline Corpus we
>>have to deal with no clear only-one-archetype-situation.
>On this I would be interested to hear your opinion. In most cases >(Ephesians
and Romans being perhaps exceptions), there could only >be ONE autograph.
>There could well have been various editions of the Pauline corpus, >but these
are later than the autographs. Which are you proposing >to reconstruct?
Shure, theoretically there only could be ONE autograph with respect to the
individual epistles as distinct entities. But practically, I think, one has to
consider at least two initial copies of the individual epistles. Since Paul
evidently used a secretary, often names co-authors, and sometimes refers to
previous epistles, it seems evident to me that one copy of the individual
epistles was sent and one copy was retained. This would be normal practice. And
shurely the two copies would slightly differ (due to human nature). I do not
hold this to be disturbing, and nobody else in antiquity would have been
bothered by that, so I do not think that there was much cross-checking at a very
early stage. However, there is a very early referrence to a faked letter (cf.
2.Thess 2,2; 3,17). But the issue there seems to be the fake of a whole letter
and not of parts of a letter. Cross-checking normally only takes place, when
there are severe doubts expressed (Pliny comes to my mind. He sometimes asked
the emperor in his letters to cross-check various appeals of individuals based
on written documents with the copies of that retained in Rome). So much to the
initial stages.
Editions including a certain number of letters prepared for publication and
wider circulation is quite another thing. First, it depends on who did the job.
If it was the author (cf. Pliny), he or (once for all) "she" would have
presumably relied on the copies he retained (presumably without cross-checking).
If it was not the author, but the one the letters had been addressed to (cf.
Cicero's letters to Atticus), he would have taken the copies he had recieved
(presumably without cross-checking). Second, if it was neither the author nor
the recipient, it would depend on to what he actually had access, what he could
assemble, to what purpose the edition was prepared (local edition, editio maior,
etc.), and last, but not least what authority is ascribed to the one who did it.
For example, Polycarp assembled letters from Ignatius, in fact the Philippian
comunity seemed to have assumed that Polycarp was able to edit and distribute
their Ignatian epistle. In this process I find only slight possibilites of
cross-checking, because normally everyone trusts the other. And, if the edition
once is prepared and circulates, the normal effect would be that its form of the
text of the individual epistles supersedes the may be slightly different forms
of the autographs. This is due because the editor is normally credited to have
done a good job. Cross-checking against autographs would be not very likely.
Only very few could have done this, and only with respect to a limited part of
the whole edition. I may add that no matter who did the job, he was perfectly
able to alter somehow the text of the individual letter, mainly by leaving out
what he considers to be of no overall interest. He also would have been free to
choose, if some letters are included or excluded. So, we are now confronted with
a new archetype situation.
This is presumably the normal way, how things go, when looking for a reasonable
scenario covering the way from the individual letter to a letter edition
replacing the autograph of the individual letter (cf. David Trobisch on the
technical aspect of the whole subject).
When looking at the Corpus Paulinum, the first thing to notice is that our
extant MSS give no undisputed evidence to the circulation of individual letters.
In fact, to my mind, the overall attested codex form heavily points to letter
_collections_ even for the fragments. Second, the patristic evidence only points
to two larger, major editions of the Corpus Paulinum: The 10 letter edition of
Marcion (which is to my mind of pre-Marcionite origin) and the canonical 14 (13)
letter edition, with the somehow ambigous role of Hebrews. Third, the letter
sequenzes in our extant MSS are relativly stable. Fourth, within our extant
textual tradition of the Corpus Paulinum, there is ample evidence that not all
of the letters attributed to Paul are included. Assuming the integrity of the
Pauline letters in their actual state of appearence, parts of the Corinthians
and may be also parts of the Philippians correspondences seem to lack. Further,
assuming Ephesians to be Ephesians and not Laodiceans, then Laodiceans is
lacking too. Fifth, Romans (cf. the ending) and Ephesians (cf. the address)
display a puzzling textual history within our extant textual tradition, and the
solving of this puzzle seems to be found in the pre-Marcionite 10 letter edition
(there Romans only had 14 chapters, and Ephesians was held to be Laodiceans).
What we are reconstructing is either way only the text of the editions. This may
sound pessimistic, but I do not think that there was so much evil doing
involved, except for few very bad anti-judaic additions within the 10 letter
edition. All in all most of the text is practically unaltered preserved, and up
to now I found no compelling reason for judging it not going back to the
autographs. But, remember some of Pauls letters are not part of the editions.
So, it depends on one's own perspective to assume what else may be credited to
the editors. As I said earlier, I personally do not think that there was much
evil doing involved, I shurely do not believe in any conspiracy theory. Occam's
razor is lurking behind all this stuff. But, on the other hand, it seems most
unlikely to me to detect at each and every variation unit "the" reading of the
autograph. What we are dealing with is the archetype of a textual tradition that
was spread through _editions_, presumably through two major ones and not too
much smaller ones.
So this is, believe it or not, _in short_, what I think on this issue.
Ulrich Schmid, Muenster
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