Thu Jun 6 08:52:09 1996

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From: waltzmn@skypoint.com (Robert B. Waltz)
Subject: Re: NT Interpolations - request for help.
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On Thu, 6 Jun 1996, Jeremy Duff  wrote:

>I wonder if I could pick the list's collective brain.
>
>I am doing a D.Phil. here in Oxford looking at Pseudepigraphy among the
>early Christians (until about 200 A.D.). While I have been thinking about
>this, I have become interested in what I see as an anomaly in NT scholarship
>/ text criticism . I am sure that I am not coming up with anything new but
>if anyone could comment on it, or point me to suitable literature which
>discusses it, I would be very grateful. I am aware that in HB textual
>criticism there is talk of finding the "final form of the text" not the
>"autograph" and I guess there might be some insights here to help me.
>
>The anomaly is as follows:
>
>Most NT textual criticism (I think) works to try to get back to the
>autograph - removing both accidental changed to the text and also purposeful
>interpolations etc. If we think 1 Cor 14.34-35 is not by Paul - that is it
>is a later interpolation into the text - then we cut it out from the text
>and hence from the canon. Fine, but, much NT scholarship has decided that
>the whole of 1 Timothy is not by Paul - it is a later "interpolation" into
>the Pauline canon. Nevertheless most NT scholars assert that it should stay
>in the canon. We can speculate about how or why it got in there but
>nevertheless it is (by hypothesis) not 'by' Paul (I know that there is a lot
>packed into the word 'by' here but I don't think that is of the essence here
>- it is later compositions were are looking at  here not secretaries,
>fragments or the like). Why is it seen as reasonable to cut out little
>interpolations but leave in big ones?
>
>Any comments or directs to literature on this would be appreciated.

I'm short on time, but cannot resist a brief reply:

One needs to distinguish between two processes here.

The first is the process of canonization. This was carried out by
the entire church in the first four centuries. After significant
hesitation, the entire church agreed on the current NT canon.

Now you or I may dispute their decisions -- e.g. as a very "low church"
protestant I don't much like 1 Timothy -- but I cannot deny that the
church canonized it. The fact that Paul is probably not responsible
for large parts of the epistle doesn't matter; Hebrews was canonized,
and everyone admitted *it* was not by Paul.

BTW -- there's a strong tendency to credit Athanasius with the
official list of canonical books. And he *was* the first to publish
the exact and official list. But don't lay too much stress on that.
His authority was limited -- note that the Codex Alexandrinus, written
well after his death -- still contains extracanonical books. I
repeat: Our current canon is the result of consensus in the church
(even if, e.g., the Catholic church did not formally publish a
canon until the Council of Trent).

But the church could not canonize the text; it could not even
produce a uniform text. So even though ever Bible after the
fifth century contained the same books, they didn't contain the
same texts.

The goal of textual criticism is to obtain the original form of
the books that were later canonized. If, somehow, there had been
a form of the books that had been canonized, we might try to look
for that. But no such form ever existed.

I hope this helps.

Bob Waltz
waltzmn@skypoint.com

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