Sun Jun 9 15:42:12 1996

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From: Maurice Robinson 
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Subject: Re: Another set of miscellaneous replies
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On Fri, 7 Jun 1996, Ulrich Schmid wrote:

> Well, the first thing we all miss at least from the long quotation from
>Kirsopp Lake (given by Maurice) is the concluding sentence: "(...are
>almost all orphan children without brothers or sisters.) Taking this fact
>into consideration along with the negative result of our collation of MSS.
>at Sinai, Patmos, and Jerusalem, it is hard to resist the conclusion that
>the scribes usually destroyed their exemplars when they had copied the
>sacred books" (HTR XXI, 1928, pp. 348f). 

I left off that sentence since the logical fallacy inherent in such a 
supposition has already been refuted by D.A.Carson in his critique of 
Pickering, and Ulrich's comment notes that same logical fallacy:

> If this had been usual scribal practice, then why do we have more than one 
> manuscript now? 

However, there is another good and sufficient answer to the situation, and
it revolves around the move from uncial to minuscule script, which
occurred at about the same time as these early minuscules were copied. No
one yet apparently has speculated or commented on the destruction of
-uncial- exemplars once a minuscule copy had been made, but this seems to
be the real thrust of Lake, Blake, and New's claim. 

> But, to be serious, if we look at the Vulgate tradition, we have 
> similar results.

In the Latin tradition the change in handwriting was not so radically
different as that in the Greek tradition.  But the additional points
Ulrich made are indeed significant within the history of that tradition. 

> (a) First, they isolated a textual stratum which they call the
>"Ecclesiastical"  text ("the most popular text in MSS. of the tenth to the
>fourteenth century") by meens of identifying four readings were almost all
>MSS under discussion deviate from the Textus Receptus. 

They noted that the TR was equal to the Byzantine tradition in all but 
four readings, where the vast majority of the 100 or so MSS deviated 
nearly unanimously.  One should not regard merely these 4 readings as the
Ecclesiastical (= Byzantine) text, but the 4 readings plus the 
remaining entirety of the TR text in that chapter.

I will (and Lake would have also, I am certain) readily grant that
intra-Byzantine sub-group readings exist among these MSS; Lake was making
the point that the MSS which comprist this group of around 100 MSS does
remain "Byzantine" to the exclusion of other texttypes. 

>However, it seems important to me that not few of the readings may 
>have been caused independently by assimilation. 

Do you REALLY think this?  Or are you just bringing in a hypothetical
possibility that the sharing of certain variants might be by chance?  I
would allow the chance element were the texttypes clearly distinct, with
only a few isolated readings held in common; but when all MSS are of the
same basic texttype, and the shared readings are often among MSS of the
same sub-type, I suspect something more genetic is reflected, even if we
cannot determine the real interrelationship among the MSS. 

>The whole thing to my mind is not as disturbing as it seems. A huge
>distinct pattern of readings seems to be fixed (i.e the primary Byzantine
>text stratum ), a few smaller distinct patterns in addition to the primary
>stratum are relatively purely displayed by few MSS. The majority of the
>MSS seems to display mixture mostly within the smaller patterns. 

I agree fully with this assessment -- basically this is a good description
of the entire group of MSS comprising the Byzantine Textform. 

>Therefore, the additional smaller patterns can be seen as representing a
>broadly disseminated and very well known (at least to later scribes) pool
>of variant-readings. If the constant threat of assimilation is taken into
>account, it is to my mind not disturbing what can be found within the
>libraries Lake-Blake-New have examined. 

I see the extraneous readings as reflecting "floating" localized variants
which were sporadically adopted, not necessarily a "broadly disseminated"
or even "well known" pattern.  Certainly the readings in question were
known to the specific scribes in any case, but how widespread or
well-known they may have been remains uncertain.  The lack of clear
genealogical connection among these MSS which existed and were likely
copied in those widely-separated monasteries remains the key point within
Lake's findings which should still send some "disturbing" signals to those
within the eclectic camp. 

_________________________________________________________________________
Maurice A. Robinson, Ph.D.           Assoc. Prof./Greek and New Testament
Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary     Wake Forest, North Carolina
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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