Wed Aug 21 22:40:10 1996

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Date: Wed, 21 Aug 1996 22:35:41 -0400 (EDT)
From: Maurice Robinson 
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Subject: Re: Colwell's 70%
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On Wed, 21 Aug 1996, Robert B. Waltz wrote:

> Frankly, I consider the Colwell criterion to be all but worthless.
> The relationship between manuscripts should not be pursued based
> on their *percentage* of agreement (unless one is seeking sister
> manuscripts). After all, *all* manuscripts actually agree on about
> 95% of the text. Rather, one needs to look at the *nature* of the
> agreements.

> My humble opinion, of course. Not that I'll brook any argument. :-)

My humble opinion differs as usual (the agreement between us did not last
long *;-), since I think the criterion has validity, even though the
precise percentage point of 70% may be subject to some adjustment up or
down. 

Certainly all MSS agree on about 95% of the text in most cases, but the
establishment of the Colwell-style percentages reflect a 70% agreement as
found within the 5% or so of the text where the variants actually occur,
and this is plainly stated in Colwell's "Methodology" article.  

I do not think that the "nature" of the agreements is the significant
item; rather the fact that the agreements occur in a definite and regular
pattern -- this pattern-agreement is precisely what establishes a
"texttype", even if MSS with a definite pattern may find that some
portions of that pattern otherwise appear in MSS of another texttype.  

For example, as mentioned in my previous post, the 2Cor.2.17 passage finds
the "polloi" reading specific to the Alexandrian texttype, but merely a
divided variant within the Byzantine Textform.  It just happens that at
that specific unit of variation, a characteristic reading of one texttype
happens to exist in quantity within another texttype, but simply has _no_
texttype-definitive status in the latter.

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

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