Wed Oct 23 08:25:54 1996

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Date: 23 Oct 96 08:18:25 EDT
From: Mike  Arcieri <102147.2045@CompuServe.COM>
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Subject: Re: Textual Criticism Theories
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Gentlemen, 

Pardon this late rejoinder regarding a point raised early on. :-)

>1. KJV only - the TR was shepherded by God to us through the centuries and we
>should not deviate from it based on what passes for "human wisdom."

>This isn't really a theory of textual criticism, just a theory about the
>text. As Daniel B. Wallace points out, there has never been a legitimate
>textual scholar who has held *this* point of view.

Actually Wallace is not entirely accurate. There was in fact a legit scholar who
advocated a TR/KJV only position, namely Edward F. Hills. His Th.D diss (at
Harvard) was on the "Caesarean Family of NT MSS" and 3 articles of his were
published by JBL. There is no doubt as to his academics, but Hills' arguments
regarding the superiority of the TR over against even the Byzantine tradition
itself pretty much go against all that he learned in New Testament Textual
Criticism. His _entire_ position is theological and full of holes (MSS evidence
is secondary). I consider Hills to be the father of modern KJV onlyism (esp. in
light of comments from modern KJV worshippers - like Ruckman - who said he owes
"a great deal to Hills for his own view re. the transmission of the text" ).
Hills' defense for the TR/JKJV is still the most "scholarly" in print.


>2. Byzantine priority - While the Byzantine text is not present significantly
>prior to 500 (?) CE, it does reflect the autographs better than the other
>text types. Maurice Robinson would say (correct me if I'm wrong) that the
>process of copying and cross-checking would generally bring most deviant
>texts back into line with the autographs.

>This is actually a complicated area, with at least three major sub-groups.
>1. The followers of Dean Burgon.  Maurice Robinson is a modern example.
 >  They believe that the majority text is always "original."

This is correct. Robinson is a legit "Burgonite" ;-) as compared to Donald
Waite, president of the "Dean Burgon Society". Waite merely uses Burgon's name
as a smokescreen to pass on his TR/KJV agenda. 

>2. The followers of Hodges & Farstad, e.g. Pickering. They believe that
>  the Byzantine text is original, but use more complex methods (at times
>   smacking of internal criticism) to determine the "original" text.

External/internal evidence is legit and was used by Robinson/Pierpont in their
edition of the GNT. The primary diff between Hodges/Farstad and
Robinson/Pierpont is the use of stemmatics, which in a number of cases allows
Hodges/Farstad and Pickering to prefer "minority" readings over "majority".

>There is also a third group exemplified by Harry Sturz. This group does not
>claim Byzantine priority, but rather Byzantine *equality* -- that is, they
>deny Hort's claim that the Byzantine text is secondary. They consider it one
>of the original text-types, and reconstruct the text on this basis.

>This is actually close to the views of Von Soden, although Sturz values
>the Byuzantine text above all others while Soden considered it the least
>of the text-types.

I'm not sure of how many Byzantine supporters actually accept this view. I
suspect Sturz may be alone on this. Blessings.

Mike Arcieri

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