Mon Nov 4 10:15:25 1996

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Date: Mon, 4 Nov 1996 10:14:19 -0500 (EST)
From: "James R. Adair" 
To: tc-list@scholar.cc.emory.edu
Subject: Re: Uncials & majuscules et al.
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On Sun, 3 Nov 1996 REElliott@aol.com wrote:

> DC also correctly states that the Armenian was derived from the Greek via the
> Syriac, which brings up an important point;  We must look at the Greek MSS
> 1st, the versional evidence 2nd and then the patrisitic citations 3rd. If the
> Armenian was derived from the Greek, then are not all versional NT MSS in
> essence "derived" from the Greek?   Therefore we must give precedence to the
> Greek MSS and if they are very silent concerning a particular passage (such
> as Mark 16) then the versional MSS et al can only be secondary and tertiary
> at best, they cannot supersede the primary Greek.

There is a problem with terminology here that can lead to deprecating the
testimony of the versions and fathers.  As Maurice Robinson and David
Parker have already pointed out, the versions are of value to the textual
critic, although Robinson and Parker differ in their assessments of the
relative value.  I think that textual critics who are newer to the field,
however, often misunderstand the connotations of the terms "primary,"
"secondary," and "tertiary" in regard to the versions and fathers. 

To say that a versional witness is secondary to a particular Greek witness
(i.e., its Vorlage) is true enough, but to go on to claim that the
testimony of the versions _as a whole_ is secondary to the testimony of
the Greek mss _as a whole_ is simply not true.  To oversimplify the
matter, suppose that an Old Syriac ms were translated from the autograph
of Mark.  It would be a witness much closer to the original than a twelfth
century Greek ms with 20 copies separating it from the autograph. 
Obviously the limitations of the Syriac language in rendering Greek and
aspects of the translation technique would have to be taken into account
in reconstructing the Greek readings lying behind the versional witness,
but its value as a witness to the text would remain great.  Versional
witnesses are secondary only in the sense that translation technique and
similar matters limit to a greater or lesser extent the certainty of the
retroversion into Greek.  They should not be considered secondary to the
entire Greek ms tradition simply because they are not written in Greek.  A
similar case can be made for the value of patristic testimony, although of
course other factors are involved. 

Jimmy Adair
Manager of Information Technology Services, Scholars Press
    and
Managing Editor of TELA, the Scholars Press World Wide Web Site
---------------> http://scholar.cc.emory.edu <-----------------

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