Thu Nov 7 10:10:31 1996

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Date: Thu, 7 Nov 1996 10:02:40 -0700
To: tc-list@scholar.cc.emory.edu
From: "Robert B. Waltz" 
Subject: Re: Patristic statistics
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On Thu, 7 Nov 1996, "Mark Arvid Johnson"  wrote:

>Digging through the TC List archives, I found Maurice Robinson on June 21,
>1996, asking for statistics of patristic citations:
>
>>From within a Byzantine-priority perspective, readings which are
>dually-shared by both the Byzantine and any other texttype are simply
>Byzantine readings from which the other texttype(s) happened not to
>depart.  Once this point is granted, and once patristic idiosyncracies are
>discounted, I have little doubt that one will find the non-Egyptian
>fathers preceding the fourth century to be far more "Byzantine" in overall
>character than otherwise has traditionally been claimed.
>
>>Bring on the statistics, gentlemen.....
>
>I did some more digging and found some interesting statistics of patristic
>citations. The source is Wilbur Pickering, adapted from Kurt Aland. They
>are taken from Pickering's review of Kurt Aland's article "The Text of the
>Church":

Can you give a reference for this article? I'm a bit concerned about
Aland's sources (given the weakness of the patristic citations in
NA27) -- and more concerned with how Pickering interpreted them.

Also, how did Pickering or Aland decide what was *the* Egyptian
text? His definition of text-types is not mine. And how did one
determine the reading of Origen? There are many, *many* readings
where the various manuscripts and commentaries of Origen attest
to different readings....

For that matter, it would be nice to see some Latin fathers.

>			Egyp	Both	Maj	Other	# Pass
>
>Marcion (160?)		23% 	10% 	18% 	49% 	94
>Irenaeus (d. 202)	16% 	16.5% 	16.5% 	51% 	181
>Clement Alex. (d. 215)	13.5% 	29% 	15% 	42.5% 	161
>Origen (d. 254)	16.5% 	28% 	17% 	38.5% 	459
>Hippolytus (d.235)	14.5% 	18% 	21% 	46.5%
>Methodius (280?) 	12.5% 	31% 	19% 	37.5% 	32
>Adamantius (d.300)	11.5% 	21% 	31% 	36.5% 	29
>Asterius (d.341)	0% 	40% 	50% 	10% 	30
>Apst. Const. (380?)	3% 	33% 	41% 	23% 	46
>Epiphanius (d.403)	11% 	30% 	22% 	37% 	114
>Chrysostom (d. 407)	2% 	38% 	40.5% 	19.5% 	915
>Severian (d.408)	3% 	37% 	30% 	30% 	91
>Theod. Mops. (d. 428)	4.5% 	29% 	39% 	27.5% 	28
>Marcus Erem. (d. 430) 	5.5% 	35% 	35% 	24.5% 	37
>Hesychius (d. 450)	3.5% 	37.5% 	33% 	26.5% 	84
>Theodotus (d. 445)	3% 	37.5% 	37.5% 	22% 	16
>Theodoret (d. 466)	1% 	41% 	42% 	16% 	481
>John Damascus (d. 749)	2% 	40% 	40% 	18% 	63
>
>Obviously, something happenned in the fourth century; the question is what
>was it. Several explanations have been advanced, from an official Byzantine
>recension, to the textual effects of the Arian controversy, to wider
>collation of MSS after the Edict of Milan.

In reading this, I am not particularly impressed by the change in the
rate of Egyptian and Byzantine readings. If accurate, what strikes *me*
is the gradual elimination of "other" readings. What are these "other"
readings? "Western"? Idiosyncratic? Other text-types?

Any thoughts?


Bob Waltz
waltzmn@skypoint.com

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