Subject: Re: Sinaiaticus via Vantage

From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 26 Apr 1996 17:57:10 -0400

In a message dated 96-04-23 13:23:28 EDT, you write:

>> > Jim West
>> There is a book which I came accross : The New Testament: Sinaitic Version
>> in Greek and English, edited and translated by a Dalmer R.Ford, published
>by
>> Vantage Press, NY 1993 [0-533-10622-2].
>> 
>> Perhaps some scholars reading this list can comment on its merit.
>
>While, I'm not a scholar, but I do know (and own) the book so perhaps I 
>can give some comments.
>
>First Vantage Press is a "vanity" press; i.e. the authors pay to have 
>their work published.  
>..... Given that this publisher is clearly not
>exactly expert in these matters --and given the sorts of error mentioned
>above-- I think it seems safe to say that one should approach the Greek
>text with caution, also. 
>
>So, in short, my advice would be that, unless one were equipped to judge
>individual readings independently, this edition be taken primarily as an
>interesting curiosity.  OTOH it is only US$24.95; where else are you going
>to find a copy of the NT text of Sinaiticus for that price?  ;-)

I once worked for Vantage, as part of my long resumme in
ghostwriting/ghostediting  (those were the days when most women magazine
editors used initials so readers would think they were men, and much of my
output in public relations work went out under the boss' name, anyway: so
ghostwriting was as good as any piecework).

Manuscripts were available for review on the editor's desk, and were paid out
at fees scaled to difficulty (but only above the usual for works of great
difficulty.)  For all we know, the editor who bid on that book is someone
you'll be interviewing this Fall at SBL.  My guess though is that she/he was
an English major who had a minor in Classics, and in ten years she'll be
running a little bar on the beach at Perth.  Or Perth-Amboy.

You're right though: even if a scholar edited that book for Vantage, he/she
got paid by the word at rates at which she/he couldn't even afford to read
it.