Subject: The long ending of Mark

From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 5 Apr 1996 14:16:25 -0500

It seems to me that the long ending of Mark has been virtually abandoned by
text critics.  Are there any today who still believe it to be authentic?  (I
ask because I learned today that F.D.E. Schleiermacher accepted it as
authentic!!!).

Thanks,

Jim

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Jim West, ThD
Professor of Biblical Languages, CCBI

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From: Maurice Robinson <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 6 Apr 1996 14:57:55 -0500 (EST)

> ask because I learned today that F.D.E. Schleiermacher accepted it as

Those who favor the Byzantine Textform fully support the long ending of
Mark, and will follow the reading found among approximately 2000
continuous text Greek MSS, which reflects _all_ known texttypes as opposed
to the joint reading of _only_ Aleph, B, and the 12th century MS 304 among
Greek MS witnesses. 

William Farmer also considers the longer reading to be authentic, even
though he does not favor Markan authorship for the passage.  Most
eclectics will also likely choose to include the passage, albeit in
brackets. I suspect those who consider the true ending of Mark to actually
occur at 16:8 will be in the minority among scholars today.  

Many eclectics will espouse a "lost" original ending which has been
supplemented by either the longer or shorter ending, though in view of
merely three MSS which happen to omit the long ending plus a few more
which contain it with obeli, I suspect (as Colwell stated) the dead hand
of Hort still weighs heavily upon modern eclectics.  

Were Aleph and B not imbued with such decisive authority, more attention
might be paid to the fact that sy-c contained the longer ending, even when
sy-s did not, and both those texts antedate Aleph and B. 

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