Subject: Re: versions

From: DC PARKER <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 4 Nov 1996 15:18:23 GMT

Professor Robinson wrote

> Versional testimony still remains secondary, in my opinion, 
precisely
> because of the need to eliminate translational items and 
version-specific
> items.  Had it been primary (i.e. Greek), the readings would stand as 
they
> were transmitted.  So I am not certain whether we are having merely 
a
> semantic difference here or whether Dr. Parker intends something 
more.

Yes (or perhaps no), I don't think that it's an unreal difference, so 
here is something more.

I still don't think that there is any _essential_ difference between a 
version and a Greek MS, for this reason: To recover the Vorlage of a 
version, one has to eliminate the clutter of translation and 
subsequent corruption.  To recover the text of a Greek MS's 
exemplar, one has to identify and to eliminate the errors of the scribe. 
 Once that is acknowledged, then the two types of evidence are of 
equal weight as witnesses in the reconstruction of the history of the 
text, and thus in the process of observing the introduction of 
readings.  Of course, a version might be taken as witness to a single 
Greek MS (though here one might have to be careful; the oldest Old 
Latin MSS would have to count as separate versions on this 
reckoning); but is not the same true of any one Greek MS (excepting 
the possibility of corrections to a scribe's work, of course)?

David Parker
DC PARKER
DEPT OF THEOLOGY
UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM
TEL. 0121-414 3613
FAX  0121-414 6866
E-MAIL [email-masked]

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From: Maurice Robinson <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 4 Nov 1996 23:16:31 -0500 (EST)

On Mon, 4 Nov 1996, DC PARKER wrote:

> readings.  

I think to this point, Dr. Parker and myself are on the same semantic
wavelength and would agree entirely.

> Of course, a version might be taken as witness to a single 

Here we may still have semantic differences.  I would consider each
separate MS of a given version as reflecting a witness to some overarching
Vorlage of that version, but not equal to the same thing as separate Greek
MSS.  

I.e., Armenian MSS witness to the Vorlage of the Armenian version, but do
not count separately as would independent Greek MS witnesses.  Those
Armenian MSS each would have to be purged of their own independent errors
and scribal alterations, and from the aggregate testimony of various
Armenian MSS the Vorlage would be reconstructed, and from that Vorlage
(purged of the idiosyncracies occurring from translation into Armenian)
the Greek archetype of that version could then be determined. 

Similarly with the Old Latin: even though these witnesses are somewhat
diverse and quite idiosyncratic, they still can in my opinion be
successfully broken down into the typical "European" and "African"
sub-types, and the OL MSS peculiar to one or the other sub-type can then
be utilized in the aggregate to attempt reconstruction of the OL Vorlage
for each sub-type (this might in the nature of things be more difficult
than with the Armenian tradition).  From there, a Greek archetype can be
postulated for each OL sub-type, etc.

So I am not yet certain whether we are saying the same thing on this
latter section, of whether Dr. Parker intends something more than do I.
For me, the _de minimis_ approach seems preferable.

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