Subject: Re: P46

From: Jim West <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 03 Apr 1997 14:26:31 -0500 (EST)

At 01:14 PM 4/3/97 -0500, you wrote:

>And some think P46 might date to the AD 90-100 period.....but this also
>does not make it correct. 

No- its age does not make it correct; but its age goes a very long way in
making it more reliable.

> When P46 stands alone in a non-error sensible
>reading, are you quite prepared to accept and defend such?  And on what
>grounds?
>

Yes.  On the grounds that antiquity counts more than any of the other
criteria (unless there are VERY compelling reasons to ignore a document's
antiquity).

>
>Maurice A. Robinson, Ph.D.           

Jim

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Jim West, ThD
Adjunct Professor of Bible, Quartz Hill School of Theology
[email-masked]

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From: Maurice Robinson <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 01:22:48 -0500 (EST)

> criteria (unless there are VERY compelling reasons to ignore a document's

This sounds very much like Philip Comfort's methodology, which to my
knowledge has not exactly been regarded in a favorable light by reviewers
(including myself).  

Why exactly should the oldest or near-oldest MS be considered best?  

If, as you say above, virtually _any_ sensible reading is to be preferred
when it stands quite alone merely because it happens to occur in the
oldest known MS, you still have a responsibility to explain how such a
reading gave rise to all other readings and also to explain
transmissionally how it is that _no_ other MS, let alone version or
father, happened to share such a singular reading. If this cannot be done,
then there remain no good grounds for holding to a reading merely because
it happens to be found in a single ancient document.  

What do you do then with Colwell's suggestion that virtually _all_
sensible variant readings were created before AD 200, regardless of the
age of the MSS in which they happen to currently appear?

Also, what do you do in cases such as Eph.5:9 where an almost equally
early papyrus (P49) differs?  What happens in John when, say, P66 and P75
differ?  Which one is best, and why? 

Antiquity of a single witness as a sole criterion is too simplistic, it
would seem to me.  That is why even among pro-Byzantine supporters like
Burgon the principle of "Antiquity" is only _one_ of seven major criteria,
and not sufficient in and of itself to determine a reading.

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