|
|
 | | From: | admin | | Subject: | THE HORTIAN-ECLECTIC THEORY REFUTED #2 | | Date: | Thu, 18 Nov 2004 05:33:39 GMT |
|
|
 | following is a continuing post from the Book "Which Version is the
Bible" by Floyd Nolen Jones. Chapter 7, pages 83-112
Which Version is the Bible?
Copyright 1995 · Floyd Jones Ministries, Inc.
All Rights Reserved. This book may be freely reproduced in any form as long
as it is not distributed for any material gain or profit
THE QUOTES FROM THE "FATHERS"
The crucial external evidence that Westcott and Hort offered in support of
their theory was that there were no Syrian readings in the Fathers' quotes
prior to A.D. 350. They maintained that Chrysostom, who died in 407, was the
first father to habitually use the Syrian. However, these statements are
simply not consistent with the facts. In the first place, Chrysostom did not
just give Syrian quotes. Furthermore, according to Edward Miller's
exhaustive compilation of the writings of the church "Fathers", Origen
(185? - 254?) gave 460 quotes which agree with the readings of the
Traditional Text and 491 quotes siding with the "Neologian" text. In view of
this, how then could Hort declare that Origen's quotations "exhibit no clear
and tangible traces of the Syrian text"?
Miller's study also revealed that Irenaeus, a second century church Father
who according to Hort represented the "Western" text, gave 63 quotes from
the Syrian (Traditional Text) text with only 41 from the so-called
"Neologian" family. It should be noted that when referring to the "Fathers",
this author is not endorsing their doctrines but merely recognizing and
emphasizing what they accepted and believed to be Scripture at that early
date. Miller further found that prior to Origen, the Traditional Text was
quoted two to one over all others of the Fathers' quotes if we omit Justin
Martyr, Heraclean, Clement of Alexandria, and Tertullian. Why should we omit
them? They were carried away with Origen's confusion. Yet even if we include
them, Miller's study showed that the ratio still favored the Traditional
Text 1.33 to 1. Thus it is seen that Hort lied about the quotes from the
Fathers and gave no actual statistics.
Miller, posthumous editor to Burgon, made full use of Burgon's patristic
citations with regard to the testimony of the ante-Nicene Fathers. His work
covered 86,489 extant citations from seventy-six of these Fathers. Of those
who died before 400 A.D., the Traditional Text ("twin brother" and virtually
identical to the text of the Textus Receptus) wins out 3 to 2 over all the
other variant readings. Moreover, if we consider only the Greek and Latin
Fathers (Syriac not included) who died prior to 400, their quotations
support the T.T. in 2,630 instances whereas 1,753 support the "Neologian".
Thus Miller found that in the Fathers' citations who died between 100 - 400
A.D., a span of 300 years, not only was the T.T. in existence from the
first - it was predominant! Hort's statement that none of the church Fathers
before 350 quoted the T.T. is simply not true. As mentioned, even Origen
occasionally cited and adopted purely Syrian readings. For example, Dr. E.F.
Hills states that in John 1-14 which is covered by Papyri 66 and 75,
fifty-two times the Syrian reading stands alone as to the text and Origen
agreed with twenty of them. This may be quickly verified by merely scanning
Tischendorf's critical apparatus. Thus, the oft stated assertion of the
critics that Origen knew nothing of the Byzantine text is simply untenable.
On the contrary, these statistics demonstrate that Origen was not only
familiar with the Byzantine text, he frequently adopted its readings in
preference to those of the "Western" and "Alexandrian" texts. Hills goes on
to report that seven of these same twenty occur in Papyri 66 and/or 75
(circa 200 A.D.).
Although Hort accused the Traditional Text as having late readings, hence it
must be a "late text", his own research revealed otherwise. In his "Notes on
Select Readings" which appears as an appendix in his Introduction, Hort
discussed about 240 instances of variation among the manuscripts of the
Gospels. In only about twenty of these was he willing to characterize the
Byzantine reading as "late". Thus, by Hort's own admission
only around ten per cent of the Byzantine readings were supposedly late.
Scholars today offer even less.
|
|
|
