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 | | From: | admin | | Subject: | THE HORTIAN-ECLECTIC THEORY REFUTED #9 | | Date: | Thu, 18 Nov 2004 05:35:48 GMT |
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 | This 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 Gospels alone about 3,036 times - not including minor errors such as
spelling or synonym departures. Their agreements are even FEWER - and these
two manuscripts are "the best and most reliable"? Considering all the
preceding data given in this section, one is left to wonder if rational,
logical, intelligent life has yet arrived on planet earth.
The 1881 Revision Committee made between eight and nine changes every five
verses. In about every ten verses, three of those changes were made for
"critical purposes". In so doing, their justification was almost exclusively
the authority of only two manuscripts, Vaticanus B and Sinaiticus A. The
testimony of Vaticanus B alone is responsible for nine-tenths of the most
striking innovations in the Revised Version.
ERASMUS VINDICATED We are constantly being told that Vaticanus B and
Sinaiticus A are the oldest extant Greek manuscripts, hence the most
reliable and best; that they are in fact the Bible. The New Greek text which
has replaced the Textus Receptus in the minds of the vast majority of the
scholars represents the private enterprise of two men, two very religious
albeit unregenerate men, Westcott and Hort. These men based their work
almost completely on Origen's fifth column for their Old Testament and his
edited New Testament. Their New Testament readings are almost exclusively
derived from only five manuscripts, principally from only one.
"B" supplies almost ninety percent of the text for all the new Greek
versions upon which the new translations are based. In other words, they use
one manuscript to the exclusion of nearly all others! Seven percent is from
Sinaiticus A, almost three percent from Alexandrinus A, a portion from
Uncial D (which is extremely corrupt), and the small remainder from Codex L
and a few other manuscripts. For the most part, this is as close as the
destructive critics have thus far come to "recovering" the original text.
Hence, the Scriptures are seen as being in somewhat of a state of
"evolution" by those who reject the fact of God's having preserved His Word
for its constant availability and use by the body of believers as He
indicated He would do.
All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for
doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good
works. (II Tim.3:16-17)
Thus the very same fault for which the critics have derided Erasmus so
relentlessly over the years - namely, that he only used five manuscripts -
is far more true of their own modern rendition of the Greek New Testament.
Remember, their charge is not completely justifiable concerning Erasmus for
he studied several hundred Greek manuscripts and prepared notes on the
variant readings found therein. And yet Westcott and Hort basically used
only five, in fact, almost only one manuscript! Indeed, for the most part
the same may be said for their modern eclectic counterparts.
As Burgon rightly perceived:
"... the whole controversy can be reduced to the narrow issue - does the
truth of the text of the Scriptures dwell in the vast multitude of the
copies, be they uncials, or cursive - or is it to be supposed that the truth
abides exclusively with a small handful of manuscripts which differ from the
great bulk of the witnesses and, strangely, also among them-selves?"
ARE THE OLDEST MSS THE BEST?
But are not the oldest manuscripts the best - the most reliable? Of course,
as Burgon attested, this would normally be true:
"The more ancient testimony is probably the better testimony. That it is not
by any means always so is a familiar fact. ... But it remains true,
notwithstanding, that until evidence has been produced to the contrary in
any particular instance, the more ancient of two witnesses may reasonably be
presumed to be the better informed witness."
However, we have earlier demonstrated from Scripture that this is not
necessarily true with regard to the text of the N.T. Furthermore, the actual
contrary evidence says that most of the variant readings found in the Greek
manuscripts were introduced by A.D. 200. Text critics themselves generally
concede this, thus we find Scrivener writing: "It is no less true than
paradoxical in sound that the worst corruptions to which the New Testament
has ever been subjected originated within a hundred years after it was
composed". Over half-a-century later Colwell agreed declaring: "The
overwhelming majority of readings were created before the year 200" and
Zuntz followed suit in stating: "Modern criticism stops before the barrier
of the second century; the age, so it seems, of unbounded liberties with the
text".
Finally, G.D. Kilpatrick - an ardent eclecticist - contends that "as
distinct from errors, most deliberate changes, if not all were made by A.D.
200". Kilpatrick then argues that the reason the creation of new variants
ceased by around 200 was that by that time it became impossible to "sell"
them. He next cites attempts by Origen to introduce changes into the text
and notes the dismal reception with which they were met:
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