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**List: Greek Ministry
Holy Bible ( γραφαῖς ἁγίαις,
Αγιας Γραφης )
Greek...
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ANCIENT GREEK.
"I.--GEOGRAPHICAL EXTENT.
AT the time of the first preaching of Christianity,
the more civilised nations of the Roman empire
(however dissimilar their respective vernacular tongues) were united by the
bond of a common language,
which to them was almost the only known medium of poetry, learning, and
philosophy. That language
was the Greek. In certain countries, as in
Greece itself, in
Egypt, and, as some say, in
Syria, it was
used in the common affairs of life; but everywhere it was the language of
literature, and as such held
the same position that was occupied by Latin during the middle ages.
The conquests of Alexander
the Great had been the primary cause, under Providence, of the wide diffusion
of this language; and
although the Grecian empire was afterwards supplanted by the Roman, yet the
civilisation, the arts,
and the language of Greece long remained predominant.
II.--CHARACTERISTICS OF THE LANGUAGE.
The ancient Greek language was divided into four principal
dialects--the Attic, which was the
purest, the Ionic, the Doric, and the Æolic, spoken originally in those
colonies on the coast of Asia
Minor--distinguished from each other by varieties of orthography and
pronunciation. When, under
Philip of Macedon, the Grecian republics lost their freedom, and became more
or less united under one
government, the various dialects were gradually amalgamated into one.
The language which thus
sprang from this intermixture of dialects differed materially from that of
books, as preserved in the
writings of the early poets and philosophers. It became current
however wherever the Greek language
was spoken; it was even used by the later writers; and, on account of its
wide diffusion, received the
name of κοινη`
διάλεκτος, the
common dialect. The
Septuagint version was written
in this dialect, and
it was also selected by Divine Providence as the
appropriate medium of communicating to man the new
covenant in Christ Jesus.
It is characterised by the promiscuous employment of forms originally
peculiar to one dialect; Attic, Ionic, and Doric words are indiscriminately
used, and often placed in
juxtaposition with words of foreign origin. Planck has observed, that
in the New Testament there
are, in the flexion of nouns, no traces of any of the ancient dialects except
the Attic, but that in the
flexion of verbs there is more variety, the Attic furnishing most examples,
and the Doric affording
others, while many of the forms are exclusively to be met with in the latter
idiom. The influence of
Hebrew characteristics is likewise to
be traced in the New Testament, in several passages the phrase-
ology being Hebrew, while the words are Greek. This is more especially
observable in the frequent
use of a double substantive (arising from the paucity of adjectives in
Hebrew), and in the use of the
words of God as indicative of the superlative degree. The Greek
alphabet is a modification of the
Phœnician, and it is to the adoption of this alphabet, which is but
ill-adapted to express any sounds
except those of Shemitic origin, that many of the anomalies of the Greek
language are to be attributed.
III.--CODICES OF THE NEW TESTAMENT.
There seems every reason to believe that
the whole of the New Testament was originally com-
municated by the Holy Spirit to
the inspired penmen in the Greek language. Some indeed have
asserted, that the Gospel according to St. Matthew and the Epistle to the
Hebrews were originally
written in Hebrew, and at a subsequent period transferred into Greek; but the
data on which this
opinion is founded are by no means conclusive.1 It is
generally thought that the autographs of the
evangelists and apostles were not preserved beyond the
commencement of the third century, even if
they remained in existence so long; but, prior to that
period, many copies of the sacred writings had
been made and dispersed among the [NT]
churches. The most
ancient copies appear generally to
have been made on Egyptian papyrus , a very perishable material, so
that none of these have been trans-
mitted to us. As early as the fourth century we find
vellum in common use for writing; and, in the
eleventh century, paper made of cotton, wool, or linen, was adopted.
The oldest MSS. have no
divisions of words, and no accents, and are all written in
capital, or, as they were formerly called,
uncial letters. The earliest MS. written in letters of the present
cursive form bears the date 890, but
even after this period the old uncial characters were sometimes used on
account of their beautiful
regularity.
Although the Scriptures were given in the
first instance by the immediate
inspiration of
God, yet
no supernatural power was communicated to those
who transcribed them. The multiplication of copies
was [not] conducted on the same principle as that of other books which have
been transmitted from ancient
times. The MSS. of the New Testament are not, therefore, free from the
errors of copyists; but as it
is not likely, or even possible, that copies executed by different persons,
and from different exemplars,
should all contain precisely the same errors, it seems
reasonable to believe that, by the careful comparison
of copies, one copy can be used to correct another, and the purity of the original text be thus in a
great measure restored. An error in an ancient
exemplar would be perpetuated in all copies and
versions made from it; and it is probably owing to tliis cause that a sort of
family resemblance is to be
traced in copies, certain MSS. indicating, by peculiar or faulty readings, the age and country of the
exemplar to which they owe their origin. This circumstance has led to
the classification of MSS.
1 Upon this point, however, the student may be
usefully referred to a paper "On the Original Language of
St.
Matthew’s Gospel," by Dr. S. P. Tregelles
(London, Bagster and Sons, 1850), reprinted from the Journal of Sacred
Literature, No. 9, and in which the subject is discussed with much learning
and ability. The opinion of the
Hebrew original of St. Matthew’s Gospel was, as the author shows,
universally entertained by the Christian Church
for the long term of fourteen hundred years subsequent to the close of the
first century."
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"Griesbach has divided all
MSS. of the New Testament into the following classes, generally termed
families, editions, or recensions:--
- The Alexandrian recension, so called because it
emanated from Alexandria: it is quoted by
Clement of Alexandria, by Origen, Eusebius,
and other Greek fathers. The Coptic
version agrees wholly with it, and the
Ethiopic and
Armenian versions coincide with it
in part.
- The Western recension, used in countries where the Latin language
was spoken, and with
which the Latin versions coincide.
The
Sahidic and
Jerusalem Syriac versions also agree
with it: Tertullian, Cyprian, Ambrose, Augustine, and
other Latin fathers, quote it.
- The Constantinopolitan recension,
to which the mass of modern MSS. and the Moscow codices
of St. Paul’s epistles are referable. Quotations from this
recension appear in the works
of the fathers who lived from the end of the fourth till the sixth century,
in Greece,
Asia Minor, and the neighbouring provinces. The
Gothic and
Sclavonic versions
coincide with it.
The classification of MSS. is, however, a very
intricate subject, the classes being so blended that
it is difficult to separate them; and, besides, the discrepancies are so
trifling, being chiefly of an
orthographical nature, that in many cases it is not easy to determine to
which class a given MS. may
belong. Hence various systems of classification have been
proposed by different writers: some affirm
that there are four distinct classes, and others that there are only two.
According to the system of
Scholz, MSS. are divisible into the Alexandrian or
African (including the first two classes of Griesbach),
and the Constantinopolitan or Asiatic.
Individual MSS. are conventionally distinguished from each other
by one of the letters of the
alphabet being affixed to each. These marks do not point out the
relative antiquity or value of the
MSS., but seem to have been applied in the first instance in a very arbitrary
manner, and to have been
afterwards retained for the sake of convenience. The most
ancient and valuable MSS. which have been
handed down to us are the following:--
- CODEX A, sometimes
called the Alexandrine MS., having in all probability been written
at
Alexandria, whence it was certainly brought. It is commonly referred
to the fifth
century. It contains the Old Testament in three
volumes, and the New Testament in
one volume: appended to the latter is the First Epistle of
Clement to the Corinthians,
and a fragment of the Second. This MS. was presented by
Cyrillus Lucaris, patriarch
of Alexandria and afterwards of Constantinople, to Charles I. of England, in
1628, and
it is now in the British Museum. A facsimile edition of the New
Testament was
published at the expense of the University of Oxford in 1726, under the
editorship of
Dr. Woide: the Old Testament was afterwards edited by the Rev. H. H.
Baber. [c.520 A.D. Byzantine (Gospels); Alexandrian (Remainder)--RJS obp]
- CODEX B, generally termed the Vatican
MS., because it belongs to that library, marked 1209.
It is one of the most ancient MSS. extant, being ascribed to the middle of
the fourth
century. It contains both the Old and New Testaments, but the book of
Revelation has
been added to it by a modern hand. It wants the end
of the Epistle to the Hebrews,
and those to Timothy, Titus, and Philemon. The Old Testament
was printed from this
MS. in 1587 by order of Sixtus V., and a translation of the New Testament has
been
given by Granville Penn. [c.340 A.D.--RJS]
Another MS., also marked B, and
therefore sometimes confounded with the preceding,
is in the Vatican Library. It is supposed to belong to the seventh
century, and contains
the Apocalypse, with the Homilies of Basil and Gregory of Nyssa: a facsimile
of it is
given in Bianchini’s Evangeliarium
Quadruplex. The
text has been published by
Tischendorf. [CHM note: probably Codex B2.]
- CODEX C, also called
Codex Ephraemi, and sometimes Codex Regius, because
preserved in the
Royal Library of Paris. This valuable MS., which originally
contained the whole of the
New Testament, and the
Septuagint version of the Old
Testament, was written in
Egypt, about the sixth century, but was erased in the thirteenth century to
make room for
the works of Ephraem the Syrian, which were written over it. By means
of chemical
applications, however, the original text has been in a great measure
restored. Wetstein
succeeded in deciphering and collating it; and, in 1843, a splendid facsimile
edition,
with prolegomena, was published by Tischendorf. [c.450 A.D. Alexandrian--
RJS obp]
- CODEX D, also known as Codex
Cantabrigiensis or Bezæ, because presented in 1581 to the
University
of Cambridge by Beza. It had for years
previously lain neglected in the monastery of
St. Irenæus at Lyons, whence Beza had
procured it. It contains the Gospels and Acts
with a Latin version. It belongs probably to the seventh century, but
to what country
is uncertain. A beautiful facsimile edition was published by Dr.
Kipling at Cambridge,
in 1793. [c.550 A.D. Western--RJS]
- CODEX D, or Codex
Claromontanus, probably marked D, because erroneously believed by Dr.
Mill
and other critics to form the second part of the preceding. It is a
Greek and Latin
copy of St. Paul’s Epistles, and is called Codex Claromontanus because
procured from
Clermont in France by Beza. It belongs
either to the seventh or eighth century. It
is preserved in the Royal Library at Paris. In the beginning of the
eighteenth century,
certain sheets were cut out of it by a thief, and sold in England, but they
were restored
to the library by Lord Oxford in 1729. [Codex Dp.
c.550 A.D. Western--RJS obp]
- CODEX ZACYNTHIUS (Ξ), a
palimpsest MS. discovered in Zante in 1820 by the late General
Macaulay, contains a considerable portion of the Gospel by St. Luke.
It is in the
Library of the British and Foreign Bible Society. The Committee
granted the use of
it for collation and transcription to Dr. Tregelles,
who says, "I do not know of any MS.
of equal antiquity accompanied by a Catena; in many respects this most
valuable
palimpsest is worthy of special attention: it is remarkable that it had
remained in this
country for nearly forty years unread and unused." It is
printed with the Alexandrian
types lent by the Trustees of the British Museum, and published by
Messrs. Bagster. [Similar to Codex B--
RJS obp]
Facsimiles of several other MSS. have
been published, but the bare enumeration of all the MSS.
of the New Testament would be impossible within our limits. The number
of MSS. known to have
been collated in whole or in part amounts, according to Scholz, to 674. By far the greater number of
these MSS. contain only the four Gospels, this portion of Scripture having
been most constantly in
demand, because most frequently used in the public service of the church.
Ancient copies of the
entire New Testament are extremely rare. MSS. Lectionaria,
which contain the detached portions of
the Testament appointed to be read in churches, are by no means uncommon.
Copies of the book of
Revelation are remarkably
scarce: there are in fact but three ancient MSS. in which this book is to
be
found, namely Codex A, one of the Codices marked B, and Codex C. Of
these, Codex C is the most
valuable, but it is unfortunately very defective, about nine chapters being
missing; so that Codex B,
the text of which has been lately published by Tischendorf, and Codex A (the Alexandrine
MS.) are
the only ancient exemplars to which we are indebted for our acquaintance with
the whole of the
New Testament in the original."--The Bible of Every Land. (1860,
Second Edition) Samuel Bagster [Info only:
Gray color indicates some Critical Text.]
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263 uncials and 2,937 minuscules exant.
The vast majority (98%) of extant Greek New Testament MSS. (numbering
5,400)
support the Traditional Text (found in the Reformation Bibles). pp. 117-120,
David W.
Cloud.
pp. 183-185 and APPENDIX 1-B & 1-C, Robert J.
Sargent.
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"IV.--PRINTED EDITIONS OF THE GREEK TESTAMENT.
Six chapters of the Gospel of St. John were printed at
Venice as early as 1504, by Aldus Manutius,
and the whole of that Gospel was printed at Tübingen in Suabia, the
modern kingdom of Wurtemberg,
in 1512. But these editions are interesting only as literary
curiosities, for though they constituted
the first portion of the Greek Testament ever committed to the press, yet
they exercised no influence
whatever on succeeding editions.
The earliest printed edition of the entire New Testament is
contained in the Complutensian
Polyglot , a work we have already mentioned in our
account of the Hebrew Scriptures.
The MSS. used
for this impression were most probably, as it is stated in the prologue,
furnished for the purpose by
Pope Leo X. from the Vatican Library. There is
abundant internal evidence to prove that these MSS.
were of no great antiquity, for the text agrees with MSS. written in the
thirteenth, fourteenth, and
fifteenth centuries in all passages wherein they differ from ancient
exemplars.
The earliest published edition of the
Greek Testament was that of
Erasmus, which appeared
at
Basle in 1516; whereas the Complutensian text, although printed in
1514, was not published till 1520.
Erasmus prepared the text from four MSS., the most ancient
of which belonged to the tenth century,
and contained all the New Testament except the Apocalypse. His other
three MSS. consisted of a copy
of the Gospels, written, according to Wetstein, in the fifteenth century; a
copy of the Acts and Epistles
of rather earlier date, and a document containing the book of
Revelation, which he asserted was almost
apostolic in age: but as the text in this MS. was accompanied with the
Commentary of Arethas, who
lived at least 900 years after the time of the apostles, its antiquity seems
very doubtful. It belonged
originally to Reuchlin, but after its publication by
Erasmus it seems to have disappeared, and no one
knows what has become of it. The other three MSS.
used by Erasmus are still preserved at Basle.
In addition to these MSS., he seems to have possessed no other critical
apparatus except the Latin
Vulgate, and a commentary of Theophylact containing part of the Greek text:
but this Theophylact
was the last of the Greek fathers: he lived at the end of the eleventh
century, and his testimony is
therefore of little weight as compared with that of the early fathers.
Erasmus professed, indeed, to
have consulted Origen, Chrysostom, and Cyril;
but he could only have seen the Latin versions of their
writings, as no edition of their original texts had then been issued from the
press. He employed but
nine months and a half in the preparation and printing of his first
edition, although it comprised
copious annotations and a Latin version
printed in parallel columns with the Greek. Indications of
this undue haste are clearly perceptible in many places, and it is nearly
certain that in several passages
where his MSS. were illegible, he supplied the defects by words of his own
translation from the
Vulgate. This is especially the case with the concluding six verses of
the Book of Revelation,
which
are well known to have been wanting in Reuchlin’s MS.
The second edition of the Greek Testament was
published by Erasmus three years after the first,
and, according to Mill, it contains no less than 400 corrections.
His third edition appeared in 1522,
and he then inserted the text 1 John 5:7, which he had [omitt]ed in his first
two editions because it
was wanting in the MSS. he had originally employed. This alteration
was made on the authority of
a MS. now in Dublin. The first
English version from the Greek was made
by Tyndale from this
third
edition. A copy of the Complutensian text was not seen by
Erasmus till after the year 1522, but his
fourth and fifth editions, which appeared in 1527 and 1535, contain many
alterations made in con-
formity to it. Dr. Mill states that in these editions there are ninety
[change]s from the Complutensian
text in the book of Revelation, and twenty-six only in all the other books.
These editions are of
especial importance, as they form the basis of all subsequent editions, and
contain, substantially, the
Greek text in general use at the present day.
During the nineteen years which elapsed
between the publication of the first and last editions of
Erasmus, nine or ten other New Testaments were printed; but they were all
taken from one or other
of the editions of Erasmus, except that by Colinæus, which was printed at Paris in 1534.
Colinæus
drew his text partly from those of Erasmus, partly from the
Complutensian, and partly from MSS.
which he collated for the purpose. Three of these MSS. are preserved
at Paris. This edition is
particularly correct and valuable, but it met with undeserved neglect, and
being shortly after its
appearance eclipsed by the more popular editions of
Stephens, it had no share whatever in the for-
mation of the received text.
The four editions of Robert
Stephens (the step-son of
Colinæus) appeared in 1546, 1549, 1550,
and 1551: his son published a fifth edition in 1569. These editions
are more celebrated for their
typographical neatness than for their critical excellence: the text is drawn partly from Erasmus, and
partly from the Complutensian; and even the third, or
folio, edition, which was alleged by Stephens
to have been formed on the authority of ancient MSS., was found, on
subsequent examination, to be
little more than a mere reprint of Erasmus’s fifth
edition, with marginal readings from about sixteen
MSS. The verses into which the New Testament is
divided were invented by Stephens, and first
appeared in his edition of 1551.
The third edition of Stephens was reprinted by
Beza, in 1565, with about
fifty emendations.
It is rather surprising that Beza did not introduce farther improvements in
the text, as he had the
advantage of possessing two valuable MSS., the Codex
Bezæ and the Codex Claromontanus above
described, besides the Syriac version,
then lately published with a very close
Latin translation by
Tremellius: but Beza employed these critical materials almost exclusively in
drawing up the polemical
disquisitions which he inserted in the notes of his editions. Like
Stephens, he was a native of France,
and a Protestant; and being persecuted on account of his
religion, he fled to Geneva, where, between
the years 1565 and 1598, he published five editions of his Testament.
All these editions are accom-
panied by the Latin Vulgate, and a
Latin version executed by himself.
The best reprint of Beza’s
Greek text is generally considered to be the edition which appeared at
Cambridge in 1642, with the
notes of Joachim Camerarius.
In 1624, the first of the celebrated
Elzevir editions was
published by the Elzevirs, printers at
Leyden. The editor is unknown; but it is evident he had little
recourse to MS. authorities, the
text, like that of Beza, being founded on the third edition of Stephens.
This text, however, obtained
so much celebrity, that it became commonly known as the textus receptus; and for upwards of a
century it was (with few exceptions) reprinted in every successive edition of
the New Testament.
Among the most noted of the editions formed from this text, may be mentioned
those published by
Cureellæus, at Amsterdam, in 1658, 1675, 1685, and 1699: these
editions contain a collection of
parallel passages, and the greatest number of various readings to be found in
any edition of the
New Testament prior to that in the sixth volume of Walton’s Polyglot. Some of these readings
are
said to be unfairly quoted, without authorities, in order to favour the Socinian
heresy.
The Greek text in Walton’s Polyglot is
printed from the folio edition of Stephens. Dr. Fell
published another edition, chiefly from the same text, at Oxford, in
1675; he copied the numerous
readings of the Polyglot, to which he added collations from other
sources."--The Bible of Every Land. (1860, Second Edition)
Samuel Bagster [Info only:
Green color indicates Textus Receptus.]
"In the meantime, it is a most
satisfactory reflection, that all
that human learning has done, or can do, in the investigation of the sacred
text, leads only to the
conviction that Divine Providence
has so watched over the transmission of the divine word, that
the utmost variations of the [Byzantine] MSS. which contain it are, after
all, of comparatively little or no impor-
tance: so that, to all intents and purposes, the most unlearned believer
possesses, in the holy volume
whence he draws his springs of hope and consolation, as true a transcript of
the revealed will of God,
as if it had been communicated to him personally and directly from
heaven."--The Bible of Every Land. (1860, Second Edition) Samuel
Bagster [Info only]
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ANCIENT GREEK.--1860 S. Bagster [Info only: Greek Character
n.d. John 1:1-14 unknown.]
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"V.--RESULTS OF THE PUBLICATION OF THE GREEK NEW TESTAMENT.
The first application of the art of printing to the
multiplication of copies of the inspired text
may justly be said to form an era in the history of the Church. Strong
and bitter hostility was excited
among the enemies of the truth by the first appearance of the New Testament
in a printed form.
At Cambridge, when first published by Erasmus, in 1516,
it was absolutely proscribed, and the priests
endeavoured to dissuade the students from the study of the Greek
language; and Standish (afterwards
bishop of St. Asaph) is said on one occasion to have flung himself on his
knees before the king and
queen, conjuring them, by all they accounted sacred, to go on as their
ancestors had done, and put
down Erasmus. Thomas
Bilney, the martyr of 1531,
was at that period a fellow of Trinity Hall.
His eyes had been opened to the perception of his state of
sinfulness by nature, and he had sought
in
vain for hope and consolation under the distress and anxiety of mind which his
convictions had
engendered. At the instigation of his ecclesiastical superiors, he had
endeavoured to find relief in
watching, fastings, and other exercises; but he soon discovered that all
attempts made in his own
strength towards the attainment of holiness of life, or purity of heart,
invariably proved abortive.
When he heard of the publication of the Greek Testament by
Erasmus, in parallel columns with the
Latin, he resolved, at any risk,
to possess himself of a copy. He succeeded in obtaining one, and
the
results of its perusal were manifested to all; among other tokens, by the
powerful strain of his preach-
ing, which was used as the means of converting Hugh
Latimer, Robert Barnes, and
many other
individuals. The effects of the study of this New Testament upon his
own mind are best described in
the simple eloquence of his own words:--"But at the
last," says he, "I heard speak of Jesus, even
then when the New Testament was first set forth by Erasmus. Which,
when I understood to be
eloquently done by him, being allured rather for the Latin than for the
word of God--for at that time
I knew not what it meant--I bought it even by the providence of God, as I do
now well understand
and perceive. And at the first reading, as I well remember, I chanced
upon this sentence of St. Paul,
(O most sweet and comfortable sentence to my soul!) in his first epistle to
Timothy, and first chapter
--‘It is a true saying, and worthy of all men to be
embraced, that Christ Jesus came into the world to
save sinners, of whom I am the chief and principal.’ This
one sentence, through God’s instruction
and inward teaching, which I did not then perceive, did so exhilarate my
heart, being before wounded
with the guilt of my sins, and being
almost in despair, that immediately I felt a marvellous comfort
and quietness, insomuch that my bruised bones leapt for joy.
(Ps. 51:8.) After this the Scripture
began to be more pleasant to me than the honey, or the honeycomb.
Wherein I learned that all my
travels, all my fasting and watching, all the redemption of masses and pardons, being done without
truth in Christ, who alone saveth his people from their sins; these, I say, I
learned to be nothing else
but even, as Augustine saith, a hasty and swift
running out of the right way; or else much like to
the vesture made of figleaves, wherewith Adam and Eve went about in vain to
cover themselves, and
could never before obtain quietness and rest, till they believed on the
promise of God, that ‘Christ the
seed of the woman should tread upon the serpent’s
head.’ Neither could I be relieved or eased of the
sharp stings and biting of my sins, before I was taught of God that lesson
which Christ speaketh of
in the third chapter of John--‘Even as Moses exalted
the serpent in the desert, so shall the Son of
man be exalted, that all which believe on him should not perish, but have life
everlasting.’ As soon
as I began to taste and savour of this heavenly lesson, which no man can
teach, but only God, which
revealed the same unto Peter, I desired the Lord to increase my faith; and, at
last, I desired nothing
more than that I, being so comforted by him, might be strengthened by his holy
Spirit and grace from
above, that I might teach the wicked
his ways, which are mercy and truth, and that the wicked might
be converted unto Him by me, who
sometime was also wicked." "--1860 S. Bagster [Info
only]
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**File: Greek: Ancient Critical Text History
(3)--1860 S. Bagster [Info only]
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