 |
"He without sin cast the first stone"
... that's an addition! |
This is a book I have been reading since early June on and off. I knew I would find it interesting and though the author was quick to repeat himself multiple times throughout the book (presumably to provide emphasis on his points and indicate the overall structure of his discussion) I found it to be an easy introduction to textual criticism and the art/science of deconstructing the historical lineage of the modern Bible.
The book is perhaps revolutionary to some, but to scholars in its field it is a mere introduction to a simple concept; no original copies of the first written account of the Gospels exist, at all, anywhere. The earliest scraps of parchment and papyrus date to ~200AD, and already these will have been copies of copies of copies.
Most interesting is that textual criticism, the process of discovering the 'original' written form of a text is applied to the likes of plato and other classics. There are far fewer witnesses to classical texts than to the Bible. However, unlike the New Testament where the earliest witnesses are within 200 years of the original, the earliest existing manuscripts of most classical texts were written about a millennium after their composition.
And, just like the game chinese whispers, variations in the text are abound. Often these are small, of no consequence to the message and thus we needn't worry about them greatly. However some alterations perhaps have doctrinal or theological implications.
 |
| Scumbag Scribe needed more Red Bull... |
The scribes responsible for such changes throughout the centuries had differing reasons for this. In the early days, they were often unskilled, amateur men or servants copying (without understanding) text from one parchment to the next - you didn't even need to be able to read to be a scribe! One such example, related to
the divinity of Christ is found in the greek construction of the word
God,
ΘΣ, in 1 Timothy 3:16.
Take note of the line in the middle of the first symbol theta. It was noticed in examination of an ancient manuscript that this line was actually ink bleeding through from another page; the symbol was actually an omicron and the word was written
ΟΣ, which means
who! See the difference in the verse:
Christ as "God made manifest in the flesh, and justified in the Spirit" but rather Christ "Who was made manifest in the flesh"
You can see where mistakes might arise. But not all changes were simple mistakes. Anti-Orthodox challenges and theological disputes resulted in scripture being 'clarified' by scribes of particular factions to strengthen their arguments. Incredible stuff!
This is an area well worth reading into; I enjoyed this book and would recommend it, not for it's written prose but simply for the content within it. I didn't find it challenging to my faith because I certainly don't subscribe to a
sola scriptura literal and inerrant understanding of the bible. I think I was quite ready to acknowledge that such issues would exist.
