Part 13 (1/2)

breast,' (literally, 'upon His chest,'--[Greek: epi to stethos autou]), and said, 'Lord, who is it that is to betray Thee?' (ch. xxi. 20)....

Yes, and the Church was not slow to take the beautiful hint. His language so kindled her imagination that the early Fathers learned to speak of St. John the Divine, as [Greek: ho epistethios],--'the (recliner) on the chest[191].'

Now, every delicate discriminating touch in this sublime picture is faithfully retained throughout by the cursive copies in the proportion of about eighty to one. The great bulk of the MSS., as usual, uncial and cursive alike, establish the undoubted text of the Evangelist, which is here the Received Text. Thus, a vast majority of the MSS., with [Symbol: Aleph]AD at their head, read [Greek: epipeson] in St. John xiii. 25.

Chrysostom[192] and probably Cyril[193] confirm the same reading. So also Nonnus[194]. Not so B and C with four other uncials and about twenty cursives (the vicious Evan. 33 being at their head), besides Origen[195] in two places and apparently Theodorus of Mopsuestia[196].

These by mischievously a.s.similating the place in ch. xiii to the later place in ch. xxi in which such affecting reference is made to it, hopelessly obscure the Evangelist's meaning. For they subst.i.tute [Greek: anapeson oun ekeinos k.t.l.] It is exactly as when children, by way of improving the sketch of a great Master, go over his matchless outlines with a clumsy pencil of their own.

That this is the true history of the subst.i.tution of [Greek: anapeson]

in St. John xiii. 25 for the less obvious [Greek: epipeson] is certain.

Origen, who was probably the author of all the mischief, twice sets the two places side by side and elaborately compares them; in the course of which operation, by the way, he betrays the viciousness of the text which he himself employed. But what further helps to explain how easily [Greek: anapeson] might usurp the place of [Greek: epipeson][197], is the discovery just noticed, that the ancients from the earliest period were in the habit of identifying St. John, as St. John had identified himself, by calling him '_the one that lay_ ([Greek: ho anapeson]) _upon the Lord's chest_.' The expression, derived from St. John xxi. 20, is employed by Irenaeus[198] (A.D. 178) and by Polycrates[199] (Bp. of Ephesus A.D. 196); by Origen[200] and by Ephraim Syrus[201]: by Epiphanius[202] and by Palladius[203]: by Gregory of n.a.z.ianzus[204] and by his namesake of Nyssa[205]: by pseudo-Eusebius[206], by pseudo-Caesarius[207], and by pseudo-Chrysostom[208]. The only wonder is, that in spite of such influences all the MSS. in the world except about twenty-six have retained the true reading.

Instructive in the meantime it is to note the fate which this word has experienced at the hands of some Critics. Lachmann, Tischendorf, Tregelles, Alford, Westcott and Hort, have all in turn bowed to the authority of Cod. B and Origen. Bishop Lightfoot mistranslates[209] and contends on the same side. Alford informs us that [Greek: epipeson] has surrept.i.tiously crept in 'from St. Luke xv. 20': (why should it? how could it?) '[Greek: anapeson] not seeming appropriate.' Whereas, on the contrary, [Greek: anapeson] is the invariable and obvious expression,--[Greek: epipeson] the unusual, and, till it has been explained, the unintelligible word. Tischendorf,--who had read [Greek: epipeson] in 1848 and [Greek: anapeson] in 1859,--in 1869 reverts to his first opinion; advocating with parental partiality what he had since met with in Cod. [Symbol: Aleph]. Is then the truth of Scripture aptly represented by that fitful beacon-light somewhere on the French coast,--now visible, now eclipsed, now visible again,--which benighted travellers amuse themselves by watching from the deck of the Calais packet?

It would be time to pa.s.s on. But because in this department of study men are observed never to abandon a position until they are fairly sh.e.l.led out and left without a pretext for remaining, I proceed to shew that [Greek: anapeson] (for [Greek: epipeson]) is only one corrupt reading out of many others hereabouts. The proof of this statement follows.

Might it not have been expected that the old uncials' ([Symbol: Aleph]ABCD) would exhibit the entire context of such a pa.s.sage as the present with tolerable accuracy? The reader is invited to attend to the results of collation:--

xiii. 21.-[Greek: o] [Symbol: Aleph]B: [Greek: umin lego] _tr._ B.

xiii. 22.-[Greek: oun] BC: + [Greek: oi Ioudaioi] [Symbol: Aleph]: [Greek: aporountei] D.

xiii. 23.-[Greek: de] B: + [Greek: ek] [Symbol: Aleph]ABCD:-[Greek: o] B: + [Greek: kai] D.

xiii. 24. (_for_ [Greek: pythesthai tis an eie] + [Greek: outos]

D) [Greek: kai legei auto, eipe tis estin] BC: (_for_ [Greek: legei]) [Greek: elegen] [Symbol: Aleph]: + [Greek: kai legei auto eipe tis estin peri ou legei] [Symbol: Aleph].

xiii. 25. (_for_ [Greek: epipeson]) [Greek: anapeson] BC:-[Greek: de]

BC: (_for_ [Greek: de]) [Greek: oun] [Symbol: Aleph]D; -[Greek: outos] [Symbol: Aleph]AD.

xiii. 26. + [Greek: oun] BC: + [Greek: auto] D:--[Greek: o] B: + [Greek: kai legei] [Symbol: Aleph]BD: + [Greek: an] D: (_for_ [Greek: bapsas]) [Greek: embapsas] AD: [Greek: bapso ... kai doso auto] BC: + [Greek: psomou] (_after_ [Greek: psomion]) C: (_for_ [Greek: embapsas]) [Greek: bapsas] D: (_for_ [Greek: kai embapsas]) [Greek: bapsas oun] [Symbol: Aleph]BC: -[Greek: to]

B: + [Greek: lambanei kai] BC: [Greek: Iskariotou] [Symbol: Aleph]BC: [Greek: apo Karyotou] D.

xiii. 27.-[Greek: tote] [Symbol: Aleph]:-[Greek: meta to psomion tote] D: (_for_ [Greek: legei oun]) [Greek: kai legei]

D:-[Greek: o] B.

In these seven verses therefore, (which present no special difficulty to a transcriber,) the Codexes in question are found to exhibit at least thirty-five varieties,--for twenty-eight of which (jointly or singly) B is responsible: [Symbol: Aleph] for twenty-two: C for twenty-one: D for nineteen: A for three. It is found that twenty-three words have been added to the text: fifteen subst.i.tuted: fourteen taken away; and the construction has been four times changed. One case there has been of senseless transposition. Simon, the father of Judas, (not Judas the traitor), is declared by [Symbol: Aleph]BCD to have been called 'Iscariot.' Even this is not all. What St. John relates concerning himself is hopelessly obscured; and a speech is put into St. Peter's mouth which he certainly never uttered. It is not too much to say that every delicate lineament has vanished from the picture. What are we to think of guides like [Symbol: Aleph]BCD, which are proved to be utterly untrustworthy?

-- 5.

The first two verses of St. Mark's Gospel have fared badly. Easy of transcription and presenting no special difficulty, they ought to have come down to us undisfigured by any serious variety of reading. On the contrary. Owing to entirely different causes, either verse has experienced calamitous treatment. I have elsewhere[210] proved that the clause [Greek: huiou tou Theou] in verse 1 is beyond suspicion. Its removal from certain copies of the Gospel was originally due to heretical influence. But because Origen gave currency to the text so mutilated, it re-appears mechanically in several Fathers who are intent only on reproducing a certain argument of Origen's against the Manichees in which the mutilated text occurs. The same Origen is responsible to some extent, and in the same way, for the frequent introduction of 'Isaiah's' name into verse 21--whereas 'in the prophets' is what St.

Mark certainly wrote; but the appearance of 'Isaiah' there in the first instance was due to quite a different cause. In the meantime, it is witnessed to by the Latin, Syriac[211], Gothic, and Egyptian versions, as well as by [Symbol: Aleph]BDL[Symbol: Delta], and (according to Tischendorf) by nearly twenty-five cursives; besides the following ancient writers: Irenaeus, Origen, Porphyry, t.i.tus, Basil, Serapion, Epiphanius, Severia.n.u.s, Victor, Eusebius, Victorinus, Jerome, Augustine.

I proceed to shew that this imposing array of authorities for reading [Greek: en to esaia to prophete] instead of [Greek: en tois prophetais]

in St. Mark i. 2, which has certainly imposed upon every recent editor and critic[212],--has been either overestimated or else misunderstood.

1. The testimony of the oldest versions, when attention is paid to their contents, is discovered to be of inferior moment in minuter matters of this nature. Thus, copies of the Old Latin version thrust Isaiah's name into St. Matt. i. 22, and Zechariah's name into xxi. 4: as well as thrust out Jeremiah's name from xxvii. 9:--the first, with Curetonian, Lewis, Harkleian, Palestinian, and D,--the second, with Chrysostom and Hilary,--the third, with the Pes.h.i.+tto. The Latin and the Syriac further subst.i.tute [Greek: tou prophetou] for [Greek: ton propheton] in St.

Matt. ii. 23,--through misapprehension of the Evangelist's meaning. What is to be thought of Cod. [Symbol: Aleph] for introducing the name of 'Isaiah' into St. Matt. xiii. 35,--where it clearly cannot stand, the quotation being confessedly from Ps. lxxviii. 2; but where nevertheless Porphyry[213], Eusebius[214], and pseudo-Jerome[215] certainly found it in many ancient copies?

2. Next, for the testimony of the Uncial Codexes [Symbol: Aleph]BDL[Symbol: Delta]:--If any one will be at the pains to tabulate the 900[216] new 'readings' adopted by Tischendorf in editing St. Mark's Gospel, he will discover that for 450, or just half of them,--all the 450, as I believe, being corruptions of the text,--[Symbol: Aleph]BL are responsible: and further, that their responsibility is shared on about 200 occasions by D: on about 265 by C: on about 350 by [Delta][217]. At some very remote period therefore there must have grown up a vicious general reading of this Gospel which remains in the few bad copies: but of which the largest traces (and very discreditable traces they are) at present survive in [Symbol: Aleph]BCDL[Symbol: Delta]. After this discovery the avowal will not be thought extraordinary that I regard with unmingled suspicion readings which are exclusively vouched for by five of the same Codexes: e.g. by [Symbol: Aleph]BDL[Symbol: Delta].

3. The cursive copies which exhibit 'Isaiah' in place of 'the prophet.'