Helen 4\19:
I think the chance of following all this is nil but Walt Jr. Wingo posted a
quote that said in 1790 some guy claimed 30,000 variations in the early Greek
texts of the NT and then Wingo suggested that their must be a hundred times
that number now. You said 95% of these are not important and I pointed out
that that would still leave 150,000 serious variations. I then tried to ask
you how many serious variations do you think there are? You asked me if I
know what it when "someone says there are 300,000 variations in the biblical
text". Eh, no-one said that. I think that there are very few phrases in the
NT that we can even be begin to trust as having existed in the original
manuscripts, if they even existed (some of the text may be variations on the
same text while other may be combinations of other texts). It is presumed
that Luke, Acts and the Pauline texts were originally written in Koine Greek
(A form of Greek little understood for 1800 years until this century when
more writings in this dialect were found). I think there is still a debate
over what language the rest was written in. I, also, know there was a major
debate in the 4th century over which of the hundreds of Christian writings
that then existed where to be accepted as canon and which where to be
destroyed.
Yes, Walt Jr. I understand what this kind of lack of solid knowledge of
what the original teachings of the founders of Christianity were means, it
means that where it is possible to argue for a broad sort of testiment of the
Christian church from the NT, as the church you and I grow up in taught, it
is ludicrious to argue for inerrancy of the Christian Scriptures. I can't
understand what kind of madness would make you do so.
Helen Willis
hhiwater@bright.net
Helen 4\19
All this is in reference to this earlier exchange:
Walt Jr. wrote:
Actually you are misrepresenting these variations. About 95% of those
variations were differences such as:
"in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord"
vs.
"in the name of our Lord Christ Jesus"
These two statements are variations, however, the essential meaning is
preserved. Your post grossly misrepresents the actual variations of the N.T.
How abou
Helen, a week ago:
This is a week old post. I was hoping someone else would catch it, because
you e-mail gives my e-mail fits. Walt are you saying that 5% of the
variations were serious variations? If so:
0.05 X 30,000 = 1,500 serious variations in texts in 1707
100 X 1,500 =150,000 serious variations in texts by 1997
Please varify that these are the figures you accept.
Helen 4/19:
We were discussing this post:
WINGO re: Article by Bart Ehrman mentioned by Steven Carr on 4/5 and sent
to me by request (Thanks, Steven!) has this interesting observation
(emphasis added):
..."IN 1707, when an Oxford scholar named John Mill published an edition
of the Greek New Testament that contained a critical apparatus
systematically and graphically detailing the differences among the
surviving witnesses of the NT. Mill had devoted some THIRTY YEARS of his
life to examining a hundred or so Greek MSS, the early versions of the
NT, and the citations of the NT in the writings of the church fathers. His
apparatus did not include all of the differences that he had
uncovered in his investigation, but only the ones that he considered
significant for the purposes of exegesis or textual reconstruction.
These, however, were enough. To the shock and dismay of many of his
contemporaries, Mill's apparatus indicated SOME 30,000 PLACES OF
VARIATION, 30,000 places where the available witnesses to the NT text
differed from one another. * * *
"We have nearly 50 times the number of MSS that John Mill had at his
disposal in 1707, and we know of possibly 100 TIMES AS MANY TEXTUAL
VARIANTS--far more variants among our manuscripts than there are words in
the New Testament...."
Ehrman gives a cogent example from the Mss. of Luke 22:17-21 ("last
supper"), showing that the references to "drink my blood" and "new
covenant" were later additions.