tions were frequently arranged with a view to
the effect of the opening and closing sentences,
rather than to the logical connection, and are
not superior to the Christian chapters, imperfect
as they are, that Stephen Langthon introduced
in iL'TO.
(B) Text OF THE Xew Testamekt. (1) The History of the Xcir-Testament Text. The Auto- graphs and First Copies. — In all probability, the New-Testament autograplis were written on the perishable papyrus paper. They circulated at first separately and independently of each other. Copies began to be made at once. With the first of such copies the hi^story of the Xew-Testa- ment text .began. Early Cliristianity was free, informal, and not distinguished for literary cul- ture. Therefore, the first copies of the Xew- Testament books were not always carefully exe- cuted, especially if made for private use only. Yet such copies must have been used as exem- plars from which other copies were made.
The External Form. — This was, except in the case of the smaller epistles, that of the roll. After a time it was customary to write several books on one large roll. The roll form was, however, inconvenient. Probably the whole New Testament was never written on one large roll. It is evident that the text of a MS. or roll com- prising several books would depend for its ac- curacy on the quality of the text of each of the separate copies used as exemplars rather than on the skill of the scribe who executed it.
The Origin of Variant Readinr/s and Various Types of Text. — It was during the first two centuries that the most of the more important errors, or variant readings, crept into the New- Testament text. Then the churches were most independent of each other; intercourse between leaders of Christian thought in different parts of the world was more rare and scholarship less accurate than was the case later. The absence of a standard text and the lack of competent supen'ision made the production of errors al- most inevitable. The same conditions permitted the rise of several distinct types of text. In any given localitv — Rome, for example — the Chris- tian teachers would seek to establish a uniform text. They would try to eliminate the diti'er- enccs between their copies of the New-Testament books. Thus there came into being and com- mon use a Roman type of text. Sucli measures could not, of course, produce absolute unifonnity even in Rome. Essentially the same process went on in other centres of Christian influence — as, for example, Alexandria.
Improvement in the Third and Fourth Cen- turies. — During the Third Century the Church improved its scholarship. Parchment was being used in preference to pajjyrus. The roll form was giving way to the codex. The older copies of the New-Testament writings were being used as standards of comparison. The scholars of Rome, Alexandria. Carthage, Antioch, and other centres of Christian learning were coining to know each other's work. Comparison of texts was possible. Such conditions brought aliout a more conservative spirit. Scholars sought to correct, eliminate, or prevent errors in MSS. The result was, on the whole, beneficial. The labors of Origen (a.d. c.18.5-254), Paniphilus (died 300), Hesychius (date uncertain), Lucian of Antioch (a.d. 250-315), and Jerome (a.d. c.340-420) were all inspired by the desire to as- certain and preserve the true text. These efforts did not produce a uniform text, but they tended to check the production and propagation of er- rors. By the end of the Fourth Century several main types of text were dominant. One" of these was the so-called Western text, represented in the writings of Ircn.Tus ; in the early Latin fathers, Tertullian and Cyprian of Carthage: in the Old Latin Version; in the earliest forms of the Syriac Version, and, in part, in the Egyptian Version. Another type of text is found "in the writings of the Alexandrian Fathers. In the East — that is, in Antioch, and afterwards Con- stantinople — a third type, sometimes called the Syrian, made its appearance. The Syrian text is a later and less original type than the Western, or Alexandrian. There were, of course, many MSS. whose text was so confused as not to be representative of any particular type.
From about a.d. 450 the history of the Greek text (of manuscripts) contains nothing needing special mention.
The Printed Greek Text.— The first printed Greek Testaments were those of Erasmus, pulj- lished at Basel, by Froben, in 151G-35. five editions in all, and' that included in the Com- plutensian Polyglot, printed 1514-1517 but not published until 1521, at Alcala, Spain. These were fallowed by the beautiful Regius editions of Robert Stephens (Etienne), of Paris (1546- 51, four editions), of which the third, that of 1550, is the mast famous; and of Theodore Beza, of Geneva ( 15651611, ten editions) . The text of all these earliest editions was practically the same, not based on early or good MSS., or constructed on true critical principles. In 1624 a Greek Testament was issued from the Elzevir Press, of Leyden, based on the editions just men- tioned, which informed the reader that he had therein the textum nunc ab omnibus reeeptum." This edition gained great currency, and its 'textus receptus' became commonly used through- out Protestant circles.
The continuous discovery of Greek MSS., and the more careful study 'of the versions and fathers, showed only too plainly that the received te.xt was far from identical "with that of the more ancient witnesses. It now became the task of scholarship to seek to ascertain, if possible, the correct text. Soon the so-called critical edi- tions began to make their appearance. The first great work of this kind was the New Testament of John Mill (O.xford, 1707), a large folio volume with prolegomena containing a mine of information. This was followed bv the editions of J. A. Bengel (Tubingen, 1734"), of J. J. Wetstein (Amsterdam, 1751-52), and of C. F. Matthaei (1782-88), and others of less im- portance. The next step in advance was taken by J. J. Griesbach, in his two-volume edition of 1786 and 1806, and his t^ijmholw Critiece (1785 and 1793). In his printed text the readings of the received text were often supplanted by those which seemed more strongly supported. Gries- bach, like Bengel, followed "clearly defined crit- ical principles. In 1840-50 the philologist, Carl Lachman. published a New Testament in which the received text was altogether discarded. In its place was a text constructed by the critic on the basis of evidence. This method has been followed in all subsequent critical editions.
