Re: John 12:7

From: Mr. Gary S. Dykes (yhwh3in1@lightspeed.net)
Date: Mon Dec 06 1999 - 21:58:00 EST


To C. W. Conrad and others,

Textual critics come in two primary flavors: those who follow the herd, and
those who have independent minds. I hope I am amongst the latter.

The Greek texts produced by the Munster Institute favor the oldest MSS. The
oldest NT MSS are almost all exclusively from one locale-- Egypt. Myself I
favor examining all of the evidence, as we know the oldest reading is not
always the best, and we know that the Egyptian text-type may be a local
one, and may itself have been a modified one.
 
As you point out, two (actually one) old papyri support the aorist tense
form of the word in question. And hence the German editions follow suit.
And it is well known that the NA editions (Nestle/Aland) are full of
numerous errors in their apparatuses. They need to be first validated.

Here is a list of MSS which do support the perfect tense form (of "keep"):

codex 02 (A)
codex 039
minuscules 1 and 2 (at Basle)
minuscule 1424
minuscule 1071
the majority text (several hundred minuscules)
families 1 and 13
codices 021, 030, 037
western flavored MSS, 28, 565 and others

-- Latin MSS vary also, most have "servet" a present tense form
-- Some Syriac texts support the perfect (others an imperfect)
-- Papyrus P75 is a conjecture here
-- codex 044 supports the aorist form, BUT it has AFETE (a present
imperative) in the first portion of our passage.

I can check the Bohairic and other versions as well, if needed.

But, I believe I have supported my supposition: that the perfect tense form
has GOOD support. MOST Greek witnesses read the perfect tense, AND
a wide geographical distribution exists. The perfect tense may be the
easier reading, but this canon of textual criticism (that the easier
reading is secondary) is not always true.

For the reading of Aleph and B, you have good additional support with codex
05 (D) and W, along with the papyrus P66 -- these form good support for the
aorist form. D and W add a wider geographical base.

So Both forms are well supported. And if given a week or so, I could really
get specific with the MS evidence.

To be more positive, one should examine EACH of John's usages of the
aorist/aorist -- aorist/perfect juxtapositions, this would take some time,
but it may shed light on style (I assume someone has already done this--
but many search engines use the NA text!!, which can give erroneous
results!!) I suggest also searching the TR as well.

It is popular to just blindly follow the popular text of Nestle/Aland, but
this is a very narrow means, and could be error laden. Swanson's work is
very useful here. I hope this clarifies my statements.

Mr. Gary S. Dykes email -- yhwh3in1@lightspeed.net
Swanson's Errata -- http://userzweb.lightspeed.net/yhwh3in1/

---
B-Greek home page: http://sunsite.unc.edu/bgreek
You are currently subscribed to b-greek as: [cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu]
To unsubscribe, forward this message to leave-b-greek-329W@franklin.oit.unc.edu
To subscribe, send a message to subscribe-b-greek@franklin.oit.unc.edu


This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.4 : Sat Apr 20 2002 - 15:40:48 EDT