The Criticism of the New Testament. Frederick Henry Ambrose Scrivener
them being more or less mutilated. It is not easy to surmise what may have been written on the sixty-seven leaves that intervened between ΜΔ 5 and ΝΓ 1; the gap ends with 3 John ver. 11 (Greek), but the space is apparently too great for the Catholic Epistles alone, even though we suppose that Jude was inserted (as appears in some catalogues) otherwise than in the last place. The leaves added by later hands are nine in number. The Greek portion of the supplement to St. John (xviii. 14-xx. 13) much resembles in text the style of the original manuscript, and is often supported by Codd. אAB(C). The Latin of this portion is taken from the Vulgate version.
The internal character of the Codex Bezae is a most difficult and indeed an almost inexhaustible theme. No known manuscript contains so many bold and extensive interpolations (six hundred, it is said, in the Acts alone), countenanced, where they are not absolutely unsupported, chiefly by the Old Latin and the Curetonian version: its own parallel Latin translation is too servilely accommodated to the Greek text to be regarded as an independent authority, save where the corresponding Greek is lost.
This passage was penned by Dr. Scrivener before the publication of the highly ingenious treatise by Mr. Rendel Harris, entitled “A Study of the Codex Bezae” (1891), being the beginning of the second volume of the Cambridge “Texts and Studies.” Mr. Harris from curious internal evidence, such as the existence in the text of a vitiated rendering of a verse of Homer which bears signs of having been retranslated from a Latin translation, infers that the Greek has been made up from the Latin, and traces the latter to the second century. He shows its affinity with the text of Irenaeus, and discovers traces in it of Montanism. He opens up many points of interest for any one who would examine this “singular Codex”: but injustice must not be done to the fertile author by supposing that in what is evidently 'a Study' he concludes that he has settled all the numerous questions which he broaches. No one however can really investigate the Codex Bezae without studying this work, which will be found both instructive in the highest degree and amusing.
Chapter V. Uncial Manuscripts Of The Gospels.
Of the manuscripts hitherto described, Codd. אABC for their presumed critical value, Cod. D for its numberless and strange deviations from other authorities, and all five for their high antiquity, demanded a full description. Of those which follow many contain but a few fragments of the Gospels, and others are so recent in date that they hardly exceed in importance some of the best cursive copies (e.g. FGHS)174. None of these need detain us long.
E. Codex Basiliensis (B vi. 21, now A. N. iii. 12) (κεφ. τ., κεφ., Am., Eus. at foot of the pages) contains the four Gospels, excepting Luke iii. 4–15; xxiv. 47–53, and was written about the middle of the eighth century, unless (with Dean Burgon) we refer it to the seventh. It measures 9 x 6-½ inches, and contains 318 folios. There are 247 folios verso, and 71 recto175. Three leaves (160, 207, 214) on which are Luke i. 69-ii. 4; xii. 58-xiii. 12; xv. 8–20 are in a cursive and later hand, above the obliterated fragments of a homily as old as the main body of the manuscript. There is a “liber praedicatorum” on the first folio. This copy is one of the most notable of the later uncials, and might well have been published at length. It was given to a religious house in Basle by Cardinal John de Ragusio, who was sent on a mission to the Greeks by the Council of Basle (1431), and probably brought it from Constantinople. Erasmus much overlooked it for later books when preparing his Greek Testament at Basle; indeed it was not brought into the Public Library there before 1559. A collation was sent to Mill by John Battier, Greek Professor at Basle: Mill named it B. I, and truly declared it to be “probatae fidei et bonae notae.” Bengal (who obtained a few extracts from it) calls it Basil. a: but its first real collator was Wetstein, whose native town it adorns. Since his time, Tischendorf in 1843, Professor Müller of Basle and Tregelles in 1846, have independently collated it throughout. Judging from the specimen sent to him, Mill (N. T. Proleg. § 1118) thought the hand much like that of Cod. A; the uncial letters (though not so regular or neat) are firm, round, and simple: indeed “the penmanship is exceedingly tasteful and delicate throughout. The employment of green, blue, and vermilion in the capitals I do not remember to have met with elsewhere” (Burgon, Guardian, Jan. 29, 1873). There is but one column of about twenty-four lines on the page; it has breathings and accents pretty uniformly, and not ill placed; otherwise, from the shape of most of the letters (e.g. pi, facsimile No. 27, lines 1, 3), it might be judged of earlier date: observe, however, the oblong form of omicron where the space is crowded in the last line of the facsimile, when the older scribes would have retained the circular shape and made the letter very small (see facsimile No. 11 b. l. 6): delta also and xi betray a less ancient scribe. The single stop in Cod. E, as was stated above (p. 48), changes its place according to the variation of its power, as in other copies of about the same age. The capitals at the beginning of sections stand out in the margin as in Codd. AC. The lists of the larger κεφάλαια together with the numbers of the sections in the margin and the Eusebian canons beneath them, as well as harmonizing references to the other Gospels at the foot of the page, names of Feast days with their Proper lessons, and other liturgical notices, have been inserted (as some think, but erroneously in Burgon's judgement) by a later hand. Under the text (Mark i. 5, 6) are placed the harmonizing references, in the order (varying in each Gospel) Mark, Luke, John, Matthew. Ιω (John) furnishes no parallel on this page. The first section (α) of Μρ (Mark i. 1, 2) corresponds to the seventieth (ο) of Λο (Luke vii. 27), and to the 103rd (ργ) of M (Matt. xi. 10). Again the second (β) of Mark (i. 3) is parallel to the seventh (ζ) of Luke (iii. 3), and to the eighth (η) of Matt. (iii. 3). The passage given in our facsimile (No. 27) is part of the third (γ) of Mark (i. 4–6), and answers to nothing in Luke, but to the ninth (θ) of Matt. (iii. 4–6). See p. 60, note 4. The value of this codex, as supplying materials for criticism, is considerable. It approaches more nearly than some others of its date to the text now commonly received, and is an excellent witness for it. The asterisk is much used to indicate disputed passages: e.g. Matt. xvi. 2, 3: Luke xxii. 43, 44; xxiii. 34: John viii. 2–11. (For the fragments attached to this Codex, see Apoc. 15.)
F. Codex Boreeli, now in the Public Library at Utrecht, once belonged to John Boreel [d. 1629], Dutch ambassador at the court of King James I. Wetstein obtained some readings from it in 1730, as far as Luke xi, but stated that he knew not where it then was. In 1830 Professor Heringa of Utrecht discovered it in private hands at Arnheim, and procured it for his University Library, where in 1850 Tregelles found it, though with some difficulty, the leaves being torn and all loose in a box, and he then made a facsimile; Tischendorf had looked through it in 1841. In 1843, after Heringa's death, H. E. Vinke published that scholar's “Disputatio de Codice Boreeliano,” which includes a full and exact collation of the text. Cod. F contains the Four Gospels with many defects, some of which have been caused since the collation was made which Wetstein published: hence the codex must still sometimes be cited on his authority as Fw. In fact there are but 204 leaves and a few fragments remaining, written with two columns of about nineteen lines each on the page, in a tall, oblong, upright form; it was referred by Mr. H. Deane in 1876 to the eighth, by Tischendorf to the ninth, by Tregelles to the tenth century. In St. Luke there are no less than twenty-four gaps: in Wetstein's collation it began at Matt. vii. 6, but now at Matt. ix. 1. Other hiatus are Matt. xii. 1–44; xiii. 55-xiv. 9; xv. 20–31; xx. 18-xxi. 5: Mark i. 43-ii. 8; ii. 23-iii. 5; xi. 6–26; xiv. 54-xv. 5; xv. 39-xvi. 19: John iii. 5–14; iv. 23–38; v. 18–38; vi. 39–63; vii. 28-viii. 10; x. 32-xi. 3; xi. 40-xii. 3; xii. 14–25: it ends at John xiii. 34. Few manuscripts have fallen into such unworthy hands. The Eusebian canons are wanting, the sections standing without them in the margin. Thus in Mark x. 13 (see facsimile No. 28) the section ρϛ (106) has not under it the proper canon β (2). The letters delta, epsilon, theta, omicron, and especially the cross-like psi (see p. 40), are of the most recent uncial form, phi is large and bevelled at both ends; the breathings and accents are fully and not incorrectly given.
Fa. Codex Coislin. I is that great copy of the Septuagint Octateuch, the glory of the Coislin Library, first made known by Montfaucon (Biblioth. Coislin., 1715), and illustrated by a facsimile in Silvestre's Paléogr. Univ. No. 65. It contains 227 leaves in two columns, 13 inches by 9: the fine massive uncials of the sixth or seventh