• Of. tlamack, Texte u. Untrrt. xiii. 1, 75 fl.
^ In the biliiiLiial MS described by Amelineau (Notice de» iISS Coptu de la Bib!. Xalionale, Paris, 189.1) the Or. runs thus : xm ^»,Ter xvreu iwitlriKot* t*. uyr,u,,v kiOov fj^ycct n uayir ux»ri »*ifiu tKvXiti. The corresponding Sahidic is not published.
* Other intcriiolations will he found in Ac 1* i" 8" 6" 6* W 9«Si27 1410 161 » 34 isli-m IQli- » 20" 21'.
i M.K. omits 'but.'
t So Engelbreth's Sah. Amilinean baa ' yoiir.' C Sah. oinita 'also.'
V A Coptic word for ' faith ' is used. B. and M.E. employ tin Oreek tjVt,c.
l:,GVi'i'lA^ VKKSIO^'S
EITHER
673
and that the dillerences between them are purely dialectical. But when we inquire more closely into the passages where all three are extant, we find that such an explanation ia not satisfactory. Sometimes each version is apparently an independ- ent translation. Occasionally the Sahidic and IJohairic agree in rendering or in underlying text as against the Middle Egj'ptian. In other places — and this is especially the case in the Gospels a — the Uohairic and Middle Egj-ptian are opposed to the Sahidic. Thus, in St. Matthew's account of the Lord's Prayer the dillicult word ^7rioi5(7ios is repre- sented in Sahidic by that which is cominq, in tlie other two versions by of to-morrow.^ AVlicn we have recovered a larger portion of the Middle Egyptian version, and when the fragments already known have been collected and edited, we shall be able to speak with greater security. Meanwhile we may provisionally state our view as follows. The New Testament was first translated into Sahidic from a text containing a considerable ' Western ' element. The translation was idiomatic and in some cases inexact. The Middle Egyptian, 7 probably made very soon afterwards, was largely influenced by the Sahidic. The Bohairic, made last of all, tliough in places influenced by the two previous translations, represented an ellort to translate with more literal exactness what was felt to be a superior Greek text.
The Coptic versions of the Old Testament are based upon the LXX. The study of them is of great interest, because it may help us to recon- struct the edition of the LXX made by Hesychius, which, as we learn from Jerome, was well known in Alexandria and E^-ynt-S Whether any of the versions of the Coptic Old Testament are free from the influence of Origen's revision is doubtful. Some Sahidic MSS give the Book of Job in a shortened form. The claim has been put forward f that we have in these MSS a witness to the original text of the LXX, before Origen made his copious additions from Theodotion's version, f But the last word on this subject has not been said. (Cf. Burkitt, Texts and Studies, iv. 3, p. 8.) The rela- tion of the Middle Egyp. of OT to the Sah. has yet to be worked out.?;
5. History of Cimticism of VEn.sioN.s.— A careful study of the Coptic versions of the New Testament is given by Lightfoot in Scrivener's Introd. to the Netr Test. 6 Lightfoot, as many distinguished scholars before him,i believed that ' we should probably not be exaggerating, if we
« An examination of Mt 6*-15 and Jn i^30 will prove the trulh of this assertion.
fi Tills translation in the Bohairic of Mt Is probably the result of a deliberate revision. The older rendtrinn (cf. Lat. Vul;;.) Htill remains in Lk, where the Boh. has that which is comiiu/ {}t\.K. is wanting in Lk U). At the end of the prayer the Doxology is wanting' in Boh. The .Sah. hoa, ' For thine is the power and the dominion for ever and ever, Amen,' The M.E. has, • For thine is the power and the priory for ever, Amen' (cf. liidaohe viii. en reZ imt ii iii^Ktui tULi n loioc ili rt'vt otiai»xt).
*The fraKTnents of the NT written in < Hd M.E. are too minute for claflsillcation. The little that remains shows the ■amc text as the Sahidic. But when wc recover more, we may And that It diflera only dialectically from the ordinary M.b. Terslon.
i fT<rJ. in Par. (VaU. Ix. J405); A-p<A. adv. Rufln. ii. 27 CV'»11- U. S22).
■ Sec Clasca, op. cU. vol. U. p. xvUl ff. ; Batch, BMiays in BilM-al Grefk, p. 216.
C llier. /Vo/. tn Jo6(\'an. Ix. 1097).
nThe translations of Zee 13' in Sah. and Old M.E. cannot be Inflependent. Both add (? cf. Field) ««< i?ii{i f*i— a readinff evidently derived from Tlieodotion, and omitted In Boh. The wortls ^icT, «»Opwvd< i/>7«{cju4»«r Tr.i yiit iyit tlfM Are found In the Old M.K., but not in Boh. and Sah.
0 Scrivener, IHain Introduction to the Criticism of the XT, •d. III. p. S8S(I.; see also (IreRory, Prolcdomena (Issi), 8.'.ltlT. For an Interetttinvj and concise account of these verMirtns see Kenyon, (Hit Bible and the Ancient .11 .'-•.s' (189 ), p. 71.1 WO II. A useful Bununary of the literature of the subject Is iriven by Nestle, Urtcxt unit (Jbertetzungen dcr /;iV;<-/ (IsliT), p. 114 IT.
, See t^uatreuiere, op. eil. p. 9. Cf. Schwartze, /I'p. in Dial. Mmnph. p. xviii.
vol.. I.— 43
placed one or both of the principal Egyptian versions,' i.e. the Bohairic and the Sahidic, 'or at least parts of them, before the close of the 2nd cent. 'a This view has been followed by Westcott and Hort, who maintain that 'the greater part of the ' Bohairic ' version cannot well be later than the 2nd cent.,' whilst 'the Version of Upper Egypt . . . was probably little if at all inferior m antiquity.' /J Ileadlam, who, in the last edition (1S94) of Scrivener's Introduction, has given a summary of the history of the criticism of the Coptic NT from the point where Lightfoot stopped, considers that ' it has been sufficiently proved tliat translations into Coptic existed in the 3rd cent., very prolably in the 'Jnd.'7 Ciasca, in the introd. to Ins edition of the Sahidic OT (where references will be found to the work of former editors 5), discusses the text and date of the Book of Job.e His examination of the book confirms him in the belief that Lightfoot was riglit in assigning part at least of the Coptic versions to the 2nd cent.f It is with the greatest dillidence that wo have ventured to suggest that this early date (even if it is right) has not been proved. Our belief in the historical evidence for stich a date was shaken by an article ij tmlilished by Prof. Guidi, to which reference hat. already been made ; and subsequent study has confirmed us in the view that there is, as yet, no adequate evidence of the existence of a Coptic version at such an early date as is often maintained.