The present writer is not prepared to contradict these statements. Yet, on the other hand, it can- not be denied that there is a growing doubt whetlier the importance of the so-called Westei-n variations has not been underrated and the purity of the text of KB overrated.* See, besides the contributions of Fr. Blass of Halle, the latest statement by C. H. Turner in JThSt, iu. 3, p. lllf. : 'If the authority for the words of the Evangelists is to be sought primarily or even partially from the " Western 'text, it must be admitted that a pro- blem lies before us which, if it may well call forth all the energies of Christian scholars, will make heavy calls alike on their patience, their caution, and their courage.' +
The other question is whether WH estimated the testimony of NB correctly. What if NB or their ancestors were not separated from a remote antiquity, but one codex was influenced by the other ? WH were inclined to believe that B was written at Rome, and that all its ancestors may have been there, while to N they ascribed an Egyptian origin. Tischendorf, on the other hand, believed he could demonstrate that one and the same copyist worked at both MSS. Quit« recently the suggestion has been thrown out that B originated under the influence of Athanasius (Kahlfs, Nestle, Zahn), and is perhaps the very copy which was procured by Athanasius for Constans. If .so, it is a question how an exceptional purity can have been handed do«Ti till that time. On "the other hand, this fact would exjilain how E seems to have left no children ; the private copy of an emperor would not be given out that other MSS might be copied from it ; certainly not at first. It is at all events
• Even Burpon speaks favourably of D, despite of its many 'monatra potius quaiu varie lectiones' (Aa^e Twelve I'ergeg of Hark, p. 211).
I There has Just appeared the Prospectus of the great under- taking of Prof. H. von Soden of Berlin : Di« Sc/tri/fen rfcjj Neuen Testanwntrs in ihrer alteiten erreichfjaren 'fezt<testnlt hergf^UUt au/Gtttnd ihrer Textgeschichte; Berlin, A. Dnncker, 2 vols. —2323 Codices have been examined, 454 more tlian are mentioned by Greirory, with the result that the text of KB is held to be decidedly that of a recension, not the neutral or oriKinal. as WH believed. This forthcoming edition will beDC«- forward forma new starting-point [24th March 1902].
strange that no MS seems to have been found aa yet w-liich might be [ironouneed with certainty to have been copied from B. * In some books of the or X and B have an almost identical text ; in others they present us with quite different recen- sions ; in the Book of Judges B contains a version not quoted by the Alexandrian P'athers from the •2nd to the 4t^i cent. (Clement, Origen, Didymus), but for the first time by Cyril, which therefore some scholars have been inclined to ascribe to Hesychius. In the NT it is easier, as Burgon stated, 'to find two consecutive verses in which the two MSS difier the one from the other, than two consecutive verses in which they entirely agree.' But this, instead of sensibly detracting from our opinion of the value of their evidence, as Burgon believed, on the contrary enhances it where they agree. It is intelligible that, as long as cod. B stood alone among extant MSS in the omission of Mk 16^"*", scholars were slow to follow it ; even after X had come to its support, Burgon was not justified, but might be excused for coming, after an investigation of more than 250 pages, to the conclusion ' that cod. B and cod. N must be henceforth allowed to be in one more serious par- ticular untrustworthy and erring witnesses. They have been convicted, in fact, of bearing false witness in respect of St. Mark 16"'^, where their evidence had been hitherto reckoned upon with the most undoubting confidence.' t But now, since F. C. Conybeare found in 1893 the Armenian manuscript which between v.* and v.* has the words ' Ariston eritzou,' i.e. of the ' Presbyter Arist[i]on' (see the facsimile in Swete's Commentary and in Introd. pi. ix), and has preserved even the name of the man to whom (directly or indirectly) we owe the longer conclusion of the Second Gospel, no reason- able doubt is any longer possible. Therefore iu this important case NB turn out to be our best witnesses among extant MSS. This awakens, of course, a strong prejudice in their favour. But what, on the other hand, about the ' Western non- interpolations ' ? and the other places where D alone seems to have preser\'ed the original read- ing ? See WH, S§ i;-40-242, 283. Certain apparently Western ' omissions ' are shown by their internal character to be original, i.e. non-interpolations; that is to say, only those Western documents re- mained free from interpolations which found their way into aU other documents. Their presence in
• The reading favip^^ (He 13 for ^e/wv), which is attested b.v Tischendorf only from B", — a second hand changed it into i-f^*. a third restored it, and wrote on the margin a,ua.Sia~t<tTi lutt xdtx;, a;(> T« TeLyeuct, fi.r, fj.irttTo.ii. — has now been found in aa Eg^ptian treatise (see J. A. Robinson, TexU and Studies, T. 6, p. i).