Attempts have been made at various times to classify the manuscripts of the Greek text of the Apocalypse into groups, families, or recensions, according to the character of the text which they exhibit. Thus Bengel believed in an .African recension, represented by snch manuscripts as A and 80; and an Asiatic recension, to which 119 and the bulk of the cursives belonged. Hort wonld gronp most of the cursives together as exhibiting the Syrian form of text; and cannot find any manuscript, even among the five uncials, that has preserved in its purity any one of the pre-Syrian forms of text-neutral, Western, Alexandrian. Delitzsch thinks tha.t the most real and useful division is into three groups, viz.- (1) Andreas-texts, such as A, 1, 7, 28, 80, 81, 96, 119. (2) Arethas-texts, such as B, 29, 33, 35, 82, 87, 93, 94, 95. (3) Mixed-texts, such as 8 and 31. It is strange that manuscripts which Bengel considered typical of different groups should be placed by Delitzsch in the same gronp ; and it is also a significant fact that Delitzsch confesses that the Leicester codex is so peculiar as to defy classification under his system. Probably one of the most important results of a. thorough examination of all the manuscripts would be the discovery of the genealogical relations by which many of them a.re connected together. When Delitzsch paid special attention to these documents, a quarter of a century ago, he made it appear tolerably certain that the number of independent witnesses for the text could very easily be reduced by such discoveries. For example, he showed that the manuscripts numbered 28, 79, and 80 were probably all copied TilE REVELATION OF ST. JOHN THE DIVINE. :llV
from the one numbered 99; if so, clearly we ought to strike 28, 79, and 80 out of the list of independent autlloritiee-the four together possess no more weight than a.ny one of them taken separately. Similarly, it seems probable that 35 is a transcript of 100, that 92 was copied from 14, that 101 is a duplicate of 88, a.nd that 82 and Bare very closely conneoted-perha.p& copied from the same exemplar.
§ 6. VERSIONS, AJJ with Greek manuscripts, so with versions or translations ma.de from the Greek, those available for the Book of Revelation are both few in number and late in date, compared with those of other New Tesl:.ament books. 1. Syriao. The great Syriac version of the Bible, known as the Peshito, did not contain the Apocalypse. The Curetonian Syriac version, which many critics suppose to be older than the Peshito, does not seem to have extended beyond the fonr Gospels ; and the known range of the much later Jerusalem Syriac is similarly limited. But tpere are two other versions in Syriac, the Philoxenian (A.D. 508) and the Harklensian (A.D. 616), which have recently been proved to be much more distinct from each other than was once euppo6ed ; and each of these includes the Apocalypse. There a.re eight Syriac manuscripts mentioned in literature as containing this book, but the present locality of three of them is unknown, and one other is a, mere fragment. They may be enumerated as follows : - (1) De Dieu's, in the University Library, at Leyden, designated "Scaliger, 18," of the sixteenth century, first published in 1627. Harklensian. (2) Ussher's, in the Library of Trinity College, Dublin, marked "B. 5. 16," written in the year 1625. Harklensian. (3) Gabriel Sionita's, now unknown, used for the Paris Polyglot in 163~; probably the same that was written by Andreas de Leon for Pope Paul V. Harklensian. (4) Moses of Mardin's, now unknown, but mentioned by De Dieu. Uncertain. (5) One mentioned by Adler, formerly in the Library of St. Mark's, at Florence, but now missing. Harklensian. (6) Earl of Crawford's, of the eleventh or twelfth century ; the only known Syriac manuscript which contains the whole New Testament. The Apocalypse is Philoxenian. (7) B. M. Addit., 17127, with a commentary; eleventh century (dated 1088~ (8) B. M. Addit., 17193 (f. 14 b), containing eight verses only. ? Philoxenian. For a fnller account of these documents, see the articles on "Polycarpus Chorepiscopus" and "Thomas Harklensis'' in Smith and Wace's 'Dictionary of Christian Biography,' written by Dr. Gwynn, Regius Professor of Divinity in Trinity College, Dublin, who informs us that he is preparing for publica- tion the Syriac version of the Apocalypse in Lord Crawford's manuscript, with a Greek re-version. The Syria-0 Lectionaries do not contain any lessons from the Apocalypse, and with this agrees a phenomenon of Lord Crawford's manuscript of which we are assured by Dr. Gwynn, viz. that the .Apocalypse "is not included in the lectionary-divisio:ns with which, ~ :regards the xvi INTRODUCTION TO