RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Bible Text
A more correct edition was issued in 1519: Mill observed about four hundred changes in the text. For this and later editions, one additional manuscript (cod. 3) was used in the Gospels, Acts, and Epistles. In the third edition (1522) the changes were much fewer; but it is noted for the introduction of I John v, 7, from the Codex Montfortianus (sixteenth century). In the fourth edition (1527) the text was altered and improved in many places, particularly in Revelation, from the Complutensian Polyglot. That of the fifth (1535) and last (Erasmus died in 1536) hardly differs from the fourth.
The next editions which call for notice are those of the great printer and scholar Robert Stephens (Estienne, Stephanus; see Stephens), three published at Paris (1546, 1549, and 1550; the first two, in small 12mo, are known as the 0 mirificam editions, from the opening words of the preface, which is the same in both; the last, a magnificent folio, is called the editio regia), and one at Geneva (16mo, 1551), in which the present division into verses was first introduced into the Greek text (see below, III, § 3). The edition of 1550, notwithstanding its various readings in the margin from fifteen manuscripts and the Complutensian Poly-
2f Stdith°nS glot' is mainly founded on the fourth or ,e2, ' fifth edition of Erasmus. Scrivener has and Beza. , , , , ,
noted a hundred and nineteen places
in which it differs from all of the manuscripts used. The text of the edition of 1551 varies but slightly from that of 1550. The four folio editions of Theodore Beza (Geneva, 1565, 1582, 1588 or 1589, and 1598), as well as his five 8vo editions (1565, 1567, 1580, 1590, 1604) follow, for the most part, Stephens's editions of 1550 or 1551, with changes here and there, many of which are not improvements. Stephens's edition of 1551 is commonly spoken of in England as the textus receptus ; but on the Continent the first Elzevir edition, printed at Leyden in 1624, has generally received that designation. The expression is borrowed from the preface to the second Elzevir edition (1633), in which occur the words, Textum ergo habes, nunc ab omnibus receptum. The text of the seven Elzevir editions (1624, 1633, 1641, Leyden; 1656, 1662, 1670, 1678, Amsterdam), among which there are a few slight differences, is made up almost wholly from Beza's smaller editions of 1565 and 1580; its editor is unknown. The texius receptus, slavishly followed, with slight diversities, in hundreds of editions, and substantially represented in all the principal modern Protestant translations prior to the nineteenth century, thus resolves itself essentially into that of the last edition of Erasmus, framed from a few modern and inferior manuscripts and the Complutensian Polyglot, in the infancy of Biblical criticism. In more than twenty places its reading is supported by the authority of no known Greek manuscript.
The editions from 1657 to 1830, with the exception of that of Griesbach (see below, § 3), are important, as regards the text, mainly for their accumulation of critical materials. In Walton's Polyglot (London, 1657; see Bibles, Polyglot, IV), Stephens's Greek text of 1550 was accompanied by the Vulgate, Peshito-Syriac, Ethiopic,
Arabic, and, in parts of the New Testament, other ancient versions, with a critical apparatus including the readings of Codd. A, Di, D2, Stephens's margin, and eleven cursive manuscripts collated by or for Archbishop Ussher. In Bishop Fell's edition (Oxford, 1675), which reproduces substantially the Elzevir text, other authorities, including readings of the Coptic and Gothic versions, are given in the notes, though the title page (ex plus 100 MSS. codicibus), is very misleading. The edition of John Mill (Oxford, 1707, fol.; improved and enlarged by Ludolph Kuster, Amsterdam, Leipsic, and Rotterdam, 1710), the work of thirty years, marks an epoch in the history of textual criticism by its vast additions to the store „_,... of critical material through the colbet e lation of the new manuscripts, the 1657 and c°llecti°n of readings from the ancient 1830. versions, and especially from the quotations found in the writings of the Christian Fathers, and by its very learned and valuable prolegomena. Mill gave his judgment on many readings in his notes and prolegomena, but did not venture to form a text of his own, reprinting Stephens's text of 1550 without intentional variation. The projected edition of the Greek Testament and Latin Vulgate in parallel columns, by the illustrious critic Richard Bentley (q.v.) deserves a brief notice. Proposals for printing were issued in 1720, and a large amount of materials was collected at great expense, including a collation of cod. B (published by Ford in 1799); but the work was never completed. It was to have been founded on the oldest Greek and Latin manuscripts compared with the principal ancient versions and the quotations in the Fathers of the first five centuries. (Cf. A. A. Ellis, Bentleii critica sacra, Cambridge, 1862; R. C. Jebb, Bentley, London, 1882.) The edition of Johann Alb rechtBengel (q.v.; Tubingen, 1734, 4to), while it had the advantage of some new manuscripts, was specially valuable for its discussions and illustrations of the principles of criticism, and its classification of manuscripts; but, except in the Apocalypse, Bengel did not venture to introduce any reading, even though he believed it unquestionably genuine, which had not previously appeared in some printed edition. His judgment of the value of different readings was, however, given in the margin (cf. E. Nestle, Bengel als Gelehrter, Tubingen, 1893, pp. 39 sqq.). The magnificent edition of Johann Jakob Wetstein (q.v.; 2 vols, fol., Amsterdam, 1751-52), the work of forty years, greatly enlarged the store of critical material by extensive collation of manuscripts and researches into the quotations of the Fathers, and by his description of this material in very valuable and copious prolegomena (reprinted, with additions by Semler, Halle, 1764). He gives also the readings of the chief printed editions which preceded him, and describes them fully. He introduced the present method of denoting the uncial manuscripts by Roman capitals, and the cursives and lectionaries by Arabic figures. Besides the critical matter, Wetstein's edition is a thesaurus of quotations from Greek, Latin, and Rabbinical authors, illustrating the phraseology of
Eible Text