BOOK I.

GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF TEXTUAL CRITICISM.

CHAPTER I.

OBJECT AND NECESSITY OF THE SCIENCE.

TEXTUAL Criticism is the name given to that branch of learning which treats of the present state of the text of ancient writings, but more especially of those which are contained in the Bible: of the nature and causes of the Various Readings which are found on comparing together different copies of the Scriptures: of the means which may be applied for ascertaining the true text: and the principles by which we must be guided in applying them. To this study the term Criticism or Biblical Criticism has sometimes been appropriated; but as these terms are also very frequently used in a wider sense, as including the science of Interpretation also, it seems better to give to our present subject a name more definitely expressing its nature and object. We shall therefore call it Textual Criticism, or the Criticism of the Text.

An example will show at once the object of this science and the advantage of taking it up at the very commencement of our scriptural studies. It is notorious that a certain book exists, called the Gospel of John. It is also well known to scholars that some copies of this book contain, and others omit, a certain passage* in which mention is made of the periodical descent of an ayysλos who troubled the water in the pool of Bethesda at Jerusalem, and imparted to it the power of healing, of whatever disease he had, the first person who afterwards stepped in. This is enough to give ground for the

The passage referred to is John v. 4: a detailed examination of which will be found in the Third Book of this work.

B

10

PRINCIPLES OF TEXTUAL CRITICISM.

[BOOK I. inquiry, did this book as originally written contain this passage, or did it not? We here presuppose nothing as to the authorship of the work so far as the present question is concerned, it may have been written by the Apostle John, or it may be a spurious writing circulated under his name. We presuppose nothing as to the character of its contents: they may have every claim upon our belief, or they may have none. We presuppose no theory as to the explanation of the passage itself: the ❝yyshos of whom it speaks may have been an angel from heaven, or simply a messenger from the neighbouring temple; and the cures effected may have been produced by natural or by supernatural causes. All these are questions of much interest; but there is another which precedes them in the proper order of inquiry,-namely, whether the narrative forms a genuine part of the Gospel in which it is found. Until we can ascertain that we have the work in the state in which it proceeded from the author's pen, it is fruitless to concern ourselves with questions and difficulties relating to its interpretation, its authenticity, or its credibility.

*

Such diversities, and indeed all diversities of whatsoever kind that are found in the text of any book, are called Various Readings. Michaelis draws a distinction between a Various Reading, and an erratum; but the difference which he points out is not well marked; and the distinction itself is of no use. If an erratum be a variation arising from mistake, it is highly probable that nearly all the diversities of reading which exist in the sacred books were errata in the beginning: and we have seldom or never the means of determining which were so, and which were not. If the term erratum be used to signify a minute or unimportant variation, as contrasted with those which are of real consequence, we still have no exact line of distinction and probably different minds would estimate the importance of particular readings upon different principles: so that what would appear of great consequence to one, would seem to another, of little or none. It is admitted that the genuine reading of a passage must be ascertained by the very same rules, whether the diversities which may be found in the text are mere errata or various readings, properly so called. We may therefore be allowed to dispense with this distinction; and whenever one copy of any passage differs from another, we shall call the text of each, with reference to that of the other, a Various Reading.

The application of Textual Criticism to the Sacred Writings, is rendered necessary by the various readings which are found on a

Introd. to N. T. vol. i. p. 260. (Marsh's Transl.)

comparison of different copies and editions. That such various readings exist, and in very considerable numbers, is a fact which admits of no dispute; nor is it a recent discovery; it has been noticed and commented on by Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Eusebius, Jerome, and a great many other respectable writers from the third century downwards. In modern times it has been brought prominently into light by the researches of many learned men who have devoted themselves to this branch of scriptural learning; such as Stephens, Walton, Mill, Wetstein, Griesbach, Scholz, Lachmann, Kennicott, De Rossi, Holmes, &c. &c. These writers have enumerated and published a vast number of various readings upon the text of every different book in the canon. Το deny the existence of such diversities is to renounce faith in human testimony and to recur to the principles of absolute scepticism.

The existence of various readings in the sacred text is therefore an incontrovertible fact; yet there are still many persons who either are not aware of it, or think that the frank recognition of it would be injurious to the interests of religion:-they seem to think that if true, it is a dangerous truth, which ought not to be made known to the common mass of Christians ;-and some writers in the century before last, especially Dr. Owen* and Dr. Whitby† inveighed against the science of Textual Criticism as a thing calculated to overturn the very foundations of Christianity. To such persons we need only say," Use your own eyes. Compare together any two editions that have ever been printed, whether of the Scriptures in the original or in any version, and if you do it carefully you will find that they are far from an exact agreement. If this be a task of too much labour, cast your eyes upon Kennicott's Hebrew Bible with its enormous assemblage of various readings, collected from MSS. editions and other sources; and upon the huge appendix published by De Rossi, containing many thousand more of the same description. Look to Mill's Greek Testament with its variations, said to amount to 30,000; augmented by more recent investigators to the number, probably of 100,000!" A glance at a single page of these works will satisfy the most doubting, that variations exist in the sacred text as set forth in different copies: and no man can assert that the recognition of

Considerations on the Prolegomena and Appendix of the late Biblia Polyglotta, London, 1658, 8vo: to which Bishop Walton published a masterly reply entitled "The Considerator Considered," London, 1659, 16mo.

+ Examen Variantium Lectionum Joannis Milli; London, 1710, 8vo: answered by Dr. Bentley, under the name of Phileleutherus Lipsiensis, in his Reply to Anthony Collins's Discourse of Freethinking. London, 1713, 8vo.

this plain fact is injurious to the interests of religion, without implying that Christianity is irreconcilable with ascertained truths: which is the very worst that its enemies could allege.

Various readings, therefore, abound in the copies of the Sacred Scriptures, and in fact are found in every book in the collection. Indeed they could not have been avoided, unless copyists, correctors, editors, and printers, had been kept continually under a miraculous influence. Any person who has been employed in transcribing a work of tolerable length, or in superintending its progress through the press, is aware that notwithstanding all his pains, and even after repeated revision, errors will remain. The celebrated printer, Robert Stephens, once published an edition of the Scriptures, in the correction of which he took so much pains that in the preface he asserted it would be found perfectly free from mistakes: yet in this very preface, he has printed pulres instead of plures, and several errors have been found in the text itself of that edition. Mistakes in copying are not to be avoided by any human care. The first copy taken from any written work will always contain some errors: some of these will be retained in transcripts made from it, and new ones will in like manner be generated; and thus a book which, like the Bible, has been very often transcribed and printed, could not remain free from various readings without a continued miracle.

The object of Textual Criticism is to ascertain which of the different readings of each passage in which variations occur, is the genuine one, or that which proceeded from the pen of the original author, or of his amanuensis. In this inquiry we must collect, compare, and weigh, the testimonies in favour of each reading; and endeavour to ascertain the truth by tracing error to its source. A conscientious student of Scripture will not be satisfied with merely taking for his guide any particular edition that may be first put into his hands, even although its editor may have been a learned and impartial scholar: much less one of the common and trivial editions, published, as so many have been, by a trading bookseller, for which no editor makes his character responsible, which perhaps had no editor, unless we dignify with this name the person who corrected the proof-sheets, according to another edition of the same kind, selected at random. He will employ whatever means of knowledge are accessible to him; he will endeavour to place himself in such circumstances that he may be enabled to form an independent deciion. For this purpose he will find it necessary to exercise patient ndustry and impartial judgment in the investigation:-there is no

other means of acquiring skill in Textual Criticism. Bengel, who published a very creditable edition of the Greek Testament about a century ago, did, indeed, lay claim to a kind of spiritual perception, by which he thought he was enabled to decide questions of reading by his internal feelings alone, without ratiocination :—but no subsequent editor appears to have admitted the reality of this internal illumination ;-for none of them has followed Bengel's decisions implicitly:-and I am afraid that if we were to appeal to the inward light for the settlement of such questions, it would lead different minds to different conclusions: and thus, in many cases, prove only "a light that leads astray." Our understandings, therefore, exercised with due diligence, fidelity, and impartiality, must be our guide; upon them we are compelled to rely in attempting to determine the genuine text of the sacred books :—and it is a subject of thankfulness, that this is a branch of theology which has hitherto, by the tacit consent of all the churches of Christendom, been left open to the investigation of the student. Churches have in many cases defined the scriptural Canon to which their members must adhere; but no church requires the adoption of any particular edition of the text: so that Textual Criticism as yet is free.