The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1866-08-21 00:00:00

tittratl ilebitbs.

TIIE GREEK TEXT OF THE NEW TESTAMENT.
Ti NV likttl.. Atlye, Esq., of !lady How, Wim-
the public arc iudebtrd for an admirable

icredium of " the History of the Printed Greek
'Etat f the New Tettament, with the material.
amiable for its revision," which ficcc appeared in
the shape of a lecture delivereil at the If artle7 lnsti
tution ,l ii now suipti a•visevrs accompanied by
20 aal vea. e 315.1 weren ii.g to which,
ih,.l ll.r .I•tKihllls cuili,seet I y crit Wise.' at
• f t:e iirrt appearance, we shall now direct

riii oi'dlitelltl,lll. We may premise, however.
that ef all things bililen from the valor gas*, in
which the general Christian public are Meek deeply
implicated. Biblical criticism is by far one of the
most vital concemitneet. how few there are that
eve a vubject of th a nature their attention might
be anticies•ed from the beamed and recondite
natert the research*, requmite to illustrate it
lut t erly.
it the popularity How fewer still they are who can
necessary to render it accep-
po
iabie to the niultitiele, may be judged by the fact
thee with the exception of a paper we once heard
from Nit Horace Mettle, on the Early English
vrisione, Mr. Willett Adve's Lecture, relating as it
does to the printed Greek Teat Writhes New Testament,
for as we can remember, the first instance
of •uch an investigation being brought
forwaid as the Ciente of a popular lecture. In the
new rupplanent lie labours under less restraint, how-
ever. than the ex i.;enciee of • popular discourse M-
r aeon an e:rstrueo topic. And, having in the body
of his work aufficiently dealt with the Greek, he
pelt turns to tho Latin Scriptures, the chief version
of which is familiar:y known as the Vulgate. Its
binary ia bet in obscurity ; but it was made in
Africa, and Tertullian is the principal witness for its
existence-. We identify it with the Boman Church,
but Mr. Adye warns us that during the first two
.itinturies that church was essentially Greek ; the
earliest Roman Liturgy was ;reek; the few remains
if the ehri•tian literature of Reim are Greek—feats
of importance we should thank these for thou who
indulge the dream of • ri sonian of the churches,
bedding on the eseential affinity of the Greek and
Anglican. Except in the cue of this appendix A.,
in which the writer has introduced this account of
the Latin Vulgate version, the supplement contains
a c.,usiderable quantity of detail applicable to the
creek Teat. The Vulgate, in feet, ts only treated
a ,rt of comminion to the Greek—not that
lich4are admit the Vulgate as throwing any critical
light upon the Greek—it is rather the other way.
The ancient Syriac version carries mere weight for
critical purposes than the Latin in discussing points
cooected with the Greek original. But it appears
tlet it would have carried Mr. Adye out of his way
to give an account of the Syrian Moreover, of late,
owing to Canon Cureton's researches, the subject of
the Syriac version of the New Testament has been a
rdd deal ventilated, mad the public attention
drawn to it in the leading review'. Mr. Adye's
ehject has been all through to take what is in
,verybody'e hands the New Testament text in the
tom fami",ar to the educated clams, as studied.
net peiple read • little Latin and sums Greek
eat thn sacred writers of the New Testament wrote
I ; —hence the internee attaching to such extant
de inmate as would tend to define what the text
was in the Ante-Nicene life. Notwithstanding the
deuce which must naturally exist to reach back to
the pure original text, the horror of many persons at
the proposed recension of certain passages palpably
%Milted from the margin to the text, is excessive.
Far example, the learned reviewer in a local con-
temporary, who shall be nameless, mamas an ultra
conservative • tone as to utter these words in recog-
mtion of Holy Writ by the Church. "Pions frauds
vve do not ask for; and the fact that even a disputed
verse has a place stall in the New Testament, and
has had for many ages past, is very much in favour
of mill a verse, even if it he not contained in every
Ma." Ccrtainly, we cannot expect absolute unani-
mity among the if a verse he well
supported it must of course stand. Fortunately,
variations of a grave kind are few. But the Critic
in iuestion is too sweeping in his statement If be
means by a verse " having a plasm at all in the New
T. dement" for a long period, merely the eiretun.
stance. having been priotted down to this time
from Stephens' Edition of 1550, a matter of three
humored veers, it becomes after all • question as to
the merits of Steptient' judgment in admitting such
a a.sage into print. In his supplement, pp. 12 (at
bottom). 13 and 14, Mr. Adve shows what
Stephens' authorities were. No. I was the
~,•.f copy produced in Spain (the Completes-
mea) awl nobody no w • what M 8.14 theseediters used,
probably inferior ones, as the existence of the great
primary Unreal MS.S. was not then known, and, at
any rate, there MS.S. 'sore not accessible. Stephens'
other authorities, were fifteen in nemher—istanti. ,
scripts—lint two of these only Uncial MS.S. (one of
the Nth century)—the other thirteen Carsive !ISA ,
from the I lih century downward.; and he was not I
very particular in his references to them—so little
particular as to lead Bentley to exclaim that "the
text stood as if an Apostle were IL Stephens' nom- I
peter." As to previous ages all one has to depend
on is mainly the collation of the various Greek
'4'. 5. to be found giving preference of course to the
net ancient. If a verse, or clause, be in doubt we
must try to find out whether the ancient Fathers
quote or refer to it as recognised then. With these
two classes of aids before as, we may form our
critical opinion of the propriety of retaining the
prase. If Oct amenable to these teats, it cannot
be maid "to have • plain at all in the New Testa.
meat." To facilitate the labour of such research,
Mr. Adye has given us not only lists of the Greek
but the Latin codices; and not only theme, but
accurate notanda of the documents constituting the
levee of the three first printed Greek texts of the
New Testament—the Spanish, Dutch, and French
(ompluternsian, Eramman, and Stephanie), to.
getter with notices of the labours of the critical
Radical Editors, R. Fetienne or Stephens, Theodore
Ken, Bishop Fell, Mill, Bentley, and the German
s hoists, Bengel, Wetaitein. Michaelis the younger,
Hattlsei, Alter, Birch, Griesbach, Scholz, Lsch•
mann, and last, not least, Constantine Tiachendorf.
We really beg pardon for the array of hard names,
but Mr. Adye has rendered them all of interest,
Finally he gives a most valuable description and
enumeration of all the sixty important Uncial Greek
NU...5., which form the very foundation of the New
'regiment ecripenres. He discumes also, as if in
confirmation of the very observations just offered, the
mede in which the mirage relative to the three
heavenly witnesses entered into the received text
of at. John. I into that, however, we shall not follow
he::, although we agree with him, and believe that
the public will agree with us, in wondering this as
GOO of the ablest contributions lately made to the
general cause of Biblical criticism.