Revisiting the Corruption of the New Testament: Manuscript, Patristic, and Apocryphal Evidence (Text and Canon of the New Testament)
"This collection of stimulating essays, edited by Dan Wallace, renowned scholar of New Testament manuscripts, interacts with Bart Ehrman's own groundbreaking bookThe Orthodox Corruption of Scripture. These essays deal mainly with issues of New Testament textual criticism, and each responds to a specific aspect of Ehrman's work. The studies attempt to 'push back' against some of Ehrman's stimulating theories. Their value lies in clarifying arguments, re-examining primary evidence, and advancing debates concerning fundamental issues surrounding the text of the New Testament. With the recent reissue of Ehrman's book, this collection forms a stimulating dialogue partner to be read alongside that work. It is essential reading for anybody interested in the text of the New Testament and in the way that text was brought together." --Paul Foster, Senior Lecturer in New Testament Language, Literature, and Theology, School of Divinity, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland"Dan Wallace has clearly become evangelical Christianity's premier active textual critic today. With painstaking detail and persuasive clarity, he and his former Dallas Seminary students demolish the contradictory and unconvincing portions of Bart Ehrman's theories about the orthodox corruption of Scripture. This book is a must read for anyone interested in this issue!" --Craig L. Blomberg, Distinguished Professor of New Testament, Denver Seminary"Today virtually all scholars agree that there are readings in the transmission history of the Greek New Testament that more likely reflect the theology, not of the New Testament authors, but of scribes who changed the text. As Wallace points out in his introduction, this is not the issue at stake. The problem that this volume of essays seeks to address is when 'orthodox corruption' is made the default explanation whenever there is a grain of suspicion that a passage may have been tampered with for doctrinal reasons, or when it is used as a heuristic device to harvest the entire textual tradition in search for suitable variants to label as 'anti-adoptionistic,' 'anti-separationist,' 'anti-docetic' or 'anti-patripassianist.' As A. E. Housman remarked, 'every problem which presents itself to the textual critic must be regarded as possibly unique.' Such a sound view of textual criticism excludes every mechanical application of any principle to account for textual variation." --Tommy Wasserman, Academic Dean and Lecturer in New Testament, O–rebro School of Theology, O–rebro, SwedenToday virtually all scholars agree that there are readings in the transmission history of the Greek New Testament that more likely reflect the theology, not of the New Testament authors, but of scribes who changed the text. As Wallace points out in his introduction, this is not the issue at stake. The problem that this volume of essays seeks to address is when 'orthodox corruption' is made the default explanation whenever there is a grain of suspicion that a passage may have been tampered with for doctrinal reasons, or when it is used as a heuristic device to harvest the entire textual tradition in search for suitable variants to label as 'anti-adoptionistic,' 'anti-separationist,' 'anti-docetic' or 'anti-patripassianist.' As A. E. Housman remarked, 'every problem which presents itself to the textual critic must be regarded as possibly unique.' Such a sound view of textual criticism excludes every mechanical application of any principle to account for textual variation. --Tommy Wasserman, Academic Dean and Lecturer in New Testament, Örebro School of Theology, Örebro, SwedenDan Wallace has clearly become evangelical Christianity's premier active textual critic today. With painstaking detail and persuasive clarity, he and his former Dallas Seminary students demolish the contradictory and unconvincing portions of Bart Ehrman's theories about the orthodox corruption of Scripture. This book is a must read for anyone interested in this issue! --Craig L. Blomberg, Distinguished Professor of New Testament, Denver Seminary