[To the moderator: I posted this about a week ago but it never showed                    up (locally) on the net.  If this has already                    actually been posted, please fill free to flush                    this copy.  --N]  From: db7n+@andrew.cmu.edu (D. Andrew Byler) >Does anyone now where an English translation of the long recension of >the Acts of the Apostles can be found?  1] A english translation of this can be found in:    "The Acts of the Apostles, translated from the Codex Bezae, with an    introduction on its Lucan Origin and Importance", J. M. Wilson    (London, 1923).  2] Another work that might be useful is:    "The Acts of the Apostles, a Critical Edition with Introduction and    Notes on Selected Passages", Albert C. Clark (Oxford, 1933;    reprinted 1970).  (This is an edition of text of Acts that makes the assumption that the text in Codex Bezae is the more authentic.  I don't know if it actually contains an english translation or not.)  3] Another useful that discusses many of the variants in detail is:    "The Theological Tendency of the Codex Bezae Cantabrigiensis in    Acts", Eldon J Epp (Cambridge, 1966).  4] The most recent reference I found was an edition in French from the early '80s.  (I can supply the reference if anyone's interested.)  5] Now, many of the works are going to be difficult to find.  So if you're interested in examining the differences in the long recension an excellent (and easily obtainable) discussion can be found in:    "A Textual Commentary on the Greek NT", Bruce Metzger (United Bible    Society, 1971).  Metzger's book serves as a companion volume to the UBS 3rd edition of the Greek NT.  It contains a discussion on the reasoning that went behind the decisions on each of the 1440 variant readings included in the UBS3.  Furthermore, notes on an addition 600 readings are included in aTCotGNT (the majority of these occur in Acts).  In particular in the introduction to the section on Acts Metzger writes:    "[An attempt was made] to set before the reader a more or less full    report (with an English translation) of the several additions and    other modifications that are attested by Western witnesses ...    Since many of these have no corresponding apparatus in the    text-volume, care was taken to supply an adequate conspectus of the    evidence that supports the divergent readings." (p 272).  >I understand that one of the early codexes, Vaticanus and Siniaticus has >this version of Acts.  It would be interesting to know what the >differences are between the long and the short forms.  6] Most of the copies of the text of Acts that we have (including the ones in Vaticanus and Siniaticus) adher pretty closely to the shorter (or Alexandrian) version.  The longer version to which you refer is usually called the "Western" version and its main witness is the Codex Bezae (althought there are a few other rather fragmentary sources).  7] As far as size, the difference is that in Clark's edition (mentioned above) the book of Acts contains 19,983 words whereas the text edited by Westcott and Hort (a typical Alexandrian text) contains 18,401 words; i.e. a difference of about 8-1/2%.  8] To answer the obvious questions, no, there are no major revelations in the longer text nor major omissions in the shorter text.  The main difference seems to "expansion" of detail in the Western text (or, if you prefer "contractions" in the Alexandrian).  The Western text seems to be given to more detail.  There are some interesting specific cases, but this probably not the place to go into it in detail.  9] The discussion over the years as to which of these versions is the more authentic has been hot and heavy.  If there is anything approaching a modern consensus it is (i) that neither text represents purely the "authentic" version, (ii) each variant reading has to be examined on its own merits however, (iii) the variant in the Alexandrian text is the "better" more often than not.