Yuri Kuchinsky

[The earlier discussion is here, http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=137978 ]

Greetings, all,

Here is Victorinus (mid-third century) quoting the opening verses of Mt and Mk.

Matthew:
"Book of the generation of Jesus Christ _son of God_ son of David son of Abraham; this (is) the face of a human."

Mark:
"The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ as it was written in Isaiah"

(Above translations from Latin by Carlson.)

Carlson remarked,

"More interesting from a text-critical perspective, however, is that Victorinus joins with Aleph (first hand), Theta, 28, and Origen in not having "Son of God" in Mark 1:1."

Ben Smith remarked,

"[Victorinus] also seems to conflate Matthew 1.1 with Luke 3.38 in inserting 'son of God' into the former in conjunction with the genealogy."

Yuri now remarks,

Yes, both of these text-critical observations are quite interesting.

In regard to the omission of "Son of God" in Mark 1:1, I would also add that, actually, lots of other Church fathers likewise omit "Son of God" here (as listed in GNT/UBS). Syrian Palestinian versions, as well as some Georgian MSS likewise omit.

Now, in regard to the apparent conflation by Victorinus of Mt 1:1 with Lk 3:38, as noted by Ben, in my view, this is even more interesting. As far as I know, no edition of Greek NT lists this particular variant.

But here, it seems, would be one more argument for Mt originally being dependent on Lk...

(After all, this particular feature in Victorinus is quite similar to what is happening with the Hebrew Gospel of Matthew, where there are _hundreds_ of apparent 'conflations' with Lk. The point being that the Western/Peripheral texts of Mt -- and not just HMt alone -- typically seem to 'conflate' Mt and Lk.)

Now, let's compare the above quotes from the 'genuine' Victorinus with the later rewriting of Victorinus by Jerome.

Matthew (according to Jerome):
"Book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham"

Mark (according to Jerome):
"The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, as it is written in Isaiah the prophet"

So we see that Jerome actually corrects Victorinus' citation of Mt, by dropping "son of God" from his citation.

Yet Jerome leaves Victorinus' citation of Mk alone, in so far as he didn't insert "Son of God" into Mk.

Nevertheless, I can also note here in passing that the 'genuine' Victorinus said simply "Isaiah", rather than "Isaiah the prophet", like we find in Jerome, as well as in the canonical text. (This is another significant variant in Mk 1:2, but I'll not get into it now.)

So it looks like Jerome corrected both citations, after all...

So all this just goes to show that, even as late as in mid-third century, Victorinus is still apparently using some rather early texts of the gospels, that seem like pre-canonical texts...

All in all, in the above quotes, Victorinus features at least 3 variants from the canonical text. Jerome corrects 2 of them, and leaves one uncorrected.


YET ANOTHER ALTERNATIVE READING!

And here's yet another very interesting variant in Victorinus that I can now point out.

Here Victorinus discusses the story of Zacharias in Lk 1,

(Genuine Victorinus)
"[W]hile Luke reckons from the priesthood of Zacharias offering a sacrifice for the people and with an angel appearing to him"

(According to Jerome)
"Luke, in narrating the priesthood of Zacharias as he offers a sacrifice for the people, and the angel that appears to him"

But the phrase "offering a sacrifice for the people" is not found in any canonical text of Lk... Actually, this phrase seems to be quite significant, because the "people" here are clearly the people of Israel. (As we can see above, Jerome leaves this particular feature of Victorinus' citation alone.)

So it would be quite significant IMHO that the opening of the Gospel of Luke would contain a prayer for the Jews.

Hence, one wonders, where did Victorinus get this turn of phrase then?

Could it perhaps be... from the Magdalene Gospel?

Magdalene Gospel
http://www.globalserve.net/~yuku/mgtext.htm

(MG 2:3) ... And while alone in the Temple, he [Zacharias] entreated God for the salvation of the people.

(MG 2:5) And the angel comforted him, and said that the supplication that he made for the people was heard before God...

And so, in the Magdalene Gospel, in the passage that is parallel to Lk, the entreaties for the Jews are mentioned not just once, but twice!

It's quite possible IMHO that this was the early text of Lk, which was later changed for political reasons (i.e. anti-Jewish feelings).

All the best,

Yuri.

Ben C Smith

It looks to me like the son of God variation in Matthew 1.1 as Victorinus gives it is a good poster child for conflation, not for dependence on a primitive text. Here we have a church father striking out on his own for a moment, unsupported by any text or translation of which I am aware, copying a very brief and memorable phrase from a similar context in Luke over to Matthew. I would read this as evidence that conflation of Matthew and Luke really did happen, and does not always point to a primitive precanonical text, though I would by no means wish to argue that it never does.

Another point. Those Jewish-Christian gospels do not stop at conflating, as it were, only the primitive portions of Luke. The Ebionite gospel to which Epiphanius had access, for example, conflates what it calls the gospel of Matthew with part of the infancy narrative of Luke, which section you have already stated was probably added to Luke only later, and was therefore not a part of the primitive gospel text.

If, then, we know that conflation did indeed happen, how do you go about distinguishing in any mixed text, as it were, conflation from dependence on a primitive text?

Your comparison of the sacrifice in Victorinus with that in the Pepysian text, on the other hand, seems rather a different sort of animal, and much more directly supportive of your thesis, since conflation of the sort I am talking about can be safely ruled out.

Ben.

Yuri Kuchinsky

Really, Ben?

You have to ask yourself, why would there be _systematic_ conflation of Mt with Lk.

Mt was definitely the most popular gospel among Christians at least from the 2c onwards. So if you want to claim that some manuscripts of Mk were later conflated with Mt, or that some manuscripts of Lk were later conflated with Mt, then I can understand it.

But why would anyone, from 2c onwards, want to conflate Mt with _Lk_? This just doesn't make any sense, sorry...

I wasn't really going to use this single example from Victorinus as any sort of a big argument for anything. Hey, anything can happen with just one passage... But when you talk about HMt, with its _hundreds_ of conflations with Lk, then we really have something very significant on our hands, that needs to be investigated further. And if we establish that a great many of these 'conflating' passages in HMt are in fact very ancient (i.e. with lots of ancient MSS support), then a very solid case will be made.

OK, that's quite significant...

Yes, but even if the Nativity sections were indeed added to Lk and Mt only later, this doesn't yet mean that they didn't also go through their own processes of textual development -- both in Lk and in Mt. After all Loisy already remarked about this. (I was planning to get some citations from Loisy about this, and I'll try to do this later.)

Thus, Epiphanius may well be preserving some earlier Nativity passages, that can tell us something important about those earlier stages of textual development of these passages.

For any given passage, support in other early manuscripts is crucial. That's why the best argument for the early status of HMt is its strong connection with the ancient Aramaic Mt.

Thank you!

Yes, I guess, in this case, the crucial question is, Where did Victorinus get this idea that Zacharias was praying _for the people_? He probably got it from somewhere, I'd say.

So, in order to solidify this case, some other instance of this in some other patristic witness would be very useful. I've a felling that it may well be out there somewhere, and I might even try to take a look sometime...

All the best,

Yuri.

Ben C Smith

I have heard that before, of course, and wonder upon what exactly it is based. My own sense (and it is no more than that) is that Matthew was more popular than Luke, but not by very much. The gulf between both Matthew and Luke on the one hand and Mark on the other seems much greater than that between Matthew and Luke.

In some regions or for some of the fathers John appears to trump all three synoptics.

I may well be completely mistaken about the relative popularity of each gospel; it would be nice to have some hard stats on the matter.

Conflation of Matthew and Luke looks to me to have worked in both directions. Again, I may be mistaken.

Ben.

Vorkosigan

There's some in Schildgen's Power and Prejudice, the Reception of the Gospel of Mark. In antiquity Matt was the most frequently chosen for commentaries, followed by John closely, among all regions and language groups. To 215, there are 3,900 references to Mt, 3,300 to Lk, 2000 to Jn, and 1400 to Mk among the Patristic fathers. In the third century Matt is refered to 3,600 times, Jn 1600, Lk 1000, and Mk a pathetic 250 (exluding Origen). Origen had 8000 references to Mt, 5K to Lk, 3K to Jn, and 650 to Mark. In general, through the remainder of the period, there is 1 Mk quote to every 7-10 of Matt. Matt was the gospel of choice in antiquity. her source was Biblica Patristica. Is this what you were looking for.

Vorkosigan

Ben C Smith

Hey, yes, that helps. Most of my research has delved into the first and second centuries, and I see that my general impression is vindicated by those stats: Matthew 3900, Luke 3300, John 2000, Mark 1400. Matthew is more popular than Luke, but not by much.

Origen also appears to maintain a similar (approximate) ratio.

It is in the third century and later, apparently, that my impression breaks down, with Matthew far outweighing Luke.

Thanks a ton.

Ben.

Yuri Kuchinsky

Thanks to Vork for providing for us the hard stats about the relative usage of the gospels in various periods.

This is consistent with what I remember from my own research.

So now we can come back to the Hebrew Gospel of Matthew, and the fact that it has a great many similarities to Lk throughout.

My question remains, Is there any reason why anyone in later times (perhaps even in medieval times?) would have made a great effort to 'conflate' the Hebrew Matthew with Lk?

It is obvious that Lk was not nearly as popular in later times as it was in early times (i.e. prior to 200 CE).

So it seems like this is a good argument for the early status of HMt -- any way you look at it.

All the best,

Yuri.

Ben C Smith

That is a good point, and I will submit it to careful thought. There has been some delay in my getting hold of Howard, but I should have it within a week or two now.

Ben.

S.C.Carlson

Thanks for digging through Schildgen and posting the relevant data both right here and also in the comments of my blog post of last year: Dewey, "Survival of Mark's Gospel" in Fall 2004 JBL. I (still!) haven't gotten her book, though it looks like just the kind of reference work I like.

That 1400 figure for Mark seems awfully high, but it might be all right if much of it is due to the Diatessaron. How much of the 1400 references/allusions to Mark before 215 is not due the Diatessaron (or Secret Mark)?

Stephen

S.C.Carlson

I'm not sure that a textual solution for this variant (either by conflation or from a primitive text) is the way to go here, especially considering the brevity and popularity of the phrase as a description of Jesus Christ. After all, scribes added son of God to Mark 1:1, and so it seems to me that the same instinct to aggrandize Jesus is at work in Victorinus as well.

Stephen