Bernard Muller

I do not have a translation of the Old Syriac gospels, but I have one on the Syriac Peshitta from James Murdoch.
From the later, I noticed, case by case:
1. No "behold" or "lo" in Lk 5:12
2. No "behold" or "lo" in Lk 5:18 (OS evidence is lacking here). (Note: No Greek MSS or the Peshitta show a "IDOU" in Mk 2:3)
3. No "behold" or "lo" in Lk 8:41
4. No "behold" or "lo" in Mt 17:3 (but existing in Lk9:30).
5. "behold" or "lo" existing in Lk 22:47

So, taking away Case 2 (lack of OS evidence), we have a match for Cases 1, 3, 4, but conflict on Case 5, if we compare the Syriac Peshitta with the OS. That's an agreement of 3 out of 4 (against the Greek MSS), which leads me to believe that, relative to "IDOU", we should have a lot of similarities between the Peshitta and the Old Syriac, more so concerning Luke's gospel.

First I checked the Greek of the Textus Receptus (TR) of the KJV against the Greek of NA26. For the IDOUs in GLuke, we have only one discrepancy: the IDOU in Lk2:9 (TR) does not show in the NA26.

Now, keeping the TR as our Greek reference, for GLuke, we have:
"IDOU" showing in the TR, but NOT in the Peshitta:
1:20, 2:25, 5:12, 5:18, 6:23, 7:12, 7:37, 8:41, 9:38, 9:39, 13:11, 19:2, 23:50, 24:49 (total: 14)

For the reverse, that is "IDOU" showing in the Peshitta, but NOT in the TR:
2:30, 3:9, 3:16, 6:42, 11:7, 11:49, 14:17, 16:24, 16:25, 22:12, 24:21 (total: 11)

In the TR, we have 61 IDOUs in GLuke. So the ratio of discrepancy is:
(14+11)/61 = 41%

To compare, the same ratio between the NA26 & TR is:
1/61 = 1.6%

So the absence of "IDOU" in Peshitta Lk5:12, Lk8:41 & Mt17:3 is due to the erratic placement & use of "IDOU" by the Peshitta (Greek to Syriac) "translator", in a large part not in accordance with the Greek MSS.
And if the Peshitta is representative of the so-called Old Syriac texts, then we have to wonder:
HOW COULD THE OS BE REPRESENTATIVE OF THE ORIGINAL GREEK?

Yuri, are you still here? If you do not answer my last three posts on this thread, I'll send you an e-mail.

Best regards, Bernard

Yuri Kuchinsky

Hi, Bernard,

You've done some pretty impressive work there comparing the Greek text with the Peshitta! Thanks!

So let me reply to your main points now.

I've doubled-checked on some of your comparisons, and, yes, in general, there seems to be a pretty high degree of coincidence between the OS and the Peshitta in the use of IDOU.

Also, you're quite right that the TR and Westcott/Hort (or NA26) are also very close.

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Now, keeping the TR as our Greek reference, for GLuke, we have: "IDOU" showing in the TR, but NOT in the Peshitta: 1:20, 2:25, 5:12, 5:18, 6:23, 7:12, 7:37, 8:41, 9:38, 9:39, 13:11, 19:2, 23:50, 24:49 (total: 14) For the reverse, that is "IDOU" showing in the Peshitta, but NOT in the TR: 2:30, 3:9, 3:16, 6:42, 11:7, 11:49, 14:17, 16:24, 16:25, 22:12, 24:21 (total: 11)

Among these, the OS almost always goes with the Pesh against the Greek.

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So the absence of "IDOU" in Peshitta Lk5:12, Lk8:41 & Mt17:3 is due to the erratic placement & use of "IDOU" by the Peshitta (Greek to Syriac) "translator", in a large part not in accordance with the Greek MSS.

I don't know. This may or may not be the case.

Admittedly, you've sown some doubt in my mind now about it, but I'm still not quite satisfied that the "erratic placement & use of IDOU" explains it all already.

There may be something more to this...

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And if the Peshitta is representative of the so-called Old Syriac texts,

Yes, this is now confirmed in regard to IDOU.

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then we have to wonder: HOW COULD THE OS BE REPRESENTATIVE OF THE ORIGINAL GREEK?

But who said that Greek was the original? I'm not sure about it at all, at least not in regard to Mt and to Lk.

Regards,

Yuri.

Yuri Kuchinsky

But, Bernard, there are also other possible scenarios besides the one you mention above. For example, rather than adding PROSERXOMAI in GLuke, PROSERXOMAI could also have been removed from Mk, or added to Mt.

As to MSS variation, you can never be so sure without a very detailed investigation for each particular case. In my experience, all sorts of MSS variations frequently exist, that never turn up in the standard Aland/NA apparatus. In particular, the variations in the Old Latin versions, in the Coptic versions, and in the Diatessarons are rather infrequently noted in the standard apparati.

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Yuri, once again, there is no variation on the IDOUs in Lk5:12,8:41,22:47 & Mt17:3; they show in all Greek MSS.

No, Bernard.

There are substantial MSS variations for these cases,

2. Lk 5:18/Mt 9:2/Mk 2:3
3. Lk 8:41/Mt 9:18/Mk 5:22
4. Lk 9:30/Mt 17:3/Mk 9:4
5. Lk 22:47/Mt 26:47/Mk 14:43

Details can be provided later on.

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Once again, that would require some late Greek editors to have added IDOU's (an unimportant word) in all Greek MSS, with no discrepancy showing, a very unlikely proposition. Note: all Greek MSS show no IDOU in Mk9:4.

Mk9:4

Aland's SQE shows the following Greek MSS as featuring IDOU:

W f13 565 700

Although N/A apparatus probably doesn't have that. For your reference, Aland's SQE has the most complete apparatus.

Sorry, Bernard, but this part above was a misunderstanding between us.

In regard to the PROSERXOMAI in Mk1:31, the only reason I mentioned Aland is because of his _Synopsis of the 4 gospels_.

In his Synopsis of the 4 gospels (both Greek and English), he pairs HLQON in Mk 1:29 with ELQWN in Mt 8:14 and EISHLQEN in Lk 4:38.

As to PROSELQWN in Mk 1:31, according to Aland's Synopsis, this word is without parallel in either Mt or Lk.

So this was what was in dispute between us, AFAIAC.

Regards,

Yuri.

Bernard Muller

So what was the original? the Old Syriac, the Syriac Peshitta? What else? A proto-MarK? In what language?
Then where do you fit the Old Syriac NT? More so, when we know, concerning IDOUs, the OS/Peshitta does not match the Greek gospels (more to come).

Waiting for the details ...

First I meant in four verses only, 3 in GLuke and 1 in GMatthew, and in only the GREEK MSS (see my claim above you quoted yourself).

Anyway, I just studied for all the 12 verses you mentioned, plus Lk5:12/Mt8:2/Mk1:40:

In the Peshitta English translation:
NO "behold" or "lo" in Lk5:12, Lk5:18 & Lk8:41. But YES for Lk9:30 & Lk22:47 (all these verses show IDOU in the Greek)
NO "behold" or "lo" in Mt9:2, Mt9:18 & Mt17:3. But YES for Mt8:2 & Mt26:47 (all these verses show IDOU in the Greek)
NO "behold" or "lo" in Mk1:40, Mk2:3, Mk5:22, Mk9:4 & Mk14:43 (all these verses show NO IDOU in NA26).

So we have discrepancies in GLuke & GMatthew combined, 6 out of 10 cases. But no discrepancies in GMark 5 cases (according to NA26 but one on 5:22 according to the KJV TR --actually no less than 3 IDOU's show in this verse).

Now, I will compare all the occurrences of "IDOU" in GMark, between the Textus Receptus (TR) of the KJV and the Syriac Peshitta:
Out of 11 verses with IDOU (according to KJV TR), 4 of them have no IDOU in NA26: 5:22, 13:21, 13:23 & 15:35.

The other (common) IDOUs are in 8 verses 1:2, 3:32, 4:3, 10:28, 10:33, 13:21, 14:41 & 14:42.

Now let's compare the TR with the Peshitta "behold" and "lo" (very interesting results):
First we have "IDOU" for each of the 8 aforementioned verses (as the ones of NA26).
Out of the 4 only KJV TR verses, we have only one concordance in the Peshitta at verse 13:23, likely a coincidence, according to what follows.
And then we have a lot of "IDOUs" which appears only in the Peshitta:
1:7, 3:34, 8:2, 9:21, 11:21, 13:1, 14:13, 14:15, 14:64, 16:6 & 16:7
And contrary to what I observed for GLuke, we do not have IDOU in the Greek MSS which are not in the Peshitta.
I suspect we may be looking at some harmonizations with GMatthew & GLuke and I' ll study that tomorrow, with also GMatthew (as I did for GLuke).

Best regards, Bernard

Bernard Muller

Yuri,
Here are tables about the IDOU (or IDE) in the gospels, as far as I could extract them from the Greek and for the Peshitta, the James Murdoch's translation.
On the top, "K" stands for the Greek under the KJV, "N" stands for Nestle-Aland NA26, "P" for the Syriac Peshitta, and "B" for the codex Bazae (GMatthew not available).
In the columns below, "x" stands for IDE and "X" stands for "IDOU". "Y" means there is a "behold" or "lo" in Murdoch's translation.
My conclusion: it's a mess with no clear patterns, the "copyists" or/and "translators" using some freedom with their IDOUs & IDEs.

Best regards, Bernard

Yuri Kuchinsky

Hello, Bernard,

Yes, I think it was a good idea for you to create a Table for how IDOU is used in various MSS. But unfortunately you didn't do a very good job in investigating those Greek Bezae readings.

But now I've gone much further, for the first part of Luke, at least... I've added to your Table for Luke, and corrected some errors.

So here's the Big McCoy,

"IDOU" in Luke,
http://www.trends.ca/~yuku/bbl/idou.htm

I placed this new Table on my webpage, because I don't know how to import it into the IIDB Board. (If someone knows how to do that, just go ahead and do it for me please.)

In any case, here's my Commentary to the new Table, plus the explanation for my abbreviations.

The main conclusion that emerges from my new Table is that the use of IDOU by the OS manuscripts is actually quite consistent, when seen from the point of view of Western/Peripheral text.

Thank you for all your hard work on this! It was a lot easier for me to take it from there, and to add to your Table.

Best,

Yuri.

============================

"IDOU" TABLE COMMENTARY

-- by Yuri Kuchinsky

I have now added the Old Syriac to Bernard's Table, and corrected his previous info about the Greek Codex Bezae.

Also, I've added another 2 columns, one for "Itala", and one for the Old Latin MS Palatinus (e), a 5th century MS that is generally considered as one of the oldest and the most important OL MSS.

My "Itala" column is based on Julicher's classic edition of the Old Latin gospels. In his edition, Julicher brings together the variant readings for just about all extant OL MSS. And my Palatinus column is also based on Julicher's edition (in his edition, Julicher places the Palatinus text in its own separate row at the bottom.)

In my "Itala" column, there are quite a few cases where the Latin Bezae (typically abbreviated as "d") disagrees with all other OL MSS. For example, in Lk 2:25, only the Latin Bezae lacks IDOU (which I marked as "-d"), while all the other OL MSS do have IDOU. Perhaps here we have some influence coming from the Greek Bezae into its Latin side.

In Lk 8:05, and 11:50, both the OS Curetonian and the OS Sinaitic MSS have IDOU, and this is shown in the Table.


RED AND BLUE MARKINGS

Certain Old Syriac readings in my Table are marked as either Red or Blue.

Red colour is used for those cases where the OS is different from the Egyptian Greek, but is supported by some other Greek or OL manuscript(s). Usually these are either the Greek Bezae or/and any of the OL MSS. (These red cases are important, because they demonstrate that the use of IDOU by the OS is far from being arbitrary. In fact, there seems to be plenty of consistency there with other important MSS.)

Blue colour is used in the Table for those cases where the OS is different from the Egyptian Greek, and isn't supported by any other Greek or OL manuscript(s). However, usually the OS is supported by the Peshitta in these cases, which indicates that the use of IDOU in these cases is still solid and consistent within the Aramaic textual tradition.

The cases that remained black demonstrate broad consistency in the whole of Luke MSS tradition.

The case for OS Lk 2:12 is doubtful, according to Burkitt. There may not be IDOU there at all.

And thanks again for your hard work, Bernard, in preparing the Tables.

All the best,

Yuri.

Bernard Muller

Yuri, thank you for the work,
You wrote:
The main conclusion that emerges from my new Table is that the use of IDOU by the OS manuscripts is actually quite consistent, when seen from the point of view of Western/Peripheral text.
And
OS is supported in 8 cases above against the standard Greek text.
OS has no Latin or Greek support in 7 (or 8) cases above. But, in 4 of these, OS is still supported by the Peshitta.
In the PART 2 OF THE TABLE below, the OS is likewise supported in 4 cases by some other Western/Peripheral MSS, either Latin or Greek. And only in 2 cases the OS has no Latin or Greek support (but the Peshitta support for one of these).

I wonder how you can say that:

On the western/peripheral side, the three witnesses (2 of your choosing!) you brought in (D, ITALA, OL-e), they agree 23 times (between each other), but disagree 11 times!
That's 15 against 8 for the first table and 8 against 3 for the second one (not taking in account rows with OS n/a (or doubtful) or incomplete slate).

Then you say, for the two tables, the OS is supported in 12 cases (and you need "support" when the OS is conflicting with the standard). But you *rule* only **one** of the three western MSS needs to agree with the OS, to have "support".
Well elementary math will dictate that every time you have disagreement in the last 3 columns (the 3 western MSS), you are going to have support for the OS if you need it. I wish I could play a game by these rules: that's a win win situation. More the western MSS are in disaccord, more you have "support" for your OS!

For the 11 cases (the case for 2:30 seems to be of the wrong color), the "support" is through (and because!) the **11** trio of western MSS not agreeing with each other. Actually there is NO "support" for the OS when (and from) your 3 western MSS agreeing with each other. More, there are **9** cases (out of 20) about all three western MSS agreeing with each other AGAINST the OS.

Out of these 11 times (20 - 9) of the OS agreeing, 10 times the agreement is extended to all across the row (including the "standard"), the eleventh time the full agreement is off just because of the Peshitta.

Out of 24 cases where the 3 last columns agree between each other, the agreement also extend to the Alexandrian (Egyptian), all the times.

Let's take now the majority result (clear-cut 2 against 1) of the 3 last columns when disagreeing:
We have 3 OS agreements against 2. The same relative to the Alexandrian (3 against 2).

In all, the Alexandrian tracks very closely your 3 western MSS combined (27 against 2), but this is not the case for the OS (14 against 11), far from it.

And then you fall back on the Peshitta to "support" the OS. But then:
The Peshitta disagrees with the OS 13 times out of 37 cases!
Of course, the odds are you'll find some "support" from this side when you do not get it from the 3 western MSS!
And despite this difference, the Peshitta is not much closer to the Alexandrian than the OS:
Peshitta: 19 agreements against 14
OS: 17 agreements against 18

So you may claim victory (according to your fudging!), but the OS, from your own table, is well on its own on the matter of IDOUs, away from the main pack. And the Peshitta is not far behind.

Actually your own study proves there is a lot of agreement (97%) between the "standard" and the western MSS, and a **lot less** between the OS (56%) and the same western MSS.

And thank you for the work, Yuri

Best regards, Bernard

Yuri Kuchinsky

Dear Bernard,

Any agreement between the OS and the OL against the canonical Greek is very significant. Because generally these OS/OL agreements (the Syro-Latin agreements), give us the gospel text of the 2nd century. But the canonical Greek is merely a 4th century text, at best.

Sure, there can be some "false positives" with a common word like IDOU, but these cannot distract us from the general principle that the Syro-Latin agreements is a very important phenomenon.

Read more about the Syro-Latin agreements here,

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/johann...e/message/2475

And don't forget that even with a common word like IDOU, additional support from some other ancient MSS like Coptic can help seal the case.

All the best,

Yuri.

Bernard Muller

Yuri wrote:
Any agreement between the OS and the OL against the canonical Greek is very significant.

The problem is you do not want to see the many agreements on the other side. And why would a few agreements be significant if not for an agenda-driven kind of guy like you?

on the other side Because generally these OS/OL agreements (the Syro-Latin agreements), give us the gospel text of the 2nd century.

That's what you think, PROVE IT!

But the canonical Greek is merely a 4th century text, at best.

Don't we have partial manuscripts of Greek gospels from the third century, even the 2nd?

Sure, there can be some "false positives" with a common word like IDOU,

"some "false positive""? They are many of those, and they look very true to me.

but these cannot distract us from the general principle that the Syro-Latin agreements is a very important phenomenon.

Yes for you, but these Syro-Latin agreements are rare, and we do not know when the OS and this Latin stuff were written.

Read more about the Syro-Latin agreements here,
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/johan...re/message/2475

I read it, and followed the thread, but you never listed & spelled out these Syro-Latin agreements in GJohn first two chapters. Then later, in the same list, you spelled out agreements, but it is between the Persian Diatessaron (written 1547) and the Magdalene gospel or Pepyisan Gospel Harmony (first known during medieval times and very medievalish in its wording). That does not sound Syro-Latin to me and early.

And don't forget that even with a common word like IDOU, additional support from some other ancient MSS like Coptic can help seal the case.

Sure, if the Bezae, and score of Latin MSS, and the Syriac Peshitta are not enough for "support", let's bring the Coptic MSS!
Hey, you need only one of those to agree with your OS (even if all the other ones disagree!) to provide "support". The minority of one rules!

Best regards, Bernard

Yuri Kuchinsky

Hello, Bernard!

My IDOU webpage has now been updated with some more material. Also, I rewrote my commentary. Check it out.

http://www.trends.ca/~yuku/bbl/idou.htm

(I've given you credit for supplying data for the Tables.)

I don't think I'll be doing the last 1/3 of Luke, unless there's some popular demand for it. I think that the 2/3 that I already have up there is quite enough to see what's going on with the use of IDOU. This evidence doesn't really prove anything either way, but still it's quite interesting.

And what's my agenda, according to you, Bernard?

As to these OS/OL agreements (the Syro-Latin agreements), giving us the gospel text of the 2nd century, this has been argued by a whole lot of big name Textual Scholars over the years. I don't really need to harp too much on this point. It's really self-evident.

All very doubtful...

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these Syro-Latin agreements are rare,

No, my friend, they are not rare at all. To the contrary, they are all over the place...

But of course all this stuff is now being covered up pretty good by the Egyptian zombie crew that's taken control of the NT TC in the 20th century...

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and we do not know when the OS and this Latin stuff were written.

And do you know when that Greek stuff was all written?

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RE: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/johann...e/message/2475 I read it, and followed the thread, but you never listed & spelled out these Syro-Latin agreements in GJohn first two chapters.

Please take a look at the rest of the stuff on my webpage, and there'll be tons of all sorts of Syro-Latin agreements there.

In general, I've decided not to follow on this particular angle in my subsequent work, because this stuff isn't easy for the general reader to understand. More recently, I prefer to deal with the stuff that's easy for a non-specialist to follow, because the biblical specialists are such crooks, racists and all around zombies that I'd only be wasting my time with them. They are just not interested in anything outside of their Egyptian Greek text, their beloved. They are programmed!!

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Then later, in the same list, you spelled out agreements, but it is between the Persian Diatessaron (written 1547) and the Magdalene gospel or Pepyisan Gospel Harmony (first known during medieval times and very medievalish in its wording). That does not sound Syro-Latin to me and early.

So can you offer us a theory as to how these multiple agreements actually derived? Is it all _purely accidental_? (I mean a realistic theory that would not involve the Space Aliens, or the travelling band of Gypsies who stole some MSS in Persia, and then made it to England and were teaching the natives to speak Persian...)

Yes, the obvious problem with the word IDOU is that it's just so common, and can be easily added or removed by a translator or editor.

So I'm not really making any claims at this time involving this word. See my updated webpage.

When I _really_ want to demonstrate dependencies between various far flung MSS, I usually prefer to use words or phrases where accidental slips of the pen, or accidents of any sort are pretty well excluded.

Cheers,

Yuri.