Tenshu

Respect

I'm probably too much of a conspiracy theorist, but can anyone inform me on how 'complete' the bible is? The text contained in the bible, is it all unedited, uncensored text? Are the texts included in the bible the only texts? Are there only four testimonies to the life of Jesus (if he even existed) ?

:notworthy

Chris Weimer

There were hundreds of apocryphal and non-canonical works on Jesus etc... and all the texts contained therein are highly edited, and there is still debate on Secret Mark, that is, Clement's letter that Mark contained Secret verses that complemented and added secret initiation that normal Mark left out.

Haran

The apocryphal and non-canonical works were rejected by early church fathers. It depends on how much you believe in their judgements whether you think those works are of historical worth compared to the canon of the Bible. Many (perhaps most) of the apocryphal works are comparatively late and borrow from the text of canonical books of the Bible and spin quite fanciful yarns (even to those who believe the Bible itself does so).

Finally, it is, IMHO, misleading to state that 'all the texts contained therein are highly edited' if one is speaking of the Bible. Hort stated the following in his "Introduction to the New Testament in the original Greek":

"With regard to the great bulk of the words of the New Testament, as of most other ancient writings, there is no variation or other ground of doubt, and therefore no room for textual criticism; and here therefore an editor is merely a transcriber. .... The proportion of words virtually accepted on all hands as raised above doubt is very great, not less, on a rough computation, than 7/8ths of the whole. The remaining 1/8th, therefore, formed in great part by changes of order and other comparative trivialities, constitutes the whole area of criticism. .... {Haran - After applying the principles of textual criticism, and...} ... setting aside differences of orthography, the words in our opinion still subject to doubt only make up about 1/60th of the whole New Testament. ...the amount of what can in any sense be called substantial variation is but a small fraction of the whole residuary variation, and can hardly form more than 1/1000th part of the entire text."

spin

Perhaps the situation is perceived a little differently 120 years after Hort did his work. Take for instance a text called The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture by Bart Ehrman. We have very many more exemplars than were available in Hort's time.


spin

Haran

Ehrman provided a very valuable work for textual critics, but even the variants he mentions do not form a major portion of the text.

You are also correct that many more exemplars have been discovered since Hort's time. However, I do not remember running across a more recent estimate than that of Hort. If you know of a more recent estimate, I would like to know it.

As you know, just because a work is 120 years old, that does not mean that it is no longer relevant. Scholars consistently utilize works this old and sometimes older. Many recent works by scholars are merely rehashes of the same material that can be found in these older books. Those going through formal training in textual criticism today must read and understand Westcott and Hort, Tischendorf, and von Soden (among many others of similar 'old age').

In a very recent book (ie. last 5-10 years) on textual criticism, an author mentioned the very same estimate by Hort. I thought it would be an easy thing to dig up the reference, but alas I read too many books at the same time and can't remember which one contained the quote. If I find it, I'll metion it.

Ultimately, I am unaware of a more recent estimate than that of Hort (apparently so was the scholar and author of the book I mentioned). If anyone knows of a more recent one, I'd like to have a reference.

Vivisector

The statistics mask the importance of the variants. A variant in which "His parents" is changed to "Joseph and his mother" amounts to nearly nothing as a proportion of total words in the NT. The doctrinal implications, however, are both obvious and enormous. The importance of the types of variants that Ehrman treats is proportionately huge relative to the amount of words that the variants represent.

V.

S.C.Carlson

Although Dan Brown counted 80 or so, Charlie Hedrick could list only 34 possible gospels in his Bible Review article using very lenient assumptions that permitted double-counting. In particular, he assumed that all the untitled papyrus fragments are from different works and none of them come from those works we only know by title. For the exercise he was doing, the assumption is fair as long as his result (34) is understood as the maximal upper bound for the current state of the evidence.

As for Secret Mark, most scholars--with a few notable exceptions--now think that it is later than canonical Mark and, as a result, tells us little of what was removed from canonical Mark. The big debate over Secret Mark is how much later: 100 years, 1700 years, or 1900 years?

Stephen Carlson

Chris Weimer

There were gospels that we never heard of, such as the Egerton gospel, unmentioned in antiquity and represent altogether a very different tradition than the synoptics.

Haran

I think that there are variants of significant theological import but I'm not sure "enormous" would be a word I would use.

Many authors on textual criticism have written words similar to those of David Alan Black which I happen to have handy at the moment:

"No biblical doctrine would go unsupported if a favorite reading was abandoned in favor of a more valid variant. This does not mean, as is sometimes said, that no doctrine of Scripture is affected by textual variation. Rather, a doctine that is affected by textual variation will always be adequately supported by other passages." - New Testament Textual Criticism: A Concise Guide

Another appropriate quote can be found in Greenlee's Introduction to Textual Criticism:

"When one is engaged in this study {ie. Textual Criticism}, and the number and importance of the variants are made the center of attention, it is well to remember that the main body of the text and its general sense are left untouched and that textual criticism engages in turning a magnifying glass upon some of the details."

Haran

Some excellent resources for reading and learning about apocryphal literature are:

The Apocryphal New Testament - J.K. Elliot
New Testament Apocrypha - Schneemelcher
The Nag Hammadi Library - J.M. Robinson
The Gnostic Scriptures - Bentley Layton