Peter Kirby

thebeast,

We don't have the originals.

cordially,
Peter Kirby (moderator)

thebeast

We do.

I'll try to dig them up for ya.

thebeast

I was wrong...

There are over 25,000 early copies of the new testament.


Read all about it here:

http://members.iquest.net/~c_m_f/bibhist.pdf


You'll find your answer on page 4.......

Satisfied?

I can dig up more if you want.

ceb

From your link (which is written without references; what's up with that?) states this:

Emphasis mine...

thebeast

Don't worry babe, the documents are there...

CX

A few clarifications:

1)Define "original New Testament texts"
2)Define "early"

There are on the order of 5600 or so Greek MSS of the NT. None is complete prior to the 4th century. Naturally we do not have the autograph for any text in the NT. There are only roughly 45 or so MSS prior to Aleph (AKA Codex Sinaiticus) in the 4th century. There are no MSS from the 1st century. There are roughly 3-6 extremely fragmentary MSS in the 2nd century. The earliest is P52 which contains somewhere around 33 words of GJn. 7 books of the NT have no attestation prior to the 4th century. I make no claim here with respect to the historical veracity of the NT, but your statement about "25,000 copies" is misleading. There are only 5600 in the original Greek and only 45 (all fragmentary) in the first 13 or 14 generations (270 years) or so after the death of Jesus.

thebeast

Only 5,600 copies...?

That's not enough for you?

Vinnie

That statement demonstrates a complete lack of knowledge pertaining to the subject at hand by its author.

Not quite. 300 or 25,000 can be irrelevant. I think the statistic of 25,000 is highly misleading. What really counts is the earliest manuscript evidence that we possess. Take each book of the NT individually. How early is our first complete or at least partially complete manuscript of each? Once full canonization set in I wouldn't expect there to be huge differences in the manuscripts and I would expect large numbers of them. But in the few hundred years before that it may have been fair game.
Honestly we have no way of knowing exactly what happened to the original letter Paul wrote to the Romans after he sent it. Could it have been altered in a major way very early and passed on to another church and that is the copy that survived? Its "possible" but I think in textual criticism we give the text the benefit of the doubt until reason tells us otherwise. So the question that reamains is, "Do we have reason to suspect otherwise?"

As Raymond Brown has said, "Many differences among the textual families visible in the great uncial codices of the 4th and 5th centuries existed already ca. 200 as we see from the papri and early translations. How could so many differences arise within a hundred years after the original books were written? The answer may lie in the attitude of the copyists toward the NT books being copied. These were holy books because of their content and origins, but there was no slavish devotion to their exact wording. They were meant to be commented on and interpreted, and some of that could be included in the text. Later when more fixed ideas of the canon and inspiration shaped the mind-set, attention began to center on keeping the exact wording. The Reformation spirit of "Scripture alone" and an ultraconservative outlook on inspiration as divine dictation intensified that attention." [Intro to NT p. 51]

There are both intentional and unintentional errors found throughout the manuscripts. In the end, the statement in bold in the Brown cite goes to show that inerrancy applies to non-existent documents that we obviously do not possess. All in all I do not finda all of the NT's textual authenticty to be highly suspect but its certainly not infallible as conservatives would lead us to believe.

Of course, copyist errors present conservatives with a special dilemma themselves. Once you allow errancy in any sense, you allow it in all senses. If some passages were not in the original then every passage in scripture has that same potential to have not been in the original. Its a slippery slope and copyist errors themselves refute the "all or nothing" mentaility of fundamentalists. Any passage now has the potential to be a copyist error or insertion. The absolute certainty that all the rules and passages are from God is not granted by a sober understanding of the evidence.

I suppose one could counter my objection with providence and argue that God would not allow anything substantial to change in the text. This would seem to be an unfalsifiable position but looking at the manuscripts we do see some significant changes. To mention a few examples: the pericope de adultera or the story of the woman caught in adultery does not appear to be original, the original ending of Mark is now lost to us, scholars believe GJohn was redacted and ended with the twentieth chapter, not with 21 as in our current copies of the Bible, the changes to 1John 5:8, etc. There are many more examples of textual corruption in the NT. Of course any change could be considered "minor" so the position cannot be falsified. But the notion that God would allow minor errors but not major errors is nothing more than a retreating speculation with no foundation. Its actually a concession.

Vinnie

Vinnie

CX, what are your thoughts on the "patristic citations"?

I put up a chart from McDowell's book:

http://www.geocities.com/ilgwamh/pat...uotations.html

Does this addd support the the manuscript evidence or is it an overstatement?

Vinnie

CX

Enough for what? And incidentally there are not 5,600 copies there are around 5600 MSS which attest to the NT most are mere scraps. Furthermore, as someone else already pointed out, the number of copies is irrelevant. Rather it is their proximity to the originals that is important.