katerina2

If'n ya knew what sdmb was, you'd be my Polycarp.

As it is, you'll just have to be my other Polycarp.

Enchantée, cheri!

First stupid question:

-what the heck is 'C.E.'?

Second, less stupid question: I like your definition of textual criticism. But what does 'textual support' prove? Historicity? Factual basis? Origins?

afaik the new testament writings have durned good textual support, iirc the best relative to the rest.

still, a few perplexities:

1. there is no written source text for the NT gospels, iirc (from the book on this I read last summer based on a tv show out of bbc a few years back). Jesus' sayings were transmitted orally then began appearing throughout the region in collections of proverbial or aphoristic writings, iirc quite similar in philosophy and ethic to a sub-branch of judaism whose name escapes me. At some point, a text was written down putting together what had been orally transmitted about his life and ministry, together with the sayings. Another text was written somewhere else doing pretty much the same. At some point a third text was written that redoes the story using oe of the earlier texts as a premise or source. Then the fourth one is written, with a different rhetorical purpose.

Homer's story iirc was written down the same way. (hence, the question of whether there ever was a man named Homer).

Iirc there was no organized rich group that early on tried to preserve the sayings or texts. Christianity as a religion/movement was really quite a powerful one. But not influential in richer classes till 2C AD or so. You don't find texts on parchment till then.

But--what intrigues me about religious texts is the lack of error in copying.

When you do textual criticism, textual emendation is a real big deal. It's quite common and human to misread, skip a line and say something twice, etc. You get your eyes trained to pick up questionable bits of non sense that seem likely copying errors. The attention to accuracy of the OT law is really amazing to me. IIRC the stats on the NT, there is phenomenal accuracy there, too. I've never seen something that compares errors betw. nt/ot docs with code of hammurabi or something, but I'd be curious to.

quand-meme!

Polycarp

Quote:

Originally posted by Vorkosigan: I'm a little confused about "attestation." There's no question that there are a lot of copies of the NT lying around, but that is hardly surprising. If by attestation you mean "multple copies," pride of place must go to Asia. Runs of a million copies for religious writings were not uncommon in Korea, Japan and China. The chief priest of the Ling-Yin Temple in Hangchow, Yen-shou (904-75) printed dozens of titles of sutras, charms and pictures of which 400,000 survive. Many exmples of a charm printed in the 8th century survive. Printed documents are common after the 8th century. See Volume 5, Book 1 of Needham's Science and Civilization in China, Paper and Printing. As another poster pointed out, since there are no originals, the number of copies is really irrelevant. If it is solid originals you want, surely the thousands upon thousands of papyri found in Egypt, or the thousands of documents from China, blow away the NT as far as being original. There are millions of such original documents known to archaeology. "Multiple attestation" meaning "numbers of copies" is useless for determining anything except popularity.

Do any of these documents have titles? You cited a lot of generalities, but few specifics. When I say “document”, I’m referring to something more than a few sentences in length. What is the length of the Chinese documents to which you referred? How did they make a million copies of something of any length? I’m really curious about this?

I’m somewhat familiar with Egyptian papyri. What Egyptian documents have thousands of extant copies?

katerina2

[quote]Originally posted by Vorkosigan:
If by attestation you mean "multple copies," pride of place must go to Asia. Runs of a million copies for religious writings were not uncommon in Korea, Japan and China.[/i]

Age? 904 ad isn't really that old, is it?

Actually, I don't think this is precisely true. Or it is question of apples and oranges. Textual criticism exists as a discipline to find principles on which to determine what a lost text originally said, though that one is lost. It's methodology has shared principles with paleontology.

But say you are a philologist and you have an author who wrote a text in 1580, signed his name to it, published about 500 copies of which five exist. Then he published it again with another editor but only about thirty of that run, of which two still exist,since he had problems with the publisher? Then two years later, same author emended his original text, added a second book, and published under the same title at a print run of about 1000 copies of which about 30 still exist? Say he made notes on his own printed copy of the second edition, and his lover/kindred spirit/adopted daughter published a third edition of his book post mortem with most of the notes added in as emendations to the text? That copy is republished about sixteen times over the centuries and hundreds exist. Then, in the end of the nineteenth century, someone discovers the annotated copy from which the third edition was published in the attic of a castle. They realize that the lover/kindred spirit had omitted some annotations: she had a political agenda. The 'fully' annotated edition is set to type and published--about 3000 of these exist. thousands of other copies are put out to stand based on this 19C edition. Then a guy comes along and says that the prior editors didn't respect the author's punctuation and paragraphing style. He publishes a new edition. this one is currently in print, 10000 copy print run.

Which text, in your opinion, is the 'original'?

[edited to remove crud]

[ June 20, 2002: Message edited by: katerina2 ]</p>

Kosh

[quote]Originally posted by Polycarp:
<strong>
First of all, I don't see any posts in this thread in which Bede commented.
</strong>

My bad. Don't why I typed Bede.

You're attempting to argue that the claims of the NT are the best documented event in history. You're going to sneak up on by asking why people don't spend so much time picking apart other ancient books, and take them at face value, then transfer it to the Bible to try and get it accepted with same lack of criticism.

You're just beating around the bush at getting to your point.

And you're wrong for the previously listed reasons.

Polycarp

Quote:

Originally posted by Kosh: You're attempting to argue that the claims of the NT are the best documented event in history. You're going to sneak up on by asking why people don't spend so much time picking apart other ancient books, and take them at face value, then transfer it to the Bible to try and get it accepted with same lack of criticism.

Do you always put words into the mouths of others? Settle down... Paranoia is unnecessary. I'm not the scary apologist boogeyman who hides under your bed at night and chants "Come to Christ" while you sleep. That's Bede (Oh man, I'm really funny sometimes...)

I'm sure I'll be getting an e-mail from him now.

Quote:

You're just beating around the bush at getting to your point. And you're wrong for the previously listed reasons.

How can I be wrong when I haven't made any claims? I'll let you know when I actually make some claims, then that way you'll know when to tell me I'm wrong. Don't bother providing any evidence. Sound like a plan?

Vorkosigan

Polycarp --

Either multiple attestation means lots of copies (in which case it is a measure of popularity) or lots of originals (in which case the NT does not fit).

The million copy runs were of short charms or sayings, placed in stupas around Japan and Korea.

Of individual titles, there 20,000 alone of a single image surviving from among the 400,000 referenced above at the Ling-yin Temple.

But again, what is the point of this multiple attestation? It is meaningless as far as I can see. It's a just a way of giving the NT a superlative that can be waved in the face of the ignorant.

Vorkosigan

Vorkosigan

As for Egypt and China, any ancient document that is an original autograph, even a letter or a laundry list, is "better-attested" than any NT manuscript. That is what I meant by the papyri comment. For example, we have copies of a treaty between egypt and the hittites, one from each side. That's multiple attestation, in the original. Beats the heck out of anything in the NT.

Vorkosigan

lpetrich

Polycarp, Kosh was quoting a common apologist viewpoint; if you disagree with it, then say so explicitly and clearly, rather than acting as if you are preparing to advocate it by waving away criticism of it as "paranoia".

Kosh

We already know you'll be wrong. Just thought I'd save you some time.

Ted Hoffman

Polycarp,
What exactly does textual support mean? And why is it important?

If a document is found in Greece dated 3 BC and another one is found in Rome dated 3 BC and both state that in the early part of the century, people in Jerusalem rose from the dead and tombs opened and they reunited with their families, what does that prove? That people indeed rose from the dead?