questions for those who accept the Tischendorf 4th centuy claim for Sinaiticus and discount the 19th century evidences

Steven Avery

Administrator

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1) Why are the Sinaiticus 1859 St. Petersburg pages (later to England) coloured and stained in a manner that points directly to darkening the ms. in the period 1850-1862. *


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2) Why are the Codex Friderico-Augustanus 1844 Leipzig pages in the condition of a pristine, fine snow-white parchment that belies any idea that the manuscript could have had 1000+ years of heavy use in a 1500 year conjectured movement, use and storage period. **

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3) If the claims of Simonides to have been involved in the manuscript were simply an ad hoc retribution attempt against Tischendorf, for the Simonides-Tischendorf-Hermas battle:

.. how did Simonides arrange history so successfully to confirm the elements of the story? ***


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4)
How did Simonides manage to publish not only the Hermas "coincidence" ****
Also the 1843 "Sinaitic" Barnabas.

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5) Why do Barnabas and Hermas have linguistic elements inconsistent with a fourth-century Greek text? *****

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* Exactly as stated as occurred at the monastery in the 1850s, and as related in the note from Kallinikos to Simonides.
The auxiliary question is: who had the means, motive and opportunity to darken the ms.


** A condition easily seen today and clear confirmed by Uspensky (1845) and Ernst von Dobsch?tz (1910).
And why did Tischendorf take some years before acknowledging the obvious connection (continuous text) of the two mss. Why was he omitting the connection in the major 1862 publication Bibliorum Codex Sinaiticus Petropolitanus, printed in Leipzig, where the CFA was housed.



*** 3) How did Simonides know that the Sinaiticus manuscript has no provenance (no ancient catalog, no earlier report before 1844, no provenance authenticity possible)

How did Simonides pre-arrange so many elements that support his story, such as being in Athos with Kallinikos and Benedict in the ms development years.
-- as later confirmed in the 1895 and 1900 Lambrou Catalog of Athos

And being closely connected to the Sinai monastery, knowledgeable of it structures and foibles

In that context, how did Kallinikos at the monastery, and Simonides for #6, know factual elements that were not known throughout the world.
a) 1844 theft of the leaves
b) 1853 "loan" that would never be returned
c) bungled Greek of Tischendorf (later acknowledged in his own writings)
d) artificial colouring of the ms. after 1850, as can even be seen today
e) mangling of the ms. The codex seen by Uspensky dissolved.
f) there could be no ancient catalog that supported the existence of the manuscript

Why did Tischendorf make up a group of self-serving fabrications about the manuscript discoveries in 1844 and 1859
Why was Tischendorf concerned about the Simonides stories even en route to the manuscript, with the major leaves with New Testament capture of 1859?

How could Simonides be talking about a manuscript that he supposedly did not know even existed?




**** "The coincidence seems almost more singular than can be accounted for by chance" - Literary forgeries, James Anson Farrer - p. 060
In both cases conflicting with the claims of Sinaiticus to be the earliest Greek editions of these texts.
Why are the texts of the earlier Simonides Hermas and Barnabas editions so similar to those of Sinaiticus?
And isn't the Ockham explanation that Simonides was involved in both the private editions and the 1844 Sinaiticus discovery edition?

Tischendorf even retracted the linguistic and dating accusation (deemed to be accurate by James Donaldson) against the authenticity of the Hermas text, as those accusations are adducible to the Sinaiticus text.




***** As carefully shown by Scottish scholar James Donaldson in articles from 1864 to 1877.
Ironically, he pointed out that Tischendorf had been correct in his retracted linguistic arguments against the 1856 Hermas, Codex Athos, or Lipsiensis, and showed:

a) that these arguments were true against Sinaiticus Hermas
b) that they also applied to Barnabas

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