the Westcott-Hort recension - source for modern versions and Critical Texts

[Steven Avery]

Let's start with what I put together in 2011, I may change emphasis and formatting on these posts and add urls.

[textualcriticism] Textual Crit and DOCTRINE - Kenneth Clark - May 3, 2011
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/TC-Alternate-list/conversations/topics/4143

James Snapp writing:
BenD,

In the course of quickly looking through Clark's 1980 book, I found an interesting excerpt about how strongly rooted the N-A text is to the 1881 WH text:

"The Nestle text of Mark shows only seventy-five changes through the twenty-one editions between 1898 and 1952 and thirty-five of these are restorations of Westcott-Hort readings. Only thirty-one have entered the Nestle text since 1903 (fourth edition), of which twenty-four are merely orthographic. The other seven involve no difference in meaning, and six of these represent a return to Westcott-Hort."

The Gentile Bias: And Other Essays (1980)
By Kenneth Willis Clark
The Effect of Recent Textual Criticism upon New Testament Studies (p. 65-89) - p. 80
https://books.google.com/books?id=2okeAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA73
from
The Background of the New Testament and Its Eschatology (1956)edited By David Daube
The Effect of Recent Textual Criticism upon New Testament Studies (p. 27-51) - p. 35e
https://books.google.com/books?id=ie88AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA35

In NA27, there are 82 changes from NA25. Still, the similarity to WH shows that the undermining of some of Hort's foundational premises has had only a minimal impact on the contents of the revised text that is offered to translators as a base-text, and which affects the contents of the text presented in translations.

Yours in Christ,

James Snapp, Jr.

Hi Folks,

Ben

> A great chapter on this question is available in Clark's book, ​

> The Gentile Bias and Other Essays (Brill, 1980) P. 90 fwd. ​

> He makes a good argument that TC *does* matter, and doctrine isn't​

> just affected, its dependent upon quality results from TC work. ​

There are dual page number systems where 53 on the left = 90 on the right (= the google page, so we use that)

The Gentile Bias and Other Essays (Brill, 1980)
Table of Contents
http://books.google.com/books?id=2okeAAAAIAAJ&pg=PR7

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

This is the article mentioned by James below.

The Effect of Recent Textual Criticism Upon New Testament Studies p. 65-89
http://books.google.com/books?id=2okeAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA108

Google is more generous with an earlier edition of this essay
You can see much more of the article at:

The Background of the New Testament and Its Eschatology (1956)
The Effect of Recent Textual Criticism Upon New Testament Studies - Kenneth Willis Clark
http://books.google.com/books?id=ie88AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA27
The TOC of this book is at:
http://books.google.com/books?id=ie88AAAAIAAJ&pg=PR7

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

The next is the one referenced by Ben:

Textual Criticism and Doctrine p. 90-103 (first published 1953)
http://books.google.com/books?id=2okeAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA90

The article is very good, perhaps a little too conservative and forgiving of textual corruption and confusion, for reasons that would take another post.
This one is a bit like a sister article.

The Theological Relevance of Textual Variation in Current Criticism of the Greek New Testament (p. 104-119 - 3 p. not shown)
http://books.google.com/books?id=2okeAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA104

This next has only 4 pages visible, yet includes a hum-zinger.

Today's Problems with the Critical Text of the New Testament (only p. 120-123)
http://books.google.com/books?id=2okeAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA120
"All the critical editions since 1881 are basically the same as Westcott-Hort." p. 122
A bit more quoting: (fundamentalforums is defunct)

Principle writers on these thread topics:

Herman Charles Hoskier (1864-1968)

Ernest Cadman Colwell (1901-1974)

Kenneth Willis Clark (1878-1979)

Günther Zuntz - (1902-1992)

James Neville Birdsall - (1928-2005)

Zane C. Hodges (1932-2008)

Kent D. Clarke - Professor of Religious Studies; Brooke Foss Westcott Professorship of New Testament Textual Criticism, Greek Studies, and Hermeneutics; Chair, Religious Studies Department - Trinity Western University, Langley/BC
Author of:
Textual Optimism: An Analysis of the United Bible Society’s Greek New Testament and Its Evaluation of Evidence Letter Ratings (JSNTSup 138; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997).
“Textual Certainty in the United Bible Societies' Greek New Testament,” Novum Testamentum 44.2 (2002): 105-134.

Michael William Holmes

Jacob van Bruggen (b. 1936)

Wilbur N. Pickering

Next - some BVDB material:

Ploughboy
https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/bib...notes-of-the-oxford-longprimer-t6080-s20.html

The similarity between the Westcott and Hort Text… of the Current Greek Texts.

1914--The Testimony of Herman Hoskier.
"Upon the first page of this hook I spoke of the “Hortian heresy.” Upon this last page I would fain explain what it is that I accuse of being a heresy.
The text printed by Westcott and Hort has been accepted as “ the true text,” and grammars, works on the synoptic problem, works on higher criticism, and others, have been grounded on this text. If the Hort text makes the evangelists appear inconsistent, then such and such an evangelist errs. Those who accept the W-H text are basing their accusations of untruth as to the Gospellists upon an Egyptian revision current 200 to 450 A.D. and abandoned between 500 to 1881, merely revived in our day and stamped as genuine.
Herman C. Hoskier, Codex B and Its Allies--a Study and an Indictment, (1914), Vol I, p. 468
https://archive.org/details/codexbitsalliess01hosk/page/468
https://books.google.com/books?id=YZlKAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA468

1980--The Testimony of Wilbur N. Pickering.
"The two most popular manual editions of the text today, Nestles-Aland and U.B.S. (United Bible Society) really vary little from the W-H text."
Wilbur N. Pickering, The Identity of the New Testament Text,
http://enigstetroos.org/pdf/PickeringWN_TheIdentityofTheNewTestament%20II.pdf (and see the text and footnotes)

1990--The Testimony of Bruce Metzger.
In 1990, Dr. Kirk D. DiVietro, a Baptist Pastor, wrote to Dr. Bruce Metzger about how he and the other members of the Nestle-Aland and United Bible Societies Committee began their work on their New Testament Greek Texts. Dr. Metzger replied to him as follows:
"We took as our base at the beginning the text of Westcott and Hort (1881) and introduced changes as seemed necessary on the basis of MSS evidence."
http://deanburgonsociety.org/CriticalTexts/dbs2695.htm
"This documentation is found in Metzger's own handwriting in DBS #2490-P, p. 272 in The Dean Burgon Society (1978--1994) Messages From the 16th Annual Meeting, August, 1994"
https://www.kjbrc.org/why-use-the-king-james-bible/

“Why Westcott and Hort's text is so similar to current Greek Texts.
It is very easy to understand why the 1881 Greek Text of Westcott and Hort is almost the same as that of the modern revised Greek Texts such as Nestle-Aland, United Bible Society and others. Both groups (Westcott and Hort and modern textual revisers) draw largely, if not exclusively, on the false readings of manuscripts "B" (Vatican) and "Aleph" (Sinai). It is axiomatic that "things equal to the same thing are equal to each other." - D.A Waite
Westcott & Hort's Greek Text and Theory Refuted
http://deanburgonsociety.org/CriticalTexts/dbs2695.htm

There is a difference??? HERE IS THE TRUTH.

"In 1962 Kenneth Clark observed: “...the Westcott-Hort text has become today our textus receptus. We have been freed from the one only to become captivated by the other. ... The psychological chains so recently broken from our fathers have again been forged upon us, even more strongly. ... Even the textual specialist finds it difficult to break the habit of evaluating every witness by the norm of this current textus receptus. HIS MIND MAY HAVE REJECTED THE WESTCOTT-HORT TERM ‘NEUTRAL,’ BUT HIS TECHNICAL PROCEDURE STILL REFLECTS THE GENERAL ACCEPTANCE OF THE TEXT. ... Psychologically it is now difficult to approach the textual problem with free and independent mind”
Clark, Kenneth Willis “Today’s Problems with the Critical Text of the New Testament,” Transitions in Biblical Scholarship, edited by J.C.R. Rylaarsdam, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968, pp. 158-160.
Quoted by Wilbur Pickering here:
https://books.google.com/books?id=hlhNAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA9

In 1964, Jacob Greenlee stated,
“THE TEXTUAL THEORY OF W-H UNDERLIES VIRTUALLY ALL SUBSEQUENT WORK IN NT TEXTUAL CRITICISM”
(Greenlee, Introduction to New Testament Textual Criticism, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1964, p. 76).
Quoted by Wilbur Pickering here:
https://books.google.com/books?id=hlhNAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA9

Consider the following quotation by Ernest Cadman Colwell, a textual scholar who published a number of widely used grammars and textbooks, including A Beginners Reader-Grammar for New Testament Greek (New York: Harper & Row, 1965), A Greek Papyrus Reader, with Vocabulary (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1935), A Hellenistic Greek Reader (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1939), and Studies in Methodology in Textual Criticism of the New Testament (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1969).

“THE DEAD HAND OF FENTON JOHN ANTHONY HORT LIES HEAVY UPON US. In the early years of this century Kirsopp Lake described Hort’s work as a failure, though a glorious one. But HORT DID NOT FAIL TO REACH HIS MAJOR GOAL. HE DETHRONED THE TEXTUS RECEPTUS. ... Hort’s success in this task and the cogency of his tightly reasoned theory shaped—AND STILL SHAPES—the thinking of those who approach the textual criticism of the NT through the English language” (emphasis added)
Ernest Cadman Colwell,

Studies in methodology in textual criticism of the New Testament - (1969)
VIII. Method in Evaluating Scribal Habits: A Study of P45, P66, P75
Ernest Cadman Colwell
https://books.google.com/books?id=4pI3AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA106
Originally published:
“Scribal Habits in Early Papyri: A Study in the Corruption of the Text.”
The Bible in Modern Scholarship, ed. J. Philip Hyatt, 370-389. Abingdon Press, 1965.

In the introduction to the 24th edition of Nestle’s Greek New Testament, editors Erwin Nestle and Kurt Aland make the following admission:

“Thus THE TEXT, BUILT UP ON THE WORK OF THE 19TH CENTURY, HAS REMAINED AS A WHOLE UNCHANGED, particularly since the research of recent years has not yet led to the establishment of a generally acknowledged N.T. text”
(Erwin Nestle and Kurt Aland, Novum Testamentum Graece, 24th edition, 1960, p. 62).
Taken from David Cloud.
Are the Modern Versions Based on Westcott-Hort?
Updated September 20, 2004 (first published March 7, 2000)
David Cloud, Way of Life Literature,
https://www.wayoflife.org/database/are_modern_versions_westcott_hort.html

 

[Steven Avery]

WIP - develop into one or two master articles

2011 post on KJBD

[KJBD] Greek textus corruptus base of modern versions - W-H == NA & UBS
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/kingjamesbibledefense/conversations/topics/5106

Today, with the CARM discussion, I was curious to see this summarized, and get the editions straight.
For this I used Marlowe's info (bibleresearcher.com) augmented by this and that.

Westcott-Hort & essentially identical NA & UBS texts - NWT just another modern version
http://forums.carm.org/vbb/showthre...e-Point-quot&p=1226883&viewfull=1#post1226883

Westcott and Hort
English Revised Version (1881)
Emphasized by Joseph Rotherdam (1897)
American Revision - ASV (1901)
Goodspeed (1923)
Williams, Charles B. (1937)
New World Translation (1950)
Phillips (1958).

Nestle-Aland - UBS (small differences from W-H)
Revised Standard Version - RSV (1946) NA-17
New American Standard - NAS (1963) NA-23.
New International Version (1973) (UBS 1&2 with mods) - TNIV (2005)
Jerusalem Bible (1966) rcc - New Jerusalem Bible (1985)
Good News Bible - GNB - (1966) American Bible Society - aka Todays English Version TEV
New American Bible - NAB (1970) NA-25 rcc
New Century Version (1987) UBS3 == NA-26
New Revised Standard Version - NRSV (1990) UBS3 == NA-26
English Standard Version - ESV (2001) UBS4 == NA-27
Holman - HCSB (2004) UBS4 == NA-27 (some deviations)
NETBible - NET (2005) UBS4 == NA-27 (maybe some deviations)

Eclectic (still mostly close to W-H)
Weymouth (1903) The Resultant Greek Testament by Weymouth
Moffatt (1913) Herman von Soden text plus Moffatt emendations
Berkeley Version (1945) - Tischendorf 8th, Nestle, some TR
Beck (1963) - selectively uses P75 (see Edward Hills ch.8)
New English Bible (1961) - Revised English Bible (1989) - Greek published in Tasker 1964

One way that it is trivial to see that the differences from W-H to NA-27 are exceedingly minor is that in a summary of 20 versions, the ASV (from Westcott-Hort) came out #2 in closeness to the NA-27 !

Novum Testamentum Graece
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novum_Testamentum_Graece

Abbreviation - Name - Relative Agreement with Nestle-Aland 27th edition
NAS New American Standard 1
ASV American Standard Version 2
NAU New American Standard 1995 Update 3
NAB New American Bible 4
ESV English Standard Version 5
HCS Holman Christian Standard Bible 6
NRS New Revised Standard Version 7
NET New English Translation 8
RSV Revised Standard Version 9
NIV New International Version 10
NJB New Jerusalem Bible 11
REB Revised English Bible 12
JNT Jewish New Testament 13
GNB Good News Bible 14
NLT New Living Translation 15
DRA Douay-Rheims American edition 16
TLB The Living Bible 17
MRD Murdock Peshitta translation 18
NKJ New King James Bible 19
KJV King James Version 20

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In addition this is shown in other writings, especially a Kenneth Clark reference to a study.

The gentile bias and other essays (1980)
Kenneth Willis Clark
originally published in: Transitions in Biblical Scholarship (1968)
http://books.google.com/books?id=2okeAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA122
Today's Problems with the Critical text of the New Testament - p. 120-131 (126-129 not in google)

the Westcott-Hort text has become today our textus receptus. (p. 121)

Now the study:

Our problem lies here, that few scholars are aware that the latest Nestle is a close copy of the 1881 text, and that edition succeeds edition with little or no textual change. All the critical editions since 1881 are basically the same as Westcott-Hort. All are founded on the same Egyptian recension, and generally reflect the same assumptions of transmission.

In order to test this assertion as a hypothesis, eight Duke students have recently collaborated in the collation of numerous critical texts against Westcott-Hort, in two sample passages (Mark 11 and John 12). ...

Can there be any doubt that these editions are a near replica of Westcott-Hort? They are typical of the many editions that have appeared. Since 1881 twenty-five editors have issued about seventy-five editions of the Greek New Testament. The collation of these many "critical" texts consistently exposes the fact that each of them is basically a repetition of the Westcott-Hort text of which we may be permitted to declare with truth: "You now have the text which is accepted by all." Indeed, we have continued for eighty-five years to live in the era of Westcott-Hort, our textus receptus. (p. 121-122)

As often, there are other excellent quotes in the article, here is one.

Colwell .. "Hort has put .. blinders in our eyes" (p. 123)

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[Steven Avery]

[TC-Alternate-list] study of NA-27/UBS non-differentiation from W-H - "basically a repetition of the Westcott-Hort text"
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/TC-Alternate-list/conversations/topics/3749

Hi Folks,

Ok, I refound the missing study !

Remember, often you will hear today that "we no longer follow Westcott and Hort", we are way beyond their text, yada.
Here area examples, you run across this as a common theme on the internet forums, often stated in a dismissive, even belligerent manner.

Which Version Can We Trust?- Arthur Ferch
http://www.adventistbiblicalresearch.org/documents/Which Version Can We Trust.htm
Further study, research, and discoveries of manuscripts since 1881 have challenged several of the conclusions of Westcott and Hort. ... several modern versions of the New Testament (for example the Revised Standard Version and New International Version) are more eclectic or selective in their choice of readings. Consequently, editors pay less attention to questions of date or families of witnesses and no longer follow one text type slavishly.

James White, The King James Only Controversy,
While modern Greek texts are not identical to that created by Westcott and Hort, one will still find defenders of the AV drawing in black and white, saying that all modern versions are based upon their work (White, p. 99).

James Martin - The KJV Debate
"modern versions do not slavishly follow Westcott and Hort anyway".

Anyone who has spent some time on the principle dozens of variants knows this is simply not the case, that changes in the modern versions away from the Westcott and Hort text are few and far between.

And the few changes are generally for the worse. e.g. Some Westcott Hort dubious ideas, as in John 1:18 and John 7:8 and 1 Thessalonians 2:7, were rejected in the Revision and came forth later in the Revised Standard Version of the late 1940s and the New American Standard of the 1950s and most versions thereafter ... the modern version text actually became more W-H alexandrian textus corruptus while earlier modern versions still followed the Received Text. In addition, some versions may follow a Westcott Hort idea that is not in their own text, like the "western non-interpolation" of Jesus being angry in Mark 1:41.

The modern versions follow NA-27 (although sometimes obscuring the preference by margin and footnote and brackets) so the basic question is .. does the GNT today differ from Westcott-Hort ?

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

This is the study I had noticed, with conclusions that decisively refute the contention that today's text is much different than W-H.

(same as post above)
=============================================

To go with this, helpful would be the details of the study referenced by Professor Maurice Robinson that shows that hundreds of verses in the Westcott-Hort text match no exemplar manuscript in any language at all. ( I believe this is caused by the smorgasbord approach where Vaticanus can be used as a base text for one variant in a verse but is departed from in another part of the same verse).

Also to go with this would be a number of quotes about how the Westcott-Hort methodology essentially ignores the Greek Byzantine Majority texts. And I would also add that it essentially ignores other major evidences as well.

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

However the point of this post is the study above. A handy study to know about when the claim is made that today's text is different. In the past I would challenge the claimant to give examples, yet these quotes are a more direct to-the-point refutation.

David Cloud does not mention the study, but has a good article on the topic.

Are The Modern Versions Based on Westcott-Hort?
http://www.wayoflife.org/database/westcotthort.html
The theories of textual criticism which underlie the Westcott-Hort Greek New Testament of 1881 have been somewhat discredited by textual critics of the 20th century. It is not surprising, therefore, that modern version proponents today often disassociate themselves from Westcott-Hort and claim that they merely use an eclectic Greek text.

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

The case of the NIV

One articles says the NIV utilizes the NA26 text, "but it differs from it in 231 places". This probably was noticed in the recent new GNT which a bit strangely used the NIV as a collation source. Are any of these among the more significant variants ? What was the criteria ? Were they following the Revision contra Westcott and Hort in some of the variants ?

"The Greek text used in translating the New Testament was an eclectic one ... " (NIV Preface)

Likely the NIV agrees with the Westcott and Hort variants from the Received Text about 95%, and on all of the major, battleground variants .. the other 5% is unclear. Although to the common reader they can mask their position at times with brackets and footnotes, as pointed out in this discussion of the ending of Mark.

Does the Ending Matter? Mark 16
http://www.nbseminary.ca/archives/does-the-ending-matter-mark-16

 

[Steven Avery]

Michael W. Holmes - Westcott & Hort & Zuntz Legacies
https://www.facebook.com/groups/purebible/permalink/645132428911983/

Michael W. Holmes - Westcott & Hort & Zuntz Legacies

Michael W. Holmes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_W._Holmes

is normally placed in the category of the hortian fogites, associated with Metzger, Ehrman and having published a ho-hum Critical Text (used as the primary reading source in LaParola due to the NA-UBS copyright whining).

On the other hand, some earlier writers like Ernest Cadman Colwell (1901-1974) and Kenneth Willis Clark (1878-1979) are two of a small number of writers who are helpful for insightful writings that pinpoint Hort failings. And the slavish acceptance of fundamental hortian text and errors even after the Potemkin Village has blown down. Clark was very blunt in stating that the Critical Text of today is still basically the hort text. (Excepting the hortian absurd western non-interpolations being largely rejected.) I've even had contras make the dumb argument that today's CT is not really comparable to the CT referenced by Clark in the 1970s.

Yet Holmes, surprisingly, wrote a paper in 2006 that bridges some of these gaps.

For today, I am just going to give the url of the paper. It can really help in connecting some dots.

Westcott & Hort at 125 (& Zuntz at 60): Their Legacies & Our Challenges (2006, 2010)
Michael W. Holmes - Bethel University
http://michaelwholmes.files.wordpre...006-sbl-revised-paper-2010-edition-24-nov.pdf

We can use this thread as one where the fundamental deficiencies of the modern hortian theories and praxis is addressed.

Holmes Extracts

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

TODAY'S CRITICAL TEXT IS HORT'S TEXT

"the critical editions currently in widest use agree, both in general and in detail, with the text printed by Westcott and Hort." p. 4

"the editors of our current critical text, regardless of whatever theories they may hold or reject, follow the same narrow strand of evidence as Westcott and Hort ... The essential physiognomy of our text remains virtually the same as Westcott and Hort‘s, because we follow the same slender segment of manuscripts.." p.5

====

That answers the objection "we no longer follow Hort, yada yada"

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

WESTCOTT AND HORT RIGGING

"Westcott and Hort's text was based on three critical elements: (1) the use of recensio to eliminate the Byzantine text, (2) the use of internal evidence to eliminate the Western text, and (3) a fully-developed view of the history of the text as the operational context for (1) and (2). " p. 5

====

The Received Text is the pure Bible from the Byzantine Text, frequently augmented and sometimes corrected from the Western text. The remaining few Alexandrian mss have, properly, essentially zero weight in the pure Bible.

And despising the pure Bible, Hort rigged his system to dismiss the underlying manuscript evidences. As Colwell pointed out. in some sharp quotes.

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

ATTEMPT TO DISMISS THE MASS OF BYZANTINE MSS AND ECW
HORT METHODOLOGY INVALID

"1) The use of recensio to eliminate the Byzantine text."

"Westcott and Hort‘s use of the genealogical method in this way was fundamentally flawed." p. 6 - (footnote to Colwell and Birdsall)

"even though the means by which Westcott and Hort completely eliminated the Byzantine tradition is invalid, their wholesale rejection of that tradition continues to deeply shape contemporary textual criticism—especially as exemplified by the editorial committee responsible for the UBS/NA text. ... we find, in practice if not in theory, a general rejection of the Byzantine tradition en bloc." (p. 7)

"this way of viewing the Byzantine textual tradition—as a late secondary textual tradition with no independent access to the original—still largely dominates the field" (p.10)

"that their basic outline of textual history is still followed by very many in the discipline." (p. 11)

The rejection en bloc of the 'Byzantine text‘ similarly tends to rob us of a most helpful instrument. This rejection is due to Griesbach, who ... considered [as did Hort after him, one may add, with even greater influence] the late text to derive from the two earlier 'recensions‘ combined. (p. 16-17) from Günther Zuntz

"by our general disregard for Western and especially Byzantine evidence, robbed ourselves of important data that could shed light on the earliest history of the transmission of the text." (p. 17)

"the continued Hortian shape of the history of the text adopted (if only by default) by many textual critics and the consequent neglect of the Byzantine tradition as a potential carrier of original readings" (p. 17)

===

these are all elements of .... the hortian fog.

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

MARGINALIZING WESTERN TEXTS AND SUPPORT OF BYZ VARIANTS

2) The use of internal evidence to eliminate the Western text.
"even as these scholars disagreed with Westcott and Hort, they effectively assumed Westcott and Hort‘s methods, and often their history of the text ... continue to work within a basically, Hortian methodological framework." (p.8)

Birdsall -
"the debate has been conducted within the limits of the data upon which Westcott and Hort laid stress, and for the resolution of which their theories were propounded and the text established." (p. 8)

"Westcott and Hort‘s method has become the ―'default setting' for contemporary criticism... the parameters of debate have largely been set by them." (p. 8-9, default setting from Epp)

===

Holmes had listed a number of Byzantine text supporters (Maurice Robinson) and those who thought the Western Text was improperly devalued (first Rendal Harris, F. C. Burkitt and then moderns like Rius-Camps, and Hemmerdinger).

Yet even these men, for the most part, even while contending on specifics, were writing in the hortian fog.

Holmes explains the methods of marginalizing the Western support of variants and ms. which support the Western texts.using a good example in Romans 14:21, showing the word-parsing rigging of the NA-UBS-Metzger crew.

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

Conclusions:

While Michael Holmes is in praxis more problem than solution ... at least he sees and expresses the problem.

Holmes shows his own predilection for the hortian fog by even highlighting the absurd 'primitive corruptions' of Hort as an argument for more conjectural emendations.

The section on Zuntz is interesting and uneven.

Bibleprotector put out a recent textual stream chart that is far superior than any here.

The pure Received Text and the Reformation Bible editions and the majesty and excellence of the AV remains the elephant in the pseudo-scholars's living room. They simply are unable to get the hortian blinders off.

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Papyrus Tidbit:

"for much of the Pauline corpus, P46 preserves our earliest surviving evidence. Yet at points this witness is clearly corrupt, and in some instances preserves what seem to be tertiary readings—corruption of a corruption, as it were, two steps removed from the original, yet preserved in our earliest surviving witness." (p. 12)

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

2013 Comments on the textualcriticism forum

[textualcriticism] the Westcott & Hort legacy examined
Steven Avery - April 4, 2013
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/textualcriticism/conversations/topics/7765

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[Steven Avery]

Westcott Hort recension

All this came up in the recent discussion with Elijah Hixson.involving the Romans 8:1 apparatus.
facebook]elijah.hixson.5
/posts/10101457542929608

One point:
Elijah was concerned about the term:

Westcott-Hort recension.

These Facebook posts, combined with what was shared above, should make it clear why this is the best term for the Critical Text textline. (Note: limited time, not checking all the urls at the moment.)

Facebook - Pure Bible
the Westcott-Hort Recension
https://www.facebook.com/groups/purebible/permalink/866552090103348/

the Westcott-Hort Recension


When discussing in textual circles, we can say directly what we are dealing with the Westcott-Hort recension. That was their accurate claim, and was well understood, even if today's Critcal Text seminarian "scholars" want to hide the simple truth.

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Life and Letters of Brooke Foss Westcott, Sometime Bishop of Durham
Arthur Westcott
https://books.google.com/books?id=G_JDAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA144

Westcott: Oct 12, 1853
"As to our proposed recension of the New Testament text, our object would be, I suppose, to prepare a text for common and general use...With such an end in view, would it not be best to introduce only certain emendations into the received text, and to note in the margin such as seem likely or noticeable - after Griesbach's manner"

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St. Paul's Epistles to the Romans: with notes (1859)
Charles John Vaughan (1816-1897)
http://archive.org/stream/gyprsrwmaouspis00paulgoog#page/n16/mode/2up

"Mr Westcott has thus allowed me to anticipate (with regard to this Epistle) the publication of that complete recension of the text of the New Testament, on which he has been for some time engaged."

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

Blurb from Vaughan's book (1870)
https://books.google.com/books?id=yZFUAAAAYAAJ&pg=RA1-PA39

"This volume contains the Greek Text of the Epistle to the Romans as settled by the Rev. B. F. Westcott, D. D. , for his complete recension of the Text of the New Testament."

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St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians,(1866)
Joseph Barbour Lightfoot (1828-1889)
https://books.google.com/books?id=N8ECAAAAQAAJ&pg=PR8

"the promise of assistance from my friends the Rev. B. F. Westcott and the Rev. F. J. A. Hort, who are engaged in a joint recension of the Greek Testament"

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Life and letters of Brooke Foss Westcott, D.D., D.C.L.: sometime bishop of Durham, Volume 1 (1870)
Arthur Westcott
https://books.google.com/books?id=iCI3AAAAMAAJ&pg=PA331

"The text which Dr. Vaughan has published ... represents in the main my recension .. We [with Hort] have now revised the text together.."

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Blurb to W-H GNT (1881)
https://books.google.com/books?id=pGAOAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA572

"Nowhere else in the compass of a single volume of moderate size will the student of our day find so complete and satisfactory a recension of the Greek Testament." Christian Intelligencer, N. Y.

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Extracts from foreign criticisms of Westcott and Horts' Greek text of the New Testament [first publ. in 1881].1885
Orello Cone
https://books.google.com/books?id=gp4HAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA6

Dr Carl Bertheau, of Hamburg, in the Theologische Literaturzeitung...
The editors "have produced a new and entirely independent recension of the text of the New Testament..."

======

This is a good book of extracts for seeing how totally duped many of the "scholars" were by Hort's gibberish.

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The Universalist Quarterly and General Review (1884)
"The New Covenant" and its Critics
Review of English version by Henry Prentiss Forbes (1849-1913)
John Wesley Hanson (1823-1901)
https://books.google.com/books?id=_gcSAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA476

the Greek text from which "The New Covenant" is rendered. It is substantially and almost entirely from the recension of Westcott and Hort .."

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The Contemporary Review (1903)
Review of Life and Letters
https://books.google.com/books?id=mwI4AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA901

"striking achivements of his life--the recension of the Greek Text of the New Testament"

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Bibliotheca Sacra, Volume 79 (1922)
Order of Events in Matthew and Mark
J. F. Springer
https://books.google.com/books?id=vKTNAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA333

"Westcott and Hort's recension of the Greek NT" - (1922)

Bonus: Springer discussing Markan priority nonsense:
"history teaches us that a consensus of experts is by no means always in the right"
https://books.google.com/books?id=yMg7LRMd4LsC&pg=PA113

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The Papyri and New Testament Textual Criticism
Jacobus Hendrik Petzer
https://books.google.com/books?id=Di8jYgnbeO4C&pg=PA24

"There is, however, not enough historical evidence to replace Westcott and hort's recension with a new one, while the former had been proven not to be relevant any more"

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

Some additional notes

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

WESTCOTT-HORT RECENSION and VATICANUS

where did the Westcott-Hort recension differ from Vaticanus?
https://www.facebook.com/groups/NTTextualCriticism/permalink/724129361007400/
.
This leads to other studies, such as the Vaticanus-primacy nature of the W-H text.

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

Stephen C. Carlsen
http://www-user.uni-bremen.de/~wie/TCG/Manuscript-2427.pdf

"Westcott and Hort were not the first to base a critical text largely on B. Some twenty years earlier. Philipp Buttmann (1860) published a recension of the Greek New Testament based on Cardinal Mai’s edition of B (1857, 1859)."

This earlier Buttmann recension text was actually 1856:

Novum Testamentum graece : ad fidem potissimum codicis vaticani B. recensuit, varias lectiones codicis B, textus recepti / editionum Griesbachii, Lachmanni, ...

Any possible relationship or connection or use of the Philipp Carl Johann Ludwig Buttmann text to W-H 1881 (and the text distributed to the revision committee in 1871) has not been studied, afaik.

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One of the better discussions of the W-H history

While Latinos Slept (2005)
Gary Lamore
https://books.google.com/books?id=-0e1NG2PpZwC&pg=PA11

using
While Men Slept. . .: A Biblical and Historical Account of the New Universal Christianity (2002)
Kirby F. Fannin
https://books.google.com/books?id=9yFfFQVtmqUC

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This Westcott-Hort recension is the underlying base of the Alphabet Soup versions, NIV, NAS, HCSB, ESV, etc. The textus corruptus today is essentially the same textual recension, the singular significant change being the rejection by most editions today of the absurd Western non-interpolations. One of many of Hort's sick textual jokes.

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

Psalm 119:140
Thy word is very pure:
therefore thy servant loveth it.

Also related:

Westcott Hort reductionalism - Vaticanus über alles
https://www.facebook.com/groups/purebible/permalink/1578874215537795/

And plan to add more from my notes and bookmarks.

 

[Steven Avery]

Zane Clark Hodges (1932-2008) hit upon some of the Colwell and Kenneth W. Clark points in"

Rationalism and Contemporary New Testament Textual Criticism (1971)
Zane C. Hodges
http://gallery.myff.org/gallery/1526131/Rationalism+-+Hodges.pdf

This is an excellent paper, from before his attempts to push the new edition of the "Majority Text" (Hodges-Farsted.)

 

[Steven Avery]

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Kevin Deegan

In 1866 Tischendorf wrote "we have at last hit upon a better plan... which is to set aside this Textus Receptus altogether...and to CONSTRUCT a fresh text." ("When Were Our Gospels Written?" by...

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