72 Comments

1. Thomas, well stated. It is obvious that both words are used of copies, so the autograph / apograph distinction is obviously a flawed one.

   What, then, is the reason for Paul using the two words? Is it simply variation with no particular significance? That's possible, but I have a suggestion.

   Holy Scriptures (hiera grammata) is only here in the New Testament (grammata appears elsewhere, as you've noted, but not with the modifier "Holy"). But it appears in Jewish usage (A.T. Robertson cites Philo and Josephus) to refer to the Old Testament. Most of the citations you gave are writing of the Old Testament, notably Justin when addressing his comments to a Jew.

   From a child, Timothy knew the Old Testament Scriptures (verse 15), and perhaps Paul used a term which would be recognised by Timothy, with some Jewish training, or any other Jew as referring to the Old Testament in verse 15. But then, in verse 16, he says "All Scripture" to draw it more broadly.

   I would suggest that Paul was saying, "You had the Old Testament, but ALL Scripture is inspired…." Thus, he affirmed the Old that Timothy had known as a child, in which he was to continue, but also the New, for he was to use both for doctrine, reproof, correction. Both were the Word he was to preach.

   That, I believe, is an explanation for the use of the two words that much better fits the context than any kind of spurious autograph / copy distinction.

   It also explains why "all" was necessary in verse 16. Otherwise, Paul could have just said, "Scripture is given by inspiration of God" and it would have taught the same truth. But by adding "all" to graphe, he contrasted and completed the thought.

   Re: the autograph/apograph distinction, as far as I can find, no one ever said, before 1881, that only the autographs were inspired. Until that point, everyone held that the words themselves were inspired, wherever they were written.

   And of course, to hold that the autographs alone were inspired, sometimes you have these awkward situations where there is more than one autograph.

   For the Ten Commandments, there were three autographs. The first set of tables of stone, the second set of stone tables, and then when Moses wrote it down in Exodus. Which was the only inspired autograph? And what was the inspired autograph of Proverbs 25:2, the piece of paper on which Solomon wrote it in the first place or the piece of paper on which Hezekiah's scribes copied it into what is now the book of Proverbs?

   When pushed, the autograph-only view crumbles pretty quickly.

2. Dear Jon,

   Thanks for the comment. I haven't had time to study out whether your distinction is correct or not at this time, but I think it's definitely worth thinking about.

3. Hi Kent,

   First, I appreciate that you you will have the Authorized Version as inspired scripture.

   One concern I would like to raise: The idea of limiting the New Testament autographs to Greek-only attempts to put a doctrinal preference over the historical reality.

   Eusebius wrote, from Clement of Alexandria, that Hebrews was written by Paul in Hebrew and that Luke then translated it carefully into Greek. If accurate, this makes Hebrew the true autographic language.

   One of many discussions of this theory also touches on the stylistic issues:

   Paul the Apostle Wrote Hebrews
   Sandra Sweeny Silver
   https://earlychurchhistory.org/communication/paul-the-apostle-wrote-hebrews/

   (Similar questions can be raised about Mark and Revelation and Matthew, and perhaps additional books, but Hebrews is an excellent focal point.)

   Now it would be hard to prove or disprove what Eusebius wrote, but would it really be contradicted by a Greek-onlyism or Greek-primacy theory? When they clash, I believe it is the theory that has to bend. There is still Greek in a central spot in transmission, and the TR editions are looked at mostly from Greek, but the autograph theory … not so good.

   Yet the Greek-autographs-only theory seems to disallow this very sensible historical possibility, or probability. For the doctrinal purpose of placing Greek in a special autographic spot. Partly to match various confessions, perhaps with an ultra-literal view.

   Similarly, Greek-onlyism on preservation runs smack into the historical excellence of the Latin lines on certain specific variants, such as the heavenly witnesses and Luke 2:22 and Acts 8:37. The Reformation Bible perfection was built on a base that included Greek and Latin, and even Syriac in a corroboration mode (the Syriac Revelation from c. AD 600 is especially interesting as akin to the TR text.)

   So please do some special consideration.
   And I look forward to your response and any counterpoint!

   Yours in Jesus name,

   Steven Avery
   Dutchess County, NY USA
   https://linktr.ee/stevenavery

4. Hi Steve, this post was written by brother Thomas Ross. I’ll let him answer.

5. Dear Steven,

   Thanks for writing. It is good for us to have strong reasons for what we believe.

   I took a look at your article by Ms. Silver.

   Let me point out that her article does not seem to display a great deal of serious consideration. For example, she says:

   “quoting the very early 100’s AD Clement of Alexandria (c. 150 – c. 215 AD) who writes…”

   If Clement was born around A. D. 150 he is not “very early 100s.” And when he was a toddler he was not interacting with the professing Christian community and digging up early information, especially if he converted to Christianity as an adult.

   She says that Clement:

   “had access to some of the living Apostles and 70 Disciples of Jesus, so he had first-hand witnesses of who was who and who wrote what.”

   If all the Apostles and the 70 that Christ sent out were, to the man, just 20 years old in A. D. 30, then they would have been 130 years old in A. D. 150 when Clement was born. If Clement started talking to them when he was only 20 years old, then they would have been at least 150 years old. I am not aware of any source that says that the Apostles lived to be at least 150 years old, or any evidence that Clement himself says that he had first-hand interviews with them at this remarkable age. The historical evidence that we have is that these men were martyred rather than living to extreme old age—and beyond extreme old age—in Alexandria, Egypt

   So, in conclusion, her argument that Clement of Alexandria had first-hand access to the Apostles is impossible. This leaves out the question of whether any of the Apostles even went to Alexandria, which is not exactly near to Israel.

   I believe Paul wrote Hebrews for reasons such as John Owen sets forth in his preface to his commentary on Hebrews. They are much stronger reasons than the unserious case of Ms. Silver.

   All of the inspired NT books were dictated by the Holy Spirit to the original writers in Greek, not in any other language. Let’s consider Hebrews.

   Christ’s churches and people have received Hebrews in Greek as the canonical, inspired text of Scripture. There are no ancient manuscripts of Hebrews in Hebrew extant. Therefore, Hebrews was not sent from heaven to the church in Hebrew, for if it had been, God would have preserved it in Hebrew, just like He preserved the inspired Aramaic portions of Daniel and Ezra in that language. The text settled forever in heaven of the book of Hebrews is in Greek, and that is the text that should be studied, translated into the languages of all the earth, etc. An unverifiable quotation of Clement of Alexandria does not change the facts one jot or tittle.

   I am not impressed with the stylistic argument, as the NT epistles are too small of a sample size to draw overarching conclusions about a person’s style. People can use style arguments to prove that I did not write my own writings if they are allowed to take a small sample size and conclude that I can only write in one way. Apart from the fact that Clement of Alexandria could simply have been wrong, nevertheless, there is no reason to deny that Paul could have written a version of the book of Hebrews in Hebrew for Jews (although Jews were regularly speaking Greek in the NT period—even at Masada the Jews were written copiously in Greek.). But whether he did that or not—and even if Luke actually wrote Hebrews, although I highly doubt it, believing the evidence for Paul is conclusive—it is certain that the text of Hebrews dictated by the Holy Spirit is in Greek, not Hebrew. God allowing the original words that He (allegedly) inspired in Hebrew for Hebrews to disappear from the face of the earth and not be in use among His people would be an egregious violation of His promises of preservation.

   I do not know the Syriac language and cannot comment much about a Syriac text of Revelation, as I have no ability to compare it with the Greek.

   It is great when there is evidence in ancient translations that supports the Textus Receptus. But God’s promises of preservation are for the original language text, so unless we want to say that, for example, Luke wrote the rest of Acts in Greek but he changed to Latin at Acts 8:37, we must say that the promises of preservation are for Greek words in Acts 8:37. If there were no Greek evidence at all for 1 John 5:7 and Acts 8:37 we would have to reject those verses because of God’s promises of preservation. Thankfully, that is not the situation. The versional evidence for these passages is strong and is great corroboration to the Spirit’s direction of the churches to receive the Greek words in those passages as the inspired and preserved text.

   Thanks for writing!

6. Hi Thomas,

   Thanks!

   3 brief points.

   The stylistic argument, presumably from Clement, is given by Eusebius, which at the least commands respect. It is not from the moderns and their games, and it involves robust books, not micro- snips of analysis. Note: Jerome also is warm to Hebrews in Hebrew.

   “an egregious violation of His promises of preservation”
   Why?
   William Whitaker saw no difficulty.

   Do you reject Luke 2:22 (her purification) and Revelation 22:19 (book of life) in the AV due to the lack of Greek support prior to the TR editions?

   Thanks!

   Steven Avery

7. Dear Steven,

   Just to clarify, do you believe that the text dictated by the Holy Spirit, and all those specific words in an entire inspired book, can disappear, and that is not an egregious violation of God’s promises of preservation?

   Whether Eusebius or a modern person says that the style of Hebrews and other Pauline epistles are too different or not, the argument is still false, for the sample size is way too small, as Eta Linnemann pointed out in her works against gospel criticism.

   Do you think that Luke 2:22 and Revelation 22:19 were written in Greek, or in some other language, when Luke and the Apostle John wrote them? If they were written in Greek, did those Greek words disappear, even though heaven and earth have not passed away?

   A resource that is valuable, although not one with which I always agree, is here:

   https://faithsaves.net/majority-text-moorman/

   on places where the KJV departs from the majority of Greek MSS.

   The Greek support for “her” in Luke 2:22 and “book” in Revelation 22:19 is not very good, but it is not nothing. If it were nothing, then those readings cannot be defended, and saying that the true reading, the actual Greek words, that Luke and John wrote vanished from the face of the earth until they were restored many centuries later is as blatant a rejection of what Scripture teaches on preservation as what any critical text person could hope for. It would make liberal critical text people leap for joy.

   Thanks.

8. Hi Thomas,

   First I would like to discuss Eta Linnemann (1926-2009) and sample size. After her conversion she wrote strongly on Paul being the author of Hebrews.in her 2002 A Call for a Retrial in the Case of the Epistle to the Hebrews. This study includes the type of stylistic analysis you claim she opposed.

   David Lewis Allen (b. 1957) goes into this in some depth in:

   Lukan Authorship of Hebrews (2010)
   https://books.google.com/books?id=Q1wmaVyAEukC&pg=PA51

   Linnemann’s section on style makes a more substantial case. She examined Harold Attridge’s assertions in his commentary’s section, “Literary Characteristics of Hebrews: Language and Style.”45 Linnemann succeeded in countering virtually all of Attridge’s examples of Hebrews’ so-called “better Greek” with similar examples from the Pauline Epistles, especially Romans. ….

   I am going to conjecture that you saw Eta Linneman show some spots where stylistic analysis has been used improperly. The ending of Mark and the Pericope Adulterae would be examples.

   If you have more broad-based rejection of stylistic analysis from Eta Linneman, please share!

   btw, note that Charles Forster (1767-1871) was very much involved in the Hebrews stylistic analysis. We are familiar with his superb book:

   A New Plea for the Authenticity of the Text of the Three Heavenly Witnesses or, Porson’s Letters to Travis eclectically examined, and the … evidences for 1 John v. 7, eclectically re-surveyed (1867)
   https://books.google.com/books?id=EKwCAAAAQAAJ

   In which there is stylistic analysis, especially of two works connected with Athanasius.

   Steven Avery
   Dutchess County, NY USA

9. For clarity, we are discussing related questions.

   1) Does every TR variant we accept require extant Greek manuscript evidence?
   (else an egregious violation of preservation)

   2) Is all preservation in Greek?
   And is this mirrored by all autographs being in Greek?

   3) Can there be multi-language authorship of the scriptures?

   Just looking at your position on (3), please note William Whitaker.

   A Disputation on Holy Scripture: Against the Papists, Especially Bellarmine and Stapleton (1588, 1849 edition)
   William Whitaker (1548-1595)
   https://books.google.com/books?id=WK7yPBiP1GcC&pg=PA125

   … he (Jerome) says that the Epistle to the Hebrews was written in Hebrew … the Greek edition both of the Gospel according to Matthew and of the Epistle to the Hebrews is authentic. For the Hebrew originals (if any such there were) are now nowhere extant, and the Greek was published in the life-time of the apostles, received in the church, and approved by the apostles themselves.

   Do you find Whitaker’s position acceptable?
   Or do you reject it due to egregious violation?

   Thanks!

   Steven

10. Dear Stephen,

    I don’t have time to get into a lot of rabbit trails, so if you can answer the questions I asked you, and also let me know if you agree with the clearly unserious nature of Ms. Silver, that would be appreciated.

    I will answer your questions in this comment, but please don’t expect any more.

    I agree with Whitaker’s position, which he states about two pages after the quote you provided. He says the quote you provided, at least apparently claiming it is what he thought, is a wrong position, and the whole NT is written in Greek.

    But even if he had said that a book of the NT was written in Hebrew and then that book was entirely lost, it would make no difference for what Scripture teaches. Christ’s words do not pass away, and Whitaker would certainly be egregiously violating Scripture on preservation had he taught that, just like he was when he taught infant baptism.

    Even the quote you give, however, says that the Greek Hebrews is the canonical text, recognized by Apostolic authority. If he also wrote a version in Hebrew, or Matthew wrote a version in Hebrew as well of his gospel, that’s just great. The Hebrew version is not the one with the words that are in heaven (Psalm 119:89) and available to the saints on earth (Isaiah 59:21).

    Since Scripture promises that the specific words of the NT would not pass away, if those words–not translations of those words–have passed away, then Scripture has told us a lie.

    If the specific words God gave to the original authors of Scripture perished from the earth, and so were not in the mouths of God’s people generation to generation (Isaiah 59:21), then His promises are not true. Therefore a reading with absolutely zero Greek evidence cannot be the true reading. There can be good reasons to receive a reading with minority Greek support (e. g., 1 John 5:7), but zero Greek support simply violates Scripture. God keeps the pure words that He inspired forever (Psalm 12:6-7). We can wrangle about whether that changes after the era of printing, but certainly this is the clear teaching of Scripture which we then need to apply plainly.

    Evaluating someone’s style is not inherently wrong. Linnemann arguing exactly what I am saying, that one cannot disprove Pauline authorship through stylistic analysis, doesn’t prove that Luke wrote Hebrews because of some quote that Eusebius says that Clement said, supposedly received first hand from the Apostles when they were 150 years old or more. But one needs a large enough sample size to make a good case, which Linnemann discusses in her book on the synoptic problem.

    If you can answer the specific questions I asked, and show how an entire book with words infallibly given by God perishing fits with Scripture, I’ll take a look. I may not reply more, though. Thanks for the comments.

    • This is to Steve too, but I’m just putting it here. I’ve thought about what I think is the primary question here. It applies, it seems, to the overall evidence. I don’t think that God preserved extant manuscripts. He preserved His Words in the language in which they were written. Translations show some evidence that those words existed. We can look at the words in the printed editions. One of the printed editions can have words from manuscripts predating them. It’s possible some of the manuscripts upon which they relied or they used do not exist any more. There is still a kind of chain of custody. All told, however, it is faith. It is the testimony of the saints based upon the inward witness of the Holy Spirit. It is what the church received.

11. And I agree with Kent on the faith component.

    Let’s take Luke 2:22. In 2022, we see 0 extant Greek mss., maybe we have a Greek church writer. And maybe the corruption was in the first 60 years after Luke wrote to the high priest Theophilus, by AD 100. We can be sure Luke wrote “her”, but if our belief requires extant Greek manuscripts, we put ourself in a bit of a sticky wicket.

    The Latin and versional evidence is massively singular, which must be her, with festivals on the purification of Mary. So the preservation was accomplished in Latin and versions, the Greek situation helped by the wonderful faith-consistent corrective analysis of Theodore Beza.

    The question boils down to the degree of Greek-primacy or Greek-onlyism a person uses for their inspiration-preservation Bibliological base.

    My personal view is more fluid.

    Steven

12. If I understand Scripture (and perhaps a case can be made that I do understand it a little bit), I can see no reason we must preclude a Hebrew version of Hebrews written by Paul and a translation by Luke. I can also see no Scriptural reason we need to accept that as reality.

    I do see strong reasons to suspect that Paul is the original author of Hebrews. I also believe that there is a reason the author of Hebrews is not explicitly identified for us, and if there was a Lukan translation that would possibly explain why, though I think there are other and perhaps more compelling explanations as to why Paul’s name would not have been included even if he were the human author.

    Even more importantly than all that, though, I can see no reason we should care about the question.

    God preserves His Word, He has not preserved an “original Hebrew version” of Hebrews, and He has preserved the Greek version. Therefore, the Greek version is the inspired original of what God has preserved for us as part of His written Word. If one chooses to believe that this is the result of divine oversight of a translation from Hebrew, one is welcome to do so. I don’t think there’s anything in Scripture that precludes that belief, but certainly also nothing that compels it.

    But one is not able to supplant the preserved Greek text with an unpreserved Hebrew text without falling into significant doctrinal problems. If there was an unpreserved Hebrew text, the only conclusion is that it was never intended by God to be Scripture.

    Perhaps it is worth noting that words can be God-given and not be Scripture. There are many words of Jesus which are not recorded. There are also almost certainly words which Jesus spoke in the Aramaic of His day and which are recorded in a fully inspired and inerrant translation into Greek. No one says that the words of Jesus which weren’t recorded were any less from God. Nor does anyone try to invalidate the Greek text of the Gospels by saying that it is the Aramaic which Jesus spoke (and which God hasn’t preserved) which is really what is inspired.

    There are words which Elijah and Elisha spoke which were God-given but not in Scripture. Elijah wrote one letter that is recorded in Scripture, but perhaps there were many others.

    It is those words which God caused to be inscripturated and preserved which are Scripture. That describes the Greek text of Hebrews and not any theoretical Hebrew text, whether it existed or not.

13. Jon Gleason,
    “preserved the Greek version … the preserved Greek text”

    Yet our preserved Reformation Bible text, expressed in the inspired scripture of the AV, was built on Greek and Latin (and Syriac) evidences, and faith-consistent methodologies, including the refinements through Erasmus, Stephanus and Beza. An amazing, providential process.

    Remember Luke 2:22 and numerous other Bible variants where extant Greek preservation actually begins in the Reformation era.

    Do we reject a word or phrase or verse because of minimal or zero earlier extant Greek support? I trow not!

    The underlying Greek-onlyism and Greek-primacy needs reconsideration, even if supported by a literal read of Confessions.

    If we can agree that their was no known extant singular ultra-pure NT text on the macro level before Stephanus and Beza, the Geneva and the AV, logically speaking, why would we insist on full Greek continuity on a micro level?

    On what basis can we declare that there was ever a singular full NT volume, even in the early centuries, as complete and pure as the Reformation Bible excellence?

    Steven

    • Dear Steven,

      I am much too busy to follow everything here, so I am late in replying. Others may have already answered your points to me, but in case not:

      It is a quantum leap, and not a well-founded one, to go from variants supported by extant translations, to a theoretical Hebrew text of Hebrews that doesn’t exist. If there were a commonly, widely available, long accepted by churches, Hebrew text of Hebrews, you would have at least an argument to make. As it is, you have none. There is no preserved Hebrew text of Hebrews and therefore the idea is simply a theory which is of no profit at all.

      It does reveal a less-than-sound Bibliology on your part, so there’s profit in what it reveals.

      If you don’t think God has preserved the Greek version of Hebrews, I don’t know what to say. If you think He has preserved a Hebrew version, where is it and which churches used it and have accepted it as authoritative down through the centuries?

      Perhaps I simply am not smart enough to understand what you are saying but I see no profit in your postulating and arguing for a Hebrew text that we don’t have.

      I have real work and real ministry to take my time so I doubt I will respond to you again. It appears to me a less than profitable round-and-round. If I have misinterpreted you on that, I apologize in advance, but I don’t think this interaction really needs me, anyway.

14. Dear Bro Gleason,

    Thanks for the comment.

    In general, I agree.

    I believe there are good indications that Hebrews is not translation Greek (like the LXX) but original, untranslated compositional Greek. The same goes for Matthew. Trying to correct either book from a speculative work in another language certainly does cause doctrinal problems, and it is very unwise to say that the inspired original vanished. If Luke had translated a Hebrew version of Hebrews (which I think is highly unlikely), then the words in heaven are the Greek words Luke wrote.

    The point that not everything that is from God is in the canonical Scripture is well taken. I would suggest to you, however, that many, or even all of the words that we have from Christ in Greek were actually spoken in Greek, and that Greek was the language of public discourse in 1st century Palestine, while Aramaic may have been a “home language” while Greek was the general language spoken in public. Thus, there are good reasons to believe that we have the actual words Christ preached in Greek in His discourses in the Gospels, except when the Gospels record Him saying something to Aramaic (e.g., Ephphatha, Mark 7:34–if everything Christ said was in Aramaic, why mention this one particular word was)?, or Eloi, eloi, etc. on the cross.

    • Brother Ross, thanks for the comment. I agree with you on Hebrews and Matthew, that the Greek does not appear to me to be a translation, although I’m not as knowledgeable as you on the languages. That wasn’t my point, though, my point was that there is no Biblical reason to say it couldn’t be translation. But Biblically, we know that what God gives as Scripture, He preserved, and so only that which has been preserved can be considered to be truly the Scripture.

      As to the words of Christ, there are places where the recorded words differ between the accounts. That’s consistent, in my view, with the accounts being inspired translations where the Spirit moved the human writers to translate differently to emphasize different aspects of the original Aramaic words. We do have a specific example in the New Testament of differing authoritative translations into Greek of Deuteronomy 6:5. So there’s no reason to say that the same could not have happened with words of Christ in Aramaic.

      Is that the only explanation for those differences in the recorded words of Christ in Greek? Of course not, but it is one that seems highly likely to me. I did not and would not affirm it as absolute fact nor do I think it theologically problematic to either hold or reject my view on it.

      I will certainly check back to read any response but I doubt I will find time to comment again on this thread.

      Thank you for your faithfulness to sound Bibliology, and I wish to reaffirm my agreement in substance with the original article here. I believe that when Warfield and Hodge redefined “inspiration” in the late 19th century, and the schools fell into line behind them, it did more damage even than the rejection of preservation has done.

      They turned inspiration into an act that God did sometime in the past to a particular piece of paper, rather than what it had always been believed to be — a divine quality of the Scriptures which applies to the words recorded in that Book we hold in our hands. They took the inspired text out of the hands of believers and turned inspiration into a theoretical theological construct of no true benefit. It has been extremely damaging.

15. By the way, Steven, I don’t want to get into a long discussion (although I hope you do get around to answering my questions), but just as your citation of Ms. Silver was very unconvincing, and your citation of Whitaker claimed his position was exactly what he said was not his position not that long after the quote you supplied, please note that Dr. Edward F. Hills, in his The King James Version Defended, says the following about Luke 2:22. He says “76 and a few other Greek minuscule manuscripts” have “her” (pg. 172 of the version I have linked to at https://faithsaves.net/bibliology/).

    Perhaps you have studied the subject to a degree comparable to that of Dr. Hills, who had a Ph. D. in textual criticism, and that explains your ability to cite the book of Revelation in Syriac, but if not, I would tend to think that Dr. Hills knows what he is talking about when he says that there IS Greek MSS support for the KJV reading in Luke 2:22. To say that readings with absolutely no Greek MSS support can be correct is to be to the left of even many critical text proponents and to throw preservation out, unless you believe that Luke 2:22 was written in Greek except for one Latin word in the middle of the verse in the copy Luke wrote with his hand, under the control of the Holy Spirit.

    Please think about whether your position is actually seriously undermining preservation, what God says about His Words, and making a consistent critique of the critical text much more difficult.

    I’m glad you want to stand for the KJV. That is wonderful.

    Thanks again.

16. Hi Thomas and Kent and forum,

    Luke 2:22 (AV)
    And when the days of her purification according to the law of Moses were accomplished, they brought him to Jerusalem, to present him to the Lord;

    The Harvard Theological Review, Volume 14
    William Henry Paine Hatch (1875-1972)
    https://books.google.com/books?id=qpcWAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA380

    Footnote 4
    Codex 76, a Vienna manuscript of the twelfth or thirteenth century, is commonly cited as a witness for αὐτῆς. This, however, is an error; for Gregory, who examined the codex in 1887, reports that it reads αὐτῶν in Luke 2:22 (cf. Tischendorf, Novum Testamentum Graece, III, 484). Codex 76 is one of the manuscripts consulted by Alter. He printed αὐτῆς in Luke 2:22 without recording the reading of this codex. Griesbach inferred from Alter’s silence that αὐτῆς was found in 76, and in order to indicate that the citation was based on inference he enclosed the number 76 in parentheses. It has been pointed out above that this manuscript really has αὐτῶν; and Alter failed to indicate this fact through carelessness. His edition is substantially a reprint of 218, a thirteenth century codex in the Imperial Library in Vienna. Professor Karl Beth, of Vienna, has kindly informed me that it reads αὐτῶν in Luke 2:22. Alter, a Roman Catholic scholar, no doubt adopted αὐτῆς from the Complutensian-Elzevir tradition, or possibly from the Vulgate eius. Scholz, with characteristic inaccuracy, omitted Griesbach’s parentheses about 76, and thenceforth αὐτῆς passed into the critical tradition as the true reading of the manuscript.

    If you need verification that there are no other Greek minuscules to support Luke 2:22 as “her”, please let me know.

    btw, Hatch does make a conceptual error in that paper, trying to play the ambiguous card on the Latin and versional singular readings that really had to be referring to Mary.

    Edward Freer Hills did wonderful work, but some of his material is a bit dated, and he and others have often missed the Hatch paper.

    Btw, I believe you have misrepresented other items, including William Whitaker (from my reading there was no contradiction with what was written a couple of pages later.) And not understanding that the purpose of the first link from Sandra Sweeney Silver was simply to properly supply the Eusebius position on Hebrews, which is not as easy as you would expect. My goal has been not to get into a technical morass, but to stay on the primary issues.

    I’ll plan on getting more into the overall conceptual, doctrinal issues on my next post.

    Steven

    • Looks like it’s time to look at what Mill’s Novum Testamentum has to say. https://i.imgur.com/cVPcHYw.png

      The above is what I found on this word in this verse: Luke 2:22. It looks like what Mill’s position, for this word, is simply that it would translate to “her” either way. That seems why Mill here says that whoever wrote the Vulgate (and whatever other translations as well) must have gotten the same reading regardless of which variant was in place here, i.e. in the Exemplars from which they drew. There’s no reason to doubt, he says, that this was the way which these exemplars are to be translated in these places. We also learn from Mill, furthermore, on p. 748 of his Novum Testamentum (in his discussion on 1 John 5:7), that Stephanus and the other TR editors had access to ancient exemplars (as Mill calls them) in their day, and that this is basis of what represents the readings in each of their texts. There is no guarantee that all of what they had (i.e. the TR editors) have remained in the possession of academia to this day, nor is there a need for this to be. There may then be some cases where the received text has become the oldest remaining exemplar. This isn’t an issue for the received text any more than that the autographs are not currently to be found. This is because at every time, we have possessed MSS copies for everything, from the First Century all the way to the time of the TR, and the TR has served in that same capacity ever since. All peripheral materials, such as patristics and ancient quotations, only provides supporting evidence in grounding the correct readings.

      Going back to Luke 2:22 in particular, this isn’t even as complicated of a passage to explain the received reading for, it seems to me, because according to Mill, in this place either reading variant gives the same exact translation. If I have gathered what he says correctly, then I personally tend to agree with this. The variant in discussion here is in the same category, therefore, as that of Revelation 16:5. T. Beza provided the expansion of the nomen sacrum in that verse. Yet the translation in that place whether it’s being made from Stephanus or Beza is identical, whether or not the nomen sacrum in Revelation 16:5 is expanded. Also, I should add your comment that you think Beza made “corrective analysis” in Luke 2:22 isn’t really accurate, considering that I see the exact same reading in the 1520 Complutensian version (at the bottom of the linked image above), so that we really have multiple witnesses for the principal accepted reading. We’re not stuck on relying on a single witness but have multiple.

      • See also “Sabbath” in Matthew 12:1 and Matthew 28:1. Thanks to Dr. Brandenburg for allowing me to post.

17. “Trying to correct either book from a speculative work in another language certainly does cause doctrinal problems”

    Agreed, and never suggested.

    This is done in certain cases, e.g. by the Aramaic primacists and the Jerusalem School for Synoptic Research. Also some proponents of Latin, in Mark and maybe more, have done similar, such as the scholars Francis Crawford Burkitt (1864-1935) and Maurice Casey (1942-2014) . Also Nehemia Gordon, who is excellent on the name of Jehovah (vs. the corrupt yahweh which is jupiter) seems to dabble a bit in this realm with medieval texts.

    So I heartily agree that this can be a trap to try to fight the Reformation Bible.

    “and it is very unwise to say that the inspired original vanished”

    Here I see no difficulty. As long as we have the pure scriptures due to the Reformation Bible efforts.

    “if everything Christ said was in Aramaic, why mention this one particular word was)?, or Eloi, eloi, etc. on the cross.”

    Well, Jesus likely spoke in multiple languages in the course of the ministry in the New Testament text, including Greek (Galilee of the Nations, Isaiah 9:1) Hebrew as Paul did in Jerusalem, and Aramaic, and possibly Latin.

    The internal translations were only done for specific purposes. e.g. To show the Old Testament prophecy in the power of the Hebrew or Aramaic, or when a place-name has a certain specific meaning, like Golgotha.

    “To say that readings with absolutely no Greek MSS support can be correct is to be to the left of even many critical text proponents and to throw preservation out, unless you believe that Luke 2:22 was written in Greek except for one Latin word in the middle of the verse in the copy Luke wrote with his hand, under the control of the Holy Spirit.”

    As I tried to explain above, I see (extant) “Greek MSS support” as an artificial standard for preservation. And I also explained the mechanics of an early drop of “her” shortly after the c. AD 40 writing to Theophilus. So I never speculated about a Latin word from Luke.

18. Dear Stephen,

    It is ironic that you site an article written decades before Dr. Hills wrote the KJV Defended to debunk Hills and then claim that Hills is dated. Your quotation did nothing to prove that Dr. Hills was either unaware of that article nor that he was wrong when he stated that there are numbers of MSS with the reading “her” in Luke 2:22. But if you were correct–for the sake of argument–what it would prove is that a different TR edition has the preserved reading, not that the actual Greek words Luke wrote under the control of the Holy Spirit disappeared for many centuries.

    What Whitaker said is perfectly clear, and it is that the quote you supplied is wrong.

    What is far, far more important is that your position that the actual words written by the original writers of Scripture can totally disappear for entire books is clearly contradicted by Scripture, and is far worse than the critical text position that parts of a few chapters can be lost (e. g. Mark 16:9-20).

    For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. (Matthew 5:18)

    Not even one consonant or vowel can disappear from the original language text. Those very pure words that God gave by inspiration will be preserved (Ps 12:6-7) and will never pass away (Mt 24:35), and the words the Father gave the Son by the Spirit for the saints were recorded in the autographs, perfectly preserved, and received by God’s people (John 17:8).

    So your position that the original language words can disappear is plainly unscriptural, and that is what matters far more than what Whitaker said or what someone argued about what one miniscule reads or does not read. I would strongly encourage you to repent of the belief that whole books full of words that God gave His people can vanish completely, leaving behind no evidence other than Eusebius quoting Clement who supposedly talked to 150 year old or more Apostles.

    By the way, your argument would destroy the KJV/TR position if it were true. Thankfully, it is not.

    I think I am done here; thank you for stopping by.

19. Pardon me, one more comment.

    It is unwise to categorically state that no extant Greek MSS have “her” in them now in Luke 2:22, much less that none existed for centuries, when there has never been a complete collation of all Greek MSS of Luke’s Gospel.

    The highly problematic affirmatoin that an article written decades before Hills wrote proves that Hills is out of date is less important than the fact that the universal negative you asserted cannot be sustained by the evidence, which yet remains unexamined in its totality.

    Thanks.

20. Hi Forum,

    It looks like we should continue with cursive ms. 76 in Luke 2:22. Hatch in 1921 in an excellent paper that is online explained how the error occurred and how it was corrected. Corrected by Caspar Rene Gregory in 1887 in a Tischendorf Prolegomena, and, more importantly, this was confirmed to Hatch by the visual inspection of Professor Karl Beth (1872–1959) of Vienna. Nonetheless, we seem to have a very skeptical stance here.

    Before ms. 76, lets include the Beza note on Luke 2:22:

    Luke 2:22 (AV)
    And when the days of her purification according to the law of Moses were accomplished,
    they brought him to Jerusalem,
    to present him to the Lord;

    Beza’s note is very helpful to understanding the superb decisions of the pure Reformation Bible.

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

    Theordore Beza:

    Of Mary, αυτης. In the Vulgate: ‘eius (‘of him/her’), apparently ‘of Mary’. For it is proper to fulfill the Law, although Mary after Christ’s birth would be all the more sanctified, in any case, we have expressed the antecedent itself in full, in order to avoid any ambiguity. Most manuscripts [codices] have αυτων, and thus Origen reads also, followed by Erasmus. But I fail to see how this could fit, while the law of purification only concerns the mother. And so I prefer to follow the old edition with which the Complutensian edition agrees.
    (Jan Krans, Beyond What is Written, p. 293-294. Cited from Beza’s 1556 edition).

    Indeed, most probably the true scripture has been corrupted by those who dreamt of diminishing Mary’s holiness to some degree in this way.
    (Jan Krans, p. 294, Beza;s 1582 addition)

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

    So Beza properly followed the Latin Vulgate and the Complutensian Polyglot, and faith-consistent textual principles, without concern for extant Greek mss. We know the CP’s approach could at times properly place Latin evidences over extant Greek mss., as occurred with the heavenly witnesses.

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

    MS. 76 has been an equal opportunity problem for both AV pure Bible defenders and contras. This error of including the ms. as support for “her purification” was in the UBS apparatus until the 1983 3rd corrected edition. And today can be seen at the NETBible footnote and at the LaParola apparatus, as well as James White. And various AV defenders generally following Hills, with the faux apparent confirmation in the errant UBS apparatus and NETBible.

    Why did Hills talk of other cursives?
    There are none with “her”, if you want I can go into how that also got a bit muddied.

    And I will say that I have been a bit surprised at the attacks on the ms. 76 information.

    Steven

21. Beza said “most” MSS have the variant under discussion. He didn’t say “no” MSS have the variant he selected.

    Thanks.

22. GA 76 is online
    CSNTM
    https://manuscripts.csntm.org/manuscript/View/GA_76
    αυτων not αὐτός

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

    Just to put this issue to rest, where I have been chastised and ridiculed for simply speaking the truth about the ms. 76 and the variant (including Edward Freer Hills following the error and missing the Hatch corrective paper, along with many others including UBS and Wallace’s NETBible.)

    Note, not one thank you came my way for pulling out and sharing the info. On my end, however, it helped me collate my information for future study, which I try to keep and expand on the research site purebibleforum.

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

    One reason Beza would say “most” for αὐτῶν is that Codex Bezae Cantabrigensis had been collated by Stephanus (and came to England in 1562) and it has the masculine singular Greek text αὐτοῦ. Which may also be in about 3 extant cursives.

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

    Note:
    If our theory is that there may somehow be other extant Greek manuscripts out there matching a variant, hitherto unknown, then we could have any Greek text at all. After all, a matching Greek manuscript might arise tomorrow.

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

    “Not even one consonant or vowel can disappear from the original language text.”

    If we draw the line of NT preservation at specific Greek words always being extant, theoretically, our opponents can simply say:

    “Show me an extant preserved NT, or an exact preserved Book, why are you only claiming specific words? Preservation is not disjointed, unconnected words.”

    Plus they can point out that your preservation has special pleading, about invisible theoretical not-yet-extant manuscripts supporting specific variants.

    Personally, I am 100% comfortable that our text was preserved in Greek and Latin and that the Reformation Bible was the tool for harmonizing the preservation of the two (three with Syriac) major Bible text lines. Adding the fact of providentially anointed men over a century who used faith-consistent textual principles.

    You are not comfortable with that, I understand. However, there is a wide range of preservation views among TR and AV defenders, and your surprisingly aggressive rhetoric, in my view, works against your position.

    Blessings and grace in Jesus name,

    Steven

23. Dear Steven,

    Nobody has been ridiculing you, although your position that it is a “probability” that Clement of Alexandria had first-hand knowledge that the original copy of Hebrews was in Hebrew from Apostles who were 150+ years old, and this “probability” is reason to affirm that the original words of an entire Biblical book have been lost, is asking for it.

    Can you take a screen shot of the page from the MSS you linked to that has Luke 2:22 and circle the variant? I don’t have time to look through the challenging handwriting.

    The reason we claim “specific words” is because that is what the passages actually say. They don’t say “books.”

    “Not one thank you” is correct–you have received multiple “thank you”s not one only, in this comment section.

    I am not the one who asserted the universal negative that among the vast numbers of uncollated MSS of Luke there is not even one that reads “her.” I did assert that Dr. Hills might know a thing or two about MSS of Luke more than we do when he affirms multiple Greek witnesses to “her” in Luke 2:22. I have never collated even one Greek MS. Have you collated any?

    I am thankful that you believe in the KJV/TR. Your reasons for it, however, overthrow Scripture’s teaching on preservation. Matthew 5:18 and the other texts I cited simply say exactly the opposite of your position. They say that preservation took place in the original language. So we do NOT have the same position–your position that entire books of words that God gave the original writers can totally disappear is a radically liberal position, far beyond even the beliefs of the modernists who put together modern CT editions.

    Thanks again.

24. Thomas Ross
    your position that it is a “probability” that Clement of Alexandria had first-hand knowledge that the original copy of Hebrews was in Hebrew from Apostles who were 150+ years old

    Thomas, it is not proper quoting to twice isolate the word “probability” when what I said was:

    “Yet the Greek-autographs-only theory seems to disallow this very sensible historical possibility, or probability.”

    Why not quote accurately? – “possibility, or probability”

    Plus I never wrote of “first-hand knowledge” leading to your awkward attempt at a reductio ad absurdum of 150-year-old NT apostles.

    And I believe the information from Eusebius is more than just a possibility. Since I do not have a Greek-onlyism presuppositionalism and know that Eusebius was often an excellent historian of the Bible. And, by the grace of the Lord Jesus, I do plan a separate study on this question which I will place on my research forum.

    And the general stylistic analysis claim, of whole books, was done by fluent, native Greek scholars, church writers, of c. AD 150-200. Without a textual axe to grind. Deserves respect.

    To me that is on a whole different level than piddle seminarian Greek Anglo and German scholars today whining about the Mark ending, which is in fact a small sample size about a very special event!

    Luke and Acts have 25,000 words each, Hebrews 5,000, so I can not take your “sample size” objection to the book authorship question as meaningful.

    Plus Clement quite obviously did not have to have first hand knowledge. this was apparently passed down to Pantaenus and then to Clement of Alexandria.

    You have to discard the possibility because of your specific preservational motif. You can not have any writings by Mark or John or Paul or Matthew translated to the Greek scriptures c. AD 40-68 when the NT was in formation.

    In such a case (e.g. John writing Revelation in Hebrew before his Greek edition, helping explain the unusual Greek grammar even in the TR text) the original words would be preserved through the Greek text. Seems perfectly fine to me, but to you it is out of bounds. And the contras seem to accept and understand this position, per my conversations on CARM and elsewhere.

    In addition, you believe “words” can be preserved outside of their context, to me this is similar to the dictionary belief of preservation of the contras.

    “All the New Testament words are in the dictionary” is similar to

    “All the New Testament words are in Greek manuscripts, maybe, if we include those not discovered.”

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

    Here is where you can see the GA 76 picture, the word looks clear, so I do not think you need a red marker. On this I got a nudge and assistance from the Facebook group Textus Receptus Academy, a gentleman named Russ Boone, I did not know about this online ms. before yesterday.

    GA 76 Pic
    https://www.purebibleforum.com/index.php?threads/ga-76-pic.2730/

    https://manuscripts.csntm.org/manuscript/View/GA_76
    CSNTM Image Id: 283976
    CSNTM Image Name is: GA_76_0097.JPG.
    GA 76 has αυτων (plural)

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

    Steven

25. Third line from the bottom of the pic.

26. Thanks for posting the pic at the link. Unfortunately, at least on my devices it is blurry if I attempt to read it. Can you say what page and line it is on in the csntm.org file? Thanks.

    Of course, one MSS not having “her” does not come close to either proving that it is not in any Greek MS, contrary to what Dr. Hills affirmed, nor, much more importantly, does it change the fact that God says He would preserve the very words He gave His churches (and, since we are to live by them, we can see what they mean in context, but that does not require that God prevent every scribe from making copyist errors over the span of whole books or single books).

    I am thankful to here that you do not believe what the article you linked to plainly said about the baptismal regenerationist and allegorical interpreter Clement of Alexandria, namely, that he spoke to the Apostles first hand.

    I do not believe that the sentence you wrote with “possibility or probability” linking to the article saying Clement spoke to the Apostles first hand would be read as meaning 0.000000000001% as a possibility, but as something likely or probable. But if you think it is not really probable, thanks for clarifying that.

    And yes, you are correct that believing Matthew 5:18, 24:35, and many other passages mean Clement is wrong. Let God be true and every man a liar.

    If entire books of the NT can have disappeared because a 4th century historian quotes an Alexandrian false teacher who said this allegedly took place, preservation of Scripture is false, and Muslims, atheists, and radical critical test people can leap for joy, while even the editors of the critical text shake their heads, for they reject such radicalism.

    I am surprised to have a TR person extolling someone from Alexandria, home of the Alexandrian text.

    Thanks again for posting the link to Luke 2.

    Have a nice day.

27. Hey Steven,
    I don’t know if you can read this, but as far as Luke 2:22 goes, see my response to your post in reply mode earlier on this page.

    You said earlier: “If our theory is that there may somehow be other extant Greek manuscripts out there matching a variant, hitherto unknown, then we could have any Greek text at all.”

    Can you explain why it isn’t possible that Beza and the editors of the Complutensian had Greek copies of Luke with the primary reading (represented in Beza’s 1598 edition) in it? I posted where both of these texts have it, and included this (https://i.imgur.com/cVPcHYw.png) image in my earlier post above.

    Also, perhaps more importantly, do you know why the variant reading αυτων can’t be translated as a singular, as the Geneva Bible editors did in 1560 when they only had Stephanus’ editions and earlier, as Beza’s Greek hadn’t been published yet? Sabbath, for example, is correctly translated to the singular in both Matthew 12:1 and 28:1.

    I would also go on the record and state I don’t think there is a pre-existing Hebrew version of any New Testament books, such as an original Matthew Gospel in this language as some have suggested, though there are some Aramaic words in the Gospels, for instance John 1:38 (comp. John 20:16 which seems to represent spoken Greek). The reason why I say this is because of the preservation of the Scriptures, c.f. 1 Peter 1:23-25. Thanks for providing your insights and I hope to hear from you again eventually.

28. That should have been “hear,” not “here,” and critical “text,” not “test.” Pardon me.

29. Hi Thomas and forum,

    Above I did put the information, it is not hard to navigate to the sequential GA#, working till 0097.

    https://manuscripts.csnm.org/manuscript/View/GA_76
    CSNTM Image Id: 283976
    CSNTM Image Name is: GA_76_0097.JPG.
    GA 76 has αυτων (plural)
    3rd line from bottom on this pic

    Thomas
    ” Clement of Alexandria, namely, that he spoke to the Apostles first hand.”

    Sandra Sweeny Silver had a wacky statement:
    “Clement of Alexandria was a very early Christian writer who had access to some of the living Apostles and 70 Disciples of Jesus, so he had first-hand witnesses …”

    but since she had “Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-215 AD)” I did not think anyone here would get tripped up, the point was to look at the Eusebius material. If I did it again, I would include a disclaimer.

    If I had to make a pct guess about Paul writing Hebrews in Hebrew, something I avoid, probably I would say “50-50”, which is reflected in my “possibility, or probability”.

    Matthew 5:18 (AV)
    For verily I say unto you,
    Till heaven and earth pass,
    one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law,
    till all be fulfilled.

    Matthew 24:35 (AV)
    Heaven and earth shall pass away,
    but my words shall not pass away.

    Please do not improperly speak for my position on those two verses. I never have connected them to theorized Greek manuscript preservation, and I do not think they prove the historical position of Clement on the authorship of Hebrews wrong.

    “If entire books of the NT can have disappeared”

    No books disappeared, in a history with John or Paul writing a book in Hebrew, they simply are no longer extant in the original autographic language. Greek editions were available, virtually immediately. This does not affect our pure Reformation Bible one iota.

    “I am surprised to have a TR person extolling someone from Alexandria, home of the Alexandrian text.”

    The two streams of Bible AV mythology of Alexandria vs. Antioch text-types, two streams, is largely a Benjamin Wilkinson myth that has been rather embarrassing for AV defenders. Wilkinson from the Adventist background lauded the Waldensians and wanted them to have an Old Latin text that is TR style, against the bad RCC Latin Vulgate.

    There were good and bad expositors in both regions, e.g. if you like Athanasius he was from Alexandria. The corruption of the Alexandrian text likely arose mostly after Clement of Alexandrian, and the root cause was gnostic copyists taking short-cuts, much of it is simply a Reader’s Digest text. It is hard to pin that on Clement of Alexandria. Carl Cosaert has a 2008 study, The text of the Gospels in Clement, that shows Clement with a proto-Byz text. Earlier, Burgon had him 55% Byz (Traditional Text) over Neologian, https://books.google.com/books?id=fX9CAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA99 .

    Steven

    • Hi Steve,

      I know that Mark Ward pounds on and against the two streams view and then presents a staw man of the concept. The doctrine of a corrupted Bible and a pure Bible, you can see all over scripture. Scripture and history also show a corrupted church and a pure church. They reveal corrupted teachings or doctrines and pure teachings or doctrines. What is the broad road and the narrow road that Jesus talks about? Scripture and history call early Christianity, the way, as opposed to what? The way of the godly as opposed to the way of the ungodly. Paul writes about writings pawned off as his to deceive. Tying this to Benjamin Wilkinson, SD Adventist, cooperates with the fable that the one Bible belief originated in the 20th century.

      • Hi Kent,

        First, I agree with you that there is a fable about Wilkinson starting the AV perfection belief, or the KJV-only movement, and actually Wilkinson’s position has a number of weaknesses. e.g. ironically he never did apply Psalm 12 to the AV. And he never defended the heavenly witnesses.

        The book by Joey Fauth is helpful with all that nonsense, The Word: God Will Keep It! The 400 Year History of the King James Bible Only Movement. So is the independent history of Edward Freer Hills, not touched by Wilkinson, directly or through Fuller.

        And I understand the reluctance to follow any contra, but really Mark Ward (a horrid writer, but let’s avoid genetic fallacies backwards and forwards) is speaking what was shown by Bryan Ross, who is a KJB defender. Ross actually followed up on my writing, after I realized that Doug Kutilek had actually made some valid points against Wilkinson’s embrace of the Old Latin. It was a bit of a research chore for me to study how Wilkinson had mangled the excellent writings of Frederick Nolan (1784-1864) and I walked Ross through that history.

        You really can not separate “Two Streams” from the false idea that the Old Latin (supposedly the Bible of the Waldensian movement) is the good guy and the Latin Vulgate (RCC) is the bad guy. And that is simply false.

        Definitely there were early corruptions from the mid-first century to AD 250, some from gnostics, and many of them are from Alexandria. However, that is not what “Two Streams” says when it tries to line up Bibles and wrongly puts the Old Latin and the Vulgate on opposite sides. This is the major error in Two Streams (there are others) but it is enough to make many AV defenders look like they do not know the textual history and are just following one another without verifying.

        Kent, I know two streams, two trees, two lines, is very popular among AV defenders, it is an attractive approach, it has some germs of truth, but there comes a time where we have to give the hard word.

        Steven

        • Steve,

          Streams is a metaphor like either a confluence or bifurcation of two rivers. Something has departed from the mainstream. It could be a tree and a branch. It could be James’s two founds, the bitter and the sweet. It could be a road that splits into two. There is one Bible, the words of which God perfectly preserved, and then there are those that are corrupted.

          Charles Ball writes in 1884 in a course of lessons on the OT, “The two families may be compared to two streams flowing side by side, one comparatively clear, the other foul and muddy.”

          J. L. Nye writes in 1882 in an Anecdote on Bible Texts: “If your life be made up of two streams, worldliness running in like the Arve, and you hope to have spirituality running in like the blue Rhone , you will soon be mistaken.”

          A Baptist Paper, the Journal and the Messenger, in 1919, writes: “And here we find the children of men dividing into two streams; those that follow the flesh, the Cain people, and those that honor the Lamb, the tribe of Abel.”

          What I’m saying is that you can make this type of comparison, forget the use of the metaphor streams, and the Mark Wards of the world will say that it is discredited by association with Wilkerson. Wilkerson was picking something up that already existed. There are definitely two sides, two branches, two streams, however you want to put it.

          • Kent Brandenburg
            “Wilkerson was picking something up that already existed. There are definitely two sides, two branches, two streams, however you want to put it.”

            We can talk about metaphors, but “two streams” as defined by Wilkinson was very specific. And today it is invariably accompanied by charts, one is called the Hark Chart, which places the Old Latin on the good stream and the Vulgate on the polluted stream. While there are other many other problems with the chart, this is the one that really cries out “worthless!”.

            You can see the genesis of the theory:

            Our Authorized Bible Vindicated (1930)
            Benjamin. George Wilkinson (1872-1968)
            https://books.google.com/books?id=CDuVBQAAQBAJ&pg=PT15
            https://archive.org/details/doctrine-bible-benjamin-g-wilkinson-our-authorized-bible-vindicated-01

            “Fundamentally, there are only two streams of Bibles”

            And you can see the Wilkinson defense of the theory:

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

            Answers to Objections
            A Reply to the “Review” of my Book
            “Our Authorized Bible Vindicated”
            Benjamin. George Wilkinson
            http://www.sdadefend.com/MINDEX-Resource%20Library/ANSWERS%20TO%20OBJECTIONS.pdf
            https://books.google.com/books?id=SxgnDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT229

            I also proved, historically, in the same chapter, that the Waldensian Bible was from the Textus Receptus. Now the Spirit of Prophecy says that the Waldensian Bible was of apostolic origin, uncorrupted, entire, and teaching apostolic Christianity. The Reformation adopted the Textus Receptus; the Jesuit counter-Reformation adopted the Vaticanus. …. The Spirit of Prophecy endorses this line of reasoning. I gave in my book, (page 42) that quotation from Sister White which shows that the Waldenses possessed a Bible which came from
            apostolic days, was entire, was unadulterated and was ever sought by the fury of the papists to be corrupted. The Spirit of Prophecy, however, tells us that angels restrained their malignant hatred and their efforts to bury the Waldensian Bible under a mass of error and superstition.

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

            You see, this more than over-simplified, actually false, representation of textual history, was intrinsically a part of the Spirit of Prophecy (Ellen G. White) error about the Waldensian Bible.

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

            And I have a page on all this here:

            Pure Bible Forum
            two lines – two streams – two trees
            https://purebibleforum.com/index.php?threads/two-lines-two-streams-two-trees.73/

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

            Here Bryan Ross helped bring this understanding to the AV defender mainstreadm.

            The Two Streams of Bibles Model of Transmission: Its Origins & Accuracy (2019)
            Bryan Ross
            http://gracelifebiblechurch.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/The-Two-Streams-of-Bibles-Model-of-Transmission-Complete-Notes.pdf

            In the Pure Bible Facebook Group, I was able to interact with researcher Steven Avery. As it turned out, Avery also had misgivings about the “two streams of Bibles” model but for different reasons. Instead of questioning the paradigm via the Gothic and Peshitta translations as I had, Avery’s doubts were primarily centered around what he perceived to be false dichotomy between the Old Latin and Latin Vulgate. Moreover, Avery also expressed misgivings regarding Benjamin Wilkinson, the fountainhead of the “two streams” notion and his ties to 7th Day Adventism.

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

            This might explain why Rick Norris and Mark Ward, terrible writers on their own account, are able to follow the Doug Kutilek lead and point out obvious and blatant errors from AV defenders.

            btw, I am far more sympathetic to Adventists than many of our Baptist and Reformed TR & AV defenders. Personally, I have had good contacts with their health retreats over the years, and understand their sabbath position. And I believe Wilkinson was brave in what he wrote on the Authorized Version, and a bit of a pioneer.

            However, showing the falsity of his two streams position, and explaining how it arose out of Adventist error, is simply a reasonable service. Too many AV defenders have tripped themselves up following this rabbit trail of the charts.

            Maybe there is a way to rehabilitate “Two Streams” theory on the NT, but it is difficult with so much misinformation around.

            Steven Avery

          • Steve,

            I’ve never read Wilkinson, and I’ve never used the terminology, “two streams,” and seen the charts on this. All I’m saying is that if you say there is a path of truth, represented by the doctrine of preservation, churches that embraced the TR/Hebrew Masoretic, a kind of supernaturalism, versus minority text, naturalistic, modern science of textual criticism, these two somethings, then the Mark Wards, etc. call it two streams view. It’s just not true that it is an embrace of Wilkinson, et al. Do you not see two basic views here? Ward and those like him don’t like this divide into two. They want a kind of neutral position that sees us all as textual critics, all basically doing the same thing, all on the same team.

          • J. L. Nye writes in 1882 in an Anecdote on Bible Texts: “If your life be made up of two streams, worldliness running in like the Arve, and you hope to have spirituality running in like the blue Rhone , you will soon be mistaken.”

            Looks like this is originally Charles Spurgeon. 🙂
            https://books.google.com/books?id=12czAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA867
            https://books.google.com/books?id=12czAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA867

30. Hi Forum,

    Andrew shared some information and asked about the Geneva 1560 having “her purification”. In 1556 Beza had both a Latin and Greek New Testament, it is very possible they had contradictory texts, singular meaning her in the Latin, and their.

    Anyway, the following information shows direct interest in the Greek ms. situation.

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

    Beyond What is Written – (2006) p. 294,
    Jan Krans
    https://archive.org/details/BeyondWhatIsWrittenErasmusAndBezaAsConjecturalCriticsOfTheNew/page/n303/mode/2up

    Gagny (In Euangelia Scholia, 1559, pp. 181v-182r) expresses the same preference for αὐτῆς, having noted αὐτοῦ and αὐτῶν in Greek manuscripts, as well as αὐτῆς in the Complutensian Polyglot. The Geneva Bible (1560) has a marginal note to the reading “her purification”: “Or, their.” …

    Note the direct interest in Greek manuscripts, even though Gagny was working with a Latin text and commentary.

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

    Jean de Gagny (d. 1549)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_de_Gagny

    So presumably Gagny did this manuscript study and decision no later than 1549.

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

    In Euangelia Scholia
    https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_fIOoN4YMm_cC/page/n399/mode/2up
    Note on right-hand side bottom of page begins:
    “Pro eius, Graeci codices variant…”

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

    So it looks like the lack of extant Greek ms. attestation was not considered a problem. And they knew the plural Greek was different than the singular forms.

    And the Complutensian contributed to the confidence and accuracy in making the decision to place the singular feminine in Greek and English editions.

    Was it “corrective analysis”? Not in the big picture, looking at the Complutensian, but yes in the picture of the Erasmus-Stephanus-Beza Greek New Testaments, where about a dozen editions had the plural error.

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

    Steven Avery

    • “In 1556 Beza had both a Latin and Greek New Testament,”

      Unfortunately, that’s not accurate. The 1556 edition was in Latin. See the screenshot (https://i.imgur.com/YeBmeaV.png) of that edition here. This page (http://textus-receptus.com/wiki/Theodore_Beza) mentions that 1565 is the year that he had a Greek edition published.

      The reason why people were concerned with the Greek variants is obvious, that’s what their area of research was. Based on what John Mill says, I think that Beza and the editors of the Complutensian had MSS that read with the principal Greek reading, which is what we see in the 1598 edition TR, however either reading would translate the same way. This puts in on par with a great number of other variants known to exist in the received text, whether spelling differences, nomina sacra (i.e. Revelation 16:5) or inflection or diacritical differences that have no effect that can be properly discerned on the way which it should be translated. And I think this is a sure thing.

      Also, the fact that the 1560 Geneva Bible says what you mentioned (or, “their” in the margin) only supports the notion I suggested, which is that they weren’t simply borrowing from T. Beza when they wrote the actual translation of Luke 2:22. It seems to be as John Mill noticed, that everyone in their exemplars either had the principal reading (αὐτῆς) or when they didn’t they still translated it the same way regardless.

      • Hi Andrew,

        Apologies on the 1556 error.

        Apparently, using Jan Krans, Beyond What is Written, and his blog, as the source …

        Beyond What is Written – Beza as Editor of the New Testament
        [URL unfurl=”false”]https://brill.com/previewpdf/book/9789047410515/BP000011.xml[/URL]

        Beza’s New Testament editions online
        [URL unfurl=”false”]http://vuntblog.blogspot.com/2012/11/bezas-new-testament-editions-online.html[/URL]

        … In 1556 there were two Latin texts, one traditional Vulgate, one corrected more towards the Greek, using the Stephanus collations. The idea of two differing Latin texts goes back to Erasmus. It would be interesting to find any scholarship showing, e.g. 25 of the major differences between the two texts. Also it would be good to try to identify online the two differing texts.

        As Jan Krans says in the comments on the blog page above:

        “The 1560 Geneva stays very close to Beza’s text and opinions, but not slavishly.”

        So the Beza note of 1556, above, would likely be a spur to “her purification” in 1560.

        Thus, their main area of textual manuscript and edition research was Greek and Latin. And the early church writers and a faith-consistent textual analysis were used for both.

        It would be interesting to see cases where Latin variants were discussed. An obvious Latin variant is the errant omission in the Lateran Council and the Complutensian of “the three agree in one” from the earthly witnesses. This was a late variant, doctrinally motivated. Luke 2:22 has the eorum plural variant in a couple of Old Latin mss. Acts 20:28 is an example where the Old Latin is quite split between Lord and God. There are many interesting Latin splits.

        Andrew, I disagree with your Luke 2:22 manuscript analysis, especially your idea that the Greek plural was being translated as a feminine singular, “either reading would translate the same way.” That does not explain the various English editions with “their purification”, (Tyndale, Coverdale, Matthew, Taverner, Great Bible.) nor the Gagney note, nor the Beza notes.

        As for your analogy with sabbath plural or singular verses, that is an area where I would need a fluent native Greek, and/or a skilled Greek translator to weigh in. However, the issues look to be quite different.

        We could do a whole post on the John Mill section, where there are some problems. The strongest part is his noting the masculine singular reading that is in Codex Beza Cantabrigiensis as absurd.

        You mention 1598, however the Beza notes began in 1556 (before Geneva 1560) and Greek text correction I believe in 1582.

        Steven Avery

      • Hi Steven,

        Thanks for your insights. I am aware of the fact that Tyndale wrote “their” in this verse, but I like to think that if he’d had enough time, he would have made a translation similar to the King James Bible. Others when they agree are simply following suit with that translation here in this passage. When more work was put into manuscript analysis, and work put into being more comprehensive, the accurate translation as put forth by the Geneva translation (New Testament 1557, full Bible 1560) was rightly ascertained. All they needed to do was dedicate enough time to completing and refining our translation, in increasingly more well-funded and supplied translation projects, at last culminating in 1604-1611 with yet another translation beyond that one.

        But back to Luke 2:22 for a moment. There are medieval translations – the Vetus Latina, the Anglo-Saxon (Royal MS 1 A XIV, f.86v) aka the “Wessex Gospels” – that say the same as the KJV in this verse. They again either had exemplars that contained the principal reading, or else they translated the variant reading to the same thing anyway. It has to be one of those two things in every case. And this is the same as in a lot of other passages as well. There is also the existence of the principal reading in the case of Luke 2:22, in the Complutensian Polyglot, as I showed, from 1520, showing the same Greek text. So then there really is no reason to assign this as something unique to T. Beza. Rather, he, and others as well, had access to Greek MSS that contained the principal reading – so, the 1598 TR version, which is one of the primary witnesses that we possess, reflects that. It must have been in the original Greek in order for it to appear in these places. And, even in the case of the variant reading being sometimes present, this was not one of the examples where it altered the translation as we see it still translated the same, rather consistently. There are such examples, but they are very limited, such as Luke 17:36 (present or omitted), John 16:33 (ἔχετε or ἕξετε), or Romans 12:11 (καιρῷ = time, or κυρίω = Lord) and a very limited number of other places. The variant here in Luke 2:22 is not that – it’s simply something that translates the same either way. Therefore not as much of a concern.

        Hence, if the people who put together the 1560 Geneva translation had access to the Greek MSS, the same ones that were later reflected in the 1598 TR edition of T. Beza, then they used that as their source for making the English (and French, etc.) text more accurate to the original language. This is obvious. But if they did NOT possess it, which is the only other alternative, then they repeated the translation process of others by most accurately translating that alternative reading as the singular “her” anyway, which is proven, in this second case, because Beza hadn’t released ANY Greek text until 1565, and they relied solely on the original languages (in both the Old Testament and the New Testament – for the first time in modern English I might add) in making the Geneva Bible of 1560. So, it’s an airtight testimony no matter what. And I would add in any case every translation, the Geneva 1560, Bishop 1568 and the KJV all reflect the Greek primary reading of this verse, in any case. So there’s no problem, either in the Greek of, or in the translation of this verse. No one is relying on a single witness or a single change, since we have the Greek being published already in 1520, as earlier noted. And this is definitely not a Latin version dependency: the assumptions one has to make to force that scenario are rather unbelievable, considering this evidence – and most certainly (this is the important point) not required. Now, I would note translations like the Vetus Latina, as well as patristics, more generally – these only serve as supporting evidence to the already existing witnesses we have. So, for instance, we could use the Diatessaron, for example, to support of lots of KJV readings long before Aleph or B; but we also have (and always will have) Greek manuscript witnesses for these variants as well: namely the TR themselves, which reflect Greek MSS, and in most cases modern academia has earlier, or much earlier, manuscripts that reflect those same readings as well. We never have to rely on some Latin version, though. Neither did the TR editors or the KJV translators or Geneva translators or the early church copyists or others, all going back to the autographs. There’s an unbreakable chain of uncorrupted transmission – and always by multiple witnesses – when it comes to the inspired originals— and evidence always conveniently turns out to support that. And this uncorrupted transmission that never seems to be able to break is our foundation, which is solid and unchanging, as it was 500 years ago when we used the MSS to construct the TR, or even longer ago than that. Hopefully that makes sense. The Scripture cannot be broken – as said in John 10:35.

        • Andrew
          “The variant here in Luke 2:22 is not that – it’s simply something that translates the same either way. Therefore not as much of a concern.”

          If that were true, nothing else would be needed, at least for AV defense. The TR issue might still exist.

          It looks like you are saying that the ultra-majority reading αὐτῶν can be translated “their purification” or “her purification”. (If you are saying something else, please indicate, thanks!)

          Afaik, this is a unique claim that you have made, based on an ultra-dubious analogy attempt. And perhaps misreading John Mill. Or perhaps dealing with a different variant, not αὐτῶν, a singular reading that is not gender fixed and allows two translations, which does exist in some languages.

          Dozens of fine writers have discussed Luke 2:22, pro and con to her purification, and I have never seen this claim made till your posts on this forum.

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

          btw, I believe you are confusing two fundamental issues.

          1) does the evidence point to an original Greek for “her purification”

          2) do we see extant manuscripts for “her purification”

          =====

          #1 has been my position, posting a possible corruption even in the first century, within 60 years of Luke’s writing to Theophilus.

          #2 – the evidence is no extant mss.
          (you sort of acknowledge this by moving to the Vetus Latina, which does help with #1, as explained in my quote of two living streams from Cornwall)

          True, anybody can claim that there are, were, or will be Greek mss. in hand, with αὐτῆς.

          We agree that there were such mss. in the first century, penned by Luke. (Since we can be quite confident that Luke was penned in Greek.)

          However, the Complutensian, Gagny, Beza, Geneva editions, AV, etc. do not give any positive evidence for extant Greek ms. support at that time. Nor do the searches today.

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

          Steven

          • Hi Steven,
            “However, the Complutensian, Gagny, Beza, Geneva editions, AV, etc. do not give any positive evidence for extant Greek ms. support at that time.”

            Aha. I said already in an above post that: “We also learn from Mill, furthermore, on p. 748 of his Novum Testamentum (in his discussion on 1 John 5:7), that Stephanus and the other TR editors had access to ancient exemplars (as Mill calls them) in their day, and that this is basis of what represents the readings in each of their texts.”

            There is no reason to doubt what John Mill says, and so certainly no reason why we would be required to reject it.

            Also, I went to considerable trouble to point out before, that Vetus Latina translations and other sources such as patristics are only in a supporting role. The main point has always been what I just mentioned now in the above paragraph, and I think anyone at all who seriously reads what I wrote before will see that. God bless and take care.

31. correction .. Joey Faust, not Joey Fauth

32. Hi Forum!

    Kent
    “I’ve never read Wilkinson, and I’ve never used the terminology, “two streams,” and seen the charts on this. …”

    However, this argument, originating from Benjamin Wilkinson, has been used by dozens of TR and AV defender writers, often with the misinformation charts that place the Old Latin on the good side and the Vulgate Latin on the bad side. This mistaken push is not just metaphorical, and has undermined the integrity and accuracy of TR and AV defense.

    Can we really chastise Mark Ward for an argument against the metaphorical idea of “two streams” that he has not actually made, but that we feel he would make? Remember, stopped clocks are right twice a day.

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

    Here is a more accurate take of “two living streams” from the 1800s, Nathaniel Ellsworth Cornwall (1812-1879) was involved in a superb defense of the heavenly witnesses authenticity, one of the very best writings, in two parts, the first part was:

    American Church Review (1874)
    The genuineness of I. John, v. 7
    https://books.google.com/books?id=rkQUAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA625
    p. 625-641

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

    We are looking at the conclusion of the second part.

    American Church Review
    The genuineness of I. John, v. 7 proved by neglected witnesses
    Nathaniel Ellsworth Cornwall
    https://books.google.com/books?id=YaPSAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA528
    p. 509-528

    And diligent, thorough scholars, in search of the whole truth of history upon this question, must discuss it on broader ground than Biblical critics commonly have in
    view. Thorough scholars recognize the fact, that every Latin Version made before the era of printing, and having a diction of its own distinct from that of other Latin versions, implies the existence of a Greek manuscript from which that translation was made.
    When this fact is duly regarded by all whom it concerns a vast advance will be made toward the true and safe decision of this long controversy, by a thorough comparison and combination of ‘‘the Greek evidence” and “the Latin evidence” from all sources, not as two kinds of testimony having rival or unequal claims to attention and regard, but strictly co-equal wherever they can he traced as contemporaneous. Both alike records, in ancient
    manuscripts, of readings received when those manuscripts—the Latin as well as the Greek—were penned; two living streams of Holy Truth and cherished knowledge of that truth ; there flowing in their own proper channels as distinct tributaries for the diffusion
    of revealed wisdom among the nations; here intermingled, rolling on with all their affluence of sacred learning above the ruins of the old philosophy, both Greek and Latin.

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

    This fits the actual activities of the superb Reformation-era scholars in the century of Bible analysis and collation from Erasmus to Stephanus to Beza to the learned men of the AV. You can actually start earlier with Lorenzo Valla (1441-1552) whose work was the spur to Erasmus.

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

    Steven

33. Our basic differences I will try to express.

    Thomas Ross and maybe other posters believe that the promises of preservation filter down to the question of known or extant or theorized Greek manuscripts, word by word.

    This is an outgrowth of a Greek-primacy perspective, which is sometimes supported by Confessional statements around the 1600s, where Greek is proclaimed the original language of the NT. It is also supported by a specific interpretation of New Testament scripture preservation verses.

    Also all pure English Bible inspiration, with a central focus on the AV, is carefully given the derivative sense. This is superior to the no inspiration view of many, such as the Dean Burgon Society, yet it also again a type of second fiddle.

    The positions of Erasmus, Stephanus and Beza were more involved in dual language New Testament reconstruction, utilizing preservation from Greek and Latin manuscripts. Syriac as well, in the 2nd half of the century. And related evidences like the early church writers and faith-consistent textual principles, principles which are often opposite the modern textual criticism pseudo-principles. Thus I have not seen those 1500s textual savants make statements of absolute Greek primacy. Erasmus to Titlemans wrote of “both from both”, Greek and Latin correcting, when he was responding to a Latin-primacy perspective.

    Returning to the Greek manuscript support, that is why so much effort has been placed here on theorizing Greek manuscripts for Luke 2:22 for ‘her’ purification. Either the Greek manuscripts existed in the 1500s, or they exist today, or the Greek-primacy proponents conjecture some other way. It is not sufficient to say that there was a corruption in the Greek manuscript line in the first two centuries, there has to be a theorized, physical quasi-extant ongoing manuscript tradition transmission in later years.

    And the same, presumably, would be done for the 5 to 10 New Testament variants in the later TR editions and the AV that do not appear to have any extant Greek manuscript support. Andrew mentioned a few, there are a few in Revelation, and others often in the Bible debate. Somehow the Greek-preservation primacists have to theorize not just an original Greek of c. AD 50-200 which was corrupted, but a transmission Greek through the centuries.

    A corollary of all this, at least for Thomas, is the rejection of any theories of translation to Greek in the original text. No first-in-Hebrew Revelation by John, helping to explain the linguistic issues, no Hebrew Hebrews by Paul with Luke a translating amanuensis as explained by Clement. no Latin edition by Mark for Rome, as explained by Hoskier and numerous others, unless it was late, no original Hebrew Matthew unless it was a different book than canonical Matthew. (The first three I see as very real possibilities.)

    As I have expressed, overall, my own position is different. My defense is of the Bible I can read, the Authorized Version. While I study the Greek and Latin sources that brought forth the AV text, I see the Greek and Latin as “two living streams”, as expressed by Cornwall, that brought forth the AV excellence, purity and perfection.

    The accusation is made that I am denying preservation when I point out verses without an extant Greek ms support, or theorize early non-Greek texts translated to Greek. This, I believe, is based on an interpretation and historical base which I do not share.

    Thank you for allowing me to share these thoughts!

    Grace and peace in the name of the Lord Jesus,

    Steven

34. Dear Steven,

    You are correct that we have different views of preservation. In all of your discussion, you have never provided careful exegesis of the Scriptural texts that plainly and clearly say that the specific words that were given to the infallibly controlled human writers of Scripture are going to be preserved forever and available to God’s people–for these texts plainly say that your view is wrong.

    Your attempt to defend the AV from a non-perfect preservation perspective destroys Scriptural preservation, its most important problem, as well as advocating radical anti-preservation ideas like entire books of Scripture disappearing without a trace in the manuscript record, something far to the left of even the editors of the critical text.

    Your historical arguments are also highly problematic (such as your quote above that every Latin variant requires the existence of a Greek text that had that variant–so scribes of Latin MSS made no copyist errors?), and your attempts to prove that readings with no Greek MSS support must be defended is also problematic. If one were to grant that when Beza said “most” MSS have a reading he really meant “no” MSS have the 1598 TR reading in Luke 2:22, that Dr. Hills is wrong when he said some MSS have the KJV reading in Luke 2:22, that we can draw dogmatic conclusions that no MS has a reading in Luke although nobody has ever even come close to collating all the MS of Luke, etc. all you would prove is that other TR editions in Luke 2:22 are correct. It would be far better to draw this conclusion than your view that entire books of Scripture can disappear without a trace, like the golden plates of the book of Mormon.

    Please carefully study Scripture’s promises on preservation and see if what the verses actually say fits what you are arguing for. If widespread adoption of your view would actually destroy the case for the TR, KJV, and preservation, maybe you should rethink it.

    Finally, I would still like it if you could tell me exactly what page in the MSS you linked to I can see the high quality pic that shows that MS does not have the KJV reading, and where on the page it is. The smaller one that allegedly had it three lines from the bottom is blurry, and it has no page number. I trust that you are reading these MSS yourself and actually know what you are looking at, and the same is true when you are talking about Syriac and the book of Revelation, namely, that you can read Syriac fluently and so know what you are speaking about. Also, you may not be aware that the book by Jan Kranz is in copyright by Brill, so whoever posted it online did so illegally; so maybe it is best not to link to books illegally placed online. I would like to get it free online instead of paying a lot of money to buy it, but that would be unethical.

    Thanks.

    • Thomas Ross

      “… destroys Scriptural preservation … anti-preservation ideas like entire books of Scripture disappearing without a trace“

      Thomas, please, you are repeating what I consider nonsense already answered. If John or his amanuensis translated a Hebrew Revelation to Greek, no book of scripture is lost. The book simply exists in Greek.

      You only try to create a difficulty because you are following your private idea of Greek-onlyism and Greek-primacy, which you drill down by variants from quasi-extant Greek manuscripts. This is a new theory, afaik only of the last decades, it has no historic base.

      Your preservation perspective is simply your own staight-jacket. A contra will ask you where the perfectly preserved word was in AD 1000 or 1500 and you will not have an answer of substance. Maybe you will follow Ellen G. White and Benjamin Wilkinson and respond about the Waldesnians. You have no real answer that fits your artificial construct.

      And God is faithful to his promises. You should try to understand the interpretation that is not Greek-primacy, including the “two living streams” expressed by Cornwall, which is close to the ideas of Erasmus, Stephanus and Beza.

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

      Thomas Ross
      “our quote above that every Latin variant requires the existence of a Greek text”

      Yes, Nathaniel Ellsworth Cornwall technically should not have used “every.” His context was variants like the heavenly witnesses and Acts 8:37, not piddle scribal corruptions. By focusing on the technical, you miss the incredible significance of the reality.

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

      Thomas Ross
      “and your attempts to prove that readings with no Greek MSS support must be defended is also problematic.”

      5-10 readings. Your problem, not mine,

      You have two choices.
      1) Abandon the TR-AV text, for a new Thomas Ross Version.
      2) Pretend you have ms. support, even if nothing is there.

      For me, there is nothing problematic with Luke 2:22 or other verses having extant no Greek ms. support, and the Reformation Bible correction.

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

      Thomas Ross
      when Beza said “most” MSS have a reading

      And I explained that there is a third reading, as in Codex Bezae, explaining his “most”.

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

      Thomas Ross
      ” … Dr. Hills is wrong when he said some MSS have the KJV reading in Luke 2:22″

      All the evidence is that Edward Freer Hills made a couple of honest errors on Luke 2:22. Others have as well. And I can keep giving you more information as to how this occurred, or you could make some inquiries of your own in textual circles. The bottom line is simple, there is no known Greek manuscript support for the ‘her’ purification text.

      Thomas Ross
      “we can draw dogmatic conclusions that no MS has a reading in Luke although nobody has ever even come close to collating all the MS of Luke, etc. all you would prove is that other TR editions in Luke 2:22 are correct..”

      So this means that you are in fact uncertain of what text is correct. Interesting. If there is no tangible Greek support, you will in fact abandon the AV text as defective.

      Apparently you will abandon the AV text on every variant where you do not find Greek ms. support.

      And will you abandon the TR, all editions, if all the TR texts do not have Greek support?
      Ooops. Your slope has slipped.

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

      Thomas Ross
      “It would be far better to draw this conclusion than your view that entire books of Scripture can disappear without a trace, like the golden plates of the book of Mormon.”

      Comments like this, based on your own nouveau-modern quirky ideas of preservation, really are foolish. You are looking for an echo chamber. As I point out, your preservation ideas are easily torn to shreds by anybody who knows the ‘facts on the ground’. Are you going to follow Ellen G. White and Benjamin Wilkinson and try to claim pristine Waldensian manuscripts, provenance and actual manuscripts unknown?

      Plus you are jumping around different topics, the simple fact that we do not have extant support for ‘her’ in Greek in Luke 2:22 to the idea that John wrote Revelation in Hebrew (or any book can have an earlier form in another language.) Two independent topics.

      Thomas Ross
      “Please carefully study Scripture’s promises on preservation and see if what the verses actually say fits what you are arguing for. If widespread adoption of your view would actually destroy the case for the TR, KJV, and preservation, maybe you should rethink it.”

      Basic issue: I do not accept your idea that the scripture promises of preservation drill down to the issue of a pastiche of widely differing Greek manuscripts jointed together by taping together verse and word manipulations in a modern apparatus.

      After laughing, the contras can easily point out the problems with this idea. If you believe that all generations must have the perfectly preserved Bible, you better be ready to tell them where it was in AD 500 and 1000 and 1500.

      Plus now we see you are even ready to abandon TR and AV editions that do not have your patch-quilt Greek word support.

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

      Thomas Ross
      “Finally, I would still like it if you could tell me exactly what page in the MSS you linked to I can see the high quality pic that shows that MS does not have the KJV reading, and where on the page it is. The smaller one that allegedly had it three lines from the bottom is blurry, and it has no page number. ”

      The page number was given on an earlier post but in one of the spots the url was wrong.

      It is not hard to navigate to the sequential GA#, working till 0097, that number is on the bottom of each pic.
      https://manuscripts.csntm.org/manuscript/View/GA_76

      CSNTM Image Id: 283976
      CSNTM Image Name is: GA_76_0097.JPG.

      – added, 14th row down, 6th pic on the row

      GA 76 has αυτων (plural)

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

      Thomas Ross
      “I trust that you are reading these MSS yourself and actually know what you are looking at”

      I found it easy to compare the Greek letters in the manuscript to the Greek letters of the various variants, no special language skills needed. However, you may not have the variant forms handy, and eyesight varies.

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

      Thomas Ross
      “and the same is true when you are talking about Syriac and the book of Revelation, namely, that you can read Syriac fluently and so know what you are speaking about.”

      Here I am working with a paper by Isaac Hollister Hall, more information at:

      Pure Bible Forum
      Syriac Revelation – close to the Received Text – Isaac Hollister Hall
      https://www.purebibleforum.com/index.php?threads/syriac-revelation-ms-very-close-to-the-received-text.2465/

      It would be interesting to have this reviewed by the experts today, like George Kiraz. So I am trying to work in that direction.

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

      Thomas Ross
      “Also, you may not be aware that the book by Jan Kranz is in copyright by Brill, so whoever posted it online did so illegally; so maybe it is best not to link to books illegally placed online. I would like to get it free online instead of paying a lot of money to buy it, but that would be unethical.”

      Right, normally I avoid any urls to books that seem to be copyright infringed. The moderator can remove that url. My understanding, Jan Krans is accepting of its availability and has not sent Archive.org a takedown notice. If so, kudos to Jan, and its availability has really helped people to understand his scholarship approach (uneven conceptually but technically very strong.) Still better not to post the url on forums.

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

      Steven Avery
      Dutchess County, NY USA
      http://www.linktr.ee/stevenavery

    • (second attempt, first lost formatting)

      Thomas Ross
      “… destroys Scriptural preservation … anti-preservation ideas like entire books of Scripture disappearing without a trace“

      Thomas, please, you are repeating what I consider nonsense already answered. If John or his amanuensis translated a Hebrew Revelation to Greek, no book of scripture is lost. The book simply exists in Greek.

      You only try to create a difficulty because you are following your private idea of Greek-onlyism and Greek-primacy, which you drill down by variants from quasi-extant Greek manuscripts. This is a new theory, afaik only of the last decades, it has no historic base.

      Your preservation perspective is simply your own staight-jacket. A contra will ask you where the perfectly preserved word was in AD 1000 or 1500 and you will not have an answer of substance. Maybe you will follow Ellen G. White and Benjamin Wilkinson and respond about the Waldesnians. You have no real answer that fits your artificial construct.

      And God is faithful to his promises. You should try to understand the interpretation that is not Greek-primacy, including the “two living streams” expressed by Cornwall, which is close to the ideas of Erasmus, Stephanus and Beza.

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

      Thomas Ross
      “our quote above that every Latin variant requires the existence of a Greek text”

      Yes, Nathaniel Ellsworth Cornwall technically should not have used “every.” His context was variants like the heavenly witnesses and Acts 8:37, not piddle scribal corruptions. By focusing on the technical, you miss the incredible significance of the reality.

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

      Thomas Ross
      “and your attempts to prove that readings with no Greek MSS support must be defended is also problematic.”

      5-10 readings. Your problem, not mine,
      You have two choices.

      1) Abandon the TR-AV text, for a new Thomas Ross Version.
      2) Pretend you have ms. support, even if nothing is there.

      For me, there is nothing problematic with Luke 2:22 or other verses having extant no Greek ms. support, and the Reformation Bible correction.

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

      Thomas Ross
      when Beza said “most” MSS have a reading

      And I explained that there is a third reading, as in Codex Bezae, explaining his “most”.

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

      Thomas Ross
      ” … Dr. Hills is wrong when he said some MSS have the KJV reading in Luke 2:22″

      All the evidence is that Edward Freer Hills made a couple of honest errors on Luke 2:22. Others have as well. And I can keep giving you more information as to how this occurred, or you could make some inquiries of your own in textual circles. The bottom line is simple, there is no known Greek manuscript support for the ‘her’ purification text.

      Thomas Ross
      “we can draw dogmatic conclusions that no MS has a reading in Luke although nobody has ever even come close to collating all the MS of Luke, etc. all you would prove is that other TR editions in Luke 2:22 are correct..”

      So this means that you are in fact uncertain of what text is correct.
      Interesting.
      If there is no tangible Greek support, you will in fact abandon the AV text as defective.

      Apparently you will abandon the AV text on every variant where you do not find Greek ms. support.
      And will you abandon the TR, all editions, if all the TR texts do not have Greek support?
      Ooops. Your slope has slipped.

      Thomas Ross
      “It would be far better to draw this conclusion than your view that entire books of Scripture can disappear without a trace, like the golden plates of the book of Mormon.”

      Comments like this, based on your own nouveau-modern quirky ideas of preservation, really are foolish. You are looking for an echo chamber. As I point out, your preservation ideas are easily torn to shreds by anybody who knows the ‘facts on the ground’. Are you going to follow Ellen G. White and Benjamin Wilkinson and try to claim pristine Waldensian manuscripts, provenance and actual manuscripts unknown?

      Plus you are jumping around different topics, the simple fact that we do not have extant support for ‘her’ in Greek in Luke 2:22 to the idea that John wrote Revelation in Hebrew (or any book can have an earlier form in another language.) Two independent topics.

      Thomas Ross
      “Please carefully study Scripture’s promises on preservation and see if what the verses actually say fits what you are arguing for. If widespread adoption of your view would actually destroy the case for the TR, KJV, and preservation, maybe you should rethink it.”

      Basic issue: I do not accept your idea that the scripture promises of preservation drill down to the issue of a pastiche of widely differing Greek manuscripts jointed together by taping together verse and word manipulations in a modern apparatus.

      After laughing, the contras can easily point out the problems with this idea. If you believe that all generations must have the perfectly preserved Bible, you better be ready to tell them where it was in AD 500 and 1000 and 1500.

      Plus now we see you are even ready to abandon TR and AV editions that do not have your patch-quilt Greek word support.

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

      Thomas Ross
      “Finally, I would still like it if you could tell me exactly what page in the MSS you linked to I can see the high quality pic that shows that MS does not have the KJV reading, and where on the page it is. The smaller one that allegedly had it three lines from the bottom is blurry, and it has no page number. ”

      The page number was given on an earlier post but in one of the spots the url was wrong.

      It is not hard to navigate to the sequential GA#, working till 0097, that number is on the bottom of each pic.
      https://manuscripts.csntm.org/manuscript/View/GA_76
      CSNTM Image Id: 283976
      CSNTM Image Name is: GA_76_0097.JPG.
      – added, 14th row down, 6th pic on the row

      GA 76 has αυτων (plural)

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

      Thomas Ross
      “I trust that you are reading these MSS yourself and actually know what you are looking at”

      I found it easy to compare the Greek letters in the manuscript to the Greek letters of the various variants, no special language skills needed. However, you may not have the variant forms handy, and eyesight varies.

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

      Thomas Ross
      “and the same is true when you are talking about Syriac and the book of Revelation, namely, that you can read Syriac fluently and so know what you are speaking about.”

      Here I am working with a paper by Isaac Hollister Hall, more information at:

      Pure Bible Forum
      Syriac Revelation – close to the Received Text – Isaac Hollister Hall
      https://www.purebibleforum.com/inde…tion-ms-very-close-to-the-received-text.2465/

      It would be interesting to have this reviewed by the experts today, like George Kiraz. So I am trying to work in that direction.

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

      Thomas Ross
      “Also, you may not be aware that the book by Jan Kranz is in copyright by Brill, so whoever posted it online did so illegally; so maybe it is best not to link to books illegally placed online. I would like to get it free online instead of paying a lot of money to buy it, but that would be unethical.”

      Right, normally I avoid any urls to books that seem to be copyright infringed. The moderator can remove that url. My understanding, Jan Krans is accepting of its availability and has not sent Archive.org a takedown notice. If so, kudos to Jan, and its availability has really helped people to understand his scholarship approach (uneven conceptually but technically very strong.) Still better not to post the url on forums.

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

      Steven Avery
      Dutchess County, NY USA
      http://www.linktr.ee/stevenavery

35. Andrew
    “We also learn from Mill, furthermore, on p. 748 of his Novum Testamentum (in his discussion on 1 John 5:7), that Stephanus and the other TR editors had access to ancient exemplars (as Mill calls them) in their day, and that this is basis of what represents the readings in each of their texts.” There is no reason to doubt what John Mill says…

    There was a major error in the Stephanus collation relating to the heavenly witnesses, and crochet marks, likely placed by his son Henri. These marks were meant to indicate the last phrase of the earthly witnesses (often dropped in Latin text) but were interpreted by many as showing that Stephanus had many mss. in Greek with the heavenly witnesses.

    John Mill was one of many who erred , even though this had actually been written about over a century earlier by Lucas Brugensis

    Thus, I would not extrapolate from the John Mill comment, as if it gives great insight into the 1500s textual labours. The comment was mistaken even on the specific question at hand.

    Steven

36. London Baptist Confession of 1677/1689:

    The Old Testament IN HEBREW … and the New Testament IN GREEK, (which at the time of the writing of it was most generally known to the Nations), being immediately inspired by God, and by his singular care and Providence KEPT PURE IN ALL AGES, are therefore authentical; so as in all controversies of Religion, the Church is finally to appeal unto them.

    Stephen, you said that the fact that God preserved all His Greek NT words is my “private idea of Greek-onlyism and Greek-primacy. … This is a new theory … only of the last decades, it has no historic base.” Your statement both greatly violates many texts of Scripture which promise God would preserve His original language words and also is entirely contrary to historic Baptist belief, unless the Baptist confession of 1677 was written only a few decades ago.

    It is also not the Protestant view summarized by Richard Muller in his Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics.

    In fact, your view is entirely absent from Baptist confessional life. Compare my essay on the subject here:

    https://faithsaves.net/baptist-canonicity-textus-receptus/

    So, while it is not as important as the fact that it severely violates Scripture, your view is also not historical, and your historical assertions are most erroneous.

    Thank you.

37. Hi Thomas,

    When I say it is a new theory, I am talking about your attempts to make a patch-quilt of variant support from various apparatuses and disjointed references. There is nothing like that from Whitaker, the AV learned men, the Confessions, etc.

    In my earlier posts I showed how the 1500s Bible text experts, Erasmus, Stephanus and Beza, highly respected both the Greek and Latin, which Nathaniel Ellsworth Cornwall properly expresses as “Two Living Streams”.

    This is to the chagrin of many AV defenders, who have been indoctrinated into a false paradigm that says Jerome-Vulgate-RCC-very,very,bad, and Old Latin, very good.

    The Vulgate has its pluses and minuses in its text, but was used powerfully in the 1500s development of the Reformation Bible.

    Mostly after Beza, around the 1600s, came the idea of viewing the Greek Textus Receptus text as the original Greek, while ironically totally ignoring how it was itself a text that combined preservation from, primarily, Greek and Latin. And this pure text also involved learned, faith-consistent textual analysis and early church writers and Syriac.

    However, even in the era of the Confessions, nobody had this wacky idea of supporting the Greek text not as a unit, but by searching out apparatus variants. Hills c. 1950 tilted a tiny bit in that direction, with a concern for trying to find Greek support, but it really is only the last decades that it became the cause célèbre of some TR-AV defenders.

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

    btw, your paper is loaded with the Benjamin Wilkinson errors, from Ellen G. White, about the Waldensian text, in footnote #10. Wilkinson through Fuller to Cloud and Holland.

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

    Here is one.

    “The Waldenses employed the Textus Receptus text type, as evidenced by the Codex Teplensis (pgs. 78-79, I Will Build My Church, Thomas Strouse)”

    The Tepl is far, far from a TR text type.
    Herman Haupt (1854-1935) studied the Tepl text.
    https://books.google.com/books?id=gOEWAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA778
    “the same text as the Vulgate”,

    Back around 2005, on the WhichVersion Yahoogroups forum, we first started to study the Tepl. Since this is a major part of the two streams Wilkinson textual mythology, I will try to set up a special page just on the Tepl topic.

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

    Steven Avery

    • I don’t know if anyone else wants to continue this discussion anymore, but I have a couple of things to note here about this post. Kent, you can choose to display this or not, it doesn’t make a difference to me.

      The journal article that is presently being used to attempt to pin some Old Latin translations to the Vulgate, doesn’t in fact say what I think its users want it to say. The writer of the “current periodical literature” section in the above linked article seems not to grasp the point being made by Haupt in his attempt to draw an example about the translation of “filius hominis.” Here is the original article, which was duly cited in Bibliotheca Sacra, as provided above.

      https://books.google.com/books?id=6NJAAQAAMAAJ&pg=GBS.RA2-PA23
      https://books.google.com/books?id=6NJAAQAAMAAJ&pg=GBS.RA3-PA41

      In the first of these links, Haupt writes: “Die Kardinalfrage nach dem Verhältniss der deutschen Bibelübersetzung des Codex Teplensis zu der romanisch-waldensischen der Dubliner Handschrift anlangend, sei hier zunächst die Übersetzung des ‘filius hominis’ der Vulgata durch ‘filh de la vergena’ bei den romanischen Waldensern und durch ‘Sun der Maid’ in der Tepler Handschrift besprochen.”

      The point here is clearly to show the way in which the editions of Tepl and the Occitan Vaudois translation translated the phrase “son of man” or “filius hominis” from the intermediate Latin source into their languages (Occitan and German). This article is supposedly showing how these two medieval translations differ from the Latin text they used, not how they agree with it; as “filius hominis” means “son of man,” whereas “filh de la vergena” and “Sun der Maid” (meaning son of the virgin) are asserted by Haupt to be exegetical translations which do not predate Zigabenos (see second link above). Nowhere is it asserted that any Latin translation, whether of Vulgate or Old Latin type, says something other than “filius hominis.” According to the link below, there are plenty of examples where the Old Latin (example: Codux Usserianus Primus) also says “filius hominis” as we would expect. See below (text on the right hand page represents the Old Latin):

      https://archive.org/details/evangeliorumvers02abbo/page/436/mode/2up

      As the two are the same on this point, who can prove that this isn’t an example of translating into Occitan/German from an exemplar of the Old Latin type and not of the Vulgate? You can clearly see in the above transcription of Luke 6:5 that both of them say “filius hominis.” Therefore it actually seems like someone is just assuming the source for Tepl and others must be Vulgate rather than Vetus Latina, but with no basis given. This evidence, as presented above, doesn’t actually suggest that at all. But then others uncritically repeat that claim once it’s been made, without actually examining the facts to see whether that’s really the case.

      By the way, people often don’t realize the nuance of the fact that there was no real version of “the Vulgate” until at least 1590 and 1592 when the Sixtine and Clementine editions were released in quick succession. The idea of referring to those two by name as being the common standard (i.e. Vulgate) is “anachronistic.” More information here: http://www.bible-researcher.com/vulgate1.html

      Of course, this discussion is not related to what we already talked about above. It’s not actually a major concern to me at least, what the source of those medieval translations was. Also, nobody that I’ve seen here refers to what Wilkinson said as the be all and end all, obviously – as the saying goes, at worst a broken clock happens to be right twice in a day. Bible believers are referring to what has been taught and believed since long before the SDA movement existed. The effort to try to tie the truth to various corrupt movements, whether of Catholicism, or of SDA, I see as a futile attempt to discredit it. It’s a 1-2 punch: first, one creates false associations between it and some corrupt movement, this is the motivated goal; and second (in another forum or under another name) they simply use that false association to discredit it by association with said movement.

      This is what I see as motivating the persistent attempt to tie the Greek text specifically to Catholicism through the Vulgate. And this is also the motivation behind the various legends surrounding what Erasmus supposedly did – even though the work of Stephanus, Beza, Elzevir and many others are left entirely out of the picture as if they didn’t exist within that mythology.

      Steven wrote: “The Vulgate has its pluses and minuses in its text, but was used powerfully in the 1500s development of the Reformation Bible.”

      I don’t believe anyone has ever demonstrated a single concrete example of where this is the case. Correct me if I’m wrong, Dr. Brandenburg or anyone else.
      And this is exactly why I think those who are motivated to argue this point can never seem to get their story straight: They all provide their own examples that supposedly prove this, and each of these examples are indeed of equal merit – as none of them are sound.

38. Dear Stephen,

    I noticed that you did not provide any serious explanation for why Baptists for centuries have believed and confessed that Greek words are what God promised to perfectly preserve, nor provide any confessional sources that say anything remotely like your position that the originally inspired words can be lost for whole books of Scripture, but that it is fine if they vanished, as long as someone translated them into another language. Statements about how highly one values Latin are not answering the question.

    From your comment, are you saying that pre-Reformation Anabaptists did NOT use a TR-type text? Do you think Greek orthodox monks constituted the true churches before the Reformation, or was the TR not in use by anyone, violating Isaiah 59:21, Matthew 28:18-20, etc.?

    Unfortunately, I would be surprised if either Benjamin Wilkerson or the patristic Jerome is in heaven, but I can still critically look at their works and get what may be valuable from them.

    While it seems like quite a remarkable conclusion to say that my essay is “loaded with Benjamin Wilkinson errors, from Ellen G. White,” based on part of one sentence in one footnote where I cite a book on ecclesiology by Dr. Thomas Strouse, I welcome evidence-based critique, even if from a hostile source. So please feel free to point out every example of how my essay is “loaded with Benjamin Wilkinson errors from Ellen G. White,” if you have actual evidence for this striking affirmation. I am aware of referencing Wilkinson in one footnote in my essay, and am not aware of him having anything to do with any of the rest of its content at all.

    I personally have not examined the Tepel MS. If it turns out that Dr. Strouse is wrong about it, I am happy to change one part of one footnote in my essay, when I have time to do that.

    I believe I may have spent too long on this discussion already. So thanks in advance for exposing the loads of Benjamin Wilkinson errors from Ellen G. White in my essay, and thanks in advance for pointing out where Baptist confessions have said that God has preserved His Words if they have disappeared without a trace but been translated into a different language, while also pointing out why Baptist confessions don’t really mean it when they say God has kept pure His Greek words in all ages, but do not expect further response from me.

    By the way, Ellen White plagiarized huge portions of her writings. Have you demonstrated that she invented the idea of a stream of pure Bibles, set in contrast to a corrupt stream,
    rather than plagiarizing that idea from Christians? Thanks again.
    Thanks again.

39. Thanks Andrew, that is helpful.

40. To Andrew and Thomas,

    You both want the Old Latin of the Waldensians to be the good guy text, and the Vulgate Latin of the RCC to be the bad guy text.

    The problem is that there is really no superiority to the Old Latin, in any manuscript or line. In fact, there are many places where Jerome’s text was superior, eliminating, using the Greek as an aid, some false phrases, accretions, that were in the Old Latin. There are four just in 1 John, 1 John – 2:17 4:3 5:6 5:20. Likely over 10 overall, where the Vulgate is strongly superior to the Old Latin.

    If the Old Latin were superior, you, or Benjamin Wilkinson, or somebody, would simply list the significant verses and variants where the Old Latin is a TR text, and the Vulgate Latin is not. No such list exists. Two line theory in its TR-AV iterations is simply false.

    Now, to be fair, Jack Moorman (d. 2021) in Early Manuscripts, Church Fathers and the Authorized Version with Manuscript Digests and Summaries may have some collation information supporting the Old Latin over the Vulgate, but I can safely say that it will be small potatoes. Since I have rarely if ever seen the Old Latin as superior on any significant variant.

    And as there are tons of places where the Old Latin and Vulgate agree with the TR against the Alexandrian corruption, and also many places where they agree with the Alexandrian corruption against the TR.

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

    Andrew
    there was no real version of “the Vulgate” until at least 1590 and 1592 when the Sixtine and Clementine editions were released in quick succession.

    Even in the Samuel Angus writing those editions are considered similar to the Stephanus and Hentenius editions of earlier in the century. So there was no radical change of text involved.

    The substantial difference in texts would be with the corrected Latin texts, modified by the Greek, of Erasmus and Beza. They had both a Vulgate Latin and a corrected Latin.

    For some reason you put “anachronism” in quotes, but the context in the article has no relation to your usage

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

    Andrew
    “nobody that I’ve seen here refers to what Wilkinson said as the be all and end all,”

    The Wilkinson (to Fuller to dozens of TR and AV defenders) errors on the:

    Old Latin
    “two streams”
    pristine Waldensian text
    Tepl

    have been, until recently, a consistent false undercurrent in modern TR and AV defense. Among those who know a bit of the textual history, it has been a major embarrassment, even more so due to the reluctance to change and accept correction.

    To his credit, Bryan Ross of Grace Baptist Church has been seeking to set the record straight.

    The Two Streams-of Bibles Model of Transmission: It’s Origins and Accuracy
    Bryan Ross
    http://gracelifebiblechurch.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/The-Two-Streams-of-Bibles-Model-of-Transmission-Complete-Notes.pdf

    Ironically, these errors of Wilkinson, likely the weakest part of his writing, were dismantled by the published response to Wilkinson in 1931:

    A Review of “Our Authorized Bible Vindicated,” by B. G. Wilkinson
    Warren Eugene Howell (1869-1943)
    https://m.egwwritings.org/en/book/944.4
    Section III- The Itala and the Bible of the Waldenses
    http://www.sdadefend.com/Living-Word/Answers2Objections/Answers2-3.htm

    Followed by Doug Kutilek in 1991. While wrong in other areas, he is essentially correct on the Old Latin issues.

    The Truth About the Waldensian Bible and the Old Latin Version
    https://web.archive.org/web/20140209110910/http://www.kjvonly.org/doug/kutilek_waldensian.htm
    2012 update
    https://sckool.org/as-i-see-it.html

    Followed by Glenn Conjurske (1947-2001) in Olde Paths and Ancient Landmarks.

    Codex Teplensis – Waldensian or Roman Catholic? (1996)
    http://straitegate.com/oldepathsfolder/op96jun.htm

    Generally, the TR and AV defenders simply put their head in the sand and refuse to learn.

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

    Andrew
    “This is what I see as motivating the persistent attempt to tie the Greek text specifically to Catholicism through the Vulgate. And this is also the motivation behind the various legends surrounding what Erasmus supposedly did – even though the work of Stephanus, Beza, Elzevir and many others are left entirely out of the picture as if they didn’t exist within that mythology.”

    Everything in that paragraph is backwards. e.g. I have been consistently appealing to Stephanus and Beza as complementary to the Erasmus position of being favorable to both Greek and Latin evidence. (Elzevir has minor significance and is after the AV.)

    The Greek text of the Reformation Bible has deep Latin roots. You can despise Catholic doctrine and fancies and have a respect for their copying and maintenance of the Latin Bible, without which we would not have our pure Reformation Bible.

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

    Steven wrote: “The Vulgate has its pluses and minuses in its text, but was used powerfully in the 1500s development of the Reformation Bible.”

    Andrew
    I don’t believe anyone has ever demonstrated a single concrete example of where this is the case.

    Trivially easy. The basic evidence for the heavenly witnesses, Acts 8:37 and Luke 2:22. And then another dozen or so salient TR readings come principally from the Vulgate Latin text.

    You really have to put on blinders to think otherwise. Without the Latin evidence, no heavenly witnesses verse.

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

    Steven Avery

41. Hi Thomas,

    Not “part of one sentence”. Here are the errors in the 28-line footnote [10] of your article, which is key to the article, note how it is the support of the “Textus Receptus” part of the title of the paper:

    The Canonicity of the Received Text or Textus Receptus Established from Reformation and Post-Reformation Baptist Confessions
    Thomas D. Ross
    https://faithsaves.net/baptist-canonicity-textus-receptus/

    [10]
    “Pre-reformation Baptists used the Textus Receptus”
    (All from Benjamin Wilkinson writing of the “pure Bible of the Waldenses”, David Cloud and Thomas Holland and Robert L. Webb secondary sources to the same error.)

    “The Waldenses employed the Textus Receptus text type, as evidenced by the Codex Teplensis” (Thomas Strouse, the Tepl error is usually simply passed down from Wilkinson.)

    “The Albigenses used the European Old Latin type of text, which is a largely TR translation, evidenced by the 13th century Old Latin Codex C” (cf. “Latin Version, the Old,” T. Nicol, ISBE) There is nothing from Thomas Nicol (1846-1916) that even hints that Colbertinus is “a largely TR translation”.
    https://www.internationalstandardbible.com/L/latin-version-the-old.html

    Also in the footnote, basically a non-sequitur.

    An emphasis, using Jean Paul Perrin, and Conybeare by Thomas Strouse, on 1 John 5:7 and Acts 8:37, which are similarly in the Vulgate text.

    Interesting and quirky: The claim of Anabaptists knowing of NT autographs at Thessalonica, using Thieleman Janszoon Braght, Martyr’s Mirror, from 1660.

    Additional FYI:
    spelling errors
    Bejamin
    Waldensies

    the aol url http://members.aol.com/dwibclc/waldbib.htm
    should be updated to https://libcfl.com/articles/waldbib.htm

    Steven Avery
    Dutchess County, NY USA

42. Thomas Ross

    “From your comment, are you saying that pre-Reformation Anabaptists did NOT use a TR-type text?”

    Christians before the Erasmus text NOT use a TR type text, and in the west they used Latin or similar Bibles, like the German. The Anabaptist movement began alongside the TR editions.

    “Do you think Greek orthodox monks constituted the true churches before the Reformation, or was the TR not in use by anyone”

    Both the Greek orthodox text and the Latin Vulgate text had corruptions, there is no known TR text in use “before the Reformation”. You attempt to get around that by patching together Greek variants from differing manuscripts.

    “Benjamin Wilkerson or the patristic Jerome … I can still critically look at their works and get what may be valuable from them.”

    Definitely, agreed.

    The point in this thread is a major error by Wilkinson that has polluted TR-AV defense in many ways, by creating the mythology of a pristine Waldensian TR text. Wilkinson even directly uses the “Spirit of Prophecy” (Ellen G. White) as his wacky defense of his theory, since his error was quickly challenged by other Adventists.

    “I believe I may have spent too long on this discussion already.”

    And I believe this has been one of the most important discussions in the TR-AV defense world for quite awhile.

    “thanks in advance for pointing out where Baptist confessions have said that God has preserved His Words if they have disappeared without a trace but been translated into a different language:\”

    Note, I have not made claims about the Baptist confessions. Above, I showed how the perspective changed from Erasmus, Stephanus and Beza in the 1500s to the Confessions of the 1600s. I see a problem in how the term “original Greek” is used without any reference to how the Latin contributed to the Reformation Bible development.

    “while also pointing out why Baptist confessions don’t really mean it when they say God has kept pure His Greek words in all ages”

    Your theory is that this is by patch-quilting variants from differing Greek manuscripts by apparatus analysis, and simply ignoring situations where there is not a Greek ms. And I find this unsatisfactory.

    “By the way, Ellen White plagiarized huge portions of her writings. Have you demonstrated that she invented the idea of a stream of pure Bibles, set in contrast to a corrupt stream, rather than plagiarizing that idea from Christians?”

    Ellen White did not make a claim of a stream of pure Bibles. That comes directly from Benjamin Wilkinson. He uses a couple of quotes from the Spirit of Prophecy (Ellen G. White) to denigrate the Vulgate and uplift the Waldensian Bibles. Then he uses a false theory that their better doctrines must have been due to their pristine Bibles. This theory was smashed to pieces in the “Reply” paper.

    Steven Avery
    Dutchess County, NY USA
    http://www.linktr.ee/stevenavery

43. This is a really important article on a very important subject where modern so-called scholarship has gone horribly astray ever since Warfield and Hodge decided to redefine “theopneustos”, taking the meaning away from both the historical theological usage of the word and the clear Biblical usage.

    Their redefinition, which they explicitly said they were doing, was less damaging in the article in which they did it (because of their explicit acknowledgment) than it has been in following articles, discussions, books, and theological seminary teaching. The net result is that many teachers and pastors will refuse to say that a copy or a translation is “inspired” and thus they have removed an inspired Book from the hands of the man in the pew.

    That was manifestly NOT what Paul was teaching in II Timothy 3 when he used “theopneustos”, for he went on, in chapter 4, to tell Timothy to “preach the Word” and echoed the qualities of the inspired Word which he had given in 3:17. The whole point of inspiration is that it is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. Seminarians and theologians have stolen that away from modern believers by stating we don’t have an inspired Word. It’s a nonsense.

    This article refutes that error. In my view, it’s one of the most important articles on this blog.

    Someone with an agenda barely tangential to that important article has hijacked the comment thread with a bunch of stuff that is completely off-topic to the article. His ideas are at least somewhat novel, but even if they were accurate, they don’t really belong on this thread. This is, of course, not my blog, but that is my view.

44. Dear Stephen,

    Am I correct that you are saying that Christians did not use the TR before the Reformation–neither the Waldenses nor any others used it? If so, you clearly do not believe in preservation. You believe a lost, non-preserved, non-used Bible was restored.

    Dear Jon,

    Thanks for the kind words. You may have a point there.

45. Dear Stephen,

    It sounds like you also do not believe there were Baptists before the Reformation. If so, you also believe in a lost church that was restored (unless you are not a Baptist–then your view makes sense).

    Your positions violate Scripture. God preserved His originally dictated words and He preserved His churches. You are wrong.

    Thanks for the critique of (mainly) one footnote in my essay on Baptist confessions. If I have the time to edit the page it is on, I can fix spelling errors, etc.

46. Thomas
    “Thanks for the critique of (mainly) one footnote in my essay on Baptist confessions…”

    My pleasure, and it has been a study and learning endeavor on my end.

    That one footnote is fundamental to your claims of the Textus Receptus and “perpetual availability”. All three quotes on the TR in footnote [10] are essentially the Wilkinson error to be corrected, using Wilkinson along with multiple secondary sources.

    Similarly you mangle a historian in Footnote [120] for the same purpose, wrongly claiming that George Richard Potter says that the:

    Textus Receptus “was also the Bible of the Middle Ages … ”

    Zwingli (1985)
    G. R. Potter
    https://books.google.com/books?id=TMw8AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA172

    Essentially, you have a “quote” put together Riplinger-style, (I know that sounds harsh) and you add your additional extrapolation about historians in general, using the errant quoting.

    All this is to support your thesis that goes against actual textual history and the Greek and Latin combined contributions to the Reformation Bible:

    “manuscript evidence exists to testify to the perpetual availability of the perfectly preserved Bible”

    And I realize that you are stuck with that thesis, and that is why footnotes [10] and [120] are misinformation. You felt you had to try to support the thesis, and the Wilkinson, Waldenses and Albigenses errors were handy-dandy for that purpose.

    Steven Avery

47. Thomas, you seem to take two opposite positions at the same time.

    “Perpetual availability” means the TR-AV text, accepted as an autographic reflection (English as derivative) existed in every age, starting in the first centuries. (This is closely related to Wilkinson’s pointing to the Waldesnian pristine text, compared to the corrupt RCC Vulgate, which Waldesnian text became, through Fuller, AV textual mythology.) While “perpetual availability” is conceptually attractive, it simply can not be supported by ‘the facts on the ground’. However, in your essay and most recent posts, you believe that it is a preservational imperative.

    Your second position on preservation says that the individual Greek words existed … somewhere … through the ages. Maybe hundreds of Greek manuscripts from AD 700 to 1200 (Lateran Council) did not have the heavenly witnesses, but still the fact that the Greek words are found, somewhere at some time, es suficiente. Thus the concern that GA 76 was thought to support ‘her’ purification and that the Revelation verses must all have some Greek support.

    Do you understand that these are radically differing positions?

    Thanks!

    • Steven,

      Perpetual availability is what the Bible teaches about the Words of God. Perfect and perpetual. You just deny scripture because of the “evidence”?

      Your points are inscrutable. Studying extant manuscripts does not overturn what we know God said.

      • Steven,

        You didn’t answer my short comment. You say they don’t have historical evidence along with it. God didn’t promise to preserve the history of the text, the history of the church, the history of the doctrine of justification. Men call the doctrine of justification, the reformed doctrine of justification, as if it arose during the reformation. Why say that? You can’t find the doctrine of justification during large chunks of history. Historical theology has value, no doubt, but we get doctrine from scripture. When it comes to the text of scripture, nothing, and I mean nothing, tells us that we know the text of scripture from historical evidence, in essence a snapshot of the text based on a naturalistic philosophy arising in the 19th century, that just so happens to conform to modernism. That’s not how we know. You seem to be staggering in unbelief.

        When I write that first paragraph, it doesn’t mean there is no evidence. I’m fine with evidence. I’d be fine with finding Noah’s ark on Mt. Ararat. I’m fine when I hear they find David’s name in an archaeological find. I love hearing it. But it’s not how we know.

        • Hi Kent,

          Your comment “You seem to be staggering in unbelief” is itself a rather staggering and false accusation.

          And I have the pure and perfect Bible in my Authorized Version. Every word, Genesis to Revelation. And yes, the Bible I read is the inspired 2 Timothy 3:16 word of God, I do not need a “derivative” qualifier. If a person wants to use the word “derivative”, we can use it for the Scrivener 1881 text, which was developed for the purpose of helping along the limping, decrepit Revision, and was derivative from the AV.

          And I believe we can see Noah’s Ark in Turkey, today, in the mountains of Ararat (note: a region). And I even consider a visit :).

          You seem to be concerned that I do not jump to accept the “perpetual availability” doctrine. Fair enough.

          If your iteration of that doctrine was true, there was absolutely no need for the Reformation Bible labours of Erasmus, Stephanus and Beza. All they had to do was pick up the perpetually available text from 1500 and give it to the printers. I mentioned this before, and you passed it by. So now I look forward to your response.

          And I do hope you do not consider the 1525 Ben Hayim Second Rabbinic Bible text as a perpetually available Old Testament edition. Its text is missing two verses in Joshua, one in Nehemiah and it has a major corruption in Psalm 22:16. (The claims for the Ben Hayim by some, including the DBS, involves another AV myth.)

          And I think you should be careful as to how you accuse those who see preservation of the word of God as occurring in a different manner than your belief. Such accusations can be idle tales.

          And I believe I have shown proper respect for your belief on preservation of the word of God.

          Steven Avery
          Dutchess County, NY USA

48. Hi Kent,

    Perpetual availability, in the way that you are talking, would have to mean the whole 66 books available to believers without any corruption at all. From c. AD 70 to today.

    The Reformation Bible providential labours of Erasmus, Stephanus and Beza would have been unnecessary. Since the full Bible was there at 1500 .. somewhere, under this theory.

    My interpretations of preservation verses differs from yours. And I really do not mind the difference, you can have your faith-based preservation view, without concern for the actual historical facts, except:

    1) the various scholarship errors, most of which go right back to Wilkinson, who was influenced by what the “Spirit of Prophecy” said about the Vulgate and the Waldensians. Similar with false claim about what historians say. Why mangle such an appeal?

    2) silly season stuff like morman golden plates

    Steven

49. Hi again Steven,

    I have no reason personally why I can’t keep reiterating my points, except for the fact that it gets circular after a while. And as I am relying on the hospitality of the forum host, so I don’t want to take up too much space or more than is necessary. But I have no problem discussing this. And I appreciate at least the providing of sources to help ground the discussion and help everyone find out what is the truth and at least having a spirit of intellectual honesty in wanting others to see the truly correct line of reasoning.

    However, the particulars which you are arguing over now are not related to the main thing I’ve been trying to focus on, up until the point where I originally rested my case, where I said “God bless and take care.” I haven’t needed to add anything beyond what was said back there. What you’re now talking about has to do with the provenance of the Latin translations, which doesn’t have a bearing on that of the original Received text.

    It bears repeating that as said above, the TR editors based everything on their manuscripts, which were all in the original Greek, and it is reported that in the prologomena of several of these writers they mention the fact that they had exemplars in the Greek for their sources and there is no reason to doubt them. This is the position that Mill took, and indeed I would add that in regard to 1 John 5:7, Mill stated (p. 746) “I say, therefore, that this Pericope [1 Jn. 5:7], however it afterwards disappeared, certainly existed in the Autograph of John himself, and in some other Copies written to it.” And he later concludes at the end of his lengthy footnote, (p. 749) “We have carefully considered the points of reasoning which have hitherto been brought forward on both sides, both for diminishing and for strengthening the authenticity. Which side should prevail, we leave to the learned to judge. To me, I confess, (better, if a longer day will give something better and more certain, when I am ready to learn) the argument for winning the authority of this verse seems to be of such strength that I do not consider it in any way to be moved from its place.” https://i.imgur.com/h78ODUX.png

    Moving really briefly to what you’re talking about now, you say there’s a “consistent false undercurrent” where people are assuming the position of a Seventh-day adventist. But is that really the case or is it simply the fact that people who reject the preservation of Scripture seek to pin this man’s views on others without them actually expressing it?

    The article I linked before says, “The Tridentine Fathers were therefore guilty of an anachronism” and this is the reference I meant to point to. See third paragraph.

    Also, Steven, you said on October 4 that you have “not made claims about the Baptist confessions,” and that you believe the “perspective changed from Erasmus, Stephanus and Beza in the 1500s to the Confessions of the 1600s.” But before that, you said, “There is nothing like that from Whitaker, the AV learned men, the Confessions, etc.” i.e. that there is “nothing like” what you describe as Thomas’ position, in what they wrote. You also said on Sept 30, of Greek-primacy, as you call it: “This is a new theory, afaik only of the last decades, it has no historic base.”

    It seems to me like they agree certainly at least with Greek primacy aspect for the New Testament in what Thomas wrote, i.e., that they refer to a Greek source only for the New Testament, as pointed out already in the 1677 confession. This seems to fit with the already-consistent at this time view that the TR editors indeed always had Greek manuscript support for every word in the TR editions at the time they were made. And also that this fact continued to be repeated through the confessions, was also noticed by John Mill and others, and is still recognized today, simply because it makes sense based on the same common knowledge. The testimony of multiple editors of Greek manuscripts who compiled editions of the TR from manuscripts all agree, so it’s not like one of them made any change that none of the others was able to find a source for. There are multiple independent witnesses to the existence of these copies. Other editors would be ready to correct any mistake that one made. So, not only is not even possible to show that the proposition of an intentional modification could have possibly happened, but, it is even much less possible still for anyone to show that it is required to have happened.

    Lastly, Steven, I see that you wrote this also: “which Waldesnian text became, through Fuller, AV textual mythology”

    I don’t think that’s quite accurate either. https://i.imgur.com/QbauJ5l.png If you read this quote by Beza, you see that he refers to the Waldensians (i.e. Vaudois) as providing for the “expenses” of producing the Olivetan Bible translation, which was later amended by Calvin, as is noted there, in what became the 1560 French Geneva Bible (and later revised by Beza himself in 1588, then David Martin in 1696/1707). So the Vaudois/Waldensians did seem to play some role in bringing the reformation bibles to reality, as the 1560 English Geneva Bible also later influenced the 1611 Authorized version.

    One other quote showing how one of them was a printer: https://i.imgur.com/2HEsYaC.png

    • Hi Andrew,

      Please allow me to focus first on one critical point.

      Andrew
      “the provenance of the Latin translations, which doesn’t have a bearing on that of the original Received text”

      “the TR editors based everything on their manuscripts, which were all in the original Greek”

      As pointed out above, Beza (also Erasmus) actually produced TWO Latin texts, one was the Vulgate, one was closer to the Greek text.

      How and why do you believe they came upon these source texts, and produced the new resulting text, if they were only using Greek manuscripts, and the Latin had no bearing on TR development?

      Thanks!

      Steven Avery

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