. Christian apologetics crippled by Westcott-Hort recension corruptions Mark 2:26 - in the days of Abiathar the high priest (AV) . Sam Shamoun going ballistic on a simple Bible text apologetics question (look for that on the King James Bible Debate forum, Ill put a url on this forum) showed that the issue of Christian apologetics and modern version corruptions and confusions is very touchy to those ... groping in the hortian fog. . Earlier today I put in one post about a very simple supposed difficulty: . Does the Bible Ever Get it Wrong? Facing Scripture’s Difficult Passages (#4): Andreas Köstenberger michaeljkruger/does-the-bible-ever-get-it-wrong-facing-scriptures-difficult-passages-4-andreas-kostenberger/ . That post simply showed that the Hebraic understanding of John Gill (1697-1771) took care of one big to-do. The article, even before the post, was actually pretty good. Although in a sense it was much ado about very little. . Then, I looked around a bit, and noticed an earlier article on a topic that I have studied a bit. Thus the following post, awaiting moderation approval. Url to Wallace added, minor changes here. . ================ . Does the Bible Ever Get it Wrong? Facing Scripture’s Difficult Passages (#2): Craig Blomberg michaeljkruger/does-the-bible-ever-get-it-wrong-facing-scriptures-difficult-passages-2-craig-blomberg/ . Hi, . Mark 2:26 (AV) How he went into the house of God in the days of Abiathar the high priest, and did eat the shewbread, which is not lawful to eat but for the priests, and gave also to them which were with him? , Much of this question involves a corruption in the Critical Text, the lack a definite article, and then having to translate “when Abiathar was high priest” (NETBible). Then comes the fun (i.e. rather wild interpretative apoloegetics, all for a corruption.) . This textual-translation issue was well understood when the versions began to use the corruption text. The learned Frederic Charles Cook (1804-1889) wrote about it here in some detail: . =============== . The Revised Version of the First Three Gospels Considered in Its Bearings Upon the Record of Our Lord’s Words and of Incidents in His Life (1882) books.google/books?id=B3Y_AAAAYAAJ&pg=PA69 . “The old reading simply states the fact that Abiathar, well known as the High Priest appointed by David himself at a much later period, was present when the young David with his attendants ate the shew bread. What the Revisers make our Lord say, is that Abiathar was High Priest at that time. A grosser anachronism could scarcely be committed, and here it is distinctly imputed to our Lord Himself, on the authority of St. Mark, the Petrine Evangelist. . This extraordinary falsification of well-known history is effected by the simple omission of the definite article (τοῦ) before High Priest. … ” . =============== . And I will add that Christopher Wordsworth (1807-1885), the Bishop of Lincoln, referenced by Cook and writing before the corruption became popular, says that the wording in the traditional Bible text suggests that Abiathar was not High Priest at the time. His whole section is worthwhile: . The New Testament … in the original Greek: with notes by C. Wordsworth (1856) books.google/books?id=HKYGAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA97 . =============== . Daniel Wallace, citing Thomas Fanshaw Middleton (1769-1822), essentially agrees that the historic Reformation Bible text is a solution to the question: . “Middleton cites several classical references to back up his statement. In grammatical terms, we could say ἐπὶ Ἀβιαθὰρ ἀρχιερέως involves a predicate genitive (“when Abiathar was high priest”) while ἐπὶ Ἀβιαθὰρ τοῦ ἀρχιερέως involves an appositive to Ἀβιαθάρ (“in the time of Abiathar the high priest”)”.- Daniel Wallace, The Problem of Abiathar in Mark 2.26, 2011 . The Problem of Abiathar in Mark 2.26 Daniel Wallace - August, 2011 reclaimingthemind.org/blog/2011/08/the-problem-of-abiathar-in-mark-2-26/ . =============== . Incidentally, to be clear, I am not saying that there is still not an apologetics issue, or discussion, with the proper text. However, it is rather easily handled. . Please note. There are many hard error blunders in the Critical Text. Many of them, like “the daughter of Herod”, are ultra-minority corruptions. The swine marathon from Gerasa is one that is an especially informative and even entertaining study. There are dozens of such errors that need no apologetics, since they are not actually the Bible. . Christian apologetics is an important work. It is crippled if it has to defend corruptions. Hort’s textual theories have been discarded, en masse. So why use and defend the residue, the Vaticanus-primacy Westcott-Hort recension. We have the pure Bible, easily available. . ================ . Psalm 119:140 Thy word is very pure: therefore thy servant loveth it. . Yours in Jesus, Steven Avery . ================ . Some notes addded here: . The Quarterly Reviewer mentioned by Cook is presumably Burgon, that has not been found yet. . This one was a big one for the Ehrman case, which you can read here, this is the UK version of Misquoting Jesus (2006) , Whose Word is It?: The Story Behind who Changed the New Testament and why (2008) Bart D. Ehrman books.google/books?id=lcrUAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA8 . And it came up in CARM, Those threads vanish, so I will plan on bringing some over on the next post. Steven
Posted on: Fri, 19 Sep 2014 06:17:38 +0000
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