G MIRA. G'MIRA: A Journal of Semitic New Testament Studies Volume 1 Number 1 Summer 2003

Transcription

1 G MIRA G'MIRA: A Journal of Semitic New Testament Studies Volume 1 Number 1 Summer 2003 THE GREEK WESTERN TYPE TEXT OF CODEX D: THE MISSING LINK BETWEEN THE ORIGINAL ARAMAIC NEW TESTAMENT AND THE RECEIVED GREEK TEXT By James Scott Trimm, S.T.D. INTRODUCTION This paper has intentionally been written so that it is easily understandable by the lay-person despite the fact that it deals with technical issues related to distinctions between Aramaic grammar and Greek grammar. I have written the paper in such an easy to understand manner because I feel it is so important for people to know and accept the conclusion of this paper, which is profound in its implications for New Testament origins. To begin with the reader should know that no two Greek manuscripts of New Testament books agree exactly. Scholars classify Greek New Testament manuscripts based upon their agreements and disagreements with each other in these variant readings. Using this method scholars have broken NT manuscripts into three categories known as text types : Western; Alexandrian and Byzantine. (Some scholars add a Cesarean text type but others see these as half breed Alexandrian-Western texts). It is important to know that the most ancient Greek manuscripts are Alexandrian and Western and the most recent ones, and the vast majority, are of the Byzantine type. It is also important to know that Codex D (referenced in this paper) is our most complete Greek manuscript of the Four Gospels and Acts in the Western type. The reader should also know that the quotations of the Greek New Testament by the earliest Greek Church Fathers like Ireaneus and Justin Martyr, tend to agree with the Western type against the other types. Finally the reader should also know that the various early translations of the NT are classed according to their text type as well. The earliest translation, the Old Latin agrees with the Western type text. The Old Syriac is believed by most scholars to be the earliest Aramaic version and it is also of the Western text type. The Peshitta Aramaic version, by contrast, tends to agree with the later Byzantine text type.

2 Now with this background the reader is ready to embark upon the following analysis-made-easy which demonstrates the VERY important place that the Greek Western text of Codex D plays as a missing link between the original Aramaic New Testament and the received Greek text. THE DUAL PREPOSITION Now in Hebrew and Aramaic when a preposition applies to more than one noun in a series the preposition is usually repeated. In the example below we have a case where the normal Aramaic grammar appears in the Old Syriac as well as the Greek Western text of codex D both of which repeat the preposition. However the Alexandrian and Byzantine Greek text types eliminate the second occurrence of the preposition creating a more natural Greek reading. In some cases the Peshitta agrees with the Old Syriac but in some instances the Peshitta has been revised to agree with the Byzantine Greek. Matthew 14:9 Old Syriac: )kyms l+mw )tmwm l+mw And because of the oath and because of the guests Greek Western text of dia touj orkouj kai dia touj sunanakeimenouj And because of the oath and because of the guests Byzantine and Alexandrian Greek: dia touj orkouj kai touj sunanakeimenouj and because of the oath and the guests Peshitta: )kymsw )tmwm Nyd l+m but because of the oath and the guests Mark 6:36 Peshitta: )yrwqlw Nyrdxd )srwg)l "to the surrounding fields and to the villages" (The Peshitta here probably preserves the original reading of the Old Syriac. The only surviving copy of the Old Syriac for this verse has only one object and so it could not have two prepositions.) Codex D has: eij touj eggista agrous kai eij taj kwmaj "to the surrounding fields and to the villages" Alexandrian and Byzantine Greek has: eij touj kuklw agrous kai kwmaj "to the surrounding fields and villages"

3 Mark 8:31 Old Syriac & Peshitta: )rps Nmw )nhk ybr Nmw )#y#q Nm "by the elders and by the chief priests and by the scribes" upo twn presbuterwn kai apo twn arxierewn kai twn grammatewn "by the elders and by the chief priests and the scribes" upo twn presbuterwn kai twn arxierewn kai twn grammatewn "by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes" Luke 2:34 Old Syriac & Peshitta: )myqlw )tlwpml "for fall and for rising" eij ptwsin kai eij anastasin "for fall and for rising" eij ptwsin kai anastasin "for fall and rising" Luke 2:52 Old Syriac: )#n) ynb twlw )hl) twl with God and with the sons of man Codex D (Greek Western Type Text): para qew kai para anqrwpoij with God and with men Alexandrian and Byzantine Greek Text Types: para qew kai anqrwpoij "with God and men" Peshitta: )#nynbw )hl) twl with God and men THE PARTICIPLE PHRASE The second evidence for the Aramaic origin of the Greek Western type text of Codex D is its tendency to use two verbs where the later Greek text types use a participle construction. This is important because this type of use of a participle construction is common in Greek (and in English) but impossible in Aramaic.

4 The following is an example: And having approached, the Tempter said to him. (Mt. 4:3 from Greek Alexandrian and Byzantine) But this grammatical construction is impossible in Aramaic so when we look at the Aramaic we see the participle construction replaced by a normal verb and an and placed before the second verb as follows: And he approached (to him) the Tempter and said to him (Mt. 4:3 from Aramaic; portion in parenthesis is in OS only) Wherever the Alexandrian and Byzantine Greek use the participle construction as shown above, the Aramaic has a normal verbal construction followed by and prefixed to the second verb as shown above. Now one might wrongly take this as evidence that the NT had been written in Greek and that the Aramaic was translated from the Greek. On the surface it might appear that Mt. 4:3 is written in idiomatic Greek that an Aramaic translator had to adjust for the Aramaic language. (since the Aramaic could have been a natural translation of the Greek but the Greek could not have been translated literally from the Aramaic without being either a paraphrase or a more idiomatically Greek revision of an earlier Greek version). But the key missing link is the very Semitic style of the Greek Western text type of Codex D. The Aramaic reads: Aramaic: )snmd wh [htwl] brqw. hl rm)w And approached (to him) he the Tempter and said to him (Mt. 4:3 from Aramaic; portion in parenthesis is in OS only) The primitive Western Greek text of Codex D translates the Aramaic literally with: kai prochlqen o peirazwn kai eipen autw And approached (to him) he the Tempter and said to him (Mt. 4:3 from Western Greek of Codex D) And the later Greek scribes revised this into more idiomatic Greek with: kai proselqwn o peirazwn eipen autw And having approached, the Tempter said to him (Mt. 4:3 from Byzantine and Alexandrian Greek)

5 Now one example does not make a pattern. But we have more than one example. One can also cite LOTS of examples of this same pattern throughout the text of Codex D where the Alexandrian and Byzantine Greek use a participle construction and the Western Greek uses a normal verbal construction and adds an and before the second verb: Mt. 4:3; 5:13; 9:28; 13:1, 4, 48; 17:7; 20:6, 30; 21:6; 25; 26:51; 27:58; 28:19 Mark 2:16; 4:36; 5:23; 8:10; 10:22; 12:20; 14:22 Luke. 5:14, 24; 8:27; 15:23; 19:5, 35 Jn. 6:11; 9:35; 11:17; 12:36 In addition, in some of the passages where the Greek Western text of Codex D does use the participle construction, the Western Greek STILL adds the and to the second verb, as if an earlier version had the normal verbal construction and had been revised to a less choppy participle construction but the reviser had neglected to remove the and from the second verb. Examples may be found in: Mt. 27:33 Mk. 2:1; Mk. 5:27; 6:48; 7:25; 8:10; 10:22; 11:2; 14:63; 15:46; 16:11, 15 Lk. 8:8; 9:6 Jn 12:3 This pattern of literal translation from the Aramaic in the Western type text and revision toward less choppy, more flowing Greek in the Alexandrian and Byzantine text types should forever satisfy those Aramaic Primacists who have expressed doubt that the Greek Western text of Codex D is the most primitive type of Greek text and, in fact, a missing link between the original Aramaic and the Alexandrian and Byzantine Greek text types. THE RELATIVE PRONOUN Another evidence for the Aramaic origin of the Greek Western type text of Codex D is that of the use of relative pronouns (some English relative pronouns are: this, that, those, these). Aramaic has no definite article (in English the definite article is the ). As a result Aramaic makes more use of relative pronouns in order to compensate for its lack of a definite article. However Greek does have definite articles, making many of the relative pronouns in the Aramaic unnecessary in the Greek versions. Now as we examine the Greek Western text type of Codex D we find that yet another pattern develops. In many places where the Aramaic Old Syriac text uses a relative pronoun, Codex D retains the relative pronoun (often also adding a definite article) and then the Greek Alexandrian and Byzantine text types drop the relative pronoun which is not really needed in the Greek, and leave only a definite article. The following is a list of examples: Mt. 15:24 Old Syriac: Nylh )n( "[the] flock, those" ta probata tauta "the sheep, those" Alexandrian & Byzantine Greek: ta probata "the sheep"

6 Peshitta: )br( "[the] sheep" Mt. 15:32 Old Syriac & Peshitta: )nh )#nk "This crowd" ton oxlon touton "the crowd, this" ton oxlon "the crowd" Mk. 8:2 Old Syriac and Peshitta: )nh )#nk "this crowd" ton oxlou touton the crowd, this ton oxlou the crowd Mk. 10:22 Old Syriac: )tlm )dh this word Peshitta: )dh )tlmb at this word toutw tw logw This the word tw logw the word

7 Luke 17:17 Old Syriac: )rs( Nylh these ten outoi deka these ten oi deka the ten CONCLUSION The Western Greek text type of Codex D presents us with an important missing link in New Testament origins. The Greek Western text preserved in Codex D preserves much of the original Aramaic grammar of the original Aramaic New Testament which was later revised into grammar better suited to Greek in the other Greek text types and in the received Greek text. The importance of the Greek text of Codex D as a more direct witness to the original Aramaic text of the New Testament should not be ignored. James Trimm COMPUTER ANALYSIS OF GREEK NEW TESTAMENT REVEALS SEMITIC GRAMMAR By Joe Viel In many seminary courses, it is taught that word order is not important in Greek. However, many secular sources have stated otherwise, saying word order DOES have significance, but the reason this is taught is because its hard to find two Greek manuscripts whose word order is always in agreement or matches the word order of normal Greek writings. The Neutral Word Order for Greek, English and Hebrew is... English Greek Ancient Hebrew Subject Verb Object Subject Object Verb Verb Subject Object A good reference on this for Greek can be found in the book Greek: An Intensive Course by Hansen and Quinn, a secularly oriented book on Greek grammar focusing on the classics. It illustrates the impact of word order by giving the following 3 ways to write "Homer educates his brother" as

8 (a) ο Οµηρος τον αδελφον παιδευει (b) παιδευει ο Οµηρος τον αδελφον (c) τον αδελφον ο Οµηρος παιδευει and comments by saying: "The first example can be considered neutral word order. The subject more often than not does precede the verb, as does the direct object. The second example puts greater emphasis on the verb...the third puts emphasis on the direct object." (Greek, an Intensive Course, Hansen and Quinn, page 30) Overall, Greek speakers expect to see the SUBJECT first, the OBJECT next, and only after that, the VERB. Disturbing this word order creates emphasis on the word that comes out of place. A particular word order is considered neutral because that's the way it appears most of the time. The only reason English people EXPECT it in a different word order than Hebrew or Greek speaking folks is because that's what they are used to! If you didn't know what the "neutral" word order was for a given language, how would you figure it out? Of course, you would look at some example sentences, and if you see 70% of those sentences conforming to a certain word order, you'd probably conclude that's the normal expectancy or the neutral order. If you saw 99% of sentences a certain way in a language you were trying to decode, you might conclude the grammar must demand that word order, and the few exceptions were probably mistakes by people speaking the language poorly, since 1 time in a hundred is not an unusual rate for errors in language use. In both the Textus Receptus and the Wescott-Hort readings of the Greek NT, the word order is found to match normal or neutral Hebrew word order and not Greek word order most of the time. In both Greek readings, a computer generated count shows 72% of all verses have the Verb before the subject or object nouns, just like in Hebrew (for the neutral case), but not like typical Greek at all. In the Gospels, it's almost 80%. No book of the Greek NT uses the neutral Greek word order a majority of the time, even though we'd expect every book written in Greek to do so most of the time. The style of Greek in Paul's letters varies wildly from letter to letter. If Paul wrote all these letters in Greek, why don't we see a consistent Greek style? In Paul's letter to Ephesus, we see the adjective preceding the noun (in natural Greek fashion) about 73% of the time (in the TR=Textus Receptus and WH=Wescott-Hort readings). But in his letter to Philemon, we don't see it at all, and the Semitic construction of the adjective AFTER the noun is used in every case. We see the Adjective-Noun order appear in Phillipians 78% of the time (TR and WH), but we see Noun-Adjective almost half (47%) in his 2nd letter to Timothy (TR). And sometimes, the TR and WH can't even agree on how often he used it one way versus the other. In Galatians, the WH reading has Paul using the neutral Greek Adjective-Noun order 84% of the time, while the TR has it only 70% of the time.

9 And the Semitic Verb-first constructions of the overall sentence varies from 53% in Galatians to 74% in Colossians. The following is a table that records a few comparisons... Letter Verb-Noun Noun-Verb Noun-Adjective Adjective-Noun Ephesus 69% 31% 27% 73% Galatians 53% 47% 30% 70% (84% in WH) Philemen 48% 52% 100% 0% Phillipians 57% 43% 22% 78% 1 Cor 61% 39% 36% 64% 2 Cor 64% 36% 36% 64% Colossians 74% 26% 32% 68% In contrast, the writings of 1st and 2nd Peter/Kefah show similarity on both of these style forms, and the writings of 1st, 2nd and 3rd John are consistent in respect to Adjective- Noun frequencies. So are we to believe that Paul wrote all these letters in Greek himself? Or does it make more sense to conclude that he wrote his letters in something else. Were they were translated into Greek by someone other than Paul, and someone different for each letter? We can also see that it's not due to who Paul used as a co-author, since Timothy is listed as co-author to both Philemon and Phillipians, yet the styles are nearly polar opposites, with Philemon showing many Semitic constructions and Phillipians showing very few. Letters using the same co-authors are often quite different in style, yet both of Paul's letters to Corinth show very similar style, yet a different co-author in each case. Now Paul was in the habit of encouraging believers in cities to read letters he had written to believers in other cities (See Col. 4:16). Is it possible that he wrote his letters in Aramaic, sent them to Aramaic speaking assemblies, and had them translated into Greek when they were sent to places like Corinth, where they would have only understood a Greek version? This might mean that Paul had some of the translations done for him personally, while others, such as those to Titus, Timothy, Philemon, etc., were probably not translated at all until a much later time period if these men already understood the Aramaic or Hebrew he originally wrote it in. This would indeed explain the wild divergence of grammatical style between his letters. Joe Viel G'MIRA: A Journal of Semitic New Testament Studies is an electronic journal dedicated to the study of the Semitic origin of the New Testament. Articles may cover any aspect of Semitic New Testament origins of all or parts of the NT including Hebrew or Aramaic NT Textual Criticism and Hebrew or Aramaic NT Source Criticism. G'MIRA will publish academic scholarly articles (full-length articles or shorter notes are both welcome), project reports, and book reviews in

10 a web based electronic journal. G'MIRA will be published quarterly on the Web in.pdf format. Submissions to G'MIRA All submissions of articles and project reports, as well as general inquiries, should be sent to the General Editor in electronic form (Word format). Submissions may be sent directly to the General Editor or they may be mailed on diskette or CD-rom(DOS/Windows or Macintosh) to the following address: James S. Trimm S.T.D. G'MIRA SANJ P.O. Box 471 Hurst, TX USA Paper copies of articles may also be submitted, providing that they accompany an electronic copy of the same article James Scott Trimm Limited Permission to Copy: Permission is granted to copy G MIRA provided that the Journal is not altered or added to in any way whatsoever including the contact information.