Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Zondervan Publishes Handwritten Bible (via Antonio Lombatti)

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Antonio Lombatti notes an initiative from Zondervan to publish a handwritten(!) Bible in order to mark the 30th anniversary of the NIV.

It will be tricky to survey scribal habits, since each verse will be written by a different person (31,173 verses). Instead of a "colophon," an index will list each participant's name and the number of the verse he or she copied.

USA Today (29/9) reports that "A photo facsimile of all the verses will be compiled and published in time for Christmas 2009. . . . One set of originals will be bound and offered to the Smithsonian. The second set, also bound, will be auctioned to benefit the International Bible Society, which holds the NIV copyright and is co-sponsoring the project with Zondervan."

Read the whole story here.

4 comments

  1. I'm wondering . . .
    Will they require positive photo ID of each scribe, or will they run the risk of pseudopigraphy?

    This project could prove helpful in the paleographic studies of a future millennium.

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  2. Maybe we Evangelical Greek scholars should attempt our own publicity stunt at ETS and SBL: a handwritten copy of the Greek NT, with each person writing one verse in Greek (using whatever text, MS, or edition he or she thinks best for that verse).

    Now there would be a true "mixed text" for future analysis!

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  3. Are there really that many Evangelical Greek Scholars?
    Grading on that broad of a curve, I might even qualify.

    Perhaps I'd better start practicing my alphabeta.

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  4. This is really cool. All stratas of abilities and talent will be represented indiscriminately. It will help us to remain levelheaded as we judge the ancient scribes and their art.

    I'm really interested to see if they make omissions and erasures and cross-throughs/outs and if they are allowed to stand.

    Malcolm

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