Vulgate Manuscripts Missing the Last Two Chapters of Romans?

I’m attempting to work on a paper on the doxology in Romans, found as 16:25–27 in the THGNT and (in brackets) in the NA28. As part of my literature review, I spent some time surveying the treatment of this question in a number of commentaries. While reading Cranfield’s classic ICC, I was very surprised to come across the following statement, for which no explicit source was cited: 

(v) In the Vulgate MSS. 1648, 1792 and 2089 the text of Romans comprises only 1:1–14:23 followed immediately by 16:24–27. [p. 1:6]

My previous understanding had been that, despite a number of theories that have postulated a shorter version of Paul’s most famous letter, there were no extant manuscripts that actually contained such a shorter text. Further investigation seemed warranted. 

The first task was to identify which manuscripts Cranfield had in mind. The reference numbers he provided do not match anything found in Wordsworth-White’s large critical edition of the Vulgate, nor do they provide any notice of a Latin manuscript with a shorter text form. Furthermore, although they mention the textual problem of the doxology in a note, they do not cite any Latin manuscripts that have it at the end of our chapter 14, where it is found in the bulk of the Byzantine tradition. 

After a little digging, I determined that Cranfield’s source (which he had previously cited) was almost certainly T. W. Manson’s 1948 article, “St. Paul’s Letter to the Romans—And Others.” Manson states that: 

To the evidence of these tables we can add that of three MSS. of the Vulgate in Gregory’s notation 1648 and 1792 (both of Munich) and 2089 (of the Monza Chapter Library). In these the text ends at xiv. 23 and is followed by a short benediction and the doxology. [p. 232]

My first query was now solved—the numbers used by Cranfield go back to Gregory’s survey of Latin manuscripts in his Textkritik and with this knowledge I was able to identify their modern shelf numbers. For this statement, Manson cites Rudolf Schumacher’s 1929 study Die beiden letzten Kapitel des Römerbriefes in Neutestamentliche Abhandlungen. Schumacher discusses the three manuscripts, all of which have the doxology, preceded by a grace wish in one form or another, after 14:23. Schumacher concludes his discussion of these manuscripts by stating: 

Nach allem Gesagten ist nicht daran zu zweifeln, daß es eine lateinische Rezension gegeben hat, welche die beiden Schlußkapitel fortließ.  [p. 15] 

In light of all that has been said, there is no doubt that there was a Latin version that omitted the two final chapters.

While this is a clear enough statement and could well be the case, what was still not clear to me was whether or not these particular manuscripts actually contained such a shorter version as Cranfield said they did. Schumacher in turn pointed to a 1911 article by De Bruyne, entitled “La finale Marcionite de la lettre aux Romains retrouvée.” 

Having already discussed the Monza manuscript (this is VL 86, a detailed discussion and full transcription of which can be found in Frede’s Altlateinische Paulus-Handschriften), De Bruyne first mentions a group of manuscripts that have the doxology after 14:23. According to De Bruyne: 

• Florence, BML, Plut 25.10 has the doxology after 14:23 written in the margin by a second hand, while a third hand has crossed it out. 
• Florence, BML, Plut 25.2 has the doxology after 14:23 in the main text. 
• Florence, Biblioteca Riccardiana, MS 222, as above.
• Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional, A.7, as above. 

De Bruyne then comes to the two Münich manuscripts originally mentioned by Cranfield, BSB, Clm 17040 and BSB, Clm 17043. De Bruyne notes that, in Clm 17040, 14:23 is followed by the text of the blessing he had previously reconstructed for the Monza manuscript, then the doxology (“il contient après le chapitre 14 le souhait suivi de la doxologie” [134]). Since this manuscript has few other archaic features, he suspected it as an interpolation, which was confirmed by the fact that it is actually written in the margin of Clm 17043, of which it seems to be a copy. 

In context, De Bruyne is concerned about using these manuscripts to reconstruct the text of the blessing and doxology found in VL 86. Although VL 86 itself contains the last two chapters of Romans, De Bruyne was already convinced that the early placement of the doxology was evidence for a shorter version of Romans in the Latin tradition. Yet while neither he nor Schumacher clearly state that any of these manuscripts actually omit the last two chapters of Romans, they also do not explicitly say that they do contain them. 

Unfortunately, neither of the Münich manuscripts are available online. However, Elisabeth Klemm provides a detailed treatment of Clm 17043 in her 2004 catalogue. In this catalogue, she explicitly refers to this discussion and says: 

Im Zusammenhang mit textkritischen Untersuchungen zu Rm 16,25-27 und der Frage nach dem originalen Schluß des Römerbriefs zieht H. J. Frede u. a. Clm 17043 heran, in welchem die Schlußverse wie in einer Reihe italienischer Hss. an Rm 14,23 anschließen (die Hss. enden aber nicht damit, es folgen trotzdem noch die beiden Schlußkapitel des Römerbriefs). [p. 89]

In connection with textual-critical studies of Rom 16:25–27 and the question of the original conclusion of the Epistle to the Romans, H. J. Frede draws upon, among other sources, Clm 17043, in which the concluding verses follow Rom 14:23, as they do in a number of Italian manuscripts (though the manuscripts do not end there; the two concluding chapters of the Epistle to the Romans still follow). 

In addition to Klemm’s statement about the Münich manuscripts, I was able to consult images of one of De Bruyne’s Italian group (Florence, BML, Plut 25.2, pictured) and determine that, while it did indeed have the doxology after 14:23, this was then followed by the remainder of the last two chapters, as well as a repetition of the doxology in its normal placement in the Latin tradition in 16:25–27.

Taken together, these data points seemed sufficient to settle my second question. While Cranfield was merely repeating Manson, Manson had misunderstood the (admittedly ambiguous) statements by Schumacher, who was, in turn, replicating the ambiguity present already in De Bruyne. While it may be the case that (as De Bruyne argued) the various placements of the doxology provide evidence for a lost shorter version of Romans, this postulated shorter version seems to be indeed lost, not only in Greek, but also in Latin.

The majority of the Latin tradition has the doxology as 16:25–27, VL86 has the doxology (though largely reconstructed) after 14:23. BML, Plut 25.2 has it in both places. (I was unable to check the rest of the witnesses mentioned by De Bruyne, but they will fall into one of these two categories). VL135 and VL77(the Latin of 012) omit it entirely. This means all four placements found in more than one Greek manuscript are also attested in the Latin tradition. (This last paragraph was edited after initial posting)

 

The Hexapla Institute Relaunched

 

The Hexapla Institute was founded in 2001 to publish a “Field for the Twenty-First Century.” Over the past 25 years, the Institute has made certain but limited progress, publishing only one of its volumes (Job 22–42) during this time, even though several dissertations were completed on Genesis, Numbers, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, and Job. The progress has been slow due to the project’s lack of funding and editors who are already heavily committed to other academic projects (all routine challenges and difficulties for academic projects of this sort). Below is a brief update on what’s the same and what exciting new developments are on the horizon.

The Original Purpose

A new chapter in the life of the Hexapla Institute is now being written, one that hopefully will include many volumes of the Edition published within its pages. But this new chapter continues to be guided by the original purpose of the Hexapla Institute: to publish a new critical edition of the remains of Origen’s Hexapla. We exist to research, edit, and publish a critical text of Origen’s Hexapla. We still intend to carry out this mission in both print (with Peeters) and digital formats (with our database currently in development stages). The Hexapla Institute's Editorial Committee with Alison Salvesen, Bas ter Haar Romeny, Peter Gentry, and yours truly remains the same. I'm excited to announce that the volumes for the Secunda (Benjamin Kantor) and Numbers 19–36 (Andrew McClurg) are in process of being typeset, proofed, and published. Thus, our mission remains the same. The changes listed below have been enacted to advance the original purpose of publishing a New Field. 

A New Chapter

The Hexapla Institute was never set up as its own independent research and education organization, and thus it was not setup to receive donations or even to apply for research grants. There were attempts to affiliate it with other such organizations over the years but to no avail. Thus, what was needed was a move to set up the Hexapla Institute as its own independent charitable tax-exempt organization with 501(c)(3) status with the Internal Revenue Service (USA). And we have now submitted the application for such recognition from the IRS and now wait for their determination. In the meantime, we are still raising funds from gifts which can be retroactively determined tax deductible in order to continue the work.

The work on the Institute’s database continues more efficiently and systematically than ever. And the Institute’s new Fellowship program for residential PhD students at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary will be of interest to readers of this blog.

Following the Work

The Hexapla Institute is not going on social media. We want to spend more time on enduring deep work rather than the ephemeral tweet. The new website will have a blog that will be used for updates on the project as well as drawing attention to the significance of the work. But it does plan to send out a Newsletter with some regularity to keep folks updated. If you want to subscribe to the email list, you can do that here.

I'm excited about this new chapter in the life of such an important Institute carrying out very meaningful and valuable work. I hope you will join me in my excitement about the work ahead. If you're interested in the fellowship program or even learning more about editing the hexaplaric materials themselves, do not hesitate to reach out to learn more.

New Review of ECM Revelation

My review of the ECM Revelation volumes is out today in Religious Studies Review. Per the format, it is short, so don’t expect a deep dive. Instead I tried to hit the high points. You should be able to read it without the paywall using this gift link. Here are the last few lines:

The entire team is to be warmly congratulated. Readers of Revelation will be in their debt for decades to come. It remains now for others to digest the results and use them to better understand the textual history of this remarkable book.

Before on the blog, I mentioned some of the most important changes and alerted readers to the fact that, for the first time ever with an ECM, most of the edition would be put online for free. That has now been done which is really remarkable since the edition costs $800 USD. Here are the links:

1. Text (introduction only, 78 pages). The main apparatus is available in the digital ECM at the VMR (here). For the punctuation, textual structure and paratextual details, I gather you still need the physical copy.
2. Supplementary Material 
3. Studies on the Text 
4. Studies on Punctuation and Textual Structure 

New book: Scribal Habits in Greek New Testament Manuscripts

Andrew Wilson has a new book coming out in SBL’s Text-Criticism Studies series. It’s a major study of scribal habits and is something Andrew’s been working on for some 20 years! (I remember reading his chapter on the subject in MAR’s Festschrift during my PhD.)

Publisher's Description

Singular readings (textual variants attested in only one Greek New Testament manuscript) are considered among the least reliable of all textual variants, far more likely to be scribal changes than the words of the authorial text. In this groundbreaking study, Andrew W. Wilson revisits long-held suppositions about textual variants and how they arose through a thorough analysis of more than ten thousand readings likely to be scribal errors. Wilson takes this evidence and reevaluates previous studies of scribal habits to assess the strengths and weaknesses of various methodologies for determining what those habits were and what impact they might have had on the wording of New Testament textual transmission. Biblical scholars and students interested in the formation of biblical texts will find new possibilities for how to approach disputed wording in the New Testament.

Table of contents 

To give you a taste of the book, here is the table of contents courtesy of Andrew.

Discount

Finally, over on Facebook, Juan Hernández, who edits the series, shared that you can order the book at a 30% discount through June 5 via the SBL online bookstore. Use discount code SP2026.

‘The Most Beautiful and Glorious Task of Learned Men’

“The most beautiful and glorious task of learned men” — that may be the best description of textual criticism I’ve ever come across. It’s from the sixth-century Roman senator, Christian writer, and monk Cassiodorus. In his book Institutions of Divine and Secular Learning, he has an entire section on the importance of correcting biblical manuscripts as part of the proper study of the Bible. 

Ezra in Amiatinus (source)

He closes his section on the three ways the Scriptures have been divided (by Jerome, Augustine, and the LXX) by saying, “Now it remains for us to say how we ought to correct scribal errors in Holy Scripture.  What use is it to read through many texts and not to know what should properly be corrected in them?” (XIV.5). His next section (XV) gives 16 points on how to do it properly. Here is his first one:

1.  You, therefore, who have a good knowledge of divine and secular letters and the understanding to discover what is not in harmony with common usage, read through sacred literature in the following manner; for the few who are learned must prepare material for the simple and less educated community. Therefore, first read carefully and correct the errors of the writers in such a way that you do not deserve criticism for trying to correct others without due deliberation; this kind of correction is, in my opinion, the most beautiful and glorious task of learned men.

And here are his last two.

15.  I pray also that you who presume, nevertheless, to emend, make the letters you add so beautiful that they appear to have been written by the scribes.  For it is wrong to find in that beauty anything foul which afterwards may shock the eyes of scholars. Consider, therefore, the sort of case entrusted to you, your service to Christians, the treasury of the Church, the enlightenment of souls. See carefully to it, therefore, that no error is left in the truth, no falseness in the purity, and no scribal mistakes in the corrected text. 

16.  First, with the Lord’s aid, we have listed the nine volumes of the law and detailed the introductory writers with their commentaries as carefully as we could. Next we touched on the three divisions of the whole divine law which our ancestors have given us. Then we included a section on the rules covering emendation of texts of divine authority to prevent disruption as well as the transmission of troublesome confusion in the text to posterity because of excessive liberty with the text.  Now we must discuss in all respects the excellence of divine reading so that each passage may abound in its own sweetness.

The whole thing is worth reading, and it’s online here courtesy of James W. and Barbara Halporn. 

Among the reasons Cassiodorus is important is that he is thought by some to be the inspiration behind the famous depiction of Ezra the Scribe in Codex Amiatinus. The nine books in Ezra’s bookcase do match Cassiodorus’s description of the Bible into nine parts.

Now the next time someone tells you textual criticism is boring, you just tell them it’s actually the most beautiful and glorious task of learned men!

Review of UBS6 in Themelios

The latest issue of Themelios is a special issue dedicated to D.A. Carson and the influential NSBT series he edited for three decades. The bulk of the issue is taken up by key authors from the series who summarize and reflect on their volumes. If you’ve never heard of the NSBT series, this would be a great way into it.

But this is not a blog about biblical theology so we’ll save that for another place. Instead, this blog post is to alert you to my review of UBS6 that is also in this issue. I am thankful to the editors who let me go a little longer than the typical Themelios review. Here’s the introduction

First published in 1966, the UBS Greek New Testament hits its 60th birthday this year. It has long been the preferred hand edition for its intended audience of translators, students, and pastors. The arrival of this new, sixth edition is a major publishing event, especially as it is accompanied by a completely new textual commentary (reviewed separately). So much has changed with this edition that it can fairly be called the most significant update to the UBS edition in fifty years (when the third edition was first linked with the Nestle-Aland). By way of review, we can highlight the salient changes under the following headings: editors, format, text, and apparatus.

And part of the conclusion: 

I expect this edition to increase the UBS’s already loyal fan base, especially among those new to the Greek New Testament. If I have an overriding concern, it is that the apparatus surrenders too much in the process so that those of us accustomed to leaning on the UBS for its extra detail will now have to go elsewhere, perhaps all the way to the ECM. But all editions have their limits, and this one is no different. It makes for an excellent hand edition, one that is well conceived and well executed, and promises to carry on the UBS legacy for many years to come—perhaps another sixty.

The only thing I would add is that I’ve now been using the UBS6 since I picked it up at SBL in November and I have really enjoyed it. I love the thinner size, the better typeface, the much cleaner page, and the simplified introduction. I would dare to say that the changes make this a true competitor to the THGNT in terms of simplicity and easy of use—especially for new students. I am myself a proponent of the NA, so I won’t be abandoning that any time soon. But I have adopted the THGNT for my first year Greek students the last few years and I am now thinking carefully about switching to this. I like that it has the visual benefits of THGNT, but with a better apparatus. Personally, I have been using UBS6 whenever I want to enjoy the simple pleasure of reading without distraction.

This same issue of Themelios also has reviews of the accompanying textual commentary by Thomas Haviland-Pabst and Kruger’s new volume on miniature codices by Ched Spellman. I will also be reviewing the commentary for JTS and have just been approved to present a combined review of UBS6 and the textual commentary at ETS this fall in Denver. If you are a glutton for reviews, come along.

Lanier on UBS6

Over on his new YouTube channel, Greg Lanier has posted a long, 45-minute review of UBS6. I haven’t watched it all yet, but what I did watch was in-depth and thorough. Overall, he seems to like it but recognizes that it will not supplement the NA edition the way it has in the past given the reduction in the apparatus. My own review is forthcoming in Themelios, and I’ll post it here when it's out. Until then, give Lanier’s video a watch.

New Blog on NT Critical Texts

Greg Paulson and Katie Leggett have a new website that ETC readers will be interested in. It’s called Critical Texts and is described as “the personal academic blog of Dr. Gregory S. Paulson and Dr. Katie Leggett, offering a creative space for reflection on critical texts in the field of Greek New Testament textual criticism.” 

Students new to the subject will find links to some helpful articles from other sites answering question like “What is the Kurzgefasste Liste?,” or “What is the NTVMR?,” and, everyone’s favorite, “What is the latest tally of NT manuscripts?” (answer: 5,711 as of 2 days ago). Of course, we have addressed that question here before. Greg has also put together a video introducing the new UBS6. 

This may also be a good time to note that their website reminded me that a third edition of the printed Kurzgefasste Liste is scheduled for later this year. We’ll look forward to that. In the meantime, add this new website to your reading list, or just check out the blogroll in the right column of this website—yes, we still have a blogroll. Who says blogs are dead?

Was Romans Partly “Performed” by Phoebe – Not Just Written by Paul?

UPDATE: Happy April Fool's Day!

It is best to indicate here that it is a joke (since on of our previous jokes written by P.J. Willliams some years ago, that archaeologists have found Q, has spread like a fire). At the same time, it is true that Phoebe likely delivered Romans and that she may have read it and been able to clarify its contents. 

 _________________________________________

Recent discussion among New Testament scholars has highlighted a startling and almost revolutionary aspect of ancient letter delivery — one that could fundamentally change how we think about the earliest receptions of Romans.

Building on the work of Oxford scholar Peter Head — particularly his detailed study of named letter‑carriers in ancient documents — some commentators have playfully suggested that early letter carriers did far more than merely deliver letters: they may have actively shaped how these letters were understood, interpreted, and even performed.

As Head demonstrates in several publications, ancient letter carriers were far from passive couriers. In his “Named Letter‑Carriers among the Oxyrhynchus Papyri” (JSNT 31.3, 2009, pp. 279‑299), he shows that the person physically carrying a letter often added oral context when presenting it to the recipient — essentially functioning as an authorized live interpreter, capable of clarifying, emphasizing, or dramatizing key points.

On the subject of Pauline letters, Head observes (p. 298):

Perhaps the crucial point for our thinking about the delivery of Pauline
letters is the understanding that the trusted letter-carrier often has an
important role in extending the communication initiated by the letter. 

[...] 

This model suggests that the earliest reception of specific Pauline
letters would have been accompanied by a Pauline representative who
could relate the specifics of the letter to the general Pauline tradition
known to him (or her). But I leave that for another day. 

Today, we may finally take up that challenge — and perhaps push it even further.

In a forthcoming article in TC: A Journal of Biblical Textual Criticism (for which I am editor), the authors have examined the Corpus Paulinum alongside thousands of papyrus letters from Greco‑Roman Egypt, comparing named letter carriers across contexts. Their findings suggest that couriers not only supplemented written messages with oral interpretation, but may have effectively performed them, mediating meaning in ways that could radically shape early audiences’ understanding. In other words, early Christian letters might have functioned less like static texts and more like scripts staged for live performance.

Taking up Head’s suggestion, the authors provocatively propose that Phoebe — the female co‑worker commended in Rom 16:1–2 and widely identified as the letter carrier of Romans — may have done far more than deliver the letter: she may have clarified Paul's arguments, answered follow-up questions on the spot, and even expanded or dramatized difficult passages in real time. One can almost imagine Phoebe “directing” the reception of Romans like a seasoned stage director, shaping the audience’s understanding as she went.

Given the complexity and density of Romans, this leads to an intriguing possibility: what if parts of the letter’s meaning were always intended to be mediated through the person delivering it? After all, if the carrier could supply additional information beyond the written text, how much of what was understood depended on Phoebe’s performance?

This leads to a provocative — and admittedly playful — question: Was Romans simply written by Paul, or was it, in some sense, also performed by Phoebe?

GA 2685 in Romans: A Close Relative of the 6-424KC/1739/1881/1908K Cluster of Witnesses

GA 2685 is a 14th century manuscript housed in the Varlaam Monastery in Metora, containing the Gospels, Romans and Hebrews. Although the folio numbers themselves are not clear, the images in the NTVMR seem to show that Hebrews begins on 291v, while Romans ends on 291r which would make this one of the few Greek manuscripts that (as with P46) has Hebrews immediately after Romans. This witness was transcribed by the IGNTP for the ECM of Romans and is included in the collation published here.

In my recently published book, Chrysostom’s Homilies on Romans and the Textual History of the New Testament (Brill, 2025), I included a phylogenetic reconstruction of the textual history of Romans (also freely available in the online supplement), based on an apparatus of high-entropy variation units derived from the IGNTP transcriptions. In this stemma, GA 2685 was placed as a sister manuscript to GA 6, closely related to GA 424KC, and in turn to GA 1739, 1881, and 1908K. Since this section of the tradition was not especially relevant to my focus in that book, I did not think much about this at the time or discuss it further.

However, I’m currently working on a paper with Joey McCollum that will introduce a set of tools for identifying manuscript groupings within a large collation, and GA 2685 came up again. This time I paid attention. Based on a quick preliminary search, this witness doesn’t seem to have been discussed in any detail in connection with the cluster of witnesses related to GA 1739 (while included in a table in a recent article by Gäbel on Hebrews in GA 1739, it isn’t discussed; it isn’t mentioned in Birdsall’s or Peterson’s dissertations), though please let me know in the comments if this connection has already been pointed out. However, it shares a large number of distinctive readings with this cluster, far too many to be a coincidence. 

In the table below (based on one of Joey’s extremely helpful tools, that will be properly introduced in the paper we are working on), I’ve ordered the readings that connect GA 2685 and one or more members of the GA 1739-related cluster based on how distinctive they are, with the list limited to readings shared by ten or fewer witnesses including GA 2685 (there are many more agreements that involve a larger number of witnesses). 

The first column has the reference to the ECM collation, the second has the distinctive reading found in GA 2685, the third has the witnesses that share this reading, and the fourth has the other readings found in this location. I’ve highlighted in blue the readings that seem to me the most significant agreements. While the connections to GA 6 are the most striking (not only does it have two unique agreements, but it agrees with GA6 in 98.99% of readings in the full collation), GA 2685 also agrees with other witnesses in this cluster in places where it disagrees with GA 6, meaning that it is unlikely to descend from it directly. In any case, GA 2685 should be included in subsequent investigations of this fascinating cluster of witnesses. 

New Greek New Testament Study Bible

I’m not often surprised by new Bibles, but today I was. On his Facebook page, Con Campbell shared the cover of a new Greek NT he’s edited called The Greek New Testament Study Bible. It’s published by Zondervan. I suppose you could compare it to Crossway’s Guided Annotating Edition of the THGNT, but at 1168 pages, this appears to be much more than that. The release date in the U.S. is not until October and I couldn’t find a list of contributors at Zonderan’s website. Here is the description from Amazon:

The Greek New Testament Study Bible provides you with access to the insights into the Greek text from some of the world’s leading scholars, while encouraging and assisting you in the use of your Greek reading skills for sermon preparation, devotional study, and New Testament courses. If you sense you are losing your competence in Greek because of the passage of time or the pressures of ministry, yet you desire to study the text in Greek for preaching, teaching, and personal study, then The Greek New Testament Study Bible will help.

In one convenient volume, you get access to the full Greek text as it is found in the Reader’s Greek New Testament. At the bottom of each page of Greek text you will find a list of infrequently occurring words with short definitions, which means you don’t need to consult a separate lexicon for basic translation work. Right page notes identify key areas of grammar and syntax pertinent to the text under consideration, including insights into the use or absence of articles; particular lexemes; connectives; prepositions; pronouns, adverbs, and particles; verbal aspect; voice; questions; case; discourse analysis; prohibitions; the use of the imperative, subjunctive, and infinitive moods; and important textual variants.

The Greek New Testament Study Bible will:

• Give you competence and confidence in your handling of the Greek text
• Enable you to make exegetical decisions based on the Greek text, grammar, and syntax
• Equip you to continue using your knowledge of the Greek language beyond seminary in pastoral ministry and devotional studies
• Provide you with a quick reference guide to some of the key questions and insights in the text.
• Help you discern the major contributions that a study of the Greek text brings to your understanding of Scripture

Key features of The Greek New Testament Study Bible:

• Lefthand pages provide the Greek text based on UBS5, while righthand pages contain study notes
• Contains more than 9,500 study notes on the Greek text
• At the bottom of each page of Greek text, definitions are provided for Greek words that appear 30 times or fewer in the New Testament.
• Includes contributions from 19 internationally recognized experts on the translation and interpretation of the Greek New Testament.
• Study notes comment on the use, or absence of articles; particular lexemes; connectives; prepositions; pronouns, adverbs, and particles; verbal aspect; voice; questions; case; discourse analysis; prohibitions; the use of the imperative, subjunctive, and infinitive moods; and important textual variants.
• Includes a glossary of 198 technical terms.

It is not clear to me what the Greek text is exactly. It says it is “based on UBS5” but then also says it’s the Greek text found in the Reader’s edition, which is really a retroversion from the NIV. So, perhaps they mean it’s based on the UBS5 the way the NIV is. It’s a bit of an odd way to say that though.

‘Conjecture Magnets’ Ranked

In his chapter on emendation in the book Pen, Print, and Pixels, Jan Krans gives some very interesting data from the Amsterdam Database. It’s the kind of data that makes you want to ask follow up questions, which is what this post does. 

On pages 175–177, Jan gives a list of places that he calls “conjecture magnets.” These are the most conjectured about problems in the NT and show, as Jan points out, that those conjecturing agree there’s a problem but obviously can’t agree on the solution! 

A passage is a “magnet” if it has five or more conjectures for it. Jan lists 46 such places. What he doesn’t do in the article is tell us the number of conjectures for each one or rank them accordingly. Thankfully, that’s the perfect kind of thing you can do easily with the Amsterdam Database. So, listed below are Jan’s 46 conjecture magnets ranked by the number of conjectures in the database as of today.

You’ll have to go to Jan’s chapter or to the database itself to see what the issue is in each case. But, as one initial observation, it’s interesting that Matthew and especially Revelation do not make the list at all.

Rank	Passage	Total Conj.
1	1 Cor 11.10	36
2	Acts 2.9	27
3	Rom 16.16-23	22
4	Rom 7.25-8.2	21
	Heb 11.37	21
	2 Pet 3.10	21
5	Eph 1.1	20
6	John 18.13-24	19
	Jas 3.6	19
7	Col 2.18	17
8	Luke 2.2	14
	Acts 5.12-16	14
	1 Cor 4.6	14
9	2 Cor 11.30-12.1	13
	Gal 4.25	13
	Heb 2.9	13
10	John 3.25	12
	John 19.29	12
	1 Cor 15.2	12
11	Mark 9.23	11
	Acts 4.25	11
	1 Cor 15.29	11
	1 Thess 3.3	11
12	Acts 13.33	10
13	1 Cor 2.4	9
	2 Cor 1.13	9
	Jas 4.5	9
14	Mark 14.41	8
	Luke 18.7	8
	John 19.39	8
	Acts 1.18	8
	Acts 16.12	8
	Rom 4.12	8
	Col 2.14	8
15	Mark 14.3	7
	Acts 10.30	7
	Eph 5.26	7
	2 Pet 1.20	7
16	Acts 18.5	6
	Acts 27.9	6
	1 Tim 4.3	6
	Heb 12.18	6
	Jas 3.1	6
17	Acts 20.4	5
	Acts 27.7	5
	1 Cor 6.5	5

News from CSNTM: Digital Manuscript Collection Interface is Coming!

The countdown has begun —on Monday 16 February, the Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscrips (CSNTM), for which I am a boardmember since 2010, will launch its new CSNTM DIgital Manuscript Collection at collections.csntm.org. According to Denis Salgado, Lead Research Fellow and Assistant Executive Director, this platform will offer enhanced functionality, increased flexibility, and the ability to host a broader range of manuscripts and resources that will be added in coming months. Whether you are a scholar, student, or someone passionate about biblical studies, this database will undoubtedly serve as an essential resource for New Testament manuscript research and discovery for years to come.

On the Origin of the Nomina Sacra

Where do the typically Christian shortforms for words such as ‘Jesus’, ‘Christ’, ‘God’, and ‘Lord’ come from? What is their origin? In a recent essay I argued that their origin lies in a necessary Christian response to Greek Jewish manuscripts in which the Tetragrammaton was dealt with in a special way. And the nomina sacra of the group of words listed above are a coherent and unified response to that Jewish practice, prompted by the fact that the early church saw Jesus in the Jewish Scriptures, and that from the beginning Jesus could be referred to by any of these terms.

Though a unified response, I still argue for a logical beginning in the contraction of the word κυριος. In the essay I suggest that the form κ̅ϲ goes back to the numeral 26, which provides a nice link to the numerical value of the Tetragrammaton.

Since writing that essay, I found a number of publications I could have used in support, and one that came out at the same time my piece was published.

First is that the link between nomina sacra and numerals had been suggested for the variant of the number of the beast in Revelation 13:18 by Pete Williams (yes, my boss) back in 2007 (bibliography see below).

Secondly, in 2021 Jesse Hoover showed how the reading 616 had been used within the Donatist church. The number 616 can be represented by χι̅ϲ, which was then interpreted as a combination of the nomina sacra for Christ and for Jesus (basically the same point Williams made, but then 1,400 years earlier).

So my suggestion that κ̅ϲ and 26 are related would make sense within the reception history of the nomina sacra.

There is a ‘thirdly’ here, though. Around the same time my essay was published, HTR published an article by Alexander Kulik. I don’t think we have met or have been otherwise in contact, both pieces are conceived independent of one another (and come from different angles as well). But his study makes an elaborate and thorough case for the plausibility of connecting the nomen sacrum κ̅ϲ with 26, much better than I could have done. You will have to read the full essay by yourself, but I think that Kulik’s piece strengthens the case to regard κυριος as the origin considerably.

Of course, Larry Hurtado had seen the similarity in shape between numerals and nomina sacra, and this led him to seeking the origin of the phenomenon in ι̅η as the initial form of a nomen sacrum for Jesus, with 18 traced back through Barnabas. Though Hurtado was on the right track, I think there is more mileage in κυριος and 26 and it is pleasing to see that some real progress may have been made.

Bibliography

Hoover, Jesse. "The Apocalyptic Number 616 and the Donatist Church." The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 72, no. 4 (2021): 709–25.

Jongkind, Dirk. "On the Origin of the Nomina Sacra, Yet Again." In Die Bibel zum Sprechen bringen: Festschrift zu Ehren von Holger Strutwolf, edited by Marie-Luise Lakmann, Gregory S. Paulson Paulson and Jan Graefe. ANTF 61 (De Gruyter, 2025), 105–18.

Kulik, Alexander. "Counting on God’s Name: The Numerology of Nomina Sacra." Harvard Theological Review 118, no. 3 (2025): 425–63.

Williams, P.J. "P115 and the Number of the Beast." Tyndale Bulletin 58, no. 1 (2007): 151–53.

Darrell Post Finds a New Member of Family 13 – L1080

In recent years, Darrell Post has worked to collate all manuscripts in John 11 and in this process he has just discovered a new member of Family 13 – Lectionary 1080 (Mount Athos, Great Lavra Monastery, A' 80, 13th century). Post tells me that the manuscript "was found to be a perfect match to Family 13 in its core group, in John 11:1-45. The lesson that covers 11:47-54 is of a slightly different pattern, but is a match to L547, also belonging to Family 13." 

This is the third lectionary which has been identified as a family member: 

In 1964, Jacob Geerlings analysed L547 in his study on The Lectionary Text of Family 13 according to Cod Vat Gr 1217 {Gregory 547) [ The Ferrar Lectionary] (Salt Lake City, 1964).

In 1982, Yvonne Burns published an article on L574, "A Newly Discovered Family 13 Manuscript and the Ferrar Lection System" in Studia Patristica 12 (pp. 278–299).

And now Post has identified a third lectionary, L1080, as a member of F13, but he points out that a full collation is necessary to see if it is a family member throughout the manuscript. Post sent me a chart which shows the pattern of readings in the chapter and also illustrates its close relationship to L547 in the lesson in 11:47–54.

Copyright of Digital Images of Biblical Manuscripts

The other day I attended an interesting professional development session on "Foundations of Copyright for Researchers" (by the way, this was not punishment for using academia.edu). One of the interesting things about this was a discussion about a recent UK court case and its implications for copyright of digital images - something many of us are interested in and use pretty much every day. 

In brief it seems that the Judge in this court case (Lord Justice Arnold) broadly ruled that simply taking a photograph of an object was not sufficiently "creative" to warrant the copyrighting of the digital image.  

"What is required is that the author was able to express their creative abilities in the production of the work by making free and creative choices so as to stamp the work created with their personal touch […] This criterion is not satisfied where the content of the work is dictated by technical considerations, rules or other constraints which leave no room for creative freedom.” 

If you are interested in this, then there is more information here: https://douglasmccarthy.com/2024/01/after-thj-v-sheridan/ (and also further reading and references to follow up). 

Want to learn to read Greek Manuscripts?

Reading manuscripts is one of the best ways to get into textual criticism and even theology of Scripture because it forces you to deal with what an actual person actually did for someone’s actual Bible. It doesn’t allow you to make assumptions about what you think should have happened and assume that the evidence will simply prove you right.

Dr. Jacob Peterson has created a wonderful website that takes readers who can read printed Greek texts from easy Greek manuscripts on to harder ones.

Screenshot of lesson 1

Just today, I stepped into the main room of CNTTS and saw that our newest employee was being trained on this website before he starts next week.

If you’ve ever wanted to be able to read the manuscripts themselves instead of relying on others to tell you what they say, I recommend xeirographa.com (with an x, not a χ).

A photo of xeirographa.com being used in the wild, which was definitely not staged.

Cole on Preservation and the Westminster Divines’ Sermons

Zach Cole of RTS Orlando has a new article out in JETS. Actually, it was out in September issue, but I just got my hardcopy. Zach’s been working on the subject of TC in the Westminster divines for a while now and his ETS paper this year built on that. It dovetails nincely with my recent article on the topic and I’ve been enjoying following Zach’s parallel work on the subject. I recommend this one. Here is the abstract.

Providential Preservation of Scripture and Textual Criticism in the Sermons of Westminster Divines

Abstract: The men who claimed that Scripture had been “kept pure in all ages” were also regular preachers who routinely dealt with textual variations and marginal readings. By giving attention to the manner in which they addressed text-critical problems in the pulpit, we can understand more precisely what the Westminster divines believed about the manner of God’s preservation of his word. It is argued that the authorial intent of WCF 1.8 allows room for the practice of textual criticism and that it does not require adoption of one particular strand of the Greek textual tradition as “approved” in every point of variation.

And here are his concluding observations in short form:

• First and most obviously, the men who affirmed that the word of God had been “kept pure in all ages” were aware of textual criticism and its challenges.
• Second, we do not find our preachers engaging in conjectural emendation, that is, advocating a reading that lacks extant manuscript support.
• Third, beyond these similarities across our preachers, we also find a modest diversity of approaches and practices when adjudicating textual problems. 
• Fourth, several of the Westminster divines show a degree comfortability with textual variation.

You can read the whole article here, although it may be paywalled for non-ETS members.