Changes to Expect with UBS6/NA29

While doing some work yesterday on the history of the Nestle-Aland, I decided to take a peek at the upcoming NA29/UBS6 editions. I couldn’t find a page for the NA29 at the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft website and the UBS6 isn’t set for release until Oct. 19. What is available now is the reader’s edition that shares the same text. I’ve given a screenshot of the page below. Besides the very obvious typographic change (which may be unique to the reader’s edition), the most notable updates are these: 

• The text adopts the ECM text for all available books. That means Mark, Acts, Catholic Letters, and Revelation. (ECM Matthew is not set for release until December, so it does not include that.)
• The order of books does not follow Erasmus any more but reverts to what is found in earlier MSS (and editions like WH). That means Gospels, Acts, Catholic Letters, Paul (with Hebrews before the Pastorals), Revelation.
• Previously “missing verses” are back in the main text with double brackets. This is the most surprising update and one I did not know about until now. Here’s how the intro explains it: “Unlike in earlier editions of the Nestle-Aland and the UBS Greek New Testament, including the Reader’s Edition, all verses assigned a number within the New Testament are now integrated into the text in double brackets. Previously this was only the case for individual passages which traditionally enjoyed an exceptional position in the church (e.g. Mk 16.9–20; Jn 7.53–8.11).”

You can read the introduction here. Also don't forget about the release of the new Textual Commentary that will accompany the UBS6. 2025 is shaping up to be a banner year for NTTC.

The format of the new UBS6 Reader’s Edition

The Order of Books in Nestle 1

Here’s something I never noticed before. The order of books in Nestle’s 1st ed. (1898) follows Luther’s 1522 NT. Here you can see the two side-by-side. What makes the Nestle odd in a way even Luther’s is not is the headings. I may be wrong, but I can’t remember Hebrews ever being included with the Catholic Letters in any manuscript.

Luther Bible (1522)

Nestle 1 (1898)

By the third edition (1901) the books were back in their Erasmian order, although Hebrews was still set off just slightly from the other Pauline letters. You can see it here in my copy of the 13th edition which is the same.

Nestle 13 reflecting the changed book order

It’s worth mentioning this because my understanding is that the NA29 will switch the order of books, placing the Catholic Epistles immediately after Acts. As a result, the NA will match one of its original three sources and the one that Nestle himself called “the one constituent factor” in his edition (=WH).

Minor update: I notice the Nestle 13th ed. (1927) has the following note at the bottom of the page of Rom 1: “HTWS [=WH, Tischendorf, Weiss, and von Soden] Epistolas Catholicas (Jc, 1.2 P, 1-3 J, Jd) Paulinis anteponunt; epistolam ad Hebraeos datam epistolis pastoralibus praemittunt.”

P.S. Did you know you can look at scans of all the Nestle/Nestle-Aland editions in the VMR? In the Manuscript Workspace, search for N1, N2, etc. in the Manuscripts tab search box. From the 22nd ed. on, search for NA22, etc.

Plans for the NA29 and UBS6

At SBL last November, Holger Strutwolf gave an update on the plans for the next editions of the NA and UBS editions. I took some notes and thought I would share them. (Sorry it’s taken so long to get these out.)

• Both editions now have the same editorial committee. These editions will follow the work on the ECM volumes, but the committee is not bound to the same decisions as the ECM editors. They will make their own judgments. (That was a point that had not been entirely clear to me before.) Note that this means NA29 will be different in principle at least from NA28.
• The UBS has heard from translators that the UBS edition has more variants than they really need to do their field translation work so the UBS6 will probably have fewer than the UBS5.
• Greg Paulson and Dora Panella will be assistants on the editions
• Holger mentioned 2022 as a possible date for the NA29 with the UBS6 following after that. They are waiting for at least one more ECM volume to be finished, probably on Mark. In that case, they can incorporate the ECM work on at least two more books (Acts and Mark). What’s happening with John, I don’t know.

History and Development of the Nestle-Aland Editions Funded

Good news out of Münster today. Greg Paulson has received funding to study the history and development of the Novum Testamentum Graece editions. Congrats, Greg! Now, how do I apply to be a research assistant for this?

Here’s the announcement:

A New NA/UBS in 2021/22

Over at the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft website, there is a German press release about a recent meeting of the new NA/UBS committee. Below is a translation into English. The most important news here is the projected date of completion (2021/22), the expected changes covering Mark and Acts, and the changed order of books.

---

Editors of “Nestle-Aland” and Greek New Testament meet at Bible Museum in Washington

Preparations for a new edition of the authoritative scholarly texts

Stuttgart / Washington. The editors for the Greek New Testament and the Novum Testamentum Graece (“Nestle-Aland”) met at the newly opened “Museum of the Bible” (MOTB) in Washington, DC. After the conference, the contours for new editions of the world’s two leading scholarly editions of the Greek New Testament are emerging. The Global Council of the United Bible Societies (UBS) recently recruited the international panel.

The editions are being prepared at the Institute for New Testament Textual Research founded by Kurt Aland at the University of Münster under the direction of Prof. Holger Strutwolf. In addition to him, the following scholars have been appointed as editors: Prof. Christos Karakolis (University of Athens), Prof. David Parker (University of Birmingham), Prof. Stephen Pisano (Pontifical Biblical Institute, Rome); David Trobisch (Green Collection, Oklahoma City) and Dr. Klaus Wachtel (University of Münster). This ensures that the experiences and interests of different regions and denominations (Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox) are incorporated. In addition, Dr. Simon Crisp (UBS) and Dr. Florian Voss (German Bible Society) are working with the panel.

“The research of the text of the New Testament is at an exciting stage,” reports Florian Voss. As part of a large-scale, international research project in Münster, Birmingham and other cities, the Greek initial text of the entire NT, the so-called Urtext, is newly constituted. As a result, among other things, the Greek text is changing in many places. “This will also affect the interpretation of the text and the translation,” explains the editor for the German Bible Society. New editions are planned for 2021/2022. They will bring changes especially in the Gospel of Mark and Acts. Furthermore, the scholars are considering adapting the order of the New Testament writings to the tradition prevalent in the manuscripts, according to which Acts is immediately followed by the so-called Catholic Letters: the Epistles of James, Peter, John, and Jude.

The German Bible Society, in consultation with the United Bible Societies, publishes the most important scholarly editions of the Biblical texts. The editions are the basis of Bible translation and exegesis worldwide.

List of Conjectures Accepted in Nestle Editions

Nestle 13th edition (1927)

Reading through a recently acquired Nestle 13th ed. I was surprised to find that the NA28 is not the first in this venerable edition’s line to use the diamond symbol. The current edition uses them, of course, to mark places where the editors couldn’t decide on the initial text.

In the 13th edition (and for some time beyond) it marks places where Erwin Nestle (son of Eberhard) thought that the majority principle used by his father had not led to the original text. In those cases, he marked his preferred reading with a diamond, explaining its use thus: “Some of these [places of textual difficulty], which must be considered original, are distinguished with the prefixed symbol ◆ in the apparatus, as Rom 5.1” (p. 12*).

A number of these diamond readings also happen to be conjectures and thanks to help from Jan Krans, I can present here a list of all the conjectures accepted by various Nestle editions. You can click on the link in parentheses to see more detail at the Amsterdam Database.

1. Matt 2:6 (link)
2. Matt 6:16 (link)
3. Matt 12:33 (link); according to us not a true conjecture
4. Matt 15:5 (link); actually only the omission of a iota subscript; 
5. Mark 7:11 (link; = cj15781)
6. Acts 7:38 (link)
7. Acts 16:12 (link)
8. Rom 13:3 (link; actually attested)
9. 1 Cor 2:4 (link)
10. 1 Cor 6:5 (link)
11. 1 Cor 14:38 (link)
12. 1 Cor 16:22 (link; just an editorial alternative)
13. 2 Cor 3:3 (link; actually attested)
14. 2 Cor 7:8 (link; also attested)
15. 2 Cor 8:12 (link; just an editorial alternative)
16. 1 Tim 4:3 (link)
17. 1 Tim 5:13 (link)
18. Rev 2:13 (link)

One of the reasons for noting this is because its easy to think that the conjectures printed at Acts 16.12 in NA27/28, 2 Pet 3.10 in NA28, and now Acts 13.33 in the ECM show a trend toward greater willingness to print a conjecture. But actually, these changes should be seen as a return to an earlier Nestle tendency and not an innovation or move away from it. In fact, based on the list here, the Nestle(-Aland) editions have grown more reticent to print conjectures since 1927 not less.

Paragraphing and Formatting in Nestle-Aland

The arrival of the THGNT has provoked us to think afresh about matters we normally take for granted like orthography, paragraphing, and even punctuation. With that provocation in mind, I was interested to see this description in my newly-acquired NA26, the first NA edition, you may remember, to move away from Nestle’s tradition of following other critical editions.

The system of paragraph divisions has been developed more extensively than before, and not simply for greater clarity. It is designed to aid the reader’s understanding of the writings by clarifying their structure, e.g., in the Gospels distinguishing the primitive units. The strophic printing of verse has been expanded, perhaps even too much at times but further revision is always possible. The same holds for punctuation, which seek to follow Greek usage in contrast to the earlier Nestle which was dominated by German usage, and The Greek New Testament where the influence is English.

Old Testament quotations are not printed in bold face as before (and in The Greek New Testament), but in italics. We hope this will be welcomed as a means of making them distinct , but without the overemphasis to which their frequency in bold face tended. They have also been completely revised: the problems involved here are familiar. (Intro, p. 44*)

Remember that NA and UBS share the same text, but not necessarily orthography, paragraphing, or punctuation. Regarding the last of these, I knew that Nestle had followed German comma rules but I didn’t realize that these were revised in the NA26 to follow “Greek usage.”

It is also interesting (to me, at least) that the NA26 introduction says that “the font used is certainly lacking in the simplicity and clarity of that used for The Greek New Testament.” That font, of course, was Porson. Metzger—rightly!—bemoaned the loss of “the beautiful Porson font” from the UBS4 which, he tells us, he had recommended for the earlier editions (Reminiscences, p. 73). For its part, the NA26 blames the font change on the need for a typeface “that could be used in diglot editions.”

Eberhard Nestle on His First Edition

The publisher’s advertisements
at the back of the edition
list “E. Nestle” as the editor.

Just recently, I came across Eberhard Nestle’s report in the Expository Times on the first edition of his Greek New Testament. I found this by way of Warren A. Kay’s helpful article “The Life and Work of Eberhard Nestle” (in The Bible as Book: The Transmission of the Greek Text, ed. Scot McKendrick and Orlaith O’Sullivan, [2003], pp. 187-199).

I do, however, have a problem with Kay’s description of the article as a “glowing review of the anonymous Greek New Testament [which] was written by none other than Nestle himself” (p. 193; emphasis mine). In the first case, it seems to me that this is much more of a report than a review and second, while it is true that Nestle is not listed on the title page of his first edition, his name is clearly given as the editor of the various formats advertised at the back of the book (see image). So I don’t think it’s right to call it anonymous.

Differences between early Nestle editions of the New Testament?

Nestle’s first edition (1898) involved the mechanical process of comparing the text of Tischendorf with that of Westcott & Hort. When they agreed Nestle printed the text; when they disagreed he consulted R.F. Weymouth (1892) and printed the majority decision. Then for the third edition (1901) he discarded Weymouth and instead used B. Weiss (1894-1900) for the casting vote.

Presumably that required some changes in the printed text, although it is said that these were limited to ‘only the most important alterations’ until the thirteenth edition (1927), where Nestle finally reviewed the text to make it fully confirm to the majority principle.

This narrative (based on Aland and Aland, The Text of the New Testament, 19f) suggests that the text of Nestle must have had three different forms reflecting these three editions with revisions. But in a footnote the Alands also say: ‘the old plates of the 1898 edition remained in use for the Nestle text even through the twenty-fifth edition’ (p. 20 note 46). So can anyone who knows about all this enlighten me a bit further?

SBL Northwest Regional Conference, Seattle, May 3-5

I am giving a paper on the “Outer Margins of Nestle/Aland 28” for the Pacific Northwest Regional meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature at Seattle University in Seattle, Washington on Friday, May 3. The following is a brief description of the paper:

The newly published edition of the standard scholars’ New Testament has kept pace with the developments in New Testament Textual Criticism, as evidenced by the application of the Coherence Based Genealogical Method to the text and apparatus of the Catholic Epistles. But the outer margins—which provide parallel references to the Old Testament— have not been revised to reflect advances in the study of the Old Testament in the New and the textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, etc. I propose to suggest how the next Nestle/Aland outer margins might be revised so as to make this remarkable resource even more valuable. A sample of proposals will be given dealing with the scripture citations in Acts.

Peter R. Rodgers

Summer Trivia – Find the Missing Editions

The following nice but incomplete collection of Nestle/Nestle-Aland editions is arranged in order (I was tempted to shuffle them and ask for the right sequence).  Which do you think are still missing? (NB: in two cases there are two printings of the same edition – spot these as well.)

Was the old Nestle-Aland text basically Westcott-Hort?

Whilst reading the excellent article from our respected co-blogger Mike Holmes on Zuntz's Text of the Epistles (for biblio see below), I was reminded of a historical quibble I have with some text-critics who maintain that the text of Nestle-Aland was, for most of its existence, basically that of Westcott-Hort. Surely the latter two gentlemen would have been honoured by it, but the assumption seems to be based on a misunderstanding. Nestle, according to Aland-Aland Text des Neuen Testaments, based the text of his first two editions on Westcott-Hort and Tischendorf's eighth edition (Weymouth being the decider in case of a difference), and from the third edition on Westcott-Hort, Tischendorf, and Bernhard Weiss (and this was done consistently only from the 13th edition of 1927). I have no reason to doubt the Alands' report on the history of the Nestle-Aland edition, and therefore it is just as wrong to say that the old Nestle-Aland text was that of Tischendorf, or Weiss, than to say it was that of Westcott-Hort.

What puzzles me, though, is a remark in the Text des Neuen Testaments explaining that NA25 was still printed from the plates dating from 1898. Can such print plates be adjusted or altered, or does the remark only applies to those pages in which no change was made?


Holmes, Michael W. "The Text of the Epistles Sixty Years after: An Assessment of Günther Zuntz's Contribution to Text-Critical Methodology and History." In Transmission and Reception: New Testament Text-Critical and Exegetical Studies, ed. J.W. Childers and D.C. Parker, 89-113. Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2006.

Nestle's Novum Testamentum Graece (First Edition)

Today, a colleague of mine presented me with a copy of Nestle's first edition of Novum Testamentum Graece. It is nice to see (and have) it. I have a number of different N/NA editions but this one was missing. The apparatus, of course, is very thin in comparison with modern editions (based as it is on a few other editions rather than textual witnesses). On the other hand, there is a lot of room for annotation - on every page there is a blank facing page.

I take the opportunity to recommend Michael D. Marlowe's "Annotated Bibliography of New Testament Textual Criticism" which gives this entry for the edition:

Nestle, 1898. Eberhard Nestle, Novum Testamentum Graece cum apparatu critico ex editionibus et libris manuscriptis collecto. Stuttgart: Privilegierte Württembergische Bibelanstalt, 1898; 2nd ed. 1899; 3rd ed. 1901; 4th ed. 1903; 5th ed. 1904; 6th ed. 1906; 7th ed. 1908; 8th ed. 1910; 9th ed. 1912.

Nestle created his first text (1898) by comparing Tischendorf 1869, Westcott and Hort 1881, and Weymouth 1892, and placing in his text whichever reading was followed by two of the three. In the margin all differences between the three are recorded. For the third edition (1901) he replaced Weymouth with Weiss 1894. Originally the marginal apparatus showed only the minority readings of the three editions from which the text was constructed, plus the readings of the Codex Bezae Cantabrigiensis in a separate paragraph below. For each edition Nestle added more information to the lower margin, making direct reference to many different manuscripts, versions, and Fathers.

Nestle died in 1913, and his son Erwin was appointed to be the editor beginning with the tenth edition (1914). See Nestle 1927.