The Old Syriac Element in the Text of Codex Bezae (1893)

7/29/2019 The Old Syriac Element in the Text of Codex Bezae (1893)

1/182


2/182

iI :

I-. .

'

..", I -.

.

. I ! -' .

!.

-

-.

-I .-

>

. mm^ ' BL^~i _*. *.V*' k

...

-. -...;I I

- .

I^HH

I

',

, : - ^ ,'

-


3/182


4/182


5/182

THEOLD SYRIAC ELEMENT

IN THE TEXTOF

CODEX BEZAE.


6/182


7/182

THE

OLD SYRIAC ELEMENTIN THE TEXT

OFCODEX BEZAE

BY

FREDERIC HENRY CHASE, B.D.LECTURER IN THEOLOGY AT CHRIST'S COLLEGE, ANDPRINCIPAL OF THE CLERGY TRAINING SCHOOL, CAMBRIDGE.

Uonbon:MACMILLAN AND CO.AND NEW YORK.1893

[ The Right of Translation is reservat\


8/182

PRINTED BY C. J. CLAY, M.A. AND SONS,AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.


9/182

TO THE

RIGHT REVEREND BROOKE FOSS WESTCOTT D.D.LORD BISHOP OF DURHAM

THIS ESSAY IS DEDICATEDAS A SLIGHT EXPRESSION

OF GRATITUDE FOR THE INSPIRATION OF HIS TEACHINGAND AS A TRIBUTE

OF REVERENCE FOR THE MEMORY OFHIS TWO FRIENDS AND FELLOW-WORKERS

WITH WHOM HIS OWN NAME IS EVER CONNECTEDBISHOP LIGHTFOOT

ANDDR HORT


10/182


11/182

PREFACE.

THE following Essay contains a fresh investigation intothe character of the text contained by the CambridgeCodex, Codex Bezae (Cod. D), and, since I have chosen theBook of the Acts for detailed examination, to a large extentinto that contained by the Oxford Codex, Codex Laudianus(Cod. E).

It is, I trust, from no waywardness or ingratitude to othersthat I must claim to be an independent worker in this field.Few probably, who have reviewed the evidence with any care,would hold that the works on Codex Bezae hitherto publishedhave foreclosed further discussion of the questions suggestedby its eccentricities.

It is due to two of my immediate predecessors in thestudy of this MS. that I should briefly allude to their work.

Professor Ramsay has devoted some sections of his recentbook, The Church in the Roman Empire, to a consideration ofsome of the readings of Codex Bezae in Acts xiii xxi 1 .Though the volume did not come into my hands until my firstchapter was already in type, I was able before the sheets wereprinted off to give to his conclusions on this subject that

1 Professor Ramsay has described the scope and character of his work on theCodex in the notes on p. 88 f. of his book. I have ventured to criticise theProfessor's work, p. 137 n.


12/182

VI 11 PREFACE.careful consideration which any work of Professor Ramsaydemands. My own views however remained absolutely un-changed.On theother hand it was my friend Mr Rendel Harris'Study of Codex Bezae which first suggested to me the investiga-tion, as to the results of which I now ask the criticism of thoseinterested in these questions. I must say frankly, as I thinkthat he would wish me to do, that I began to work at theCodex because I thought that his methods were unsatisfactoryand his main conclusions untenable. As however an investi-gator is not necessarily a censor, my criticisms on the detailsof his work find expression (except on the rarest occasions)simply in my own presentation and examination of the facts.

It will, I believe, be convenient if I briefly record thestages of my work and explain my method.When I read Mr Rendel Harris' book I was struck withthe fact that several of the phenomena of the MS., to whichhe drew attention, could be explained by Syriac, just aseasily as by Latin, influence ; and I was led to believe thatSyriac influence must have played some part in the genesisof the Bezan text.

The only satisfactory way of investigating the text of theMS. was, as it seemed to me, minutely to examine somesection large enough to guarantee that no characteristicfeature of the text would be left unnoted. Having a specialinterest in questions connected with the Acts, I chose for mypurpose the earlier chapters of that Book. The first step wasto mark in different ways (i) the variations from the commontext in particular words and phrases ; (2) changes of order ;(3) interpolations ; (4) omissions. This preliminary reviewover, I considered separately each variation thus marked, andtried to arrive at an explanation of it. Such problems asresisted solution were left for reconsideration in the light of


13/182

PREFACE. IXfurther experience. In other cases provisional solutions wereregistered. I had not however gone very far when I becameconvinced that Syriac influence was a far more widely workingfactor in the genesis of the Bezan text than I had at firstthought. I therefore commenced a third review of thecharacteristic readings of the Bezan text of the Acts, takingas a working hypothesis the theory of assimilation to a Syriactext. As one problem after another, which had previouslyseemed insoluble, yielded its secret to this method of interro-gation, I became sure that Codex D and Codex E containedSyriacised texts. The study of the interpolations in the twoMSS. and of those passages of Codex D in which thelanguage becomes almost incoherent finally dissipated anylingering doubts as to this conclusion. I then decided thatmy work should take the form of a somewhat detailedexamination of all, or almost all, the characteristic readingsof the Codex till the commencement of the first lacuna(viii. 29), and of a briefer discussion of some selected pas-sages in the remaining chapters in which the Greek text ofthe MS. is extant (x. 14 xxii. 29).Two difficulties early presented themselves. On the onehand there appeared to be coincidences between the Bezantext and the Syriac Vulgate, which (like the Latin Vulgate)may in any particular place embody the reading of someolder text of which it is the revision. But I was always con-scious that it might be urged that these coincidences oughtto be explained by the supposition that the Syriac Vulgatecontains a text assimilated to a Greek text, this Greek textcoinciding at times with that of Codex Bezae. Again, theBezan text seemed to imply a Syriac text different from,and older than, that of the Syriac Vulgate. But here againmy position was open to the obvious criticism, ' You arejudging the Bezan text by a standard which you evolve outof the Bezan text itself. You are arguing in a vicious circle.'


14/182

X 1'KKI'ACKThe growing appreciation of these two difficulties made the

earlier stages of the work peculiarly anxious and laborious.Many passages had to be investigated and reinvestigated yetagain. My safe emergence, as I hope, from these labyrinthsI owe to three clues. They are these: (i) The agreementof Codex E with Codex D in the insertion of a gloss, coupledwith divergence in the wording of the gloss ; (2) Theoccurrence of a Syriac idiom in any particular phrase in theSyriac text of the Acts of which the corresponding Bezanphrase seemed to be the equivalent; (3) The occurrence insuch a phrase as that just indicated of a word or expressionwhich the comparison of other passages in the Syriac N.T.proved to be characteristically Syriac. Each passage requireda method of treatment in a sense peculiar to itself; but theconclusions arrived at in any particular case must not beisolated from the consideration of the whole series of passages.

My method of considering the characteristic readings ofthe Bezan text in the order in which they occur in the Bookof the Acts itself, while I believe it to be the true scientificmethod, is peculiarly ill-adapted for the advocacy of a theory.The passages which supply the clearest evidence do notnecessarily occur first. The most patient student will reason-ably demand that I should make out a priina facie case beforehe consents to enter on a review of the evidence as a whole.I have therefore selected ten passages (where the phenomenaare not specially complicated), the notes on which will, I hope,convince the student that the theories advanced are worthyof his consideration. The passages are ii. 17 (ai)rcoz'), if. 47(jov KOO-/J.OV\ iii. I3f., iv. 32, vi. I vii., 24, viii. 27, xi. 27 f.,xii. IO, xix. 28 f.

I am aware that my endeavours to unravel the tangles oftin- lie/an text will severely tax the patience of the mostpatient reader. But when everything depends on the careful


15/182

I'RKKACE. XIexamination of small points, I have discovered no way ofavoiding what will seem to many a wearisome minuteness.Trustworthy results cannot be obtained unless all the pheno-mena of a passage are taken into account. It is an importanttruism that points which at first sight seem trivial are often ofthe highest value as guides to a true interpretation of theevidence.

The interest of an investigation into the Bezan text lies inits bearing on wider questions. I have therefore consideredin a second chapter the three problems of the date, the birth-place, the affinities of the Bezan text. The conclusion as tothe first of these questions supplies, I believe, a secure basisfor further researches. A special instance will be found in theAppendix on [Mark] xvi. 9 20. In connexion with thesecond of these subjects I was led to examine the text of thenewly-recovered fragment of ' the Gospel according to Peter 1 .'In considering the third of these questions it was impossiblenot to take into view the Bezan text of the Gospels. Invarious parts of the Essay incidentally and in the AppendixI have treated of a sufficient number of passages from theGospels to justify the assertion that the conclusions reachedin the discussion of the Bezan text of the Acts hold good forthe Bezan text of the Gospels also. I am bold enough tohope that scholars will recognise in this part of the Essay,as indeed in the Essay as a whole, the true solution of theproblem of the ' Western ' text.

Of my own work throughout I wish to speak with unfeigneddiffidence. A pioneer cannot hope to escape man}- mistakes.Moreover I must state frankly that I make no pretensions tobeing a trained Syriac scholar. I have only that working

1 I retjret that I did not see L)r Tli. /aim's Das Evangelium des J\'/nif in timeto make any use of it.


16/182

xii PREFACE.knowledge of Syriac which a student of the New Testamentgreatly needs and may very easily acquire. To several friendsin Cambridge who have most kindly read through differentparts of the proof-sheets I take this opportunity of tenderingmy warmest thanks. To Mr McLean, B.A., Fellow andHebrew Lecturer of my own College, I owe an especial debt.His patient accuracy has enabled me to correct some more orless serious errors of my own in Syriac matters. He has nothowever seen all that I have written, so that the mistakeswhich will be found are not to be laid at his door. Nor is heresponsible for any of my arguments or of my conclusions.

But if I speak with diffidence of my own work, I believethat I am justified in claiming for my results that they are offar-reaching importance. The light which they throw onmany problems is, I believe, as clear as it is valuable. Thechief of these questions, for the further examination of whichI am not without hope that the results reached in this Essaymay be found to supply a starting-point, I may be allowed toindicate :

(1) The Bezan text as a whole, especially that of theGospels, will need fresh detailed examination.

(2) The early quotations (particularly in Justin, theClementines, Irenaeus and Tertullian) from the N.T., espe-cially the Gospels, will repay reinvestigation. Fresh know-ledge as to the early history of the text of the Books of theN.T. forces us back to a date for the primitive text of theseBooks earlier than is always recognised.

(3) A more fruitful study of the 'Western' text, especiallyof the Old Latin authorities, is now, I believe, possible.(4) Codex Bezae and the 'Western' text generally are

made available as material for the critical study of the earlySyriac text of the N.T.

(5) Information is gained as to the lines along whichearly Missionary efforts moved. Of these efforts Antioch was


17/182

PREFACE. Xlllstill in the second century a chief centre. The connexionbetween Antioch and the Christianity of Carthage is especiallyworthy of note.

Anyone who has been led to work independently at, andhas reached independent conclusions on, a subject which hasengaged the attention of many generations of scholars mustbe deeply conscious of two feelings.He knows his need of the cooperation of his fellow-students, their correction, their revision, their approval, if soit may be, of his work. The watchword avvadXovvres is thelaw of progress in Christian scholarship as it is in Christianevangelization.He knows better than he knew before the greatness of thedebt which he owes to those whom for many years he hasregarded as his teachers.

By the kindness of the Bishop of Durham I am allowedto connect this Essay with his name and with those other twonames to which his own is inseparably united in the reverentand thankful remembrance of Cambridge men. Thus anopportunity is afforded me of expressing, however inade-quately, this ever-growing sense of gratitude.

CAMBRIDGE,June, 1893.


18/182


19/182

TABLE OF CONTENTS.PAGES

1. THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT IN THE BEZAN TEXT OFTHE ACTS. i I02Examination of the Bezan text.

2. THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. DATE. BIRTH-PLACE. AFFINITIES. 103 149

(1) The date of Bezan text and of the underlying Syriac text. 103 115(i) Evidence of Tertullian [103 105]. (ii) Evidence of Iren-aeus : Examination of quotations in the Latin translation of Iren.

iii. xii. [105 108] : three reasons for the belief that the text of theActs quoted in the Latin reproduces that quoted in the original Greekof Irenaeus, viz. (i) it is unlikely that the Latin translator wouldcontinuously substitute another text; (2) two passages from theActs quoted where the Greek of Irenaeus is preserved containpeculiarities Bezan in character ; (3) Irenaeus elsewhere uses aSyriacised text of N.T. [108113]. Date of Iren. iii. [113]. (iii)Evidence of Theophilus of Antioch [113 115]. Conclusions [115].

(2) The birthplace of the Bezan text. 115131Antioch, its Greek and Syriac population [115 f.]. The supposi-

tion that Antioch was the birthplace of the Bezan text confirmed byexamination of the fragment of ' the Gospel according to Peter,'which is marked by (i) assimilation to Scriptural passages [i 17 121] :(ii) signs of Syriac influence, especially that of the Diatessaron[121 131].


20/182

XVI CONTENTS.PAGES

(3) Affinities of the Bezan text of the Acts. 131 149(1) The Old Syriac text underlying the Bezan text of the Acts :

its character, glosses [132 f.] : variations of reading; Cod Eimplies older Syriac text than does Cod. D; corruptions in Syriactext underlying the latter; implied early date [133].

(2) The Greek text of Cod. D and of Cod. E : they exhibitdifferent modes of Syriacisation [134 f.]: two stages of Syriacisation[[35 f.]: the two MSS. probably exhibit the Greek texts of twoGraeco-Syriac bilingual MSS. [136]: such texts the result of gradualgrowth [136 f.].

(3) The origin of the 'Western'

text of N.T. : wide influence ofSyriacised texts [137 139]: this points to the rise of the ' Western 'text at an influential centre [139]. Examination by the ' Reviewer'of theories as to birthplace [139 142]: his suggestion of Antioch ;his arguments in support of this [142 148] : two further arguments[148 f.]. Antioch the birthplace of the Bezan text and of the'Western' text [149].

APPENDIX.Note on [Mark] xvi. 9 20. 150 157

Gloss from an Old Syriac version of [Mark] xvi. 15, 19 in theBezan text of Acts i. i [150]. Conclusion as to date of Syriac andGreek texts of [Mark] xvi. [150 f.]. This confirmed by four pieces ofevidence : (i) Codex Bezae gives a Syriacised text of [Mark] xvi.9 15 [151 153]. Conclusion as to date [153], (ii) Tatian in theDiatessaron used the section [153 f.]. (iii) Justin and probablyAristides knew the section [154 f.]. (iv) The section probably usedin 'the Gospel according to Peter' [156]. Final result as to theantiquity of the section [156 f.]. Reasons for hesitating to infergenuineness [157]. The result confirmed by apparent coincidenceswith Col. Hebr. [157].


21/182

I.

THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENTIN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS.IT seems advisable as a preliminary to the detailed exami-

nation of the Bezan text of the Acts that I should statewith all brevity the main elements of the theory as to thattext which I believe that this investigation will establish.They are three in number.

(1) The Bezan text of the Acts is the result of an assimi-lation of a Greek text to a Syriac text. The extent indeedto which this work of assimilation has been carried out variesin different parts of the Bezan text. It reveals itself some-times in the addition of a gloss, sometimes in the recon-struction of a paragraph, sometimes in the alteration of aword or even of the form of a word. It never long remainsinactive.

(2) A marked characteristic of this Syriac text is itsconstant tendency to harmonize the text of the Acts withother parts of Scripture ; it weaves, that is, into its renderingof a particular passage phrases from other parts of the Acts,from the Gospels, the Pauline Epistles, and the Old Testament.

(3) This Syriac text of the Acts, on which large portions ofthe Bezan text are based, is not that of the Syriac Vulgate.It is that of an old Syriac Version, in which, when the evidencederived from Codex D is supplemented by that derived fromother sources, we can, I believe, from time to time discerntraces of variations of reading. The conclusion that it isan Old Syriac text which lies behind that of Codex D isfounded on the consideration of two lines of evidence exter-nal and internal. The external evidence I shall deal with in

C. C. B. I


22/182

2 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENTa separate chapter. The internal evidence lies in the characterof the Syriac text itself, when it is compared with that of theSyriac Vulgate. The evidence which falls under the latter headwill come before us in our discussion of the several passages.

For the sake of convenience I shall from the first speak of'the Old Syriac' text in dealing with Syriac readings whichare not those of the Syriac Vulgate, fully realizing that I amthereby making an important assumption, an assumptionhowever which will be gradually justified by the evidencewhich we shall consider. For a similar reason I shall use theterm ' the Bezan scribe ' to denote the scribe who in anyparticular passage assimilated the Greek text to the Syriac,and in that passage produced ' the Bezan text '. Takinghowever all the evidence into consideration, I am inclined tobelieve that the ' Syriacised ' character of the Bezan text isthe result not of one man's work but of a process carriedout by successive workers. Again, I have employed theterm 'the true text' to denote the common form of theGreek text, which, whatever doubt there may be as tosmaller points of reading, stands in marked contrast to theeccentric Bezan text. I do not think that in any of thepassages which I shall discuss the problem is complicatedby serious textual difficulty. As ' the true text ' in thissense I have printed that given in Dr Westcott and DrHort's edition of the New Testament.

I have not given the Bezan Latin except in a few cases.The evidence which I have brought together as to thecharacter of the Greek text in Codex Bezae completelyestablishes, if I mistake not, Dr Hort's opinion (Introduction,p. 83) that 'for the criticism of the Greek text the Latinreading has here no independent authority '. To prove thatthe Bezan Greek text is moulded on a Syriac text is todisprove the theory of its Latinisation. In saying this I donot wish to deny that there may be a very few passagesscattered up and down the MS. in which the scribe, allowinghis eye to wander to the Latin copy before him while hewrote the Greek, may have been influenced by the Latin in


23/182

i. 2] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 3his transcription of a word or phrase of the Greek 1 . But theseinstances of Latinisation (if such they can be called) are atmost very rare ; they are accidents of the particular transcrip-tion and do not affect the essential character of the text whichthe MS. presents.

For the Greek and Latin text of Codex Bezae I haverelied on Dr Scrivener's characteristically excellent collationBczac Codex Cantabrigiensis, Cambridge, i864 2. In quotingfor the first time a passage from Codex D or Codex E (CodexLaudianus) I have always used small uncial type.

ActS i. 2. A)(pl HC HMepACAN6/\HMC|)9H GNTeiAAMeNOC TOIC ATTOCTOAOICAIA TTNC Afioy oyc e2eAeATo KAI eKeAeyceKnpycceiN TO eyAfreAiON.The true text has it\f>i tfs rêpa.? e^retXa/u-eyo? rot? airo-Sia TTvevfAaros ayiov 01)9 e'êXeâro dve\?]fj,(f)dr].Two points claim consideration a change of order and

an interpolation.(i) It seems clear that the Bezan Latin ('usque in eumdiem quern susceptus est quo praecepit apostolis ') is an

awkward translation, and not the original, of the BezanGreek. On the other hand the Syriac seems to offer anexplanation of the variation in order from the common Greektext. The Syriac is always obliged to remodel a sentence inwhich an aorist participle plays an important part (see e.g.v. 40) ; in some way the participle must be paraphrased.Here the Syriac Vulgate translates quite naturally thus :' Until that day in-which He-was-taken-up after He-had-com-manded (K'OOT XCL^.-I i^vrj .23) them (even) those Apostleswhom-He-chose in the Holy Ghost.' The order in the Bezan

1 An instance is found in Acts xiii. 10 yioi Al&BoAoy | fili diabole.2 For my own satisfaction I have compared Dr Scrivener's printed text with

that of the MS. itself in all the important passages, with which I have to deal.The only result of my inspection is to confirm my confidence in the patient andminute accuracy of that great scholar.I 2


24/182

4 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [i. 2Greek is the same as that in the Syriac except that the formerretains the true Greek order 8m irv. uy. 01)9 eeX. (2)What of the interpolated words KOI etceXevcrev Kijpvcrcreiv TOevayyeXiov ? Among the Curetonian fragments of the OldSyriac version of the Gospels the last four verses (17 20) of[Ale.] xvi. have a place. In v. 19 we read 'But our-LordJesus after that He \&A-commanded (.TQ^.I i^\= ô) 1 His-disciples, was-exalted to-heaven.' Further, in v. 15 (where theCuretonian fragments fail us, but where there is but little roomfor variation in translation) we read in the Greek text :Krjpvâre TO evayye\iov Trdcrrj rfi KTiaei. We cannot doubtthat the Bezan interpolation is originally Syriac. The word.TTL^ in Acts i. 2 at once called to mind the TnA in the OldSyriac of [Me.] xvi. 19. The passage of the Gospel seemedto supply what was lacking in the text of the Acts : itsuggested the substance of the Lord's parting commands.Hence in the text of Acts i. 2 the interpolation of theimportant words of [Me.] xvi. 15, 19.Two remarks must be added before we leave the passage.

In the interpolated words we should perhaps have ex-pected K-rjpvâi, (Me. I.e. /cr/pvâTe). But the imperative,infinitive, and participle of Syriac verbs are tenseless. Whenthe Bezan scribe therefore is following the Syriac, his constanttendency is to replace an aorist by a present in his Greek.Thus, to take one example, in Matt. x. 27 KHPYCCGTAI takes theplace of the true Greek KrjpvâTe.The Bezan Greek, it will be noticed, preserves the trueGreek text evreiXdfievos, but represents the second Syriac' commanded ' by e/ceXevaev. The Latin on the other handhas praecepit in both places. At first sight it might seempossible that in this passage the Latin preserves a Syrismwhich does not appear in the Greek. If indeed the originalscribe wrote out his Latin version, modelling it on the Greek,

1 No doubt the 'commanded' of [Me.] xvi. 19 is due to harmonizing withMatt, xxviii. 20 (comp. Jn. xv. 14, 17). Cureton's printed text has i^\S3. Isthis the error of his transcription or of the MS. itself?


25/182

i. 3] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 5just after he had written out his Greek text, modelling thaton the Syriac, it would not be unnatural that from time totime such cases should occur. But a study of such passagesas iv. 32, xi. 26, 27, xv. 29 shews that the Latin scribe had noclue to the meaning of an enigmatical Greek rendering of aSyriac gloss, and that therefore the formation of the BezanLatin must be independent of, and later in time than, theformation of the Bezan Greek, and further, that we haveno ground for thinking that the birthplace of the one is thebirthplace of the other.

1. 3. TeCCepAKONTA HMepOON.The true text has Si rj/Aepwv reaaepciKovTa, which is

roughly represented by the Bezan Latin 'post dies quadra-ginta'. The Bezan Greek on the other hand omits thepreposition and changes the order of the words, (i) As tothe latter point, the true text in Me. i. 13 has reaaep. 77^.,while the order in Matt. iv. 2, Lc. iv. 2 is ?}//,. reaaep. But theOld and the Vulgate Syriac alike reverse the usual order inMatt. iv. 2 1 . (2) Though the Syriac Vulgate has here thepreposition .= (in), the Old Syriac may well have used nopreposition partly that it might avoid translating the difficultSid of the Greek. This suggestion is confirmed by the inter-polation HMepAc M in x. 41 (a verse which we can refer back tothe Old Syriac ; see note on xi. 27). Both changes, the varia-tion of order and the omission of the preposition, are probablydue to the same cause, viz. assimilation to Matt. iv. 2(^sacu ^iV-rirt'), which, as having a place in the Diates-saron (Ciasca, p. 8), would be specially familiar to a Syriacscribe. The Bezan scribe, it must be added, has but half donehis work ; for he leaves the genitive i]p.epwv unaltered.

i. 3. TAG rrepi THC BACiAeiAC Toy Of.The true text has ra Trepi /c.r.A,. The Bezan Latin is

' ea quae sunt de regno '. It is of course possible that the' Die Voranstellung des Zahlworts ist hiiufiger' (Noldeke, Syr. Grain,, p. 164).


26/182

6 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [i. 4quac of the Latin was taken as a feminine plural and gaverise to the Greek ret?. But there is another explanation,which further knowledge of the Bezan text will confirm.In Syriac, as in Hebrew, there is no neuter ; for the neuterthe feminine is commonly used. Thus, though here theSyriac Vulgate has simply ' speaking about the kingdom ofGod ', the Philoxenian Version has the plural of the femininepronoun (.1 ^co). The Syriac Vulgate translates Lc. xix. 42ra 7rpo


27/182

i. 4, 5] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS.I. 4. HN HKOYCA (J)HCIN AlA TOY CTOMATOCThe true text is rjv rjKovaare p,ov.The Bezan Latin has ' quam audistis de ore moo '. I

believe that ^Tjcriv is a Greek addition. The words Sidrov o-To/Aaro? JAOV are due to assimilation to xv. 7, wherethe Syriac Vulgate has ' from-my-mouth '. But what ofijfcovcra? If the Old Syriac were .^sacxSi ^yz ^_oAxiJin.i..T(which-ye-heard from my-mouth), it would be very easy in abadly written MS. for the *-_\^ to fall out before ^ andleave ^v^ax. (I-heard) remaining.

1. 5. KAI O M6AA6TAIThis is an interpolation from Jn. vii. 39. The teal o may

be an instance of superficial Latinisation, the Bezan Latinbeing

' et eum '. I believe however that it is due to the Bezanscribe wavering in his reading of a (which), easily in a MS.confused with o (and) (see notes on ii. 6 f., xix. 29), his inde-cision ending in a double rendering (see note on iii. 2).

i. 5. 600C THC neNTHKOCTHC.tThis is another interpolation. Compare i Cor. xvi. 8

eirtfjieveo 8e eV 'E eco? rrjs TrefT^/coo-r^?. Was this phrase' until Pentecost ' interpolated in Lc. xxiv. 49 in some form ofthe Old Syriac ? The Syriac Vulgate uses the same verb torender KaOicrare (Lc.) and eVt/Aez/w (i Cor.), and the twopassages read in the Syriac are not dissimilar. Such aninterpolation is in the manner of that version (see note onvi. 10). If so, the interpolation would naturally pass fromLc. into our present passage. I venture to make the sugges-tion because the words here do not fit into the context andhave the appearance of being taken from the Gospels (seei. 2, viii. i). But I have no evidence to produce in supportof the suggestion. We have not the Old Syriac of Lc. xxiv.beyond v. 44, and the words do not occur in the Arabic Tatian(Ciasca, p. 98).


28/182

8 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [i. 5In connexion with this suggestion as to Lc. xxiv. 49

I will briefly discuss another passage of the Gospels whichseems to be assimilated to a phrase of an Epistle. Thepassage to which we turn has a special interest, inasmuch asit would appear that the eccentric reading in this place wasthe reason why Codex Bezae was taken to the Council ofTrent (Scrivener, p. viii, Rendel Harris, p. 36). In the Bezantext of Jn. xxi. 22 we read CAN AYTON 9eAco MeueiN OYTCOC ecncepxoMAi TI npoc ce. The OUTCO? has no place in the true text.Is the word an interpolation introduced from i Cor. vii. 40fiaKaptwrepa Se eariv eav ovrws fiewy ? Before further con-sidering this question let us turn to the Syriac. The Vulgatein Jn..xxi. 21 f. is as follows: 'Him (rd4oA) when Cephassaw, he-said to-Jesus, My-Lord and-this-man (r^icrao) what ?Jesus said to-him, If I will that this-man tarry (r^lico r^cuii.t),until I -come, to-thee what to-thee ?' The rdJcn in the lastsentence, it will be remarked, is quite natural : the word hasoccurred twice before in the passage ; it here has a specialpoint as connecting the answer of Christ with the question ofSt Peter. It cannot be doubted that it is the original Syriacreading. But in the Old Syriac MS. used by the Bezan scribeI believe that Klion (this-man) had been changed into r^JAcn(thus).

The change may be an unthinking emendation1.

But it is also possible that it was deliberately made in theinterests of asceticism in order to conform the passage toi Cor. vii. 40 ' But happy-is-she if thus she-shall-tarry (Kli^crjK'OJJ^).' In the latter case, as the passage has a place inthe Diatessaron (Ciasca, p. 98)", is the emendation due to theEncratite Tatian ? Between these two alternatives of acci-dent or asceticism it is perhaps impossible to decide without

1 Comp. Acts xv. 15 Syr. Vulg. K'.tcrAo (and-to-this-thing), Cod. DK


29/182

i. 9] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 9further evidence. One point however still remains. Jeromeadv. Jovin. i. (Migne P. L. 23 col. 246) quotes the passage inthis form 'Quid ad te si eum uolo sic esse?' Is Jeromesimply paraphrasing ? Or is he in the esse quoting an OldLatin reading? In the latter case it may be plausiblysuggested that the reading esse is ultimately due to a con-fusion between K'cuaJ.i (that-he-should-tarry) and K'ocoi.i(that-he-should-be).

i. 9. KAYTA eirroNToc AYTOY

KAI ATTHp9H ATTO 0(t>9AAMOONThe true text has KOA, ravra etVcoy ^XejrovTdiv avrcav

Kal ve()e\T vTreXa/Bev avrov CITTO ru>v o>8a\^wv avrav.The Syriac Vulgate is as follows: 'And-when

these-things He-(had-)spoken, when (**} looking (were they)at-Him, He-was-taken-up, and-a-cloud received-Him, and-He-was-hidden from-their-eyes.' Comparing the Bezan readingwith the Syriac we notice the following points, (i) If wesuppose that the Bezan scribe is translating from the Syriac,we^can account for his variation from the true Greek text in thefirst line. See below on ii. i, 2. (2) In the Syriac wecan see why the clause ' when they were looking ' would fallout ; it begins with UA (when) and the former clause beganwith :i^c\ (and-when). (3) If the Bezan scribe is attend-ing to the Syriac rather than transcribing the Greek, wecan explain V7re/3a\ev instead of the vjreXafiev of the truetext : the former is an inaccurate reminiscence of thelatter (see on aTr^pdrj). (4) In the last words 'And-a-cloud received-Him, and-He-was-hidden from-their-eyes'we have a characteristic Syriac amplification and also acharacteristic assimilation to a passage from the Gospel(Lc. xix. 42). The Bezan text seems derived from the Syriac,the word ' He-was-taken-up ' being omitted, and dTnjp0rj (aninaccurate reminiscence of eV>/p#?7 in the true text) being madeto do duty as a representation of ' He-was-hidden '.


30/182

10 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [i. 13i. 13. KAI ore eicHAGeN ANGBHCAN ei TO ynepoooN.The true text has teal ore elcrri\,6ov, et? TO vTrepwov ave-Two points claim attention, (i) It is quite possible that

is to be explained as an itacisui for elarij\&ov. Butanother explanation may be suggested. The 3rd personplural of the perfect of the Syriac verb ends in a vav (a),

"\which however, except in the case of the r^LX verbs, is notsounded. There is nothing in the pronunciation to distinguishbetween the singular and the plural of the 3rd person inthe perfect. A scribe therefore writing the Greek text butat the same time recalling the sound of the Syriac wouldbe liable constantly to substitute the 3rd singular for the3rd plural of the perfect. I think we probably have such anerror here. The same account maybe given of i. 23 (earrjaev') ,ii. 4 (ijp^aro). In a somewhat similar way, as indeed Harvey(Irenaeus i. p. 83 n. 5) points out, we may explain theearly and important variation in Jn. i. 13 (^...ejewrjOtj).(2) The order of the words aveflrjcrav et? TO vjrepwov agreeswith the Syriac. ' They went up into that upper-room inwhich &c.' In the Syriac this order is necessary so that therelative may stand side by side with the noun to which itrefers.

i. 13. lAKOOBOC TOY AA0AIOY.The true text has not 6 TOI).The Bezan Latin is able to translate the true Greek

literally ' iacobus alphei '. The Syriac however cannot re-produce the brevity of the Greek 'la/o/3o? 'AX^aiou. It isobliged to add ' the-son ', ' the-son of, explicitly. Thus belowit has 'Judas the-son of-James ' (where the Bezan text is notaffected), and all through the long list of names Lc. iii. 23 38the word ' the-son ' is inserted. The 6 rou of the Bezan textrepresents the Syriac phrase 'the-son of. The same expla-nation applies to Acts xiii. 22, Jn. xxi. 2.


31/182

i. 14] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. I Ii. 14. CYN TAIC TYNAI2IN KAI T6KNOIC.Here Cod. D adds rat? and KCU re/cz/


32/182

12 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [i. l6, ii. I f.Cod. E supplements that of Cod. D in regard to a glosscertainly Syriac (see e.g. iv. 32, v. 12).

i. 16. AeiTHN rp^HN TAYTHN HN TTpoeiTTeN TO TTNA TO A["IO.

The true text has e&ei, and reads ri]v ^pa^-ijv rjv.The ravrrjv answers to the Syriac reli*^. The Syriac

relative .1 is in a very large number of cases preceded by ademonstrative pronoun. Thus in this verse we have

' thatJudas who '. Comp. e.g. i. 2 (that day), 13 (that upper-room),ii. 2 (that house), iii. 15 (that prince), iv. 22 (that man).

ii. I f. ONTCON N TTANTOON 171 TOKAI eiAoy epeNCTo K.T.A.

The true text has ?}Gav Trdvres O/AOV tVt TO avro,Here we have a complete reshaping of a sentence not a

wholly unusual phenomenon in the Bezan text. The Latin('erant simul omnes in unum et factum est') clearly lends usno aid in our endeavour to account for the peculiarities ofthe Bezan Greek. We turn to the Syriac Vulgate. Therewe read ' When assembled (^IXUA) were-they all-of-them(.^ocrA^) together.' This appears to be a natural Syriacrepresentation of the true Greek text, (i) It is true that theclauses are differently arranged in the Syriac and in the trueGreek text. But the Syriac is fond of coordinate sentencesbeginning with ' when ', and the slight rearrangement at thispoint is, I think, quite in accordance with the style of theSyriac Version. (2) In the true Greek text two wordsare used to express the unity of the Disciples 6/zoO (i>. /.opoOv/jiaSov) and eVt TO CO/TO. In the Syriac text the latterof these two words has its exact equivalent ; the former isrepresented by ' assembled '. This last word is used in trans-lating 6/j,odv[*a86v in v. 12 and xii. 20. (3) The Syriaccould only express Traces' by 'all-of-them' (see v. 12, Me. i.27, vi. 42, xii. 44 &c. &c.). We conclude then that the


33/182

ii. 6 f.] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 13Syriac is the natural and idiomatic rendering of the true Greektext. But it is no less clear that the Bezan Greek is, exceptfor the omission of any word answering to the Syriac ' as-sembled ', a close translation of the Syriac. The genitiveabsolute is, as so often, the equivalent of the Syriac 'when...';the idiomatic Syriac ' all-of-them ' reappears with absoluteliteralness in the Bezan avru>v jravrwv.

In the next line the Bezan text has KAI eiAoy (= t'Soi)) ereNero.The Bezan Latin has no ecce, so that the intruder cannot comeinto the Greek from that source. But the Syriac is very fondof interpolating K'cn ('behold'); compare ii. 15 'for behold, itis now the third hour', ii. 33 'which behold ye see and hear',iii. 2, iv. 16, x. 33, xiii. 32 f. and (a characteristic passage fromthe Old Syriac) Lc. xxiii. 40 f. ' Art not thou even afraid ofGod, because behold, we also are in the same judgment ? Andbehold, we as those who are worthy.' In this last passage,the twice repeated 'behold' of the Old Syriac has no place inthe Syriac Vulgate. What happened in Lc. xxiii. 40 f. 1happened, I believe, in our present passage. In its IBovCod. Bezae preserves a trait of the Old Syriac of the Acts,a trait which has disappeared in the Vulgate.

In the same verse notice o\ov rov olicov (true Greektext) = K'Avirs caiA = TTANTA TON OIKON (Cod. D). The BezanLatin has 'totam domum '. Note the converse change inxiii. 44.

ii. 6f. KAI HKOYON eic GKACTOCAAAoyNTAC TAIC fAWCCAIC AyTGON

Ae KAI e6AyMAZONrrpoc AAAHAoyc

The true Greek text is ore tffeovaev el? e^acrro? rfj I8la1 Comp. (in the Curetonian fragments) Lc. xxii. 12 'Behold, he sheweth to

you one large upper room'; 27 ' Behold, am not I as a minister among you ? ' Inthe former verse the Vulgate has, in the latter it omits, the ' behold '. Note alsoxxiv. 21 'And behold three days behold since all these things were'. The Vulgateretains the former ' behold ' only.


34/182

14 THE OLD SYRTAC ELEMENT [ii. 6 f.SzXeT&) \a\ovvrwv avTwv' eîa-ravro Se KOL eOav/

The Bezan Latin has: 'qui audiebant...lingua sua...dicentesad alterutrum '.

The Syriac is as follows: 'Because (.1 A\*^) hearing waseach man (jr-ir*' JE.JK') of-them that-speaking were-theyin-their-tongues (.ôcfXi-iaEla). Amazed were-they all-of-them and-wondering while saying one to-another (xwA .ijj).'

Comparing the Syriac and the Bezan texts I notice thefollowing points. (i) The Syriac phrase 'that-speakingwere-they' Cod. D naturally renders by the participle, butequally naturally uses the accusative, not the genitive of thetrue text. It conforms to the Syriac order, placing \a\ovvrasfirst in the clause. (2) The Peshitto uses the word'tongue' in representing SmXe/cro?. This word it has in i. 19(in-the-tongue of-the-place), ii. 8, in both which places theBezan text retains SiaXe/cTos. Here however it conforms tothe Syriac. (3) Syriac has no precise equivalent to I'Sios 1 .Accordingly the Bezan text omits the word i&ios in ii. 8(contrast the Bezan Latin 'propria lingua nostra') and here.The word TSto? in such a passage as this has the notion ofpossession and of distribution. The former idea the Syriacrepresents by the pronominal suffix 'their'; the latter itloosely expresses by the change of the singular SmXe/crto intothe plural ' tongues '. In both these necessary turns of ex-pression the Bezan text here follows the Syriac. (4) TheSyriac phrase used here .tuA .T ^TâK' is common: seev. 12, Me. iv. 41, Lc. viii. 25, and (with the addition of ooco)Lc. xxiv. 32, Jn. xi. 56, xii. 19, xvi. 17, Acts iv. 15. On theother hand the Bezan phrase in this passage Xeyovres irposd\\Ti]\ov^ is found, I believe, only in Lc. viii. 25. Hence wehave grounds for saying that the 'one to-another' of thepresent passage is a natural Syriac interpolation.

1 Compare in the Curetonian fragments, e.g. Matt. xxii. 5 'And one went to-the-farm, and one went to-the-merchandise' ; Jn. v. 18 'Because He had called(loci my-Father '.


35/182

ii. 9, 10, 13] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. I 5As we look back then over the passage we see that the

Bezan text is an exact rendering of all the idiomatic Syriacphrases.Does the Bezan text diverge from the Syriac text whenat the beginning of the passage it alters the true Greek OTIiJKovaev into KOI rjKovov ? In discussing xix. 29 (see also noteon i. 5) we shall find what I think is a certain instance of aconfusion between .1 and o. Further in Acts xvii. 18 theexpression Jt-iK* Jt-JK* (each man) is used with the 3rdperson plural. I conclude therefore that the Bezan text ishere following an Old Syriac text which read

. 9. KAIOl KATOIKOYNTGC THN MeCOTTOTAMIAN.

The true Greek text has KOI 'EXa/xetrai KOI ol /carot-KOVVT K.r.\., with which the Bezan Latin agrees ' et quiinhabitant'. The Syriac has ' And-Elamites (KL*i\K'G) and-those (AiK'a) who-dwell between the-Rivers.' The word

(and-those) would very easily fall out after the word(and-Elamites), and thus the Bezan reading would

be generated.ii. 10. 4>pYnAN

KAI TTAMC^YAlAN AlfYTTTON TGThe true Greek text has Tes e\eyov ori


36/182

16 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [ii. 14To deal with the first clause, the Syriac has : ' But

others mocking were (oocn ^n^susn} at-them while saying(â^fcK' .Vk)-' This is the normal Syriac rendering of such aGreek sentence. Compare Lc. xxii. 65 /SXacr^yuoOyre?\eyov, where the Syriac is : ' blaspheming vvere-they and-saying (^-i_5WrTeNT6C AAAoyC eCOOCGN.

In regard to the second line, the Syriac, with its love forpronouns (Duval, Traitc dc Gram. Syriaquc, p. 287 f.), idio-matically begins the clause with Âcn. This reappears inthe OVTOL of the Bezan text.

ii. 14. TOTE CTAOeic Ae o rreipocCYN TOIC A6KA ATTOCTOAOICermpeN npooroc THN CJHONHN Ayjoy KAI erne.

The true text has : araOel? 8k 6 He'r/oo? crvv rot? evBe/caeirfjpev ri]v ^xavrjv avrov KOI a7re(f)OeyâTo avrois.

I take the points which require consideration in order,(i) The Tore of the Bezan Greek, to which nothing in theBezan Latin corresponds, remains still, as it were, outside thesentence, the 8e barring its entrance. Plainly it is an ad-venturer from some other text, caught in the act of breakinginto the Bezan Greek. Its native place is the Syriac, whichhere reads: ' And-afterwards (î^vracv) Simon Cephas withthe-eleven Apostles.' An interpolated rare is found in v. 19,x. 21, 48 (cf. xi. 26), the Syriac in each place having


37/182

ii. 14] TN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 1 7pera ravra, though it answers to nothing in the Syriac Vul-gate, yet represents some word or words of the Old Syriac.(2) The curious reading rot? Beica aTroo-roXot? may be due toa scribe whose nervous anxiety for accuracy made him forthe moment forget the election of St Matthias ; compare i. 26TOON iB ArrocToAooN. But a reference to the Syriac suggestsanother explanation. The words for ' with the-eleven ' areifl02k.:u >!*>.. Would not the similarity of ô.^. and 002*.cause a hasty reader to pass over the intermediate .i*> ? If hedid so, the reading ' with the-ten ' would result. It willbe noticed that the Bezan text agrees with the Syriac ininserting the word 'Apostles'. (3) After eirripev Cod. Dhas an interpolated Trpwros, Cod. E after rrjv (frwvyv avrou aninterpolated nporepoN. Is there any Syriac word likely to beinserted here which could be represented equally well byeither of these two Greek words? I believe that >a.ijo answersall the requirements. It is a favourite word in the SyriacN.T., being commonly used to express the Trpo- of compoundverbs (see on viii. 19) and being employed in Me. {.35 (irpwlevvvâ \iav), Lc. xxi. 38 (mpOpiêv), xxiv. 22 (opOptvai), toexpress the idea of earlincss. The Greek word of Cod. D orthat of Cod. E well represents it. We conclude that an OldSyriac copy of the Acts read here orA.n po-iir^ Ta.To (lit.he-was-early he-lifted-up his-voice, i.e. he spoke at once).Compare Matt. xvii. 25 (Greek and Syriac). (4) Why isthe forcible aTreÔeygaro driven out and its place taken by thefeeble elirev ? The word aTro^deyyea-dai occurs twice elsewherein the N.T., viz. Acts ii. 4, xxvi. 25. In both these passagesthe Syriac renders it by the extremely common word A_isr)(to-speak). Here it has the appropriate but equally commoncomes this rts Tore? Just below are the words 'that-not Gods (are) they those(^CVJCO -^ Cl3r^ : note oyTOl in Cod. D) who-by-hands &c.' I wouldsuggest that the two Syriac words given above in some badly written MS. slippedup a line and took their place after the Syriac word ' Paul ' ; that then an emenda-tion, favoured, if not caused, by transcriptional corruption, was made and the twowords became

C, C. B.


38/182

1 8 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [ii. 1 7word T^ar^, introducing St Peter's speech. Hence theBezan elirev.

In the clause which follows the Syriac has : ' All-of-themwho-dwelling (are) in-Jerusalem.' The ' all-of-them ' musthave the first place in the sentence. Hence the Bezanreading HANTSC 01 KATOIKOYNTGC lepoycAAHM, as against the truetext ol KO.TOLK. 'lep.

ii. 17. ecTAi.The true text prefixes Kai. A reference to the following

passages in the Syriac, in which in the Greek a Kai, or a Bebegins a quotation, viz. Rom. i. 17, Gal. iii. 16, Hebr. i. 6,(comp. Matt. ii. 6), seems to shew that the Syriac regularlyomits the particle of connexion in a quotation from the O.T.It omits it here.

. 17. erri TTACACKAI TTpoc^HTeycoyciN 01 yioi AYTOONKAI SyrATepec AYTOON.

The true text has eVl iracrav adp/ca, KOI 7rpo0. ol violKai at Owyarepes vp,u>v. (i) The reading crap/ca? may

conceivably be due to the influence of the LXX. where' theplural o-ap/ce? is fairly common. But another explanationseems more in harmony with the phenomena of the Bezantext. The Syriac Vulgate has iflo=>, but probably an OldSyriac text had K'iflara, which could be taken as singular(as generally) or as plural (Jude 7, Apoc. xix. 18, 21). Herethe plural might seem natural in view of the enumerationwhich follows. (2) The genesis of the reading ol violavrutv K. Ovj. avrdov, so inexplicable in the ' Western ' text,Greek and Latin, becomes obvious when we write side by side._OAAi=j (your-sons) and ^_oorxki=> (their-sons). Compare

xiv. 17 vjju,v...Ta^ Kapbias VJJLWV, where the Syriac is ... ^_ocn\.^pcD^cxaA (to-them...their-hearts).

There are several variations from the true text in theBezan text of the quotation from Joel. They are chiefly


39/182

ii. 23] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 19omissions. The easiest explanation of them, I believe, isthat we have here a Greek representation of an early Syriactext. I will give one argument in support of this suggestion.We read in the true text (V. 18) /cat, ye eVt TOI>? Sov\ov? fjiovKal eTrl ra? &ov\as /AOV [ev rat? rfpepais e'/cet'yai?] eV^eeo avrorov TTz^eu/uaro? /AOV[, teal Trpo^rjreva-ovo-iv^. The Bezan textomits the two clauses which I have bracketed. The SyriacVulgate has the passage in this form (the words omitted in theBezan text are again in brackets) : ' And-on my-servants and-on my-handmaids will-I-pour-out my-Spirit [in those days,and-they-shall-prophesy].' The omitted words, it will be seencome together in the Syriac, and the double omission in Greekbecomes a single omission in Syriac.

ii. 23. 6KAOTON A(\BONT6C.

The last word, which is found also in Cod. E, has noplace in the true text. The worthlessness of the BezanLatin for the criticism of the Bezan Greek is well illus-trated by its relation to this particular textual problem.It reads: ' prouidentia di auditum accepistis '. It is not thesource of Xaffovres. Having got traditum accepistis from theGreek, the Latin scribe apparently interpreted it to mean ' Yehave received as handed down by tradition.' Hence for theword traditum he substituted a mental gloss upon it, and sowrote ' auditum accepistis '.

But have we here a case, such as will meet us severaltimes in the Bezan text of the Acts, of assimilation tothe Passion story of the Gospels ? We turn to St John xix. 6,' Pilate saith unto them, Take (\afiere) him yourselves andcrucify (crravpwaare} him... 16. Then therefore he delivered(Trape&wrcev) him unto them to be crucified ( f(va o-ravpwOrj}.17. They took (7rape\a(3ov) Jesus therefore.'There can, I think, be little doubt that the interpolatedXa/3(Wes comes from Jn. xix. But the question remainswhether it is originally Greek or whether it comes throughan Old Syriac Version ? There are several reasons which

2 2


40/182

20 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [ii. 23induce me to decide for the latter alternative, (i) If thisgloss stood alone, it might be conceded that it is Greek. Butit can hardly be separated from other clauses from thePassion story in the Gospels interpolated in the Bezan textof the Acts, which, I believe, can be shewn to come throughan Old Syriac Version (see iii. 13, v. 21). (2) It is whenwe think of the coincidences of Acts ii. with Jn. xix. from thepoint of view of an English rendering, that their force appearsgreatest. For then we seem to have a twofold resemblancebetween Acts ii. 23 and Jn. xix. 6, 16 f. 'having taken'(Acts), 'take' (Jn. xix. 6), 'took' (v. 17): 'crucified' (Acts),'crucify' (Jn. xix. 6), 'to be crucified' (v. 16). But themoment we look at the Greek, much of the likeness betweenthe three verses melts away. For on the one hand Jn. xix.17 has the compound 7rape\a/3ov ; and on the other handSt John uses a-ravpuxrare, '(va cnavpwOfi, the Acts has irpoa--Trrj^avres. When however we turn to the Syriac, all thosepoints of contact which struck us in the English, but ofwhich a reference to the Greek robbed us, are restored tous again. The same word for ' crucify ' is used in the threeverses ; the Syriac, having no compounds, uses the simpleword 'take' in Jn. xix. 17'. Thus the resemblance betweenthe passage in the Acts and that in the history of the Passionwould strike a Syriac reader far more than a student of theoriginal Greek. (3) These verses in Jn. xix. had a placein the Diatessaron (Ciasca, p. 90 f.). They would therefore bespecially familiar to Syrian Christians in early times. Indeed,though the Syriac Vulgate has not retained the word ' whenthey had taken' (=\a{36vTes Codd. DE), yet it has anotherword derived apparently from the same source. Its wordsare these: 'Him who-separated was for this same thing[comp. i Pet. i. 20] in the foreknowledge and-will of-Godye-dclivered in(to)-the-hands of-wicked-men and-cmcificd and-

1 The full phrase here is: 'They-took Jesus and-made-Him-go-out? Theitalicised word may be intended roughly to represent the wapa- of the compoundverb (see note on viii. 19), but it is more probably due to assimilation to Me.xv. 10.


41/182

ii. 24, 25] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 21slew.' The italicised words indicate the coincidences betweenthe Syriac Vulgate in Acts ii. 23 and in Jn. xix. 6, 16, 17.We may reasonably conclude that an Old Syriac text ofActs ii. 23 contained the interpolation ' when they-had-taken ', and we may further surmise that this interpolationfrom Jn. xix. brought into the Syriac Vulgate from the samesource another interpolation viz., ' ye-delivered ', though it lostits own position in the passage.

ii. 24. AYCAC TAG toAiNAC TOY AiAoy.The true text has rov Oavdrov (comp. Ps. xviii. 4, cxvi. 3).

I do not myself doubt that in this particular case the readingrov a&ov comes from the Syriac. For the Syriac Vulgatehere reads : ' God... loosed the-pangs of-Sheol, because it wasimpossible that-He-should-be-held in-Sheol'; and this wordSJieol is very natural in the Syriac N.T., comp. (in the SyriacVulgate) Rom. x. 7 ' Who descended into-the-abyss of-Sheol ?' i Pet. iii. 19 'He preached to-the-souls which-were-held in-Sheol.' But a reading so obvious in itself in viewof v. 31 (ovre ev/careX-ei^Oij et? a8f}i>}, which might too besuggested by the LXX. of Ps. xviii. 6, may well have arisenindependently in different authorities. When therefore weread in the Epistle of Polycarp c. i. ov jjyeipev 6 Beo


42/182

22 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [ii. 30, 37. 30. 6K KApnoy THC KApAiAC

KATA CApKA ANACTHCAI TON XPNKAI KA0ICM K.T.A.The true text has etc KapTrov TT}? OCTAVOS avrov Ka0i(rai.The Bezan text presents us with a variant and a gloss.

(i) What is to be said of the very singular reading T?}?ArapSia? ? I believe that it is due to assimilation to v. 26r)V(j>pdvdri ?} KapSia JAOV. Note rj adp% /AOU of i'. 26 and theKara erupted of the Bezan gloss, if the passage be takenby itself, there is little or nothing to indicate whether thereading first arose in Greek or in Syriac. It is perhapsworth noticing that the Syriac Vulgate incorporates thevery words of the Ps. cxxxi. 13 'Of the-fruit oi-thy-bellywill-I-make-to-sit upon thy-throne,' as though it were oblite-rating an error in an earlier Syriac text. But such anargument as this cannot be pressed. (2) The glosspossibly arose to limit and define the meaning of 'the fruitof thy heart'. The Kara adpica appears Pauline (Rom. i. 3,ix. 5, i Cor. x. 17, 2 Cor. v. 16). Nothing certain can be saidof the latter part of the gloss, nor does it yield any suggestionas to its original language.

In v. 31 the words Trpoi&wv ekaX^aev -rrepl are omittedin Cod. D. The omission is obviously an accidental one. Itmay be due simply to the scribe dropping a line of his Greek.But it is worth noting that if the Syriac words 'on his-throne'stood over the Syriac words ' about (lit. on) the-resurrection ',thus

CQj.floia.2i

a scribe writing Greek, but following in Syriac, would veryeasily omit the words in question.

ii. 37. TOT6 HANT6C 01 CyN6AOONTCKAI AKOYCANT6C KATeNYfHCAN TH KApAlAKAI TIN6C eH AYTCON ITTANrrpoc TON rreTpoN KAI TOYC AnocToAoyc


43/182

ii. 37] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 23Tl OYN TTOIHCM6N ANApeC AA6/\(j)OIyrroAeiHATe HweiN.The true text has d/covo-avres Se Karevv^rjcrav rrjv

el-7rdv re Trpo? rov Herpov KOI rot"? XotTrou? dTroaroXovs TtTroi^aoofjiev, a^Spe? aSeX(/>ot ;

I will deal with the several points of the passage in order.(i) I have already pointed out that 'then' seems to be afavourite particle of connexion in Syriac (see above on v. 14).The interpolated words which follow are to be explained asan instance of assimilation, and, as will, I think, clearlyappear, must be referred back to an Old Syriac text of theActs. The conscience-stricken multitude of Jews on the dayof Pentecost recalled the conscience-stricken multitude of Jewson the day of the Crucifixion. Let us place the Bezan textof Acts ii. 37 side by side with the Old Syriac rendering ofLc. xxiii. 48 :

LUKE. ACTS.And all those that were assembled Then all those that came together,

there,and saw what was done, and heard,were smiting upon their breast, were pricked in the heart,and saying. and some of them said.Though the Greek of Lc. /. c. (ical -jravres 01o^Xot) bears no resemblance to the language of our Bezangloss, the phrase used in the Old Syriac

(lit. and-all-of-them those who-assembled there) on the onehand is an exact representation in Syriac of the Bezan gloss,and on the other admirably fits in with the Syriac word whichfollows, as suggested by the Bezan text ; Ci^.??3T.c\ (and-heard)in Acts answering to ovo (and-saw) in Luke : the Vulgate inActs has a^jsn. .1^0. It should be added that Lc. xxiii. 48had a place in the Diatessaron (Ciasca, p. 93). (2) /catTe


44/182

24 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [ii. 4!elfrav (Syr. 'Men however of-them said'). But the samephrase is found, as we shall see, four verses lower down(v. 41), where nothing in the Greek answers to it, in theSyriac Vulgate; and this, added to the fact that the firstwords of v. 37 are proved (as I believe) to come from theOld Syriac of the Acts, justifies us in holding that in thewords Tti/e? e| avrwv we have another phrase of the samevenerable document. (3) Of the omission of X,ot?rou?before aTroo-roXoL"? I will only remark that I believe thatthe palaeographical explanation of the omission is easierin Syriac than in Greek ^.^C^saxl (to-Simon), r


45/182

ii. 45, 46] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 25has: ' And-some of-them readily received his-word and-be-lieved.' Here the 'some of-them' enables us to see why theword 'and-believed' is added. The gloss is the product, Ibelieve, of assimilation. The result of St Peter's words atJerusalem must needs be coordinated with the result ofSt Paul's words at Athens. We compare this verse andxvii. 34 as they stand in the Syriac Vulgate :

ii. 41. xvii. 34.And-some of-them And-some of-themreadily received his-word clave-to-himand-believed. and-believed.

For another case of assimilation to xvii. see iv. 2; andfor passages where the account of St Peter's work is har-monised with that of St Paul's see v. 15, xi. 2.

Codex Bezae may, I believe, be taken as a witness thatthe Old Syriac had the word ' believed '. But the evidencedoes not enable us to decide whether the Old Syriac copyused by the Bezan scribe had an epitomised form of the fullSyriac text, or whether the Bezan scribe epitomised theOld Syriac text before him. It is of course possible thatthe Syriac Vulgate here is an amplification of a simplerreading in the Old Syriac, represented by the Bezan Greek.

ii. 45 f. 45. KAI OCOI KTHMATA I)(ONH YTTApHeic enirrpACKoNKAi AieMeplZON AYTA KA0HM6pAN TTACITOIC AN TIC XpeiAN 6l)(eN

46. TTANTec re npoceKAprepoYN N TOO leptoKAI KATOIKOYCAN 6771 TO AYTO KAoONTC T6 ApTO K.T.A.

The true text is KCU rd Krâra tcai ra? vTrdpêiKOV Kal Sie/jbeptôv avrd Trdcriv Kadori av rt? %peiavKCL& rjfiepav re TrpocrKapTepovisTes o/jiodv/jLaftov ev rat lepw,/cX&We? re ar' oi/cov aprov-Of this passage and of the preceding clause the VulgateSyriac has the following rendering: 44. ' And-all-of-them thosewho-had-believed together were, and-every-thing which-was


46/182

26 THE OLD SVRIAC ELEMENT [ii. 45, 46to-them of-community was-it. 45. And-those to-whom therewas a-possession selling were-they it, and dividing were-theyto-each man according to what he-needing was (7.tS3 vv-rfrôcn oixiflo.i). 46. And-every-day OSCU\A) continuing were-they in-the-temple in-one soul and-in-the-house breakingwere-they bread.'

This passage in the Bezan text is a tangled one. Itsdifficulties arise from the fact that, often diverging from thetrue Greek text and coinciding with the Syriac Vulgate, itsometimes diverges from both and, as I believe, implies anOld Syriac text. I will take the points seriatim.

(i) The Syriac makes a change in the form of i>. 44 ('and-every-thing... of-community was-it') which breaks in upon theconstruction. When it comes to the words of v. 45 thesubject of the verbs, which has been obscured by the con-struction adopted in v. 44, must be made clear. Hence usingup the words ra Kn'âra it fashions a new clause and har-monises its opening words (* î*^) with the parallel passagein iv. 34. In all this it is exactly followed by the Bezan text,the only point of divergence being that the Bezan text hasrj V7rdpj;is, the Syriac equivalent of which may well have hada place in the Old Syriac. (2) In the words /ca#' êpavTrda-L rot? av ri9 -%peiav el%ev, the Bezan text differs alike fromthe true Greek and from the Syriac Vulgate. The Bezanchaos appears to point back to an Old Syriac text, and in someway, about which it seems impossible to dogmatise, to dependon a confusion between two pairs of Syriac words (a)(all-of-them) and }ac\.A^ (every-day), see below ; (b) .1(those who) and .1 r^liAjK' (according as). (3) Trdvres -rein the Bezan text corresponds with tcaff {/pepav of the true text(with which the Syriac Vulgate (}aculii) agrees). Evidentlythe confusion between ^__acriiA and ôcul^ noted above hasbeen at work, but whether in the genesis of the Old Syriactext or in the mind of the Bezan scribe it is impossible tosay for certain. The truth I suspect is that the two words


47/182

ii. 45, 46] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OK THE ACTS. 2/simply changed places in the two successive clauses of theOld Syriac. (4) The Syriac, unable to represent thelong participial clauses of the Greek (Trpoa-Kaprepovvres...K\


48/182

28 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [ii. 47remain in obscurity. But the whole structure of the Bezanpassage becomes, I believe, intelligible if, and only if, weregard it as a rendering of a Syriac Version.

ii. 47. KAI exoNTec xAP IN rrpoc OAON TON KOCMON.Instead of KOO-^OV the true text has \aov. In Syriac ' the

people' is rzn., 'the world ' is Klsai^.. The change fromthe former to the latter in Syriac would be very easy and,when the sense in any degree favoured it, natural. In two pas-sages in the Syriac N.T. it has taken place. The Old Syriacof Matt. i. 21 reads ' He-shall-save tlie-ivorld (r


49/182

ii. 47] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 29The last words indeed of this extract, as we read them inthe Greek (eyeveTO 8e avroidvvr)


50/182

30 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [Hi. I&c.' Thus in the Syriac Versions the word ' together ' intro-duced the expression

' in-the-church ' into ii. 47, and thenwas itself caught by the tide of textual revision and carriedfar away from its chosen companion. The history, which wehave tried to follow out, repays us for the labour, if it shewsus, as I believe it does, the character of the Syriac Vulgateas a revised text when compared with the Old Syriac, whichwe are learning to look upon as the basis of no small part ofthe Bezan text.

iii. I. rrejpoc KAI VCO&NHC ANEBAINON eic TOTO AeiAeiNON ern THN oopAN GNATH TH rrpocey'XHC.

There is nothing to answer to TO Sei\tvov in the trueGreek text.

Here once more an interpolation is due to assimilation,in this case to assimilation of the beginning to a later stageof the history. In iv. 3, after the healing of the man andSt Peter's speech to the people, we read that it was nowevening, f/v jap eo-Trepa 7/877. The connexion of this clausewith the interpolated TO Sei^ivov does not appear. But let usappeal to the Syriac. In iv. 3 the Syriac Vulgate hasr^JCJSfli cn\ K'ocn .raioi (there-had- drawn-nigh the-even-ing). Did the Old Syriac interpolate in iii. I the wordP^T "73J3 (in-the-evening)? The phrase TO &ei\ivov occurs inthe sense of evening in the LXX. version of Gen. iii. 8 (='inthe cool of the day'), Exod. xxix. 39, 41, Lev. vi. 20, 2 Kingsxviii. 29 ('the offering of the evening oblation'), comp. 2 Chron.xxxi. 3 (T? o\oKavT(aaeis...Tr]v Sei~\,ivtjv). In the Syriac Ver-sion of all these passages except Gen. /. c., 2 Kings /. c., theword relx_sni is found ; it is in fact the common, if not theonly, Syriac word for evening. It is impossible to doubt thatrdx-sairj was intruded into the Old Syriac of Acts iii. I,and that the Bezan scribe employs an unusual word torepresent it, as he does in the case of other Syriac glosses(see v. 39, vi. 10).


51/182

iii. 2, 3 ff.] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS.iii. 2. TOY AireiN eAeHMOcyNHN rrAp AYTCON

AYTOON eic TO Vepoisi.Here the strange phrase Trap avrwv elaTrop. avrojv takes

the place of the true text Trapd TWV elo-Tropevoaevwv.In the Syriac Vulgate the clause stands thus: ' that-he-

might-be asking alms from those (^__cucn) who-entering(were) into-the-temple '. This is the natural Syriac renderingof the true Greek text ; and the Bezan Greek is an almostliteral translation of the Syriac. The second avrav will benoticed. This may be intended to represent ^_acn\, whichthe Old Syriac may have idiomatically appended to the verbexpressing motion. But it is more likely that the Bezanscribe carelessly rendered ^__CJcn twice. Such an explana-tion must be given of the repeated TOVTO in v. 12, and is themost probable account of KAI CKAGICAN Te (ii. 3) and KMTe (iv. 4).

iii. 3 fif. 3. OYTOC ATCNICAC TOIC oc})9AAMOicKAI lAC3N TTETpON KAI VcrtANHNweAAoisiTAc eiNAi eic TO iepoNHptOTA AYTOYC eAeHMOCYNHN

4. eMBAe^AC Ae o neTpoc eic AYTONCYN VCOANHN KAI CIHEN AT6NGICON IC HMAC

5- A ATeNCICAC AYTOICnpOCAOKOON Tl AABeiN HAp AYTOON.

The important words in the true text are: 3. 09 ISoov...elcrievai... r/pwra eKerifjiocrvvriv \aftelv. 4. are^/cro.? 8e IT ____crvv ru> 'Iwdvy eifrev BXe-v^ov et? TUJLCL^. 5- o ^ eirel^v avrolsTrpoaSoKtov TI Trap' avrduv \aftelv.The different points in this passage must be taken inorder, (i) The Syriac relative 1 is weak. The Syriacnaturally renders 09 by r^.icr> (this-man). Hence the BezanoSro?. (2) The variation of the words expressing sightin the different authorities is instructive ;


52/182

32 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [iii. 3 ff.True Greek. Bezan Latin. Bezan Greek. Syriac.

1'. 3 IS(OV uiditv. 4 aTevicras intuitus

/3\etyov et?... aspice drevia-ov iCV-uv. 5 eTrefyev adtendebat aTevura? T*>

The Syriac T*, denoting an earnest gaze, is the commonrendering of drevlaai. It translates fiXe-frcti et? in the threepassages in which it occurs (Me. xii. 14, Lc. ix. 62, Jn. xiii.22). It is perhaps the most natural word in such a contextas this to render eVei^e^, which does not occur again in theN.T. exactly in this sense 1 . The Syriac is characteristicallycourageous in its repetition of a word, and here it has thecourage of its character. It is impossible, I think, to resistthe conclusion that the Bezan text simply renders the Syriacwords expressing sight. (3) But what of the interpolatedphrase in v. 3 dreviaas rols offrddXfjiois avrov ? ' To see withthe eyes ' is an O.T. phrase. It occurs e.g. in 2 Kings vii. 2,Ps. xci. 8, Ezek. xl. 4, where the Syriac verb is K'V-M. TheOld Syriac, as we shall see, is fond of interpolating O.T.phrases (see on iv. 24, v. 38, vii. 43). It would naturallyenough here interpolate the words ^cncvix^a T* .1^ (whenhe-had-looked with-his-eyes). (4) In 7 r. 3 the Syriacperforce renders the compound elH (plur. in r


53/182

Hi. 7 f] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 33Similarly we may explain xviii. 2 AIA TOfor, though here .flocv.Aio.lD (Claudius) is the subject of thesentence, the name is of course unalterable in Syriac. (7)Note 6 Se arezn'cra?. ..TrpocrSotfooz/. The Bezan scribe is render-ing a construction of the Old Syriac: his Greek has no con-struction. (8) In v. 5 the Syriac has : ' Since hopingwas-he to-receive from-them something.' This order in Syriacis the natural one, that the infinitive with a may standimmediately after the verb on which it depends. The Bezantext adopts the Syriac order, except that ri> retains its placenext after TrpoaSo/cwv. Cod. E still more closely follows theSyriac, rrpocAoKooN AABeiN TI rrAp AYTOON.The number and variety of the ways in which the Bezantext is in this passage brought into conformity with theSyriac precludes, I venture to think, any possibility ofdisagreement as to our verdict.

iii. 7 f. 7. KAI TTIACAC AVION The AeSiAC xeipoc HpeipeNKAI TTApAXpHMA 6CTA0HKAI eCTAIpeOOOHCAN AYTOY

8. Al BACeiC KAI TA CC^YP^ KAI eEAAAOMeNOC GCTHKAI TTepieiTATei )(AlpOM6NOCKAI 6ICHA06N CYN AYTOIC IC TO IGpONAINOON TON 6N.

The true text has : Kal 7rid(ras...i!iyet,pev avrov -Trapa^p^/jia8e ea-repecoOija-av al /Sao-et? avrov Kai...Kal Trepieirdrei Kalelcrr)\dev GVV avrolf et? TO lepov TrepiTrardov Kal d\\o/An. The Old

C. c. B. 3


54/182

34 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [iii. 7 f.Syriac then probably read in Acts iii. 7 ' and-immediately he-stood-up '. This interpolated word is due to assimilation.The miracle of the disciple must be conformed to the miracleof the Master. In Me. ix. 27 we read Kpar^o-a


55/182

iii. 10, II] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 356e6v (.MiTJsg . . . .1^). (4) We have seen reason to thinkit probable that the Old Syriac, having already used the word,omitted the Syriac equivalent of eo-rri in v. 8. But, thisword being eliminated, the natural Syriac rendering of e|a\-\o/jt,evos TrepieTrdrei would be : ' leaping was-he and-walking '.If this be allowed, we have an explanation of the fact that,whereas the Syriac Vulgate has ' And-he-entered with-theminto-the-temple, while walking and-leaping and-praising God ',the Old Syriac, as represented by Cod. D, omits theseparticiples ' walking and-leaping ' ; since, in the reverse order,they had occurred just above.We conclude therefore that the Old Syriac of v. 8 was asfollows :

' Leaping was-he and-walking,While rejoicing :And-he-entered with-them into-the-tcmple,While praising God.'

The result of this attempt to restore the Old Syriac in thisverse seems to justify itself by the parallelism which it intro-duces into the text.

. 10. eni TOO rer^NHweNOO AYTGO.The rS av^^e^Kon of the true text is naturally rendered

(comp. Me. x. 32, i Pet. iv. 12) in the Syriac by K'ocni(which-was). The Bezan scribe no less naturally translatesthe Syriac by rw


56/182

36 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [Hi. 12seemed to imply his going out with tJiem (comp. xii. 21,23 Cod. D). This desire for fulness of detail was reinforcedby the constant wish for assimilation to passages of theGospels. There is no passage in the Greek Gospels whichwould supply the phraseology of this passage ; but in theSyriac Version (where aKo\ov0eiv avrta becomes ' to-go with-(behind-)him ') there are several which might do so. ThusLc. xxii. 39 KOL e%e\6(av en-opevOrf. . .r/KoXovdiycrai' 8e avru> KCU01 /j,a0r]Tal is thus rendered in the Old Syriac :

'

And-going-out was-He and-He-went (AxK'o K'ocn ..nâ)...and-there-went (cvAtK'o) with-Him also His-disciples.' For the Syriacphrase compare the Old Syriac of Matt. xx. 29 and theVulgate of Acts x. 23. (2) The second interpolation ol8e Qa/j-ftrjOevres eo-râav is due to assimilation in the OldSyriac to Acts ix. 7 ' standing were-they while wondering( j_cQ_L2*3a>),' where the Greek is io-TrJKeicrav eveol. Comparethe Syriac Vulgate of Lc. i. 2 1 ' But the-people stand-ing (âr^lc) was and-waiting for-Zacharias and-wondering(^cmsaoi)'. The word ensow (wonder) has occurred in iii.10, and orusnox is a twin word with xcnit, which the SyriacVulgate uses to render e/cflapftoi (see the Syriac of x. 45).(3) In rfj crroa r/ icaXov/ieV?? we have a literal rendering ofthe Syriac r^TnAxran. Compare the Hebraistic language ofthe Apocalypse, e.g. ii. 2O rrjv yvvaifca 'lec/i/SeX, ?; \eyova~a.

iii. 12. ATTOKpiOeic Ae o nerpoc eineN npoc AYTOYC.The true text has I8u>v Se 6 Tlerpo^ dTreKpivaro TT/JO? rov

\aov.The Bezan text seems to point back to an Old Syriac

text; for (a) the intrusion of el-Trey (see ix. 13, x. 47, xi. 9,xxii. 28, xxiv. 10) and that of the pronoun (' to-them ') are,I believe, both characteristically Syriac changes ; (/;) theSyriac Vulgate has : ' And-when Simon saw, he-answeredand-said to-them ' a reading which has the appearance ofbeing a conflation of the reading of the true Greek textand that of the Old Syriac.


57/182

iii. 12, I3f.] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 37iii. 12. ooc HMOON TH IAIA AyNAMi n eyceBiA

TOYTO rrerroiHKOTOoN TOYTO rrepiTTATeiN Ayro.The true text has w? 18ia 8vvd/j,ei 1} evaefteiq rrerroiyKoa-tvrov rrepirrareiv avrov.The Syriac Vulgate has : ' As-if by-the-power which-is-ours (A*^) or by-our-authority \ve-have-done this-thing(K'.ien) that this-man should-walk.' The Bezan text (a)represents the Syriac ' this-thing ' both before and afterrrerroiriKo-Twv (see on iii. 2) ; (b] translating more or lessindependently from the Syriac diverges from the constructionof the true Greek. It is possible that the Old Syriac readhere riA>i con vyr^as-if we-ourselves).

iii. 13 f. 13. ON HM6IC TTApeAOOKATe eiC KplCINKAI ATTHpNHCAC0AI AyTONKATA rrpocoonoN neiAAToyTOY KplNANTOC EKGINOyAnoAyeiN AYTON GeAoNTOc

14. yweic Ae TON AHON KAI AIKAIONeBApyNATG KAI HTHCAT6 ANApA (|>ONeiA.

The true text has ov vpeis /j,ev TrapeSwtcaTe /caiKara TrpoawTrov Hei\,drov, Kpivavros e/ceivov aTroXvewSe rov a


58/182

38 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [Hi. 13 f.give-Him-up to-judgment and-to-the-power of-the-Governor '(where it should be noticed that the Old Syriac and Cod. Dhave simply ' give Him up to the Governor '). The evidencethen is overwhelming that ' to-give-up to-judgment' is acharacteristic Syriac phrase used in the Gospels. The wordr^li*.i (judgment), it should be added, renders KpLais inMatt. v. 21 f., x. 15, xi. 22 &c., and rcpiTijpiov in I Cor. vi. 2, 4.Thus Cod. D and Cod. E each gives a different but quitenatural translation of the same Syriac word. (2) Thegloss avrov 0e\ovros may be accounted for by Lc. xxiii.20 0e\u>v aTToXvcrai rov T^crow. But it will be noticed thatin the Syriac Vulgate the phrase occurs also in Jn. xix. 12'Pilate wishing was (rôco rf_=3) that-he-might-release-Him(efyjrei aTro\vaai avrov).' Both passages had a place in theDiatessaron (Ciasca, p. 89 f.). (3) The r/pvi'jcraaOe of thetrue text was literally translated by .^_oo\i^x This eitherhad been in the Old Syriac corrupted into ^ôivtaSk orwas so read by the Bezan scribe 1 . For instances of thisword used in malampartem see Payne Smith, T/ies. Syr., subvoce.

I may be allowed to refer to a passage in the Gospels inwhich, as I believe, a corruption in the Syriac text hasgenerated an almost meaningless reading in Cod. D and inseveral Old Latin MSS. In Cod. D we read in Me. ix. 15,

TTAC 0)(AOC eiAONTEC TON IHN 60AMBHCANKAI npocxepONTec HCTTAZONTO AYTON.

In the Syriac Vulgate the words are: ' They-saw-Him and-wondered and-ran (cuônio) and-saluted Him.' In the OldSyriac copy, on which the text of Cod. D is ultimately based, Ibelieve that the place of cu^cnicv (and-they-ran) was takenby o\c\io (and-they-exulted). In the Arabic Tatian weread (Ciasca, p. 43) ' et prae gaudio properantes '. If thisreading is indeed that of the Diatessaron (and the divergence

1 This suggestion \va.s made by Harvey, Irenacus, ii. p. 55.


59/182

iii. 1 6, 17] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 39from the Syriac Vulgate, to which the text of the ArabicTatian is usually conformed, makes this probable), thenthe blunder otona must go back to the days before Tatian;for Tatian's text involves a conflation of the two words' and-they-ran ' and ' and-they-exulted '. In other words theSyriac text of the Gospels had already a history in Tatian'stime. And this fact, if fact it be, implies the existence ofa Syriac St Mark far back in the Second Century.

iii. 16. TOYTON Oeiopeire KAI oiAAteon ecrepeooceN TO ONOMA Ayroy.

The true text has TOVTOV ov Oewpeire KCLI olSare eTO ovoAO, avrov.

The true text is followed by the Bezan Latin, and (as faras the construction goes) by the Syriac Vulgate. There can,I think, be little doubt that the on of the Bezan Greekanswers to an ambiguous .1 in Syriac, and that the Old Syriacwas as follows : ' This-man (r^-lcrA) seeing (are-)ye and-knowing (are-)ye whom-it-strengthenecl (ix.K'.i) (even-)His-name.' The Syriac Vulgate has ' Him. . .He (OOT) strengthenedand-Jiealed\ the last word coming from the Gospel history(e.g. Matt. iv. 24, xii. 15, xiv. 14, xv. 30, xix. 2, xxi. 14).

iii. 17. KAI NYN ANApec AAeAcfioiOTI yMGIC MN KATA AfNOIAN enpAAT TTONHpO.

The true text has KOI vvv, aSeXot, oiSa ore Kara cvyvoiavThe reading of the Syriac Vulgate is : ' But now, my-

brethren, knowing (am) I (rdJK' ^-.T) that-in-error ye-didthis-thing (rfjcn ^_o^xa.^.).'Here note the following points, (i) eVto-rttyLte^a seems toimply either that the Old Syriac had, or that the Bezanscribe read it as having, the common participial form ^IA^.I'(knowing(-are)-we) : see e.g. Matt. xxi. 27, xxii. 16, Me. xi.33. It might arise from r


60/182

40 THE OLD SYKIAC ELEMENT [ill. IQ, 21xii. 2). (2) The u/xet? ptv of the Bezan text suggeststhat the Old Syriac read ^_o$\.va^- . . . ^ôAur^.l (that-ye...did) just as the Vulgate Syriac has in v. 13

(that-ye...gave-up), and in v. 14(ye...denied), i.e. that the Old Syriac

emphasises the you in the words of extenuation as it haddone in the words of accusation. Compare on v. 39. (3)About the interpolated Trovrjpov we remark (a) that the 'this'of the Syriac Vulgate shews that the Syriac ' ye-did ' couldnot well stand without some defining word ; (b) that thewords .irut. (do) and .T-J~) (evil) are very commonly usedtogether ; see the Syriac rendering of KaKOTrotfo-ai (Me. iii. 4,Lc. vi. 9), of KaKOTroios (i Pet. iv. 15, cf. Jn. xviii. 30), of ol ra(f)av\a TTpdgavTes (Jn. v. 29), and compare Matt, xxvii.23 1| Me., Lc.; Lc. xxiii. 32 f., 39, Rom. vii. 19, xiii. 4. Seealso the Bezan text in v. 4, viii. 24, Lc. xxiii. 41 oyroc Ae

rroiMnpoN

iii. 19. OTTOOC AN eneA6oociN KAipoi.The true text has the simple verb eÔwaiv, with which

the Bezan Latin (' ut ueniant tempora ') agrees.The Syriac Vulgate has : ' that-there-may-come to-you(^_aA\ ^_o^\r^-i)'. Compare the Vulgate of Lc. xix. 43'The-days shall-come to-thee (.*î .ô^rdJ)'. The 'to-you ', so natural an addition in the pronoun-loving Syriac, isliterally represented in Cod. E OTTOOC AN eA0oociN KAipoi ANA^Y-Zeooc YMIN. Cod. D represents it by the compound verb, sothat here we have the converse of the case noted in i. 4.

iii. 21. AIA CTOMATOC TOONTOON TTpO(})HTCdN.

The true text has air alwvos after TWV dyiuv. In theSyriac Vulgate the words >l2- ^san (who-(were)-from eter-nity) stand at the end of the clause. The words thereforemay have easily fallen out in the Old Syriac, or the Bezanscribe, as the words come out of order when compared with


61/182


62/182

42 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [iv. I f.KAI ANAfTeAAeiN TON IHNN TH ANACTAC6I TO)N

NKpOJN.The true text has \a\ovvrwv &e avrwv TTÔ? rov \aoveTrearrjcrav avrois 01 dpîepels Kal o crrparrjybs rov tepovKal o/' âôovKatoi, ciaTrovov/jifvoi oia rb oiod&Ketv avrovsrov \aov KCL\ KarcvyyeMêiv ev ro> 'J rjcrov r^v dvda-raa-tv njvK veicpwv.The points in the passage are these, (i) The SyriacVulgate has : ' And-while these words speaking (KllJS*,.AY_=n-73 ) were-they '. The addition of ' these words ' isnatural in Syriac because of the Semitic love for ' cognateaccusatives '. The Bezan text and that of Cod. E (TAYTATA PHMATA) follow the Syriac. (2) For eirea-rijaav avrolsthe Syriac Vulgate has ' there-rose against-them '. TheBezan text is contented with the compound verb withoutthe pronoun, probably for the reason given above (seeon iii. 19). (3) The Bezan text omits Kal 6 a-rpar. rovlepov. The omission, I think, can be easily explained whenwe turn to the Syriac. The Syriac word rdicxîrtf' (captainor captains) is pointed as a plural in the Syriac Vulgatehere and v. 24, 26 (in the latter verse it goes with a verbwhich is in the plural) 1 . But it will be noticed that thereis a similarity in form between the words, r^JOîK'a(Kal ol arparrjyoi) and r^.i-QOl\ O (/cat 01 SaSSou/caiot), sothat the eye of a scribe might easily pass from the former tothe latter, and the phrase ' and-the-captains of-the-temple 'fall out. That this omission was actually made in the OldSyriac text we have independent evidence in the fact thatthe Syriac Vulgate has here : ' the-Priests and-the-Sadduceesand-the-captains of-the-temple '. When the Old Syriac wasrevised, the omitted words were added, but added at theend of the clause. (4) What of the remarkable readingin i'. 2 Kal dva


63/182

iv. 5, 6, 9] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. 43found reason to think that the Syriac text followed by Cod.D assimilated the account of St Peter's preaching to thatof St Paul's preaching in xvii. (v. 33). In the present passagethe Syriac Vulgate has: ' And-preaching (r \i^so)(-vvere)in-Christ about (-^-) the-resurrection '. In xvii. 18 it has:' Because that Jesus and-His-resurrection preaching was-he(ti^so coAv=o.AjAc\ ^.dzA) to-them '. The use of the sameverb in the two passages, while the Greek verbs differ, isprobably a survival of fuller assimilation in the Old Syriac.If the Old Syriac of xvii. 18 had 'Because that-about Jesusand-the-resurrection (K'^vJSii.joo ^.cxz.* Jlsw.t A.\^5n) preach-ing was-he to-them', the reading K* ovsa.jLja=> (in-the-resur-raction) would very easily arise and pass into our presentpassage. I venture to offer this suggestion as to the genesisof this reading, fully acknowledging that it is very largelyconjectural.

iv. 5. erri THN AypioNThe i]^pav is an addition to the true text. The Syriac

Vulgate has Klit-wr^ KltflcxAo, .where the word 'day' isnecessary.

iv. 6. ICONA6AC.

The true text has "Iwavvt]?.The difference between the two names in Greek is muchmore considerable than that between (AjjCU (John) and^__oucu (Jonathan). In xiii. 8 there is a remarkable varia-tion in a name due to Syriac influence. Cod. D has er IMAC( eToiMAc, as is clear from the Bezan Latin ' etoemas '). Aconfusion between / and t would be easy in Latin ; but thefresh transliteration remains to be accounted for. Thevariation therefore is probably to be traced to a confusion ofA and .\g in Syriac, which produced the reading ooosoa.^K'.

iv. 9. ANAKpeiNOMeOA A(f> YMOXThe a^> vfj,wv, absent from the true Greek text, but found

in Cod. E, is a literal rendering of the Syriac


64/182

44 THE OLD SYRIAC ELEMENT [iv. 12, 14iv. 12. KAI YK ecriN N AAAo oyAeM

oy r*p ecriN erepoN ONOMA yno TON oypANoAeAOM6NON ANOptOTTOIC.The true text has KOL OVK ecrriv eV d\\co ovSevl r/ ffwrijpia,

ovSe yap ovo/j.d ecrriv erepov VTTO rov ovpavov TO 8e8o/jievov evThe points to be considered are these, (i) What of the

omission of 77 a-wr^piaf In v. 10 Cod. E reads CN TOYTOJoyroc TTApecTHKeN eisiconioN YMOON CHwepON YTIHC KAI GN AAAoioyAeM. Here there are two interpolations (a) cnj/juepov fromv. 9 and (b) ev u\\u> ovSevi from v. 1 2. Preserved in Cod. Ewe may well suspect that these two interpolations are ofSyriac origin. Eurther, they are both consonant with whatwe have learned to be a characteristic of the Old Syriac textof the Acts, viz. its love of fulness and of assimilation. Butagain, the Syriac Vulgate of v. 10 in its emphatic rendering ofev Tovro) 'in Him Himself (cons cna)' seems to preservean indication that this gloss once followed in the Syriac ' inHim Himself. ..and in no other'. We may then conclude thatin all probability the Old. Syriac ended v. 10 with the wordsf*\&r< -x.JnS'-rj rÂcv (and-not in-a-man another). Now ifthese words of v. 10 were in a scribe's mind, when he cameto i'. 12 îwK' JC-iKlsa &ulc\ (and-there-is-not in-a-mananother) he would be very likely to omit the word ' salvation 'which did not occur in v. 10. (2) The Syriac Vulgatehas for the two last lines : ' For there-is not a-name another-one under heaven which-has-been-given (.rseaaOxK'ii) to-men.'With this the Bezan Greek exactly corresponds, except thatit has the order erepov ovcâ and that it retains the SeSo-fjbtvov of the true Greek, and by its retention of it makes ship-wreck of the grammar. As to the last point however it isnot unlikely that the Old Syriac has .=3orrAvj.i. Comparev. 25 OC...AAAHCAC.

v. 14. oyAeN eixN TTOIHCAI HThe true text has nothing to answer to jroifjaat, 17.


65/182

iv. 15] IN THE BEZAN TEXT OF THE ACTS. '45With it the Bezan Latin (' nihil habebant contradicere')agrees.The Syriac Vulgate has: 'And-not able (^* M^T ^n) were-they anything to-say against-them '. The Syriac participlehere used means either ' finding' (e.g. Matt. xi. 29, xxii. 9) or'able' (e.g. Matt. ix. 15, x. 28). This phrase then of theBezan text has affinities with several passages in the N.T.,when Syriac is the medium of comparison, affinities whichat once vanish if the Greek is referred to. Thus the in-terpolated words may be due to assimilation to Lc. xix. 48'And-not finding (^.ma^r ra) were-they what they-might-do?Compare Jn. xv. 5 'Because without me not able (^.M^T ta)(are-)ye to-do anyth

The Old Syriac Element in the Text of Codex Bezae (1893)

Documents

Transcript of The Old Syriac Element in the Text of Codex Bezae (1893)