A Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament, Vol. II.

by Frederick Henry Ambrose Scrivener

2. The Curetonian Syriac.

The volume which contained the greater part of the Curetonian portions of the Gospels was brought by Archdeacon Tattam in 1842 from the Monastery of St. Mary Deipara in the Nitrian Desert (p. 140). Eighty leaves and a half were picked out by Dr. Cureton, then one of the officers in the Manuscript department of the British Museum, from a mass of other matter which had been bound up with them by unlearned possessors, and comprise the Additional MS. 14,451 of the Library they adorn, and two more reached England in 1847. They are in quarto, with two columns on a page, in a bold hand and the Estrangelo or old Syriac character, on vellum originally very white, the single points for stops, some titles, &c. being in red ink; there are no marks of Church Lessons by the first hand, which Cureton (a most competent judge) assigned to the middle of the fifth century. The fragments contain Matt. i. 1-viii. 22; x. 32-xxiii. 25; Mark xvi. 17-20; John i. 1-42; iii. 5-vii. 37; (but many words in iii. 6-iv. 6 are illegible); xiv. 10-12; 15-19; 21-23; 26-29; Luke ii. 48-iii. 16; vii. 33-xv. 21; xvii. 23-xxiv. 44, or 1786 verses, so arranged that St. Mark's Gospel is here immediately followed by St. John's. Three more leaves of this version (part, perhaps, of the same MS.) were found among the Syriac MSS. procured by Dr. Sachau, and now at Berlin (Royal Libr. Orient. quart. 528). They contain Luke xv. 22-xvi. 12; xvii. 1-23; John vii. 37-52; viii. 12-19. They were published by Roediger (Monatsbericht, Berlin Royal Academy of Sciences, July, 1872), and were privately printed by the late Professor Wright to range with Cureton's volume. Within the last year the discovery has been announced of another Curetonian MS., which was found in the Library of the Convent on Mount Sinai by Mrs. Lewis. An edition of it is now in progress, but will not be published soon enough for notice in this work. The Syriac text of the London MS. was printed in fine Estrangelo type in 1848, and freely imparted to such scholars [pg 015] as might need its help; but it was not till 1858 that the work was published[14], with a very literal translation into rather bald English, a beautiful and exact facsimile (Luke xv. 11-13; 16-19) by Mrs. Cureton, and a Preface (pp. xcv), full of interesting and indeed startling matter. Dr. Cureton went so far as to persuade himself that he had discovered in these Syriac fragments a text of St. Matthew's Gospel that “to a great extent, has retained the identical terms and expressions which the Apostle himself employed; and that we have here, in our Lord's discourses, to a great extent the very same words as the Divine Author of our holy religion Himself uttered in proclaiming the glad tidings of salvation in the Hebrew dialect ...” (p. xciii): that here in fact we have to a great extent the original of that Hebrew Gospel of St. Matthew of which the canonical Greek Gospel is but a translation. It is beside our present purpose to examine in detail the arguments of Dr. Cureton on this head[15], and it would be the less necessary in any case, since they seem to have convinced no one save himself: but the place his version occupies with reference to the Peshitto is a question upon which there has been and still prevails a controversy which largely concerns the issue between contending schools of textual critics[16].

Any one who shall compare the verses we have cited from them in parallel columns (pp. [38-40]) will readily admit that the translations have a common origin, whatever that may be; many other passages, though not perhaps of equal length, might be named where the resemblance is closer still; where for twenty words together the Peshitto and the Curetonian shall be positively identical, although the Syriac idiom would admit other words and another order just as naturally as that actually employed. Nor will this conclusion be shaken by the not less manifest fact that throughout many passages the diversity is so great that no one, with those places alone before him, would be led to suspect any connexion between the two versions; for resemblances in such a case furnish a positive proof, not to be weakened by the mere negative presumption supplied by divergencies. Add to this the consideration that the Greek manuscripts from which either version was made or corrected (as the case may prove) were materially different in their character; the Peshitto for the most part favouring Cod. A[17], the Curetonian taking part with Cod. D, or with the Old Latin, or often standing quite alone, unsupported by any critical authority whatever; and the reader is then in possession of the whole case, from whose perplexities we have to unravel our decision, which of these two recensions [pg 017] best exhibits the text of the Holy Gospels as received from the second century downwards by the Syrian Church.

We must not dissemble the fact that Cureton's view of the superior antiquity of the Curetonian to the Peshitto has been adopted by many eminent scholars. So for example Dr. Hort, who was obliged to account for the relation of the two by a baseless supposition of an imaginary recension at Edessa or Nisibis when the Peshitto was drawn up as a Syrian “Vulgate” (The New Testament in Greek, pp. 135-7). So with more strength of argument Dr. Nestle in “Real Encyclopedie für protestanche Theologie en Kirche[18].”

1. Now it is obvious to remark, in the first place, that the Peshitto has the advantage of possession, and that too of fourteen centuries standing. The mere fact that the Syriac manuscripts of the rival sects, whether modern or as old as the seventh century, agree with each other in the most important points, and at least to a large extent with the citations from Ephraem and Aphraates, as will be shown, seems to bring the Peshitto text, substantially in the same state as we have it at present, up to the fourth century of our era. Of this version, again, there are many codices, of different ages and widely diffused; of the Curetonian there is indeed one, of the fifth century, so far as the verdict of a most accomplished judge can determine so delicate a question: yet surely this is not to be much preferred, in respect to antiquity, to those ancient copies of the Peshitto which we have enumerated on pp. [10], [11], and which include a MS. of the fifth century, several others nearly as ancient, and two which are dated in the sixth century, the Florentine of a.d. 586, and the Vatican of a.d. 548. Another “Curetonian” MS., lately discovered, is still under examination, and we have, as yet, no adequate account of it. From the Peshitto, as the authorized version of the Oriental Church, there are many quotations in Syriac books from the fourth century downwards; Dr. Cureton, perhaps the profoundest Syriac scholar of his day in England, failed to allege any second citation from the Gospels by a native writer which [pg 018] might serve to keep in countenance the statement of Dionysius Barsalibi, late in the twelfth century, that “there is found occasionally a Syriac copy made out of the Hebrew, which inserts the three kings in the genealogy” (Matt. i. 8)[19]. With every wish to give to this respectable old writer, and to others who bear testimony to the same reading, the consideration that is fairly their due, we can hardly fail to see that the weight of evidence enormously preponderates in the opposite scale.

2. It will probably be admitted that in external proof Cureton's theory is not strong, while yet the internal character of the version may be deemed by many powerfully to favour his view. Negligent or licentious renderings (and the Curetonian Syriac is pretty full of them) cannot but lessen a version's usefulness as an instrument of criticism, by increasing our difficulty of reproducing the precise words of the original which the translator had before him; but in another point of view these very faults may still form the main strength of Dr. Cureton's case. It is, no doubt, a grave suggestion, that the more polished, accurate, faithful, and grammatical of the two versions—and the Peshitto richly deserves all this praise—is more likely to have been produced by a careful and gradual revision of one much its inferior in these respects, than the worse to have originated in the mere corruption of the better (Cureton, Pref. p. lxxxi). A priori, we readily confess that probability inclines this way; but it is a probability which needs the confirmation of facts, and by adverse facts may be utterly set aside. Cureton's remark that “upon the comparison of several of the oldest copies now in the British Museum of that very text of the Gospels which has been generally received as the Peshitto, the more ancient the manuscripts be, the more nearly do they correspond with the text of these Syriac fragments” (Pref. p. lxxiii), is confirmed by other, and subsequent, labourers in the same field. The received text of the Peshitto was printed from MSS. of a late type. It was the opinion of P. E. Pusey (whose name has already been mentioned in these pages) that a revision of the Peshitto text was made in the eighth century. The oldest Syriac Massoretic MS. which we possess is dated a. gr. 1210 = a.d. 899[20], but a copy of the Gospels (Add. 14,448), the date of which appears to [pg 019] be a. h. 80 = a.d. 699-700, contains a text which approximates to the type of the printed Peshitto, but exhibits marginal notes in a later hand, referring, however, chiefly to pronunciation and accentuation. There is no evidence that any formal revision took place; but it would appear certain that as questions of orthography, of grammar, and of pronunciation were fixed by the decisions of the Massoretes and grammarians, the faults (as they were deemed) of the older readings were emended by scribes. Hence it is, that if we open a codex of the Peshitto Gospels of about the date of the Codex Curetonianus, we find many resemblances of the kind indicated by Cureton, between the fifth century Peshitto text and the Curetonian text, because both belong to an early, and perhaps less accurate era of transcription[21]. But the resemblances only extend to matters of grammar and spelling. In more important readings, the fifth century form of the Peshitto does not approximate to the Curetonian text. This was clearly seen by Pusey, as a result of the collation of a large number of Peshitto MSS. He found that the text of the oldest of them was substantially the same as that which is printed in the Polyglotts. The grammar may have been improved, but the translation was not revised. This argument has been elaborated in two volumes of the Oxford “Studia Biblica,” in part by the use of Philip Pusey's materials, in part by independent researches. In vol. i, paper viii, “A Syriac Biblical MS. of the fifth century,” the readings which appear to be peculiar to that MS. (about seventy in number, for it only contains SS. Matthew and Mark) are set out[22]. Of these twenty-two can be compared with the Curetonian; and it is found that only three approximate more nearly than the printed Peshitto to the text which, it is contended, is older than the Peshitto. Further on[23] a stronger argument is adduced; for it is shown that in eleven passages, where the fifth century codex has a different reading from the printed Peshitto, the Curetonian, instead of agreeing with the ancient text (as ex hypothesi it ought) approximates to the printed Peshitto, and sometimes agrees with it. In vol. ii, paper iii, “The materials for the criticism of the Peshitto New Testament,” other evidence is adduced in support of the same conclusions. St. Matt. v. 31-48 [pg 020] is given, with varr. lectt. derived from twenty distinct authorities, so as to place before the reader the Peshitto in its best and most ancient form. The same passage is set out in the Curetonian form. The various readings in the Peshitto in the eighteen verses amount to at least thirty-one; but the majority are the merest minutiae of spelling and pronunciation. Only one deserves serious attention; and even that, more for accuracy than in relation to the sense of the context; so little has the Syriac New Testament been altered, or corrupted, in the course of ages of transcription. Again, when comparison is made with the Curetonian, while twenty-eight variations from the best form of the Peshitto occur in the above passage, only four find any support in an old Peshitto MS., and but one of the four is of any interest. In addition to these there is one place where the Curetonian agrees with the oldest Peshitto MSS., against the printed Peshitto text. It is plain then that, as far as the enquiry has yet been pursued, the peculiar readings of the Curetonian cannot be traced backwards through the form of text in the oldest Peshitto MSS. If such a revision of the Peshitto, as Dr. Hort's theory postulates, ever took place, it must have been made at a very remote period in the history of Syriac Christian literature; and the new text must have been substituted for the old by measures so drastic that the old (as far as we know) survives only in one Nitrian and (as we are told) in one Sinaitic MS. But this is not only improbable in itself, but is contrary to the analogy supplied by the Latin versions.

Those who contend for the superior antiquity of the Curetonian rely in great part on the character of the quotations in the two great Syriac writers, Aphraates and Mar-Ephraem, who flourished in the century preceding the era in which our oldest Peshitto MSS. were transcribed[24]. Both writers abound in quotations from the New Testament, but many of them are very free, or mere adaptations. A large number in St. Ephraem are certainly from the Peshitto. Wright, in his edition of Aphraates, was inclined to attribute that writer's quotations to the same source. This has been traversed by others, who contend that the quotations in Aphraates more nearly resemble the Curetonian, or the text of Tatian's Diatessaron, as far as we know it. [pg 021] The question of the source of St. Ephraem's quotations has been fully discussed in “Studia Biblica,” iii, paper iv, by Rev. F. H. Woods, who has also taken some notice of those in Aphraates. Mr. Woods holds, as do others (though, as we think, on insufficient evidence) that the text of the Peshitto was not fully settled in the days of Aphraates and Ephraem. His conclusion is that it is quite clear, that Ephraem, in the main, used the Peshitto text (op. cit., p. 107), but as regards Aphraates, he holds that the quotations approximate more closely to the Curetonian. Yet Dr. Zahn, and many others, think that Aphraates used the Diatessaron. The statement of these differences of opinion is enough in itself to show that the source of quotations in these ancient Syriac books is not always easy to determine. Hence it follows that arguments based on the writings of Aphraates and Ephraem are precarious. Moreover, a variation from the Peshitto does not necessarily indicate the employment of another version. The variation might be derived from a Greek text; for there was constant intercourse between Greek and Syrian Christians, and many of the latter were well acquainted with Greek.

While we seek in vain amongst the readings of MSS., and the writings of Syriac authors, for any satisfactory explanation of the origin of the Curetonian, the work itself may perhaps reveal something of its nature, if not of its history. We have already seen[25] that in the opinion of certain textual critics the history of the Latin Vulgate must have its counterpart in the history of the Bible of Edessa. The origin of Jerome's translation is well known. It is supposed that the Peshitto grew in like manner out of an earlier translation. It is contended that the Ur-Peshitto is represented to us by the text of the Curetonian; and the two texts have been compared in order to establish this relation. In so doing, no sufficient account has been taken of the phenomena presented by the differences between the Peshitto and the Curetonian. When it is argued that in some of those differences the Peshitto text bears marks of emendation, of the improving touch of a later hand, we answer[26], that in others there are as evident marks in the Curetonian of alteration and [pg 022] corruption. Indeed, to so large an extent do these prevail, that there are good grounds for the suspicion which has been entertained that the Curetonian (at least as exhibited by the editor from his MS.) is itself the later version. In order to give effect to this argument, it would be necessary to show the entire extant Curetonian text, side by side with the corresponding portions of the Peshitto; otherwise it is scarcely possible to realize (i) how manifestly the Curetonian is an attempt to improve upon the Peshitto text; and (ii) how frequently (as a later composition) it demands an acquaintance with the Gospels on the part of the reader; and (iii) how it is pervaded by views of Gospel history, which belong to the Church rather than to the sacred text. But even the short passages, which we have printed as specimens, afford illustrations of the argument.

1. In St. Matthew xii. 1-4, where the Peshitto exhibits the Textus Receptus, saying that the disciples were hungry, and began to pluck ears of corn and to eat, the Curetonian improves upon the Peshitto thus:—“and the disciples were hungry and began to pluck ears of corn, and break them in their hands, and eat”—introducing words borrowed from St. Luke[27].

2. (α) But in the next verse of the passage, where the words “on the sabbath” are absolutely required in order to make the Pharisees' question intelligible to the first readers of St. Matthew, the Curetonian must needs draw on the common knowledge of educated readers by exhibiting the question thus:—“Why are thy disciples doing what is not lawful to do?” Of course the Peshitto is here an “improvement” on the Curetonian, in reading the words “on the Sabbath”; but that does not affect our argument. Would a primitive version, intended for first converts, have left the reader ignorant what the action objected to might be? whether to pluck ears in another man's field, or to rub out grain on the Sabbath? But a later editor, who revised the text for some purpose (it matters not, at present, for what purpose), might consider the explanatory words superfluous.

(β) In like manner in ver. 4, “the bread of the table of the Lord,” a simple phrase, which every one could understand, has become in the Curetonian “face-bread,” an expression which [pg 023] demands knowledge of the earlier Scriptures on the part of the reader, and displays the erudition of the editor, as do his emendations in the list of names in the first chapter of St. Matthew[28].

3. The other passage which we print (St. Mark xvi. 17-29) will illustrate our third criticism. The Curetonian is, “Our Lord Jesus then, after He had commanded His disciples, was exalted to heaven, and sat on the right hand of God.” The simpler Peshitto phrase runs thus, “Jesus our Lord then, after He had spoken with them, ascended to heaven, and sat on the right hand of God.” The two slight touches of improvement in the Curetonian are evident, and belong to that aspect of the record which finds expression in the Creeds, and in the obedience of the Church. A similar touch appears in the Curetonian addition to ver. 17—them that believe on me.

Again in Matt. v. 32 we read (with all authorities), “Whosoever shall put away his wife, except for the cause of fornication,” &c.; so the Peshitto; but the Curetonian substitutes adultery, and thereby sanctions, not the precept delivered by our Lord, but the interpretation almost universally placed upon it. Now either the Curetonian has alone preserved the true text, or the Curetonian is an emended version. The first supposition is unreasonable; the latter is alone suitable to this and to many other passages.

Not less curious is the addition in ver. 41, “Whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him two others.” The Curetonian (with D and some Latin copies) make our Lord say, “Go three miles.” If we cannot admit that this is the true text, then it is an emendation; for it is no accidental change.

But there is a distinct group of emendations which vividly illustrates our contention, that the Curetonian form of Syriac text is pervaded by views of Gospel history which belong rather to the Church than to the sacred records. While fully accepting the Catholic dogma of the perpetual virginity of the Blessed Virgin, we must grant that it is in the nature of a pious opinion, which Christian sentiment recognized as true, but which is not explicitly stated in the New Testament. Hence we view with grave suspicion a class of emendations which are obviously [pg 024] framed to confute the heresy of the Helvidians. Such a class is found in St. Matt. i. In ver. 16, Pesh., “Joseph the husband of Mary;” Cur., “Joseph to whom was espoused Mary the Virgin.” Ver. 19, Pesh., “Joseph her husband, being a just man;” Cur., “Joseph, because he was a righteous man.” Ver. 20, Pesh., “Fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife;” Cur., “Mary thy espoused.” Ver. 24, Pesh., “Joseph ... took unto him his wife;” Cur., “took Mary.” The Curetonian translator, for dogmatic purposes, makes four distinct and separate omissions, in three of which he stands unsupported—of the word husband in two places, of the word wife in two others. These are emendations of a deliberate and peculiar kind. We cannot account for all these vagaries by remarking that the Curetonian has often the support of the so-called Western family of text[29]. We must face the question whether the MS. of an ancient version, which exhibits such singular phenomena on its first page, is worthy to be set above that version, which is the common heritage of the whole Syriac Church, and which appears to be the basis of the Curetonian itself. To determine the place of a document in our Apparatus Criticus, we must know something of its history. Of the history of the Curetonian version we know nothing. Its internal character inspires grave doubts of its trustworthiness. We note its peculiarities with interest; but we do not yet see our way to yield much deference to its authority. The Peshitto bears witness to that form of text, which was received in very ancient times in the Syriac Church. The Curetonian, like the Palestinian, is interesting as showing what readings were accepted locally, or by individual editors[30].