So Chrysostom, speaking of the reading Βηθαβαρά.
Origen (iv. 140) says that not only σχεδὸν ἐν πᾶσι τοῖς ἀντιγράφοις, but also that apud Heracleonem, (who wrote within 50 years of S. John's death,) he found Βηθανία written in S. John i. 28. Moved by geographical considerations, however, (as he explains,) for Βηθανία, Origen proposes to read Βηθαβαρά.—Chrysostom (viii. 96 d), after noticing the former reading, declares,—ὅσα δὲ τῶν ἀντιγράφων ἀκριβέστερον ἔχει ἐν Βηθαβαρά φησιν: but he goes on to reproduce Origen's reasoning;—thereby betraying himself.—The author of the Catena in Matth. (Cramer, i. 190-1) simply reproduces Chrysostom:—χρὴ δὲ γινώσκειν ὅτι τὰ ἀκριβῆ τῶν ἀντιγράφων ἐν Βηθαβαρὰ περιέχει. And so, other Scholia; until at last what was only due to the mistaken assiduity of Origen, became generally received as the reading of the “more accurate copies.”
A scholium on S. Luke xxiv. 13, in like manner, declares that the true reading of that place is not “60” but “160,”—οὕτως γὰρ τὰ ἀκριβῆ περιέχει, καὶ ἡ Ὠριγένους τῆς ἀληθείας βεβαίωσις. Accordingly, Eusebius also reads the place in the same erroneous way.
Accordingly, in Cod. Evan. 266 (= Paris Reg. 67) is read, at S. Mark xvi. 8 (fol. 125), as follows:—ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ. [then, rubro,] τέλος τοῦ Β᾽ ἑωθίνου, καὶ τῆς κυριακῆς τῶν μυροφόρων. ἀρχή. [then the text:] Ἀναστάς κ.τ.λ. ... After ver. 20, (at fol. 126 of the same Codex) is found the following concluding rubric:—τέλος τοῦ Γ᾽ ἑωθίνου εὐαγγελίου.
In the same place, (viz. at the end of S. Mark's Gospel,) is found in another Codex (Evan. 7 = Paris Reg. 71,) the following rubric:—τέλος τοῦ τρίτου τοῦ ἑωθίνου, καὶ τοῦ ὄρθρου τῆς ἀναλήψεως.
Cod. 27 (xi) is not provided with any lectionary apparatus, and is written continuously throughout: and yet at S. Mark xvi. 9 a fresh paragraph is observed to commence.
Not dissimilar is the phenomenon recorded in respect of some copies of the Armenian version. “The Armenian, in the edition of Zohrab, separates the concluding 12 verses from the rest of the Gospel.... Many of the oldest MSS., after the words ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ, put the final Εὐαγγέλιον κατὰ Μάρκον, and then give the additional verses with a new superscription.” (Tregelles, Printed Text, p. 253).... We are now in a position to understand the Armenian evidence, which has been described above, at p. [36], as well as to estimate its exact value.
I allude of course to Matthaei's Cod. g. (See the note in his N. T. vol. ix. p. 228.) Whether or no the learned critic was right in his conjecture “aliquot folia excidisse,” matters nothing. The left hand page ends at the words ἐφοβοῦντο γάρ. Now, if τελος had followed, how obvious would have been the inference that the Gospel itself of S. Mark had come to an end there!
Note, that in the Codex Bezæ (D), S. Mark's Gospel ends at ver. 15: in the Gothic Codex Argenteus, at ver. 11. The Codex Vercell. (a) proves to be imperfect from ch. xv. 15; Cod. Veron. (b) from xiii. 24; Cod. Brix. (f) from xiv. 70.
P.S. I avail myself of this blank space to introduce a passage from Theophylact (A.D. 1077) which should have obtained notice in a much earlier page:—Ἀναστὰς δὲ ὁ Ἰησοῦς; ἐνταῦθα στίξον, εἶτα εἱπέ; πρωί πρώτῇ σαββάτου ἐφάνη Μαρίᾳ τῇ Μαγδαληνῇ. οὐ γὰρ ἀνέστη πρωί (τίς γὰρ οἴδε πότε ἀνέστη;) ἀλλ᾽ ἐφάνη πρωί κυριακῇ ἡμέρᾳ (αὔτη γὰρ ἡ πρώτη τοῦ σαββάτου, τουτέστι, τῆς ἑβδομάδος,) ἥν ἄνω ἐκάλεσε μίαν σαββάτων; [Opp. vol. i. p. 263 C.