From: (Michael Hore)

Date: 11 Jun 1997

I’ve now had a chance to look at this document on the TRF web

site

Before I comment, I would recommend anybody interested

having a look at this document rather than just accepting

what I’m going to say about it, since I’m going to be

rather critical. I invite everyone to see for themselves

if what I’m saying is reasonable.

This document reads as polemic rather than as a scholarly text.


For example, the heading “Cumulative Evidence Versus Modernistic

Unbelief”, and the subheading “Modernists Attack Authenticity

Of [sic] Mark 16: 9-20”, give an indication of where this

document is coming from. Who are these unbelieving modernists?


People who have spent their lives studying the whole complex

field of text transmission. “Modernists” is used as a

perjorative term. These people are not unbelievers. I

think it would be true to say that they generally believe

in the divine inspiration of scripture. However at some points

their conclusions disagree with RF doctrine, so they’re

accused of “unbelief”. Oh well…

The document draws much of its material heavily from “The

Pulpit Commentary”. I’ve never heard of that, but they say

“…the Pulpit Commentary, one of the most famous Bible

commentaries printed in the English language.” And I

thought I’d looked at a lot of commentaries – somehow I

missed it.

I suspect this commentary is old, and the name of the

author of the many quotations is not given. This is another

way in which this document looks suspiciously unscholarly.

Anyway, let me get to the arguments. These come under

6 main headings:

1. Evidence Of The Greek Manuscripts

[these people love capital letters!]

2. Evidence Of The Ancient Versions

3. Evidence From The Writings Of The Early Church Leaders.

4. Numeric Evidence Of Divine Inspiration.

5. The Evidence Of The Bible.

6. The Evidence Of The Believer’s Experience.

I’m only going to look at 1, 2, 3, and 5. I regard 3 as

lunatic fringe stuff, frankly. Where in the Bible is there

any suggestion that its text should follow some numeric

pattern, which as others on this newsgroup have shown, can

be found in any text if you try? And as for 6, no doubt

people who have seen apparitions of Mary at Lourdes can

claim just as much from experience. That’s all I’m going

to say about 3 and 6.

Turning to (1), the evidence of the Greek manuscripts. I

have no particular argument with the shortcomings that

are given regarding Codex Sinaiticus (also known as Aleph)

and Codex Vaticanus (also known as B). These are both

witnesses to what’s called the Alexandrian text tradition,

and so are not independent. The problems with this text

tradition are now well understood, as are the problems

with the other traditions. Just citing a list of problems

in isolation is not particularly helpful. In fact the

Alexandrian tradition is now considered to be the most

reliable, and Aleph and B are the oldest manuscripts we

have in this tradition. The Chester Beatty Papyrus

attests to the antiquity of this tradition.

(2) The cursive manuscripts are all much later than the

uncials, and so don’t help us much here. It’s hardly

surprising that they contain the disputed verses, since

a scribe would naturally include something doubtful

rather than leave it out.

(3) The versions translated into other languages are important

witnesses, but the document only mentions those that

support its position, not the many that don’t. Selective

citation is no way to carry on a reasonable argument.

(4) Here again we have selective citation. The evidence

of the early church writers really goes the other way.

Anyway, to back up what I’m saying, I’m going to quote from

_A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament_, by

Bruce M. Metzger. This is a commentary on the deliberations

of the United Bible Society committee that had to make

textual decisions for the third edition of their Greek

text. This is slightly old now (it goes back to when I

was at Moore College) but I doubt that later revisions

differ substantially in the areas we’re looking at here.

Quoting from p.122-3, “The Ending(s) of Mark”:

Four endings of the Gospel according to Mark are current

in the manuscripts. (1) The last twelve verses of the

commonly received text of Mark are absent from the two

oldest Greek manuscripts (Aleph and B), from the Old Latin

cedex Bobiensis, the Sinaitic Syriac manuscript, about

one hundred Armenian manuscripts, and the two oldest

Georgian manuscripts (written A.D. 897 and A.D. 913).

Clement of Alexandria and Origen show no knowledge of

the existende of these verses; furthermore Eusebius and

Jerome attest that the passage was absent from almost

all Greek copies of Mark known to them. The original

form of the Eusebian sections (drawn up by Ammonius)

makes no provision for numbering sections of the text

after 16.8. Not a few manuscripts which contain the

passage have scribal notes stating that older Greek

copies lack it, and in other witnesses the passage is

marked with asterisks or obeli, the conventional signs

used by copyists to indicate a spurious addition to a

document.

…..

The longer ending (3) [the traditional ending], though

current in a variety of witnesses, some of them ancient,

must also be judged by internal evidence to be secondary.

(a) The vocabulary and style of verses 9-20 are non-

Markan (e.g. _apisteo_, _blapto_, _bebaioo_, _epakoloutheo_,

_theaomai_, _sunergeo_, _husteron_ are found nowhere else

in Mark; and _thanasimon_ and _tois met’ autou genomenois_,

as designations of the disciples, occur only here in the

New Testament).


(b) The connection between ver.8 and verses 9-20 is so

awkward that it is difficult to believe that the evangelist

intended the section to be a continuation of the Gospel.

Thus, the subject of ver.8 is the women, whereas Jesus is

the presumed subject in ver.9; in ver.9 Mary Magdalene is

identified even though she has been mentioned only a few

lines before (15.47 and 16.1); the other women of verses

1-8 are now forgotten; the use of _anastas de_ and the

position of _proton_ are appropriate at the beginning

of a comprehensive narrative, but they are ill-suited in

a continuation of verses 1-8. In short, all these

features indicate that the section was added by someone

who knew a form of Mark that ended abruptly with ver.8 and

who wished to supply a more appropriate conclusion. In

view of the inconcinnities [eh? I don’t know that word!]

between verses 1-8 and 9-20, it is unlikely that the long

ending was composed _ad hoc_ to full up an obvious gap;

it is more likely that the section was excerpted from

another document, dating perhaps from the first half of

the second century.

(end quote)

I don’t really think I can add to that – the UBS scholars

know a lot more about the complex issues of text transmission

than I do. It’s easy to push a point of view by selective

quotation of evidence to an uncritical audience. However

this is a large and complex area, to which justice is not

done by this document on the web site.

Let me just add, though, that I don’t think the question of

the ending of Mark is hugely important. As the Revival

Fellowship document states, there is really not much there

that isn’t in other places in the NT – especially Acts. The

ending could well have been written by someone familiar with

Acts as a more fitting ending to the Gospel than the original

brupt ending at v.8. What I do disagree with is the elevating

of this passage to a major proof text for the RF doctrines,

and the unnecessarily perjorative tone of the RF document,

towards modern New Testament scholarship. This is the mark

of a sect, to concentrate on discrediting everyone who

disagrees, rather than try to have a reasonable discussion.

If the passage I quoted above reads like an attempt to

discredit a piece of scripture because it teaches uncomfortable

things, I can only suggest you re-read it.

Cheers, Mike.

……

From: (Peter Ballard)

Date: 13 Jun 97

Newsgroups: aus.religion.christian

Subject: Numerics: let’s check some more [was: Mk 16 (again sorry)]

What is particularly amusing – or sad – about the numerics claims

is that they are totally incorrect.

The first claim is that Mark 16:9-20 has 175 words (= 25 * 7)

in the Greek. I have seen this claim numerous times.

But even this modest claim is demonstrably false.

Below is a Greek New Testament, “tagged” for different versions.

W=Westcott+Hort U=UBS B=Byzantine Majority

T=Textus Receptus S=Scrivener Textus Receptus

c=chi h=eta q=psi w=omega y=theta

[square brackets] denotes doubtful words

mar:16:9 anastas de prwi prwth sabbatou efanh prwton maria th magdalhnh WU=par TSB=af hs ekbeblhkei epta daimonia

mar:16:10 ekeinh poreuyeisa aphggeilen tois met autou genomenois U=penyousi WTSB=penyousin kai klaiousin

mar:16:11 kakeinoi akousantes oti zh kai eyeayh up auths hpisthsan

mar:16:12 meta de tauta dusin ex autwn peripatousin efanerwyh en etera morfh poreuomenois eis agron

mar:16:13 kakeinoi apelyontes aphggeilan tois loipois oude ekeinois episteusan

mar:16:14 usteron WU=[de] anakeimenois autois tois endeka efanerwyh kai wneidisen thn apistian autwn kai sklhrokardian oti tois yeasamenois auton eghgermenon W=[ek W=nekrwn] ouk episteusan

mar:16:15 kai eipen autois poreuyentes eis ton kosmon apanta khruxate to euaggelion pash th ktisei

mar:16:16 o pisteusas kai baptisyeis swyhsetai o de apisthsas katakriyhsetai

mar:16:17 shmeia de tois pisteusasin W=akolouyhsei tauta UBST=parakolouyhsei en tw onomati mou daimonia ekbalousin glwssais lalhsousin UBST=kainais

mar:16:18 WU=[kai WU=en WU=tais WU=cersin] ofeis arousin kan yanasimon ti piwsin ou mh autous WUB=blaqh TS=blaqei epi arrwstous ceiras epiyhsousin kai kalws exousin

mar:16:19 o men oun kurios U=ihsous W=[ihsous] meta to lalhsai autois WU=anelhmfyh TSB=anelhfyh eis ton ouranon kai ekayisen ek dexiwn tou yeou

mar:16:20 ekeinoi de exelyontes ekhruxan pantacou tou kuriou sunergountos kai ton logon bebaiountos dia twn epakolouyountwn shmeiwn TSB=amhn

Even if we count the doubtful words, the highest word count for any

text is 172 for Westcott+Hort. There’s just no way to get 175.

I can only conclude that the numerics of Mark 16 is an urban myth:

frequently quoted, but never verified.