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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
28 of 28 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Demonstrates Byzantine texts are trustworthy,
By Gary F. Zeolla "Director of Darkness to Light... (Pennsylvania USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)
This review is from: The Byzantine Text-Type & New Testament Textual Criticism (Paperback)
Since the late 1800's, many textual critics have considered the handful of Alexandrian Greek texts to be more reliable than the far more numerous Byzantine texts. The Byzantine texts have been written off as being "conflations" from a later time than the Alexandrian texts. And this attitude has led to the creation of today's Critical Text (CT).However, others have staunchly maintained that the Alexandrian manuscripts are not that reliable and that the Byzantine texts in fact preserve readings dating to the earliest centuries. And since the Byzantine texts comprise the vast majority of the manuscripts, this text is referred to as the Majority Text (MT). And this book by Sturz proves that the Byzantine texts are in fact much more reliable than CT scholars would like to admit. But first it should be noted that Sturz is not a supporter of the MT per se. He takes a middle position in this debate. He simply believes, "... the Byzantine text should be recognized as having an important and useful place in textual criticism because it is an independent witness to an early form of the New Testament text" (p.23). Sturz explains why he disagrees with the CT assessment of the Byzantine text, "Although the reasoning of Westcott and Hort seemed sound at the time they wrote, discoveries since then have undermined the confident appraisal that characteristically Syrian [Byzantine] readings are necessarily late" (p.55). The most important of these discoveries was several Egyptian papyri. Sturz lists "150 distinctively Byzantine readings" found in these papyri. Included in his list are papyri numbers 13, 45, 46, 47, 49, 59, 66, 72, 74, and 75 (pp. 61, 145-159). Sturz brings up another very important point about these papyri, "They attest the early existence of readings in the Eastern part of the Roman empire in which the Byzantine and the properly (i.e. geographically) Western witnesses agree and at the same time are opposed by the Alexandrian" (p.70). IOW, some early "Western" texts agree with the Byzantine tradition where it differs from the Alexandrian. Sturz lists 170 of these types of readings (pp.160-174). Sturz concludes, "In view of the above, it is concluded that the papyri supply valid evidence that distinctively Byzantine readings were not created in the fourth century but were already in existence before the end of the second century and that, because of this, Byzantine readings merit serious consideration" (p.69). And Sturz asks the question, "What about Byzantine readings which occur in parts of the New Testament where there are no papyri, AS YET, to confirm them?" (p.64, emphasis in original). The problem is that even with the most recent discoveries, the papyri data is still rather sparse. Sturz's supports these statements with extensive charts documenting these Byzantine readings in the early papyri. He also demonstrates that Byzantine readings have been found in the writings of the Church Fathers. And he explains that the Byzantine text was not created by a fourth century "conflation" as CT scholars have claimed. So overall, this book does a thorough job of showing that the Byzantine texts are just as reliable manuscripts as Alexandrian manuscripts. Now I would go a step further and say the Byzantine manuscripts are in fact more reliable than Alexandrian manuscripts. And I document my reasons for believing so in my book "Differences Between Bible Versions." But I quote from Sturz's book in my book as it at least provides a foundation for accepting that the Byzantine texts are reliable.
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Fresh and Thought Provoking Perspective,
By
This review is from: The Byzantine Text-Type & New Testament Textual Criticism (Paperback)
I was slow to begin reading this book. I owned it for a few years before I gave it a second look. [I have a 1984 edition] Once I started reading it held my interest. The author's logic and willingness to depart from both the current and traditional wisdom on the subject of N.T. textual criticism gains my applause. He seemed to be both fair minded and soft spoken in his tone.The subject is not a simple one, but the author defined his terms and was very understandable. I feel I have a better understand of the subject than I did and I have read other books on the same subject. Perhaps the best part of the book is the theories held by others are briefly summerized and the strengths and weaknesses of each from the author's perspective are given. Not matter where one stands on the issue of textual criticism I believe this book is an important read.
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent Defense of the Byzantine Text,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Byzantine Text-Type & New Testament Textual Criticism (Paperback)
Now please don't take the title in the wrong way. Sturz is not a Byzantine only man. What he sets out to do is show that the Byzantine text is useful in textual criticism. For almost 150 pages, he does nothing but refute the Wescott and Hort theories regarding the Byzantine text. He does an excellent job documenting the errors of the Lucian recension, the shorter reading should be prefered, the harder reading should be accepted, and the rest of the other junk. He documents clearly that the Byzantine text is actually older than the fourth century. He just gives a good defense of the Byzantine text. For the next approx. 100 pages, he gives nothing but manuscript evidence. He goes through many verses, showing that the Byzantine readings are earlier that said, that the readings are not conflations, and many other things. Then he gives an extensive bibliography for those willing to further study the issue. I am King James-only and I disagreed with his "refutation" of Edward Hills and Dean Burgon's position on the Byzantine text. Other than that, he clearly presents a lot of truth regarding the Byzantine text. Not all the stuff will be easily grasped. Because of this, I don't necessarily recommend this book to those who are new to the issue. Like the other reviewer said, you can get stuff out of it, but I really think a knowledge of the subject will be needed to understand most of the book.
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