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Text and Canon Institute—Changing the Goalpost of New Testament Textual Criticism
March 20, 2025 · 1 hr
Dr. Shah walks us through the troublesome transformation of New Testament textual criticism from seeking the original text to prioritizing all variants and community insights.
Series Reviewing Biblical Texts March 20, 2025 · 1 hr · Reviewing Biblical Texts
Dr. Shah walks us through the troublesome transformation of New Testament textual criticism from seeking the original text to prioritizing all variants and community insights. ...more Show the full description Show less Dr. Shah walks us through the troublesome transformation of New Testament textual criticism from seeking the original text to prioritizing all variants and community insights.
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Dr. Abidan Shah is a New Testament text critic, author, professor, and pastor of Clearview Church in North Carolina. His desire is to make biblical scholarship accessible and applicable to all people.
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The Journey into Textual Criticism 0:06 Well, again, thank you, doctor Gurry, for, inviting me to come. It's been awesome to see you again. Actually, you were supposed to be here. Yeah. Yeah. Was was it last month, a month before last? Yeah.0:18 And, unfortunately, a lot of plans got changed and a lot of things got canceled. So kinda sad to think about that. But it's okay.0:31 My my my interest in textual criticism, if I can say a couple of things about that and then maybe talk about the book, was actually when, when I was a little boy watching my dad teach Sunday0:42 night Bible study. He's a pastor, still pastoring for the past, 50 some years now, 55 years. 83 years old. He's still going strong. And on Sunday nights, he0:54 would, teach Greek. And it was very, you know, elementary Greek living in India. Didn't know much about Greek or anything, but, he would teach it. And that got my interest1:06 going. Even though I wasn't going in the ministry at the time, it just was something I always wanted to learn. And then when did my bachelor's in, of course, journalism, not has nothing to do with,1:18 textual criticism. And then God called me in the ministry, and I then came to Southeastern. In Southeastern, I took Greek under doctor Maurice Robinson. And, I1:30 was just expecting to take Greek and didn't realize had no clue about textual criticism. And he begins to talk about, the eclectic text and1:42 the Byzantine text and and all these things, and I'm going, what is he talking about? And and some of the guys in the class, you know, they knew what was happening, and and I was so envious of them because they knew what1:53 he was talking about. And, so that from there on, my interest grew in the field. And, lo and behold, I was able to work under him, and he has2:05 been very gracious. So that is just briefly about why textual criticism for me. Now, this book right here,2:18 is my dissertation, changing the goalpost of New Testament textual criticism. It it went through, before I could get it approved, there's so many things,2:30 I had to, change and make things right over the years to make sure I'm on the right target. Initially, the the dissertation was going to be just on2:42 Bart Ehrman. And, this is this is when he was not that famous. And this is before misquoting Jesus. So2:53 I I I was like, this is all good. Everything is great. I'm on track, and I know I've read pretty much everything he's written so far. And then he wrote misquoting Jesus. And3:05 every scholar in New Testament field jumped in on the chance to rebut, Bart Ehrman. And I looked at my dissertation, I said, pretty much they've said everything I3:17 was gonna say and 10 times better. So that that stalled the process. And I even told doctor Robinson, I said, do you think I should just change and try something else? And he said,3:29 no. In fact, you need to expand this and expand it to include other scholars, who are sorta headed in the same direction,3:41 albeit, with different roads. And so that's how the dissertation came about, and, that's that's where I'm at. So,3:54 some of the things, in this book, I wish I could have included because, because of the limitation of the dissertation. I had to cut, doctor Robinson4:06 could tell you that, close to a hundred and 50 some pages, because there's a limit. So 250 pages and that's it. So I couldn't include examples and4:17 analysis as much as I wanted to. So it is what it is. What I wanna do very quickly, I think doctor Gurry said, maybe 20 minutes, 30 minutes, something like that, talk about the books and a few minutes for4:29 questions. Does that sound good? Okay. I wanna read a little bit from the introduction, kinda set the tone for what I'm talking about. So4:41 before the 19 sixties, the goal of New Testament textual criticism was singular, to retrieve the original text of the New Testament. And since then, the goalpost has incrementally shifted4:53 away from the original text to retrieving any text or many texts of the New Testament. Under this new approach to the text, all variants are considered to be5:05 equally valuable regardless of their external evidence in the history of transmission. Previously, variants were looked upon as a means to recover the original text, but5:17 now they are increasingly treated as windows into the various early Christian communities and their struggles with doctrines. Now it is considered far more5:29 profitable to gain insight into the various Christianities or trajectories of faith, and that's why I'm quoting, Kuster's, Helmut Kuster's,5:41 term there, trajectories of faith, in the early church then to seek after an elusive and elusive original text. Some scholars have concluded the original5:53 text is hopelessly lost, and cannot be retrieved with any confidence or accuracy. Other scholars have gone a step further to claim the idea of an6:05 original text itself is a misconception that needs to be abandoned. So that is the bottom line of,6:17 and I hope, everybody can see what I was reading, hopefully, right here. And so in this book, I'm sort of examining 46:29 individuals and 1 computer program, which is known as a CBGM. And the 4 individuals are Bart Ehrman, and, of course, doctor Bart6:41 Ehrman, David c Parker, Eldon Epp, and J Keith Elliott, and and then CBGM. So6:54 1 of the things that I want us to see the importance of, this study is, something that Bart Ehrman claimed,7:06 and I'll come to that in a few minutes. But let me let me go further for time's sake. So much I can read, but I rather use that time wisely. In my second chapter, I kind of focus7:18 on the traditional goals and methods of New Testament textual criticism. 1 of the things that, again, doctor Gurri's good friend and, of course, mine as well, Elijah7:30 Hixson, asked me, when this book came out, do you believe that all text critics or all leading text critics have abandoned this? And my answer was absolutely not. I I don't believe7:41 that at all. In fact, you will see in the book, talk about how that's not the case. And in fact, the second chapter, I give a list of past and7:53 even present text critics who hold to the to the original text, or the retrievability of the original text. And this is across the board, whether they are documentary theorists8:05 or, reason eclectics or rigorous or thoroughgoing eclectics. And across the board, they they're holding to the original text even though they have different methodologies, different8:17 emphasis on the external or internal evidence or just the external or just the internal, they're still holding on to the same thing.8:29 Now the growing complexity of the term original text, let me say something about that very, very quickly. And maybe I can read that section if that's okay. In the past 3 decades,8:43 the concept of the original text has become increasingly complex and requires some clarifications. First, the designation original text was historical historically8:55 attributed to the text that was penned by the original author. And here, I'm actually quoting from, Strutwolf, who is, you know, kind of very important, especially in the,9:07 the Moonster world or the CBGM. So I would never, say, oh, this, you know, CBGM doesn't believe in the original text. Actually, I'll say that,9:19 just contrary to that in the CBGM chapter. So Holger Strudfel gives a representative definition. He said, if I speak as a text to a critic, I'm using the term original text to denote the author's9:31 text of your certain writing. This is the text that textual criticism can reach by using all the available evidence from manuscripts, early translations, and citations. So he this is from9:43 his article, original text, and textual history. And and so, this is the classic definition9:55 of the original text. The original text was generally deemed to be inspired by God, generally deemed. And binding for faith and practices and procuring this text was a primary goal of, New10:07 Testament text for criticism. Keep looking at my time. Second, based on the conclusions of, historical critical studies, the traditional definition of the original10:19 texts was challenged. It was claimed that it could be 1 of 4 chronological texts, pre authorial, authorial, canonical, and post10:30 canonical. Now these were, introduced by Epp in his, famous article, multivillains, of the term original text in the New10:42 Testament text criticism. And he called them the predecessor text, the autographic text, canonical text, and the interpretive text forms. And, so, there you10:54 have that. Now let me jump over very quickly to the to this paragraph right here. The original text finally, the original text has received a new tax onomy in recent years with the11:06 advent of the CBGM. And this sort of is like Epps, but it's different. Here, it is 3, you know, it has 311:17 different kinds. The authorial text, the Osgong's text or initial text, and the archetypal text. The first category of authorial text represents a traditional understanding of the original text. Same thing11:29 that Strut Wolf, I just read from him. The text that's penned by the original biblical author. The second category of Osagam's text is the goal of New Testament textual criticism under the CBGM.11:42 This is distinct from the third category of the archetypal text, which only represents the beginning of the family tree from which all the extent manuscripts descended. It is claimed that this by the11:54 way, I don't know why, the copy editors, the last 1 or maybe the second last 1, remove that from many places in12:06 my, book. Maybe it's just he he didn't like that. So it always jars me. It's like, how did I miss that there? But I looked through the whole book, and pretty much12:18 every place has been taken out. So it's very jarring. So just bear with me on that. So you're getting12:23 you're getting the original text from doctor Shaw right now, guys. He's giving you the authorial text. Okay? Different from the printed text. So keep going.12:35 Yeah. It is claimed that this initial manuscript is now lost and can only be recreated as a hypothetical ancestor. Conversely, the Ausgos text is deemed to be even more12:46 important than the archetypal text since it reaches back closer to the original text. Under the influence of the new movement in New Testament text credit, criticism, text critics are became becoming12:58 increasingly hesitant to claim that they have the original text and are settling for just the Osgong's text or the initial text. So, that is my opinion there.13:14 Here here's, a representative definition that I wanna mention from a person that I admire very much, and, friends with her on13:26 Facebook, is Amy Anderson. They just wrote, she and, Wendy Witter wrote the book, Textual Criticism of the Bible for the Old and the New Testament.13:38 But here, in her definition, she says, in the red right here, we can see it. The main goal of early textual critics was to establish the original reading of the biblical13:49 text. The terminology of original text is now seen as problematic because textual critics have recognized the complexity of the writing and publication process in ancient14:01 times. However, the goal of establishing the Osgong's text, the earliest form of the text from which all extent copies descent is feasible for the New Testament since we have an abundance of manuscripts14:13 copied shortly after the autographs themselves were written. Now I know someone will read that passage and go, well, what's what's the big deal? You know? Isn't that don't we, you know,14:25 isn't that what textual criticism is about? But you see, the way it is phrased, the term terminology of original text is now seen as problematic. We always knew14:37 that we we had to work towards the original text. We always knew that what we had was a generally accepted original text. But now it is14:49 a problem. And and when you examine the writings of these 4 proponents and the concept of the Osgong's text under under CBGM,15:02 it seems almost that there's a call to abandon, not worry about the original text. Let's just go for the initial text. Now I'm not suggesting that every15:14 text critic out there is saying, oh, that's it. We're done. This is we don't have the original text. That's not true. I don't believe they're saying that, but the confidence is gone. Or15:26 the desire to seek after that little by little is waning. It's chipping away at that, the15:38 quest, the original quest that the original text doesn't matter. So, so in this chapter, in keeping my eye on the time, I kind of,15:51 can anybody see my screen? The the what I'm sharing? Is that is that oh, the Kindle? Okay. Okay. Good. I kinda talk about Westcott and Hoard under a documentary theorist of the original16:03 text. I even talk about Philip Comfort. Okay? Because he is a documentary, theorist, Zane Hodges, Farstad, of course, Maurice Robinson16:16 and Pierpont. And, of course, all of these people understood the problem. They understood that there is corruption. There is, there are variants. Nonetheless,16:27 seeking the original text and finding the original text and having confidence in the fact that we are holding in our hands the original text was not a problem. Under recent16:39 collectives on the original text, I look at Leon Wagne, Zoentz, Metzger, Barbara Allen, Curtin Barbara Allen, Greenlee, Birdsall.16:51 I wanna read this quote from Birdsall very quickly. This is from 19 57. He says, the original text is a treasure to be yearned for and prized greatly.17:03 Yet we cannot be certain today that we have the absisma verba of the apostles in our printed scriptures. So he understands the complexity of the discipline. But he says we must keep on with the search and leave nothing17:15 uninvestigated till certainty be ours. So I hope that is communicated clearly that I'm not suggesting that scholars have abandoned17:27 the search. All I'm saying is that that passion, the zeal to go look for it is not quite the same, across the board, and it's changing.17:39 And then, Bursall says, we are nearer today to the original text than our forebears, but there is much still to be done. A colossal volume of work awaits us before our goal be attained. Our lord has said that heaven and17:51 earth shall pass away, but his words never. And in similar vein that no iota nor tittle shall pass from the law till all be fulfill fulfilled, it would appear that the exact establishment of his18:02 words and all the scriptural witness to him is a prime duty of the church in every generation. May many within the church continue to turn their hand to this task. Now if I were to write that in myChallenges and Shifts in Textual Criticism 18:14 master's or PhD paper, it would be like you're preaching. Get it out of here. But but, I'm sure doctor Gurry knows, Bursall was a tremendous18:26 scholar, just high class scholar. And so he is not just preaching. He's really thought through what he was saying. So and then, of course,18:38 Gordon Fee, Michael Holmes, Dirk Jonkund, who doctor Gary knows very well, who did the first reading of my dissertation. They all, hold to18:49 this. Now, of course, in the Greek new testament that they put together, Phrygaelis' text, they don't claim that19:01 this is the original text. Okay? So they they they did not say that what we're putting together is now the original text, but they're operating the way I put it19:13 over here is, it appears that the editor of the Tyndall House Greek New Testament are operating under the premise of its attainability through responsible textual criticism. I think that's fair19:25 to say. They're not claiming that they came up with a text better than n a 28 or or UBS 5 or Robinson's Byzantine.19:37 They're just saying this is another option. And then, of course, I, say over here in this conclusion, which is in blue, although more practitioners19:50 could have been included here, this is enough to demonstrate the dominant understanding among reasoned eclectics eclectics regarding the original text. Since reason eclecticism remains the most popular20:02 methodology, the general retrievability of the original text of the New Testament remains the dominant view among text critics. So I hope Elijah will see20:14 that and give me a pass on that. Alright. And of course, thoroughgoing eclectics on the original text, and there are only 2 major20:26 ones, Kilpatrick and Keith Elliott. And I would include Jeffrey Kloehrer in that category as well, who is, Elliott's student. I don't20:38 know if he's still with the Museum of the Bible. I was assuming last I heard he was. And he did a study on first Corinthians and, this remarkable study. But nonetheless,20:49 both Kilpatrick and Keith Elliott believed in the original text. But Keith Elliott, as I will show later, has abandoned that,21:05 that original quest. In my conclusion in the second chapter, and I'll move rapidly, Petzer, again, a great text critic. He says he made an insightful prognostication21:18 regarding the field of New Testament textual criticism. He said, it will be up to 20 first century textual criticism to solve the 2 remaining riddles that of, a, the21:29 question of the nature of the earliest transmission of the text or the second century, which was the most considered by all text critics the most turbulent time where a lot of variance came in.21:42 And the second b, which, applies to us and to this book, the nature of the original text and its relation to the autographs or the first century.21:55 And true to his words, the current focus in New Testament Church of Christ has been on the question of the original text of the New Testament. That's that's where we are. Again, I'm not gonna read22:07 every line. Bart Ehrman is my is the first 1 that I deal with. His his book, just to summarize, is22:19 the Orthodox Correction of Scripture, which was written 12 years prior to misquoting Jesus. And, it did not get much attention. I'm talking about Orthodox22:30 corruption of scripture. Most scholars who did comment on it gave it a pass. Although some brought up issues with22:43 the way Erman dealt with some of the examples, but they didn't go into much detail. But then, of course, when,22:55 miscoding Jesus came out, I mean, then people went back and pulled up Orthodox corruption of scripture and began to deal with what was happening there. I have, listed some of those23:07 people here. Ivo Tom, by the way, I got to know him, who worked under Barbara Allen, sent me his German thesis, which was kinda hard to read, but,23:20 did a great job in those early years. And, of course, doctor Robinson wrote about it. Kim Haines Eidson dealt with some of the issues in the early,23:31 couple hundred years of Christianity and the fidelity of the scribes. Barbara Holland also wrote with regards to this. And, the, of23:43 course, Dan Wallace has written several articles and, you know, collections and all that. Main thing about Ehrman is his dependence on Walter Bauer.23:57 You know, Ehrman declares that scribes occasionally alter the words to their sacred texts to make them more patently orthodox and to prevent their misuse by Christians who espoused24:09 aberrant views. And he uses Walter Bowers' view. The original view was there was orthodoxy and then heresy came. And there24:21 were other scholars in between FC Bauer and others who who use the Hegelian dialect where, you know, you have, thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. And he they sort24:33 of applied that to the study of church history, early Christianity to claim that, you know, it was not that orthodoxy was first and heresy came later. In fact,24:45 in some places, heresy was first, and then orthodoxy kinda was the real heresy. And so that's that was Bauer's thesis.24:57 Now Bauer was, by the way, DC Parker also, acknowledges Bauer's contribution, and in25:09 some ways is also dependent on his on his work. Just wanna mention that, although he doesn't talk about it as much as Erman does. Now25:23 the Erman is aware. That Bauer's thesis has holes. He knows that. In fact, he says it right here, and I've kind of highlighted this.25:38 Peter, just let me know whenever you're ready, and I'll kinda because I know you have a class, so I don't wanna get into your time.25:45 You're good. You got you got you got 20 minutes. So if you can just save about 10 for q and a.25:49 Oh, okay. Okay. Okay. So, Erman is aware of the weaknesses in Bauer's thesis. Nonetheless, he maintains that despite the clear shortcomings of his state study, Bauer's26:01 intuitions were right enukue. If anything, early Christianity was even less tidy and more diversified than he realized. And contrary to his opinion, we do not need to wait for the second century to begin painting this26:13 picture. Now I I cover in this chapter some of the inconsistencies in Bauer and then how Ehrman even goes way beyond that.26:26 For example, Bauer is dealing with caricatures of early church leaders. Ehrman is dealing with manuscripts.26:39 I mean, how can you have those 2 connected where it doesn't make any sense? Bauer is dealing with regional theological26:51 polemics. I mean, we we have some ideas. Odessa. We know where that is. We know Alexandria. We know where that is. But Erman is27:03 not dealing with manuscripts where, you know, we can't be sure where what was the location? What was the origin of that manuscript? How can we say that, oh, yeah. That was the heresy that was going27:15 on over there? So how did Ehrman make the connection with Bauer and continue the correct connection in spite of the fact that Bauer's27:27 thesis breaks down, but Ehrman is going in a whole different direction and still claiming Bauer as his foundation. And, again, I I kinda deal27:39 with that here, which I'm not gonna take the time to go through it. I analyze his thesis briefly. Again, as I said, I had 150 pages I had to take out because of27:50 the limitations in, for the dissertation. And nonetheless, Ba, Erman has written a whole lot of books supporting his his,28:02 thesis. You know? But anyways, he's a popularizer. Next is, Parker. And Parker is not as popular as, say, Erman28:14 with the average person. I have people in local churches who will talk to me about Ehrman, but nobody has come to me and said, let me talk to you about Parker. What do you think about his views? That's that's never28:25 happened. And so, but Parker wrote The Living Text of the Gospel. He's he's very, very accomplished and and has served as the executive director of the International Greek New Testament Project,28:37 tremendous scholar. But in this, in this book, Living Text the Gospel, if I can quickly read this, he says the task of textual criticism and the role of textual critics have28:49 changed. Instead of eliminating material in order to recover a single original text, the editor analyzes all the developments of the material in order to demonstrate the process to which they29:01 owe their origin. Kinda like he compares it to, you know, Shakespeare and Mozart. They had their different, editions and29:13 versions. And so also with the New Testament text, is it the 1 that Matthew was writing, or is it the 1 that left his desk, or is it the 1 that he brought it back and said, let29:25 me change that. You know? So that's what he will say. The person who chastised,29:38 Parker the most was the birds all. And and again, I don't have time to read every little detail of that. Of course, my other scholars did too, and and I kinda deal with,29:50 Parker's work and, quickly moving along. See? Alright. Next is, Eldon30:01 app And, Eldon Epp, unlike Erman, who is who's a popularizer in a way, of course, he's a scholar, but also a popularizer. Parker is more,30:14 academic, collecting data, making it available online, those kind of things. As you know, Eldon Epp is a is 1 of the greatest essayists out there, and,30:27 he has written essays on text criticism that still to this day are required reading, like, twentieth century in a loop, continuing in a loop,30:39 decision points. I mean, they are a must for text critics. So if you haven't read Eldenet, I'm sure doctor Gurri has told you that. You gotta read him. He's he's just amazing. Well, in 19 61 in30:50 his dissertation, he was already talking about the fact that the original text may not be achievable. But then through the years, he kinda let it go, and31:02 then there was a shift in his view, which is, of course, the article multivalence of, the term original text. And and there on,31:14 this this this whole movement took off, and, that's where we are. Let me see if I can move along here.31:26 He he, he often tries to point back to the Chicago School with, like, Donald Riddle, Parviz, Kenneth Clark. Kenneth Clark was, by the way, Robinson's mentor. And, he says,31:38 you know, those are the guys who were telling us to abandon the search long ago. But but that's not that's not really true. Although each of these test scripts call for an approach beyond simply31:50 recovering the original text, they never advocated a complete abandonment of the latter. So we need to clarify that. Alright. So, that's it. Next in32:02 line is, Keith Elliott. And Keith Elliott is, he he wrote an article back in 19 74. Can we recover the original New Testament?32:14 And and I wanna read this very quickly. He said, too often it is thought that the primary interest of the textual critic is is in the distinctive reading of this or that manuscript or with the variations in word32:26 order and say the Latin or Syriac version, this would be wrong, wrong assumption. Admittedly, much research on New Testament manuscript is concerned with these matters, but it would be incorrect to32:37 deduce that these are the main objects of such study. The principal purpose of textual criticism is to establish, so far as possible, the original text of the books of the New Testament. I mean,32:49 that's that's I wouldn't agree with that hundred percent. And Elliot is not an evangelical scholar. He himself will say that but there's a shift that33:01 comes starting in 2000 with a symposium at Southeastern. He begins to talk about, the work of Erman and Parker at the time.33:13 Orthodox corruption living text was so influential. And then just now we come to, here's 1, he says, let33:25 me see if I can find a the new textual criticism is therefore reluctant to work towards the elusive authorial text. Instead, what we see is the more creative and rewarding pursuit of the nature of and reasons for the33:36 changeability of the wording. When and why was the text altered and which ginger groups undertook such orthodox corruption are the relevant questions now. So that's where, Elliot stands.33:48 Now we come to coherence based genealogical method, and I'm gonna skip over that because you have an expert sitting in the room that I would not dare step in that direction.34:00 They're very they're very sad because we just talked about it last week, and they fell in love with the CBGM.34:07 Of course. Of course. But doctor Gurry is is a premier scholar in on this methodology in the world in the world. And34:19 so,34:20 There's there are 3 of us. So, you know, it's a very elite group.34:25 Yes. Yes. Of course. And, we've, I mean, there's my there's my copy right here. Of course, I've read your dissertation, read this. Still I'm scratching my head going,34:37 I still don't get every little detail. So, and plenty of plenty of writing all over it. But the 1 point I wanna quickly point out, again, it comes down34:49 to the Oscon's text as a critical outcome of the CBGM. The final outcome of the CBGM is the Oscon's text, which also serves as a starting point for further refinement in an iterative process.35:01 Mink defines this as a hypothetical reconstructed text as it presumably existed according to the hypothesis before the beginning of his copy. On the surface, this appears to be the only available and viable35:13 option to reach the original text. On closer examination, it severely undermines the concept entirely. Although in theory, an original text is presumed, so I won't say that,35:26 the supporters of CBGM are abandoning the the original text. I'll never say that. In fact, I will affirm that again in a few moments. The the interior and original text is presumed the35:37 shifting status of the initial text severely diminishes any hopes of ever retrieving anything earlier than the Osconch's text. It should be kept in mind that the so called initial text is not found in any35:49 manuscript, but has to be constructed piecemeal from many manuscript, which in itself remains a form of eclecticism. Such a procedure is based more on goalpost moving presupposition than36:01 standard human text critical endeavor. And so that's what I will say. And in my final paragraph on the CBGM, evidently, the CBGM in36:13 its claim stands in the similar trend of moving away from the traditional goal of in new tension criticism. But now here, I wanna clarify this. Even though the proponents may hold to the importance of the original textShow more In this video 0:00 The Journey into Textual Criticism18:07 Challenges and Shifts in Textual Criticism36:21 Theological Implications and Inerrancy
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