Minuscule 918

From Textus Receptus

Minuscule 918 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering), O ⁶⁶ (von Soden),^[1] also Codex Escurialensis, is a 16th-century Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament on paper, with a commentary. The manuscript is famous for the Comma Johanneum.

Description

The codex contains the text of the Catholic and Pauline epistles on 397 paper leaves (size 34.5 cm by 23.5 cm). The text is written in one column per page, 28 lines per page.^[2]^[3]^[4] The Catholic epistles contain a commentary.^[4]

Text

The Greek text of the codex is a representative of the Byzantine text-type in the Pauline epistles. Kurt and Barbara Aland gave it the following textual profile in the Catholic epistles: 63¹, 7^1/2, 15², 15^s. This means the text of the manuscript agrees with the Byzantine standard text 63 times, and 7 times with the Byzantine when it has the same reading as the original text, it agrees 15 times with the original text against the Byzantine, it has 15 independent or distinctive readings (Sonderlesarten). In the Pauline epistles Alands gave the profile – 165¹, 44^1/2, 1², 6^s. Alands placed the Greek text of the Pauline epistles in Category V and the text of the Catholic epistles in the Category III.^[5]

Johannine Comma

The Johannine Comma in Minuscule 918 [1].

It contains the Comma Johanneum from the original scribe.^[6] It is claimed that Minuscule 918 was copied from Erasmus' 1522 Greek New Testament. CSNTM’s short article and several TR-oriented sites list 918 as a 16th-century witness with the comma. (This is a central reason people suspect printed-text influence.) The two are compared below:

ὅτι τρεῖς εἰσιν οἱ μαρτυροῦντες ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ, πηρ, λόγος, καὶ πνεῦμα ἅγιον, καὶ οὗτοι οἱ τρεῖς ἕν εἰσι. καὶ τρεῖς εἰσιν οἱ μαρτυροῦντες ἐν τῇ γῇ, πνεῦμα, καὶ ὕδωρ, καὶ αἷμα, καὶ οἱ τρεῖς εἰς τὸ ἕν εἰσιν. (Minuscule 918)

Compared:

ὅτι τρεῖς ἐισιν ὁι μαρτυροῦντες ἑν τῷ ὁυρανῷ, πατὴρ, λόγος, καὶ πνεῦμα ἅγιου, καὶ οὗτοι ὁι τρεῖς ἕν ἐισι. καὶ τρεῖς εἰσιν οἱ μαρτυροῦντες ἕν τῇ γῇ, πνεῦμα, καὶ ὕδωρ, καὶ αἷμα, καὶ οἱ τρεῖς εἰς τὸ ἕν εἰσιν. (Erasmus 1522)

The only difference is Minuscule 918 has the Nomen Sacrum πηρ, whereas Erasmus' 1522 does not, but has the expanded πατὴρ.

Elijah Hixson says of Minuscule 918:

918 (date: probably 1573–1578)

GA 918 is another manuscript with a Catholic provenance. It is one of three manuscripts (the other two are 61 and 429marg) that have a CJ in exactly the same form as Erasmus’ third edition, so Erasmus is likely the source of the CJ here. If that were not enough, Wachtel (Der byzantinische Text) places 918 in “Group 453”. It is the youngest member of that group by a couple of centuries and the only member to have the CJ, so per my remarks above, it’s beyond a reasonable doubt that the CJ is an addition derived from Erasmus. We might have expected the Complutensian Polyglot here given its Spanish Catholic provenance (see below), but there are a number of differences between Erasmus’ third edition and the Complutensian Polyglot in the CJ, and 918 matches Erasmus perfectly. Consequently, 918 is not a witness to a pre-Erasmian CJ.

We can say a bit more about 918. We know that the scribe is one Nicolás de la Torre (sometimes written as Νικόλαος Τουρριανός; see the reference in Ernst Gamillscheg and Dieter Harlfinger, Repertorium der griechischen Kopisten 800–1600). Nikolaos was born in Crete, but he worked for Philip II of Spain at the Library of El Escorial beginning in 1573. Nikolaos’ dated manuscripts have a range of 1562–1586, but given the ties to El Escorial (where the manuscript remains to this day), and given what we know about Nikolaos employment there and travels elsewhere, I would expect that he made the manuscript between 1573 and 1578.

Conclusion: GA 918 is a manuscript of Spanish Catholic provenance from the 1570s that broke from its textual tradition by adding the CJ from Erasmus’ third edition.

Jeff Riddle responded on his blog:

EH begins by stating that “this is another manuscript with a Catholic provenance.”

He also points out that this is one of three mss. of these ten (along with 61 and 429marg) which agree with Erasmus. So, “Erasmus is likely the source,” adding, “consequently 918 is not a witness to the pre-Erasmian CJ.”

Questions: As with 429marg do the conclusions here risk the charge of circular reasoning? Is it possible that 918 and Erasmus were both dependent on a common source?

EH adds this conclusion: “GA 918 is a manuscript of Spanish Catholic provenance from the 1570s that broke from its textual tradition by adding the CJ from Erasmus’ third edition.”

How strange indeed that a Spanish mss. would follow the reading of Erasmus and not the Complutension!

History

F. H. A. Scrivener dated it to the fourteenth century.^[7] C. R. Gregory dated the manuscript to the sixteenth century, which is in agreed to by the INTF. The manuscript was added to the list of New Testament manuscripts by Scrivener (206^a) Gregory (234^a). Gregory saw it in 1886. It was briefly described by Emmanuel Miller (Miller 8).^[8] In 1908 Gregory gave it the number 918.^[1] Currently the manuscript is housed at the library of Escorial (Cod. Escurialensis, Σ. I. 5), in Escurial.

References

1. Gregory, Caspar René (1908). Die griechischen Handschriften des Neuen Testament. Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs'sche Buchhandlung. p. 79.
2. Aland, Kurt; M. Welte; B. Köster; K. Junack (1994). Kurzgefasste Liste der griechischen Handschriften des Neues Testaments. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter. p. 101. ISBN 3-11-011986-2.
3. "Liste Handschriften". Münster: Institute for New Testament Textual Research. Retrieved 22 September 2011.
4. Gregory, Caspar René (1900). Textkritik des Neuen Testamentes. Vol. 1. Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs. p. 283.
5. Aland, Kurt; Aland, Barbara (1995). The Text of the New Testament: An Introduction to the Critical Editions and to the Theory and Practice of Modern Textual Criticism. Erroll F. Rhodes (trans.). Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. p. 134. ISBN 978-0-8028-4098-1.
6. Bruce M. Metzger; Bart D. Ehrman (2005). The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption and Restoration. Oxford University Press. p. 147.
7. Scrivener, Frederick Henry Ambrose; Edward Miller (1894). A Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament. Vol. 1 (4 ed.). London: George Bell & Sons. p. 299.
8. Emmanuel Miller (1848). Catalogue des manuscrits grecs de la bibliothèque de l'Escurial. Paris: Imprimerie nationale. pp. 54–66.

External links

Liste Handschriften - Institute for New Testament Textual Research

The King James Version 2023 Edition New Testament is now complete and in print format here.

Internal Links

Old Testament - New Testament KJV 1900

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Scrivener's 1894 Textus Receptus

2016 Urdu New Testament (TR Based)

Russian Synodal Version (TR Based)

Reina Valera Gómez Spanish (TR Based)

Marginal Notes in the 1611 Authorized Version

Ephesians 3:9

Why We Should Not Passover Easter 1, 2, & 3

Will Kinney

List of TR/KJV based foreign bibles

List of New Testament minuscules

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List of New Testament Papyri

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