Featured The disagreement on the identity of God's word.

1. Psalm 119:89-97 offers seven statements about God's Eternal Divine Word:

• God is always faithful to his Word
• His judgements remain firm
• His Word bring life
• Avoiding death rests upon loyalty to his Word
• Hope for eternal salvation comes through his Word
• His Word preserves persons form wickedness
• While his creatures reflect God’s perfection only in a limited way, God’s Word remains utterly perfect.

2. Variant readings in our Scriptures have been present from the very first copy of the original text.
Some scholars have even suggested that an original author(s) may have produced a number of different copies of his text.

3. Shortly after 325 C. E. the canon of biblical text was established in the midst of the known differences in each copy. The question was not "which individual copy contained God's Word" but what general documents were to be included in the canon of Scripture.

4. God's Eternal Divine Word can be differentiated from that which we receive through human endeavors. Despite the weaknesses inherent in the Church's participation in copying and delivering God's Word, the proclamation of God's message remains clear.

Rob

 

The Word of God has been transmitted over more than two millennia by fallible believers.

It is easily demonstrated that there are discrepancies between manuscripts.

What is harder to determine is which variant among the many is the original. It’s educated guesswork.

Yet each one of the manuscripts was, at one time, a treasured copy of the Word of God for an ancient people.

God’s Word, even copied by fallible people, is still powerfully effective and able to do the work that God intended.

Examination of variants is a scholarly endeavor that attempts to bring us closer to an understanding of God and his ways.
Today’s believers have to unique opportunity to compare thousands of ancient manuscripts and attempt to determine what might have been the original wording.
Yet our walk of faith is no greater than those who came before us.

Rob

 

Manuscripts are just one source for determining the text of the Old and New Testaments. There are the ancient Versions like the LXX, Old Latin, Latin Vulgate, Old Syria, etc etc

We also have thousands of quotations in the writings of the Early Church Fathers, which are many times of more value than the manuscripts and Versions

 

Not necessarily

 

1 John 5.7

 

The FACT that the verse is clearly known to both Tertullian and Cyprian, is beyond any doubt that it did form part of the Original Letter of John.

Tertullian


“And so the connection of the Father, and the Son, and of the Paraclete makes three cohering Persons, one in the other, which three are one (qui tres unum sunt) [in substance ‘unum’, not ‘one’ in number, ‘unus’]; in the same manner which it was said, ‘I and the Father are one’, to denote the unity of substance, not the singularity of number” (Ad Prax. C.25).

Cyprain


“The Lord said, I and the Father are one, and again of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, it is written: and these three are one” (De Unitate Ecclesiae, Op.p.109)

We can also add some references from Augustine, which again shows that verse 7 was known to him


“quia pater et filius unum sunt; ita etiam spiritus sanctus unum cum eis est quia haec tria unum sunt, = “since the Father and the Son are one. So also the Holy Spirit is one with them, since these three are one” (Augustine, de trin 4.29)


“In sua quippe substantia qua sunt tria unum sunt, pater et filius et spiritus sanctus, =

“Since in their proper substance wherein they are, the three are one, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit” (ibid, 30)


“Deus itaque summus et uerum cum Verbo suo et Spiritu sancto, quae tria unum sunt” = “Therefore God supreme and true, with His Word and Holy Spirit, which three are one” (City of God, Book 5, Chapter 11)

 

From a poster called Maestroh on another board.

.... the learned studies of J.H. Petzer:

"...It is in this aspect that one can judge the value of this (Latin) version for the reconstruction of the history of the Greek text. Again Fischer has aptly dealt with the theory of this matter in his brief survey of the Old Latin NT, and I need not repeat it here; it will suffice to refer briefly to the two main points of the theory. The first is that the Latin version does not have any direct bearing on the "original' text" (autographs) of the NT. It is much too late for that. Its only value as a direct witness, therefore, is to the history of the Greek text, insofar as it had contact with that history.

Second, it is not so much the individual Latin witnesses that are important for reconstructing the history of the Greek text, but rather the text-types because they represent a revision on the basis of (a) Greek MS(S). This point is important, since it is only the text-type that had consistent contact with Greek evidence...Text-types are thus identified by means of differences in patterns of vocabulary and diction in the different Latin witnesses as well as differences in their relation to the Greek text. This specific definition of text-type used in this research makes the research both easier and more difficult. It makes it easier in the sense that one works with a more defined or dixed definition of what one is to search for. What makes it more difficult, however, is the state of the evidence, since it is clear what is available today represents only a small part of what once existed and that this part does not come from the main line of developments. The MSS, representing what is called the direct tradition, are not only fragmentary but also often very late. This makes it difficult to decide where and how particular MSS relate to others. What makes the matter worse is that almost every MS is of a mixed nature. Most probably not one single 'pure' Latin MS of the first millennium has survived. Every VG MS of the period contains OL readings in a greater or lesser extent, and every OL MSS seems to have been contaminated to some extent by Vg readings. Even in the MSS with a predominantly OL text, apparently few contain a text that represents one of the OL text-types 'purely.' They are all mixed.

"It is important to see that each text-type represents only one Greek witness, the one that is assumed to have formed the Vorlage on which the revision was based."

"With respect to the OL tradition, however, a text-type is defined somewhat differently than in the textual criticism of the Greek NT. In the latter it refers to forms of text that developed largely as as result of copying mistakes. In the former it has a more formal definition and refers in general to revisions and/or new translations of the Vorlage, whereby a deliberate attempt was mde to revise an existing version." (118-19)

No doubt individual Fathers and scribes did have passing contact with Greek evidence and this contact did influence their Latin text on occasion. But that this contact was in passing and inconsistent makes it worthless for reconstructing the history of the Greek text, as it cannot really be evaluated

 

Tertullian

"What follows Philip's question, and the Lord's whole treatment of it, to the end of John's Gospel, continues to furnish us with statements of the same kind, distinguishing the Father and the Son, with the properties of each. Then there is the Paraclete or Comforter, also, which He promises to pray for to the Father, and to send from heaven after He had ascended to the Father. He is called "another Comforter," indeed; John 14:16 but in what way He is another we have already shown, "He shall receive of mine," says Christ, John 16:14 just as Christ Himself received of the Father's. Thus the connection of the Father in the Son, and of the Son in the Paraclete, produces three coherent Persons, who are yet distinct One from Another. These Three are one essence, not one Person, as it is said, "I and my Father are One," John 10:30 in respect of unity of substance not singularity of number" (CHURCH FATHERS: Against Praxeas (Tertullian), Chapter 25. The Paraclete, or Holy Ghost. He is Distinct from the Father and the Son as to Their Personal Existence)

Cyprian


The Lord says, "I and the Father are one; " John 10:30 and again it is written of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, "And these three are one." 1 John 5:7 (CHURCH FATHERS: Treatise 1 (Cyprian of Carthage), 6)

Tertullian and Cyprian were friends, both read Greek and Latin. Both use John 10:30 and 1 John 5:7 to show the distinction of Person and unity of essence, in the Trinity

 

They wrote in Latin not Greek. They're a Latin fathers. And cyprian is giving an interpretation

 

You are wrong.

Both were of the Latin Church but both read and wrote Greek

It is a fact that Tertullian translated directly from the Greek into Latin. And Cyprian had a good Greek education!

Cyprian is very clear that he knew of 1 John 5.7, which Tertullian was also aware of

Without the missing words in verse 7, there are problems with the Greek grammar, which does not exist with the reading as in the KJV

these are facts

 

Cyprian and Tertullian on 1 John 5:7