VI. Unbelievable
Biblical Text Rules
from https://www.skypoint.com/members/waltzmn/CanonsOfCrit.html
The Greek text behind the modern New Testaments does not
exist anywhere except in the ever-changing minds of the text experts. The
modern Greek New Testament is a jigsaw puzzle, not a uniform document. This
approach goes back to text criticism in general and the Wescott Hort approach
in particular. They kept their invented text a secret to all but the KJV Revision
Committee, against the established rule for an unchanging text and modest editing
of the English. They did not invite the world of Greek scholarship to see their
work - until the moment the Revision was published in English. They published their
new text the same year, and we are expected to think this was happenstance
rather than a carefully constructed plan.
However, we should look at the text editing rules, which
are far more compelling than biographical information. When I was in seminary,
I found a number of books on the topic in the clearance section of a Christian
bookstore. I was intrigued by these rules at first, but soon I realized how
self-serving and irrational they were. The apostates like to say, “The Bible
did not float down from heaven. It is a man-made book.” There is no better
description of the artificial, modern, man-made text and its editors.
The Text Editing Rules – in English
The shorter text is
better.
Sinaiticus-Aleph and
Vaticanus-B are the two manuscripts loved by Westcost and Hort, and they tend
to drop words or shorten verses. If the shorter text is better, then we should drop
words, phrases, and sections from the new Bibles. That facilitates the removal
of the ending of Mark, the Johannine Comma, and the woman caught in adultery in
John. Dropping of individual words is far more frequent than most people
imagine, because we soon become used to what is missing or placed in a
footnote. The favorite sources of Wescott Hort were Sinaiticus-Aleph and
Vaticanus-B.
The best reading comes
from the best source.
This issue was already
decided, because the Minority Text with the fewest copies – now conveniently
called The Standard Text – is constantly promoted by text critics, so the
results are the best. This is circular reasoning, to say that readings that
agree in Sinaiticus-Aleph and Vaticanus-B are the best because those two
sources are known as the best.
The more difficult
reading is preferred.
Difficult is defined as
difficult for the traditional Christian, the believer. That makes any heretical
text preferred because Christians have not taught that doctrinal lesson. Here
we must draw aside the wizard’s curtain and expose him for pulling levers,
blowing smoke, and shouting through loudspeakers. The activist Hort despised
the Majority Text and loved finding samples that did not agree with traditional
Christianity. This rule also assumes that Christianity was invented after a
good teacher, a nice man, was killed by Roman soldiers and buried for good. His disciples and Paul turned this into an
ancient religion of miracles because Jesus rose from the dead “in their hearts.”
That perfectly explains the ending of Mark at 16:8 – “for they were afraid.”
Manuscripts are
weighed, not counted.
Does anyone see what
they did with this? The vast majority of all New Testament texts belong to the
Majority Text for a reason. Since “the best readings come from the best texts,”
every modernist knows where to look and what to avoid. Thus the Majority Text
is rejected by Wescott Hort and disciples for being the most accepted, the most
used, the most familiar.
The Nestle-Aland GNT
This changes
constantly, something Aland took pride in, perhaps because it is the toy of a
few and no one can stop its influence now.
