Chapter LII: Section L: A Various Reading

There is a various reading, in the Greek manuscripts, which is full of meaning with reference to our present inquiry. Whilst many manuscripts, including the Alexandrian, which is referred to the fifth century, read _baptisōntai_,—“except they _baptize_ they eat not,” (Mark vii, 4); the two oldest and of the highest authority, the codices Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, both dating from the fourth century, and with them numbers of a later date, read, _rantisōntai_, “except they _sprinkle_ they eat not.” The presumption is very strong in favor of _rantisōntai_ being the true reading. Its bearing on the logical connection of Mark’s statement is worthy of note. According to it, he describes three classes of rites. He specifies, first, _self-washings_ of the hands, as always used before dinner; second, certain _sprinklings_, resorted to upon supposition of more serious defilements; and third, _baptisms_ of pots and cups, etc., the modes of purifying, for which, prescribed in the law, were various. The relation of these purifyings to those appointed by Moses is apparent. They coincide with the self-washings, the sprinklings, and the purifying of things prescribed by him. The various readings here involve considerations of great importance. As before stated, _rantisōntai_ is the reading of the two oldest and most highly esteemed manuscripts, dating back to within about two hundred and fifty years of the death of the apostle John. These manuscripts are recognized by critical scholars as being so far independent of each other that their various readings indicate the gradual divergence which would progress from copy to copy through several generations of manuscripts; so that the reading on which they unite must have originated, if not with the evangelist, at least very soon after the first publication of his gospel. On the other hand, the reading, _baptisōntai_, first found in the Alexandrian codex, of the fifth century, appears in the great majority of extant manuscripts. We may confidently conclude that there must have been earlier copies of high authority in which this reading was found. It thus appears that at a time but little if any removed from the age of the apostles, these two readings existed side by side in the received copies of the gospel.

This fact is the more significant in view of the jealous care with which the purity of the New Testament text was guarded. So long as the last of the apostles survived, his inspired authority was an available resort on all questions of controversy, arising in the churches. (2 Cor. xi, 28; 3 John 9, 10.) During this period, the importance of an absolutely pure text of the writings of the apostles and evangelists was not fully appreciated. The work of transcription was left to the zeal of private individuals, who were often wanting in the necessary qualifications; whilst there was no system of responsible revision. It was probably during this period, closing about fifty years after the death of the apostle John, that the most important variations and errors crept in. About that time, the importance of a pure text, as an authoritative standard of appeal on questions of controversy, began to be felt; and, thereafter, great vigilance was exercised by the officers of the church in securing correct copies. The transcriptions were made from the best and most accurate manuscripts. And when a copy was made, it appears to have been subjected to a critical revision, after having been first collated usually by the scribe himself, with the copy from which it was taken, for the purpose of correcting any clerical errors, that might have occurred in the transcription. The manuscript was then handed over to “the corrector,” whose business it was to revise the text by a comparison with other available manuscripts. In this office the services of the most learned and able men in the church were employed; and it was not until sanctioned by such revision that a manuscript was accepted as an authentic copy. Beside the process here described, the ancient manuscripts abound in changes made by subsequent critics. The codex Sinaiticus exhibits alterations “by at least ten different revisers, some of them systematically spread over every page, others occasional or limited to separate portions of the manuscript, many of them being cotemporaneous with the first writer; far the greater part belonging to the sixth or seventh century, a few being as recent as the twelfth.”[68]

Footnote 68:

Scrivener’s Collation of the Codex Sinaiticus, Introduction, p. xx.

In view of the diligence of the criticism thus systematically exercised, the fact is very remarkable that the two readings, _baptisōntai_, and _rantisōntai_ should have been transmitted side by side, and traceable back nearly to the apostolic age. And it is further remarkable, that no one of the ten successive critics whose revisions are traceable on the codex Sinaiticus has corrected the place in question so as to read _baptisōntai_, although it is certain that reading did extensively prevail. Nor is the variation alluded to in the writings of the fathers. It is immaterial to the present argument which is the true reading. If it was _rantisōntai_, the language of Mark explains the meaning of Luke. What the Pharisee expected was that Jesus should have _baptized_ himself by _sprinkling_. And, whichever is the true reading, this fact is patent that at an age so early as to be undistinguishable from that of the apostles and evangelists, so intimate was the relation between sprinkling and baptism that the one word was inadvertently substituted for the other, in transcription; and the alteration received by the ablest men in the church, without question or protest, then or afterward, or the betrayal even of a consciousness of change; despite the watchfulness of a criticism systematic in its exercise and jealous for the purity of the text. If the primitive church understood baptism to mean immersion, if the rite was administered in that, as the only Scriptural mode, the occurrence of the case here presented would have been plainly impossible. It could only happen where the two words were identified as designating the same rite. How easily the words might be confounded will appear by a comparison of them as written in the primitive Greek, known as uncials, or capital letters:—

ΒΑΠΤΙΖΩΝΤΑΙ.

ΡΑΝΤΙΖΩΝΤΑΙ

Were the first and third letters dimly written, or blurred, the one word might readily be taken for the other.