Hello Lane,
I have addressed your question in a number of earlier posts, some of which I excerpt here to help me conserve my time. I hope you don't mind this approach.
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There were a number of Greek texts in the Reformation era, the primary of which were, Stephen’s, Beza’s, and the Elzevirs. The TBS’s 1894 TR was put together by Scrivener to indicate the exact Greek text underlying the KJV. As a distinct Greek text it never existed before Scrivener compiled it. The 1611 translators picked and chose from the different Greek texts, the previous English versions – and other language versions – when rendering the AV. The TR 1894 but gives a Greek text exactly corresponding to the English of the AV.
Here is some background on the “TRs”.
The Trinitarian Bible Society's edition containing F.H.A. Scrivener's edition of "The New Testament in the Original Greek according to the text followed in the Authorized Version" (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1894 and 1902). In the Preface this TBS edition says,
The editions of Beza, particularly that of 1598, and the last two editions of Stephens, were the chief sources used for the Authorized Version of 1611.
The Elzevir partners, Bonaventure and Abraham, published editions of the Greek text at Leyden in 1624, 1633, and 1641, following Beza's 1565 edition, with a few changes from his later revisions. The preface to the 1633 Elzevir edition gave a name to this form of the text, which underlies the English Authorized Version, the Dutch Statenvertaling of 1637, and all of the Protestant versions of the period of the Reformation—"Textum ergo habes, nunc ab omnibus receptum, [in quo nihil immutatum aut corruptum damus]" [thus you now have the universally received text in which we present nothing that has been changed or is corrupted]. The Elzevir text became known throughout Europe as the Textus Receptus or Received Text, and in course of time these titles came to be associated in England with the Stephens text of 1550.
The editions of Stephens, Beza and the Elzevirs all present substantially the same text, and the variations are not of great significance and rarely affect the sense. The present edition of the Textus Receptus underlying the English Authorized Version follows the text of Beza's 1598 edition as the primary authority, and corresponds with [Scrivener's of 1894 and 1902].
Scrivener has a book,
The Authorized Edition Of The English Bible (1611), Its Subsequent Reprints And Modern Representatives (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1910), with a section, “Appendix E.
The Greek text adopted by the Translators of the Authorized Version of the New Testament, where he examines the “TRs” the translators used. It is of interest to those doing careful study in this area. It can likely be obtained in a good seminary library or even by your local library’s Inter-library Loan System (how I got mine, and which I photo-copied).
So in one sense, there are a number of “TRs”.
The TR, and the one underlying the AV is Scrivener’s work done in 1894, and published by the TBS. This, in my view, and that of KJV defenders, is the true Textus Receptus, as it depicts (gathers together in one edition) in Greek the various texts the translators chose and upon which they based their translation.
We hold that the Lord provided the Reformation editors with the manuscripts He wanted them to use (wherein the genuine readings were preserved), and guided their judgment in the translating. I do NOT mean by this they were “inspired,” as some erroneously hold.
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[And this is from another discussion of the TR.]
You said,
I assume the Textus Receptus is what the AV folks would state is the authoritative manuscript that translators should refer to.
Yes, this is so.
What is this based on? It is my understanding that the Textus Receptus is a critical compilation by Scrivener based on the manuscript choices of the AV translators. Accurate or no?
Yes, that is accurate.
Is the sole argument for the TR that it was chosen by the Church and it doesn't matter whether Erasmus may have made some errors and doesn't matter how or which manuscripts the AV translators used and why they made those choices?
The argument for the TR is that God had kept the Byzantine textform (the Scriptures of the Greek Church) in a very pure (but not perfect) state, and these mss were used by Erasmus, along with readings from the Latin Vulgate, and other Latin mss, to produce his Greek editions, the later ones being those used by subsequent editors, such as Beza, Stephens, and the Elzevirs.
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[Jan 1, 2008 note]: Erika Rummel, in her
Erasmus' Annotations
on the New Testament: From Philologist to Theologian (Univ. of Toronto Press 1986), makes the point that Erasmus had access to (and took copious notes on) a
vast array of NT manuscripts during his many travels; it is a myth that he had "access" to only a few manuscripts when he produced his NT editions.
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Edward Hills, a textual scholar and KJV defender, says he has found 3 errors in the KJV, one of which I know he attributes to Eramsus, and that is in Romans 7:6. I am still researching that. From Ted Letis’ books, I have learned that John Owen (and perhaps Turretin) owned possible minute variants within the TR editions, and their view was that God had allowed them:
This is from Dr. Theodore P. Letis’
The Majority Text: Essays and Reviews in the Continuing Debate:
Owen saw only the minor variants between the various editions of TR as valid areas for discrimination, staying within the broad parameters of providential preservation, as exemplified by “Erasmus, Stephen, Beza, Arias Montanus, and some others.” Within the confines of these editions was “the first and most honest course fixed on” for “consulting various copies and comparing them among themselves.”
This is both the concrete domain of the providentially preserved text, as well as the only area for legitimate comparisons to chose readings among the minutiae of differences. In fact, “God by His Providence preserving the whole entire; suffered this lesser variety [within the providentially preserved editions of the TR –TPL] to fall out, in or among the copies we have, for the quickening and exercising of our diligence in our search into His Word [for ascertaining the finality of preservation among the minutiae of differences among the TR editions –TPL] (The Divine Original, p. 301)* It is the activity, editions, and variants after this period of stabilization that represent illegitimate activity, or, as Owen says, “another way.”
Thus Owen maintained an absolute providential preservation while granting variants. (“John Owen Versus Brian Walton” fn 30, p. 160)
* Owen’s
Divine Original online:
DIVINE ORIGINAL, AUTHORITY, SELF-EVIDENCING LIGHT, AND POWER OF THE SCRIPTURES. This is from volume 16 of Owen’s works.
This would be in line with the thinking of Dr. Hills. There is another view, and that is God
completely – that is, perfectly – preserved the Greek and Hebrew texts, so that they are without any error whatever.
If one wants to understand the matter of the Greek (the Hebrew is another discussion) editions used by the Reformers and post-Reformation divines, it is helpful to learn something of the historical context of those times. Letis’ two books are excellent historical resources:
The Majority Text, and
The Ecclesiastical Text: Text Criticism, Biblical Authority, and the Popular Mind. Although there is some excellent work in the latter, I think the former might be the more valuable. They may be obtained at reasonable prices, along with other of his works, by contacting Russ Spees <email@kjv-ibts.org>.
Who knows that the doctrine of providential preservation, and that with regard to the Textus Receptus (the early forms of it), was developed by the post-Reformation theologians to withstand the assault of Rome’s counter-reformation? And that the doctrine of Sola Scriptura was based on God’s preserving the texts these theologians had – the Reformation texts – and it was these “texts in hand” the WCF 1:8 had in mind. Letis’ latter book,
The Ecclesiastical Text, has as its first essay the groundbreaking, “B.B. Warfield, Common-Sense Philosophy and Biblical Criticism,” which clearly proves that Warfield
redefined the WCF’s understanding of the Scriptures referred to in 1:8 (contrary to the intent of its framers) to refer to the no-longer extant autographs instead of the apographs, the copies they actually had. Warfield meant well, but he departed from bulwark of the Standards, and what we see today, in terms of the erosion of integrity in the Reformed communions, is in great measure a result of this. Of course there is more to this erosion, such as the entertaining of Arminianism within the very precincts of the Calvinist stronghold, yet the loss of a sure Scripture is as a mighty torpedo in the hull. It remains to be seen, the effects of this loss in that one body of congregations that held to the doctrines of grace. Maybe not this generation, but in one or two, should the Lord tarry that long, we will see devastation – as regards spiritual stability – that will make us weep, for this is the province of our children and grandchildren.
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Your next question:
“what is the Providence by which the manuscript choices were made that people used to form what they consider to be the authoritative Greek Scriptures?”
God preserved the true reading of the NT in the majority of mss. Great defenses of this position are made by the Majority Text people; I list three, Maurice Robinson and Wm. Pierpont (their valuable Introduction has a link in one of my above posts); Wilbur N. Pickering, and his,
The Identity of the New Testament Text II, and Jakob van Bruggen’s,
The Ancient Text of the New Testament:
http://web.archive.org/web/200304282...m/VanBrug.html.
One would think it reasonable that such an overwhelming majority of Greek manuscripts – over 90% of the 5,000+ extant mss, lectionary readings, etc – represented that text form commonly used by the people of God, and was due to their coming from a common source albeit in widely diverse geographical areas, meaning the original apostolic writings. Westcott and Hort tried to invalidate this clear numerical superiority by a theory of an official church edition in the 4th century which resulted in this 90% agreement of mss, and for a while the “church intelligencia” bought into their theory, but increasingly it was proven to be groundless speculation, and today is entirely debunked, save for those who are “not up to speed” in text critical matters.
So the priority of the Majority (or Byzantine) text remains, at least for some.
But the AV adherents go a step farther than the MT folks: they see God’s preservation of the Greek text not only in the Byzantine mss, but in the confluence of those and other sources which contained readings lost in the Byzantine, such as disappeared during the dominance of the Arian party in the Byzantine empire, and the struggle against the Sabellians, in the 4th century, namely those Scripture passages declaring the triunity of the Godhead and the deity of Jesus Christ.*
The AV folks hold that God, even though He had
adequately (and that is the operative word) preserved the NT Scriptures in previous times and locales, at the onset of the Reformation brought together those passages He had preserved the readings of into the Scriptures the Reformation divines would use to restore Biblical doctrine and the Biblical church, and from there these Scriptures would go forth into all the world in the great missionary thrust of the recent centuries. It was a matter of
adequate preservation compared to
preservation in the minutiae.
I refer to another post which discusses this in further detail:
The PuritanBoard - View Single Post - TTer gone CTer
* see Frederick Nolan’s classic,
AN INQUIRY INTO THE INTEGRITY OF THE GREEK VULGATE OR RECEIVED TEXT OF THE NEW TESTAMENT:
An Inquiry into the Integrity of the Greek Vulgate.
I am trying to be concise, and so I may not answer all your questions, and would be glad to if you state them further. This also is why I give links to resources, and to other posts.
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These 90% are what is called the Traditional or Majority or Byzantine textform, in contradistinction to the Critical textform, which is not Byzantine but Alexandrian. There is a distinction between the Majority Text and the Textus Receptus of the AV, and this difference consists primarily in the additions to the Byzantine of certain readings missing from it but present in some Latin mss, including the Latin Vulgate (and other versions), such as “God” in 1 Timothy 3:16, the entirety of 1 John 5:7, and some others. The AV folks say that certain readings were expunged from the Byzantine manuscripts during the period (roughly 335 to 385 A.D.) the Arian party was in control of both the Greek Church and Empire; one might imagine what the JWs or Unitarians would do were they in the same positions of authority. There are historical accounts of the Arians persecuting and torturing the orthodox believers to get them to recant owning Christ as God; if they would do this to flesh & souls, what would they do to paper?
At any rate, the AVers say that the Lord providentially preserved these missing readings by taking them from the Latin mss of the West where the persecuting authorities of the East had far less effect – first through the pen of Erasmus, and then the other Reformation editors.
The ESV guys
can say they have the Word of God, only the text has some mutilations in it (I mean essentially omissions, and some changes). There are some honorable and godly people, such as Dr. James White, who take strong exception to my view (and the MT view as well), though a weak point in his presentation is that the texts (the Critical and Eclectic texts) as well as the different English translations that come from them often differ among themselves.
The woman through whom the Lord converted me to Himself used a Lamsa Pesh-itta (to avoid the censoring software!) version, and I think she told me it was because that was the Bible Oral Roberts was using! A pastor in NYC I love and who has profoundly changed and enriched my walk with Christ uses the NIV, and I think is now changing to the ESV. When men and women cleave to the Word of God they have in a good conscience God blesses them, and makes them a blessing to others, despite our small differences as regards the versions.
For those who have problems with the language of the KJV, and the few errors in the NKJV, I would recommend Jay Green’s
Modern King James Version.
There are godlier men than I who use the ESV, and whom God uses more than me, because of their better hearts.
Early on in my walk, coming as I did out of the 60’s counter-culture, drugs, and occult stuff, I saw quickly that for me to withstand Satan I would need certainty of mind as regards the reliability and authenticity of His Scripture. It was a close combat for many years, and I
had to
know my sword and shield would hold in the fray. That’s the furnace I was forged in. And it was the Doctrines of Grace which enabled me to stand before my God, in His power and grace, not trusting in myself. Though it was years before I took to heart the things in this previous sentence.
Hope this clarifies somewhat.