Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton from source ms Claromontanus (D06)

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andrewcriddle
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Re: Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton from source ms Claromontanus (

Post by andrewcriddle »

Steven Avery wrote:
andrewcriddle wrote:One possible problem with using omission by homoeoteleuton as evidence for a relation between manuscripts is that this sort of error is peculiarly likely to occur independently.
I'm not sure what you mean when you say that a homoeoteleuton (or something that gives the appearance of an h.t) will occur "independently". What happened in Sinaiticus was clearly a homoeoteleuton caused by miscopying another manuscript, and the evidence shows that it was subject to quick correction. Thus it was dependent on misreading a source manuscript.

What is extremely unusual with Claromontanus and Sinaiticus is that you can see the model and the target are both extant, and they have a number of corroborating factors that mitigate strongly against this being simply an oddball coincidence. With some other manuscript hundreds of years earlier in another locale having the exact same 300 consecutive letters in the section, and the exact same line length element that created the h.t. (to give two major aspects, there are more, and there are more h.t between the two mss.)

My suggestion is to spend a little time going over the two manuscripts and the support writing.

==============

Oh, I am familiar with Royse, and appreciate his work, however if you feel there is something that specifically relates to analyzing this Claromontanus-Sinauticus connection, please give a clear explanation of how some particular aspect of his studies apply. In fact, please let me know if he ever even finds a case where the homoeoteleuton can be seen, involving two extant manuscripts. Such is rare (putting aside ms 2427 and the Buttmann edition, mentioned by Meyer) and I would appreciate any examples where we can see this occurring.

Thanks!

Steven
I hadn't read your article properly sorry. I thought you were saying that their is a shared omission by homoeoteleuton between Claromontanus and Sinaiticus. What you are actually saying is that although the two manuscripts do not share a omission by homoeoteleuton it would be easy for the omission in Sinaiticus to be produced by a a scribe copying from a manuscript like Claromontanus. Frankly this is a very weak argument.

Textually Sinaiticus and Claromontanus are rather different (IIUC P46 has more interesting readings in common with Claromontanus than there are interesting readings shared between Sinaiticus and Claromontanus.).
In the passage at the beginning of 1 Corinthians 13 we can see for example that in verse 3 Sinaiticus reads that I may be be burned while Claromontanus reads that I may glory.

Andrew Criddle

Correction This should be Sinaiticus reads that I may glory while Claromontanus reads that I may be burned
Last edited by andrewcriddle on Thu Mar 16, 2017 1:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
andrewcriddle
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Re: Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton from source ms Claromontanus (

Post by andrewcriddle »

andrewcriddle wrote: I hadn't read your article properly sorry. I thought you were saying that their is a shared omission by homoeoteleuton between Claromontanus and Sinaiticus. What you are actually saying is that although the two manuscripts do not share a omission by homoeoteleuton it would be easy for the omission in Sinaiticus to be produced by a a scribe copying from a manuscript like Claromontanus. Frankly this is a very weak argument.

Textually Sinaiticus and Claromontanus are rather different (IIUC P46 has more interesting readings in common with Claromontanus than there are interesting readings shared between Sinaiticus and Claromontanus.).
In the passage at the beginning of 1 Corinthians 13 we can see for example that in verse 3 Sinaiticus reads that I may be be burned while Claromontanus reads that I may glory.
Correction This should be Sinaiticus reads that I may glory while Claromontanus reads that I may be burned

Andrew Criddle
Claromontanus lacks the second epeita in 1 Corinthians 12:28 (between dunameis and charismata) present in Sinaiticus and the Alexandrian tradition. (The Byzantine text reads eita)

Andrew Criddle
Last edited by andrewcriddle on Thu Mar 16, 2017 1:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Steven Avery
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Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton from source ms Claromontanus

Post by Steven Avery »

andrewcriddle wrote:I hadn't read your article properly sorry. I thought you were saying that their is a shared omission by homoeoteleuton between Claromontanus and Sinaiticus.

Shared omissions are common, and do not show much about relationship between mss, unless the omissions are very unusual (see the "peculiar error" section from Paul Maas.) Otherwise such cases show little more than a notch towards texttype affinity.

What we are talking about here are direct elements that can connect one ms to another, linearly, source to target, similar to the the situation talked about by Paul Maas and used by Stephen C. Carlson in the 2427 analysis. They have a probability and time-geography element that show that one ms. was actually used in the creation of the other.

================

Paul Maas in Textual Criticism (1958 English edition p. 4) states:
"Sometimes a witness can be shown to depend on another surviving witness from a single passage"

And Stephen C. Carlson, referencing the Maas section, pointed out that:
"line omissions in a manuscript are highly diagnostic of the manuscript's exemplar"
https://www.sbl-site.org/publications/a ... icleId=577

Maas gives three examples of such cases (we are most interested in the closeness to #3)
Sometimes a witness can be shown to depend on another surviving witness from a single passage.

viz. if the peculiar error in the descendant is clearly due to the external state of the text in the surviving exemplar,
e.g., where physical damage to the text in the exemplar has caused the loss of letters or groups of letters, and these letters are missing in the descendant without any visible external cause;

or where additions claimed as his own by the scribe of the exemplar reappear in the copy without any such indication;

or where in copying a prose exemplar a line has been omitted, destroying the logical unity."
Maas is giving three different examples of where a scribal feature can be decisive in showing manuscript connection and dependency. He is not saying these are the only cases, he is giving three examples. And one of the three is a line omission.

Now the Claromontanus-Sinaiticus case is similar to the third one. It does not have the "destroying the logical unity" component, since the text makes sense even with the omission.

However, as is pointed out in our papers, The Claromontanus-Sinaiticus connection has features that ADD to the staightforward fact of homoeoteleutons being feasible from Claromontaus to Sinaiticus omission, such as:

1) it is not just a line, it is a whole section.
2) being a textbook case of homoeoteleuton based on two identical lines in the model, needed line length
3) 300+ (the adjusted count, 240+ in the h.t. area) identical sequential letters between two supposedly diverse geographical and time manuscripts.
4) the unexpected short line after the h.t. And the indentation.
(There may be more.)

Thus, it is my assertion, for your evaluation, that the Maas description is 100% appropriate to apply to Sinaiticus from Claromontanus:

"Sometimes a witness can be shown to depend on another surviving witness from a single passage."

Then you add the additional homoeoteleutons that match with the two manuscripts (WIP, four are referenced in the paper) and the case is anywhere from extremely strong, to sealed.

================
andrewcriddle wrote: What you are actually saying is that although the two manuscripts do not share a omission by homoeoteleuton it would be easy for the omission in Sinaiticus to be produced by a a scribe copying from a manuscript like Claromontanus. Frankly this is a very weak argument.

All you are showing is that you have not looked closely at the two manuscripts or read the supporting material carefully. There is far more here than "easy for the omission."

e.g. The manuscript Sinaiticus is copied from would have to have the exact same 240+ same letters as Claromontanus.
This ms would have to have the exact same line-length structure, that causes the h.t.
This ms would be expected to also share other quirks, like the next short line, that show up in Sinaiticus.

And, the unknown source ms. would have to have all this in common with Claromontanus ... despite being in a totally different geographical area (Sardinia is one major theory for Claromontanus) and a totally different time, centuries apart.

================
andrewcriddle wrote:Textually Sinaiticus and Claromontanus are rather different (IIUC P46 has more interesting readings in common with Claromontanus than there are interesting readings shared between Sinaiticus and Claromontanus.).

We are not claiming that all of Claromontanus was used directly for Sinaiticus. Simply that the evidence is decisive (my word, academically that can be softened to compelling) that Claromontanus was a contributing manuscript. Btw, Mayer checked some of the papyri and found nothing that could lead to a Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton. By contrast, Claromontanus has a number of spots that fit extremely well as the source of the Sinaiticus text in those sections. The point is simply that Claromontanus was clearly the source for a good number of Sinaiticus homoeoteleutons, thus it was directly available to the scribe who wrote Sinaiticus, whether this was done in 400 AD, 600 AD, or c. 1840 AD. (Claromontanus and its daughter mss were available in strategic cities c. 1840 and the first direct historical note of the Sinaiticus NT was 1845.)
andrewcriddle wrote:In the passage at the beginning of 1 Corinthians 13 we can see for example that in verse 3 Sinaiticus reads that I may be be burned while Claromontanus reads that I may glory. .

Interesting readings shared tells you little.

Homoeoteleutons that have corroborating factors can show you decisively the relationship of the two mss.

Steven
Steven Avery
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Re: Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton from source ms Claromontanus (

Post by Steven Avery »

Andrew, would you be able to supply us of examples of the common, or easy, lineup, source and target, using two of the 5000+ Greek manuscripts?

Simply the same lines repeated in one manuscript - with the endings arrayed matching the h.t. in the second.
We also want the same letters in the section (allowing contractions). Although it does not have to be as long a section as Claromontanus-->Sinaiticus.

This is simply meant for thinking, I've never seen any shown (except for our current studies on Claromontanus and Sinaiticus), although one scholar alluded to how this rarely happens. Perhaps with today's computer technology more have been found.
The primitive text of the Gospels and Acts (1914)
Albert Curtis Clark
https://books.google.com/books?id=4js1AQAAIAAJ&pg=PR3

There is another reason which is not infrequently suggested by editors, viz. that the scribe has accidentally omitted a line, or several lines, of his model. When we have two MSS., one of which is known to be a transcript of the other, and we can compare the copy with the model, we find actual instances of such omission. In the vast majority of cases, however, we have only the copy, not the model also.
Just two or three examples would be nice.

Thanks!

Steven
Steven Avery
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Re: Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton from source ms Claromontanus (

Post by Steven Avery »

Here is actually the point that comes first, for your consideration:

This Claromontanus-Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton is an unusual phenomenon to see in extant mss, and, at least by appearance, can be considered the best "textbook case" example known.

Agree?

If not, why not? Can you find a better example?

Steven
Steven Avery
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Re: Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton from source ms Claromontanus (

Post by Steven Avery »

Pic by Mark Michie ! Worth 1000 words, if studied.

Larger pic at:

Codex Sinaiticus Authenticity Research
Homoeoteleuton - Text Omitted because of Similar Endings
Claromontanus -- >Sinaiticus
http://www.sinaiticus.net/homeoteleuton.html
sinaiticus.net by Mark Michie_Faststone half.jpg
sinaiticus.net by Mark Michie_Faststone half.jpg (60.07 KiB) Viewed 9886 times
Last edited by Steven Avery on Tue Mar 21, 2017 4:21 pm, edited 6 times in total.
andrewcriddle
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Re: Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton from source ms Claromontanus

Post by andrewcriddle »

Steven Avery wrote: Shared omissions are common, and do not show much about relationship between mss, unless the omissions are very unusual (see the "peculiar error" section from Paul Maas.) Otherwise such cases show little more than a notch towards texttype affinity.

What we are talking about here are direct elements that can connect one ms to another, linearly, source to target, similar to the the situation talked about by Paul Maas and used by Stephen C. Carlson in the 2427 analysis. They have a probability and time-geography element that show that one ms. was actually used in the creation of the other.

================

Paul Maas in Textual Criticism (1958 English edition p. 4) states:
"Sometimes a witness can be shown to depend on another surviving witness from a single passage"

And Stephen C. Carlson, referencing the Maas section, pointed out that:
"line omissions in a manuscript are highly diagnostic of the manuscript's exemplar"
https://www.sbl-site.org/publications/a ... icleId=577

Maas gives three examples of such cases (we are most interested in the closeness to #3)
Sometimes a witness can be shown to depend on another surviving witness from a single passage.

viz. if the peculiar error in the descendant is clearly due to the external state of the text in the surviving exemplar,
e.g., where physical damage to the text in the exemplar has caused the loss of letters or groups of letters, and these letters are missing in the descendant without any visible external cause;

or where additions claimed as his own by the scribe of the exemplar reappear in the copy without any such indication;

or where in copying a prose exemplar a line has been omitted, destroying the logical unity."
Maas is giving three different examples of where a scribal feature can be decisive in showing manuscript connection and dependency. He is not saying these are the only cases, he is giving three examples. And one of the three is a line omission.

Now the Claromontanus-Sinaiticus case is similar to the third one. It does not have the "destroying the logical unity" component, since the text makes sense even with the omission.

However, as is pointed out in our papers, The Claromontanus-Sinaiticus connection has features that ADD to the staightforward fact of homoeoteleutons being feasible from Claromontaus to Sinaiticus omission, such as:

1) it is not just a line, it is a whole section.
2) being a textbook case of homoeoteleuton based on two identical lines in the model, needed line length
3) 300+ (the adjusted count, 240+ in the h.t. area) identical sequential letters between two supposedly diverse geographical and time manuscripts.
4) the unexpected short line after the h.t. And the indentation.
(There may be more.)

Thus, it is my assertion, for your evaluation, that the Maas description is 100% appropriate to apply to Sinaiticus from Claromontanus:

"Sometimes a witness can be shown to depend on another surviving witness from a single passage."

Then you add the additional homoeoteleutons that match with the two manuscripts (WIP, four are referenced in the paper) and the case is anywhere from extremely strong, to sealed.

================
I've been reading Maas and although his very brief treatment is not entirely unambiguous I think you are misunderstanding him.

IIUC Maas is thinking of a case where a passage in missing in manuscript A with no obvious explanation such as homoeoteleuton and this passage exactly corresponds to a line in manuscript B.

The omission in Mark 8:11 in archaic Mark
Mark 8:11 συζητειν αυτω, ζητουντες παρ’ αυτου σημειον απο του ουρανου, πειραζοντες ] συζητειν αυτω πειραζοντες
appears to be of this nature and is not due to homoeoteleuton.

Andrew Criddle
andrewcriddle
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Re: Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton from source ms Claromontanus (

Post by andrewcriddle »

andrewcriddle wrote:
andrewcriddle wrote: I hadn't read your article properly sorry. I thought you were saying that their is a shared omission by homoeoteleuton between Claromontanus and Sinaiticus. What you are actually saying is that although the two manuscripts do not share a omission by homoeoteleuton it would be easy for the omission in Sinaiticus to be produced by a a scribe copying from a manuscript like Claromontanus. Frankly this is a very weak argument.

Textually Sinaiticus and Claromontanus are rather different (IIUC P46 has more interesting readings in common with Claromontanus than there are interesting readings shared between Sinaiticus and Claromontanus.).
In the passage at the beginning of 1 Corinthians 13 we can see for example that in verse 3 Sinaiticus reads that I may be be burned while Claromontanus reads that I may glory.
Correction This should be Sinaiticus reads that I may glory while Claromontanus reads that I may be burned

Andrew Criddle
Claromontanus lacks the second epeita in 1 Corinthians 12:28 (between dunameis and charismata) present in Sinaiticus and the Alexandrian tradition. (The Byzantine text reads eita)

Andrew Criddle
in 12:31 Claromontanus reads κρείσσονα mightier compared to Sinaiticus μείζονα greater (the epsilon appears omitted I'm giving the standard forms).

Andrew Criddle
Last edited by andrewcriddle on Thu Mar 16, 2017 1:22 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Solo
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Re: Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton from source ms Claromontanus (

Post by Solo »

andrewcriddle wrote:In the passage at the beginning of 1 Corinthians 13 we can see for example that in verse 3 Sinaiticus reads that I may be be burned while Claromontanus reads that I may glory.
Andrew Criddle
Hi Andrew,
Are you saying that the Claromontanus in 1 Cor 13:3 uses a verb different than “kauchomai” from Sinaiticus ? I can’t make out the word in the rendition of the page that you provided for Claromontanus. Many thanks.

Best, Jiri
Steven Avery
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Re: Sinaiticus homoeoteleuton from source ms Claromontanus

Post by Steven Avery »

Steven Avery wrote:Paul Maas in Textual Criticism (1958 English edition p. 4) states: ...
Sometimes a witness can be shown to depend on another surviving witness from a single passage.
... or where in copying a prose exemplar a line has been omitted, destroying the logical unity.
andrewcriddle wrote:I've been reading Maas and although his very brief treatment is not entirely unambiguous I think you are misunderstanding him. IIUC Maas is thinking of a case where a passage in missing in manuscript A with no obvious explanation such as homoeoteleuton and this passage exactly corresponds to a line in manuscript B.
The omission in Mark 8:11 in archaic Mark
Mark 8:11 συζητειν αυτω, ζητουντες παρ’ αυτου σημειον απο του ουρανου, πειραζοντες ] συζητειν αυτω πειραζοντες
appears to be of this nature and is not due to homoeoteleuton.

I'll accept that the reference from Maas above is any omission, which can be h.t. or simply random scribal fatigue. I do not see how there is a need for "no obvious explanation" to show the connection. If the Sinaiticus (uncorrected) text was gibberish, it would be a closer match to the Maas construct.

The main point of referencing Maas was more to show the basic idea that even a single scribal phenomenon can be decisive in connecting two manuscripts. With Claromontanus and Sinaiticus, we already have multiple homoeoteleutons showing the direct connection, and in the localized spot in 1 Cor 13 we have additional corroborative elements, beyond the classic basic situation of the two identical lines.

=============

Overview:
We want our textual theory to also be in line with the historical "facts on the ground". Sinaiticus was either written 4th century, or later (Hilgenfeld, Davidson, perhaps Trobisch, Simonides, and folks with simpatico to the history including Simonides.) Later can be 5th through 7th century or later medieval, or c. 1840.

(The reason I include later medieval is the Davidson linguistic arguments on Hermas and Barnabas.)

If a person takes the 4th century position, as the "deeply entrenched scholarship", with a sort of textual-religious fervor, they will clearly seek out ways to minimize the incredible textual evidence here uncovered. Since it is irreconcilable with their known "fact" of a c. 350 AD Sinaiticus.

Steven
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