Barbara Aland, Andreas Juckel, eds., Das Neue Testament in syrischer Überlieferung. II Die paulinischen Briefe, Teil 3: 1./2. Thessalonicherbrief, 1./2. Timotheusbrief, Titusbrief, Philemonbrief und Hebräerbrief. (Arbeiten zur neutestamentlichen Textforschung 32) Berlin-New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2002. Pp. viii + 551. Cloth, Euro 198. ISBN 3-11-017387-5.
Jan
Joosten
Marc Bloch University
Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute
George A. Kiraz
James E. Walters
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Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute
January 2003
Vol. 6, No. 1
For this publication, a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
license has been granted by the author(s), who retain full
copyright.
https://hugoye.bethmardutho.org/article/hv6n1prjoosten
Jan Joosten
Barbara Aland, Andreas Juckel, eds., Das Neue Testament in syrischer Überlieferung. II Die paulinischen Briefe, Teil 3: 1./2. Thessalonicherbrief, 1./2. Timotheusbrief, Titusbrief, Philemonbrief und Hebräerbrief. (Arbeiten zur neutestamentlichen Textforschung 32) Berlin-New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2002. Pp. viii + 551. Cloth, Euro 198. ISBN 3-11-017387-5.
https://hugoye.bethmardutho.org/pdf/vol6/HV6N1PRJoosten.pdf
Hugoye: Journal of Syriac Studies
Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute, 2003
vol 6
issue 1
Hugoye: Journal of Syriac Studies is an electronic journal dedicated to the study
of the Syriac tradition, published semi-annually (in January and July) by Beth
Mardutho: The Syriac Institute. Published since 1998, Hugoye seeks to offer the
best scholarship available in the field of Syriac studies.
Syriac Studies
Syriac New Testament
Barbara Aland
Andreas Juckel
File created by XSLT transformation of original HTML encoded article.
[1]
Following volumes covering the Major Catholic Epistles (1986),
Romans and I Corinthians (1991), and II Corinthians, Galatians,
Ephesians, Philippians and Colossians (1995), the present
publication is the fourth tome of Syriac New Testament texts
edited by Barbara Aland and Andreas Juckel, both of the
Institut für neutestamentlichen Textforschung in
Münster. All volumes appeared in the same series, in a
format that has remained essentially unchanged. Taken together,
they make up an impressive contribution to the study of the
Syriac text of the New Testament.
[2] The most
substantial part of the book is an edition of the Syriac text
of the Corpus Paulinum from I Thessalonians through Hebrews as
attested in the Peshitta, in the Harklean, and in quotations in
Syriac literature. The different Syriac versions are presented
verse by verse in horizontal lines. The Peshitta is given in a
diplomatic edition taking British Library Add. 14.470 (5/6th
century, referred to as P4) as the basic text. The
apparatus signals variant readings in eleven other, mostly
early, manuscripts. Although this is not a full critical
edition of the Peshitta, the editors are certainly right in
judging that the variants included are representative for the
entire early history of the version. Since no other critical
edition was ever made of the Peshitta Epistles (the British and
Foreign Bible Society edition of 1920 offered an eclectic text
based on early manuscripts, but no apparatus), this segment
alone—which forms a small part of the volume as a whole
— merits NT scholars' eternal gratitude.
[3] The
Harklean is presented in a critical edition based on three
manuscripts, the most important of which is Ms 37 of St. Mark's
monastery in Jerusalem (8/9th century, referred to as
H4). Here too, the new edition improves much on the
earlier edition of Joseph White (1803), which was based on a
single manuscript (breaking off at Hebr. 11:27). The
translation technique of the Harklean, which aims at formal
equivalence with the Vorlage, makes it easy to retrovert into
Greek. A retroversion of the Harklean epistles—prepared
in comparison with the minuscules of "Family 2138" which are
closely allied to the Vorlage of the Harklean—is proposed
on 452-494.
[4] The real
bonus of the present edition, however, and a breathtaking tour
de force, is the collection of quotations in Syriac literature.
Thousands of quotations, excerpted from more than 160 writings,
dating from the fourth century to Bar Hebraeus, both originally
Syriac and translated from Greek, are transcribed in extenso
and presented in chronological order alongside the Peshitta and
Harklean versions. All the material is there for a historical
study of the Syriac text of the Pauline epistles, from the
earliest Old Syriac stage, through the Peshitta, the
Philoxenian and the Harklean versions, to post-Harklean efforts
at taking the imitation of the Greek language to its limit. The
editors are justified in expressing the hope that "the wealth
of material in our three volumes shall elicit corresponding
researches" (p. V).
[5] In
comparison with the edition of the Old Testament Peshitta by
the Peshitta Institute in Leiden, the present edition clearly
expresses different options. The strength of the Peshitta
Institute's approach lies in its focus on the manuscript
tradition, treating the manuscripts (or at least the earlier
ones) exhaustively. This has made it possible to write a
history of the OT Peshitta text—something that is neither
attempted nor achieved in the Münster edition for the text
of the NT Peshitta. In contrast, Aland and Juckel and their
team have selected a more global approach, where the Peshitta
text is set in the context of earlier and later Syriac versions
of the New Testament. Partly the different policies are
dictated by differences in the material: in the Syriac OT there
is no analogue to the Old Syriac version, and while the
Peshitta is based on the Hebrew OT the later versions are based
on the Septuagint. Yet, one might also say that the two
projects form a challenge to one another, pointing to possible
paths for future research.
[6] Apart
from the text edition and its paraphernalia (information on the
manuscripts, information on the Syriac writings from which the
quotations were excerpted, indexes), the volume contains brief
discussions on the textual history of the Peshitta (Ch. III)
and the Harklean (Ch. IV). These chapters are highly
instructive and reflect the same standards of professionalism
as the text edition. They should be required reading for
advanced students with an interest in the Syriac Bible. With
regard to the Harklean it is shown that variant readings can
generally be classified as errors, assimilations to the
Peshitta, or "grecizations" designed to conform the Syriac even
more to the Greek text. More important, it is convincingly
argued that the Harklean base text was translated from a single
Greek manuscript while asterisks and marginal readings were
taken from another manuscript (and perhaps from the Philoxenian
version as well). The obelos marks elements required by Syriac
idiom that have no precise counterpart in the Greek. The
Harklean version was not a mere revision of the Philoxenian but
an entirely new translation of a Greek manuscript. A
confrontation of these views with the famous subscription to
the Harklean version leads to a new interpretation of the
Syriac text. The key terms are ’tktb "to be
produced" (said of a biblical manuscript) and
’tphm "to be annotated with
variant readings".
[7] With
regard to the Peshitta the great homogeneity (Konformität)
of the manuscript tradition is correctly observed. The majority
of variants are of relatively little consequence. Three classes
of variants are identified by Aland and Juckel: a) variants
bringing the Peshitta text closer to the Greek or to a specific
Greek reading (in many cases variation within the Greek
tradition is reflected in Peshitta manuscripts as well); b)
idiomatic changes taking their origin in the genius of the
Syriac language (some of these may be caused by influence from
the elusive "Old Syriac" version of the epistles); c) in Old
Testament quotations, readings created by influence of the Old
Testament Peshitta. The dynamics of the manuscript tradition
are discussed in some detail and illustrated with 59 annotated
examples.
[8] It is in
the discussion on the Peshitta, where questions of Syriac idiom
and translation technique are relatively more important than
textual traditions, that one may occasionally disagree with the
editors. First a question of detail. In Hebr. 1:7,
dcbd mlakwhy rwh
, the
editors prefer the reading rwhy,
with 1cs suffix, offered by three manuscripts over the majority
reading rwh
, in the status
absolutus (19). The original Peshitta rendering, "who makes my
spirit into his angels" (Er macht meinem Geist zu seinen
Engeln), was later corrected on the basis of the text of the OT
Peshitta of Psalm 104:4, so they argue. This evaluation is
certainly wrong. The status absolutus is original, and the
Syriac clause means "who makes his angels into (or out of)
wind". The addition of the suffix is due to scribes'
unfamiliarity with the status absolutus of nouns functioning as
nexus objects: a type of syntax that is common in the OT
Peshitta but disappears in later Syriac texts. They
"syriacized" the form by adding a silent yudh of the suffix.
The phenomenon is often met with in unusual cases of status
absolutus (for examples, see J. Joosten, The Syriac Language of
the Peshitta and Old Syriac Versions of Matthew [Leiden: Brill,
1996], 73, n. 46).
[9] A more
important issue is the question of OT Peshitta influence on the
text of OT quotations (notably in Hebrews, where such
quotations are numerous). According to Aland and Juckel, this
influence is secondary: OT Peshitta readings creep into the
manuscript tradition, creating variants (10, 20). This reviewer
would argue the opposite: OT Peshitta influence on the
quotations occurred in the earliest stage of the textual
tradition. The factor creating variant readings is the
influence of the Greek NT text with which the OT Peshitta text
quoted in the NT Peshitta was often at variance. Later scribes
corrected readings conforming with the OT Peshitta in order to
bring the text into line with the Greek text of Hebrews. Three
arguments favour this alternative view. First, readings
influenced by the OT Peshitta occur quite frequently in all
manuscripts without variation. Thus in Hebr. 5:6 and 7:21, the
words bdmwth dmlkyzdq, "in the likeness of Melchizedek,"
attested by all Peshitta manuscripts, do not reflect the Greek
text of Hebrews (κατα την
ταξιν
Μελχισεδεκ),
"according to the order of M.") but the text of the OT Peshitta
of Psalm 110:4. Similar instances of OT Peshitta influence
attested by the entire manuscript tradition, can be found in
Hebr. 1:7, 8, 10; 2:7, 12; 3:7, 9, 10; 8:9, 11; 10:5-6; 13:6
(of course, each case merits a discussion, which cannot be
given in the present review). Such cases tend to show that OT
Peshitta readings belong to the original Peshitta translation
of Hebrews. Second, it seems that the Old Syriac text of
Hebrews contained even more traces of OT Peshitta influence
than does the Peshitta. Thus, Aphrahat's version of Hebr. 2:13
(Isa. 8:17-18) and 8:8-12 (Jer. 31:31-34) stands closer to the
OT Peshitta text than does the Peshitta in several details. The
Peshitta version of Hebrews apparently followed an established
trend in adopting such readings. Third, the situation in the
gospels furnishes a relevant analogy. In the gospels there can
be no doubt that the Old Syriac's OT quotations show more OT
Peshitta influence than do the Peshitta gospels (see J.
Joosten, Textus 15 [1990], 55-76). Here the movement is clearly
from a text more closely aligned with the OT Peshitta toward
greater conformity with the Greek text of the NT. The same
general evolution of the text of OT quotations would seem to
hold for Hebrews (and for the other Pauline epistles).
[10] As
far as the present reviewer has been able to check, the Syriac
texts are transcribed with great trustworthiness. The only
mistakes I have been able to identify occur in non-German
titles in the bibliography: 543 "AMPHOUX (...) le
group"—read "groupe"; 545 "CURETON (...) ancient
recension"—read "antient" (sic); "DCB (...) Biography,
Literatur"—read "Literature"; 546 "DUVAL (...)
jusque'à"—read "jusqu'à"; 548 "PETIT (...)
text grec"—read "texte"; 550 "WRIGHT (...) Syriac
litterature" —read "literature". But these are mere
trifles.
[11] It
is very much to be hoped that the team will go on with this
project and publish at least the Book of Acts in the same way.
The Minor Catholic Epistles and the Apocalypse would also
benefit immensely, even although there is no Peshitta
translation for these books (nor early quotations). Even for
the Gospels the treatment would provide a useful complement to
Gwilliam and Pusey's edition of the Peshitta and G. Kiraz's
comparative edition of the Old Syriac, Peshitta and Harklean
versions.