Page:The New Testament in the original Greek - 1881.djvu/57

 INTRODUCTION TO THE AMERICAS' EDITION. xlis

F. Armenian Version.

It belongs to the fifth century, and is the work of Micsrob and Moses Cliorenensis. It has considerable critical value, though the existing MSS. are not very ancient, and there are wide differences among them. The version embraces the entire Bible. The first edition appeared at Amsterdam, 1666, under the care of Bishop Uscan of Erivan ; the best edition, founded on manuscripts, is by Zohrab New Testa- ment, 1789; whole Bible, 1805. It is now regularly pub- lished by the British and Foreign Bible Society.

On the Armenian Version, see the article by Tregelles in Smith's Bible Diet., Am. ed., vol. iv. p. 3374.

We pass by the Slavonic, Arabic, and Persic versions, which are of too late a date to be of critical value for the restoration of the primitive text

3. PATBISTIC QUOTATIONS.

The third source of textual criticism is furnished by the quotations in the early Christian writers, from which the greater part of the New Testament might be recon- strncted. The Greek fathers give direct, the Latin fathers indirect, testimony to the original text. Some of them n Irenieus, Origen, Tertullian are older than our oldest MSS., and therefore of the greatest value.

But the fathers must be used with great care and dis- crimination. They were theologians and Christians rather than critics. They often quote very loosely, simply from memory, and more for doctrinal, polemical, and practical than critical purposes. Their testimony is fragmentary, and fails us where we most wish and need information. Besides, their editors have so frequently thought they were

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