Page:The New Testament in the original Greek - 1881.djvu/89

 INTRODUCTION TO THE AMERICAN EDITION*. Ixxxi

3. THIRD PERIOD : THE RESTORATION OF THE PRIMITIVE TEXT. FROM LACHMANN AND TISCIIENDORF TO WEST-

COTT AND 1IORT A.D. 1830-81.

(12.) CARL LACHMANN (professor of classical philology in Berlin; d. 1851): Novum Testamentiim Grace et La- tine, Bcrol. 1842-50, 2 vols. Comp. his art. in the Studien vnd Kritiken, 1830, No. 4, pp. 817-845. Lachmann had previously published a small edition in 1831, with various readings at the end. In the larger edition he was aided by the younger PHILIP BUTTMANN, who added the appara- tus of the Greek text, and published also another small edition based on the Vatican MS., 1856, 1862, and 1865.

Lachmann was not a professional theologian, and not hampered by traditional prejudice. His object was to re- store the oldest accessible text, i. e. the text of the fourth or fifth century, as found in the oldest sources then known (especially Codd. A, B, C, Itala, Vulgate, antc-Nicene fa- thers) ; yet not as a final text, but simply as a sure histor- ical basis for further operations of internal criticism. lie gives, with diplomatic accuracy, even palpable writing er- rors if sufficiently attested; not as proceeding from the original writers, but as parts of the textus traditus of the fourth century. His range of authorities was limited ; Cod. Sinaiticus had not yet been discovered, and Codd. B and C not critically edited. But to him belongs the credit of having broken a new path, and established, with the genius and experience of a master critic, the true basis. lie car- ried out the hint of Bentlcy and Bengel, and had the bold- ness to destroy the tyranny of the Textus Receptus, and to substitute for it the uncial text of the Nicene age.

Lachmann met with much opposition from the profession-

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