Catholics and Textual Criticism

A correspondent writes:

I am wondering, how do Catholics regard textual criticism? What is the Catholic position on the canonicity of various New Testament passages like the Pericope Adulterae, the Comma Johanneum, and the Longer Ending of Mark, for example?

 

What Textual Criticism Is

For those who may be unfamiliar with the term, textual criticism involves the study of how texts change over time—how bits get added, deleted, or altered.

Some variation in texts was inevitable before the invention of the printing press, since all texts were hand-copied and scribes sometimes made mistakes. Accidental textual variations even occur now that we have the printing press, though not as much.

Also, some textual variations are intentional. This happens on both the smaller level—as when a scribe or a publisher intentionally fixes a typo—and on the larger level, when they produce a “revised and expanded edition” of a work.

 

Textual Criticism and the Bible

One of the goals of textual criticism when it’s applied to the Bible is determining what the original reading of a text was.

There are various ways of doing this, and they involve detective work based on comparing the different readings that are out there and using lines of evidence to figure out which was most likely the original.

There are a large number of textual variants in the thousands of manuscripts that were hand copied before the printing press, but the large majority of them are trivial, such as alternate spellings and word order.

Very few would have any impact on doctrine, and no key doctrine of the Faith is at stake.

Nevertheless, love for God’s word has led Christian and Jewish scholars to spend a great deal of time trying to determine the original wording of the Bible.

 

Earliest Editions and Authoritative/Canonical Editions

It should be pointed out that, even if you determine the earliest reading of a text, that does not tell you what the canonical or authorized version is.

A number of years ago, Mark Twain’s original manuscript for Huckleberry Finn was discovered, and scholars of American literature could see the earliest readings of this text in Twain’s own handwriting—with all the crossing out and marginal additions he made during the writing process.

But even though scholars now could see the earliest readings of different passages, that didn’t mean these belonged in the authorized, “canonical” edition of the novel—i.e., the version of Huckleberry Finn that Twain authorized for publication. Indeed, Twain had crossed them out!

Something similar happens when authors or publishers issue new editions of books. While what a first edition said is of historical interest, later editions supersede earlier ones. Thus, the first edition of a chemistry textbook written in 1940 should not be considered as valuable a teaching text as an updated edition published in 2020 (chemistry has advanced in the last 80 years!). Neither should one rely on a copy of the U.S. legal code published a hundred years ago, but on the current edition of the law.

A parallel phenomenon happens with Scripture, where expanded versions of books and revised versions of material also appear. As I write in The Bible Is a Catholic Book:

God sometimes inspired books that contained material he had already placed in other books. These could be condensed versions of the original. The most famous is Deuteronomy, which condenses and revises the laws given earlier in the Pentateuch. Thus its name, Deuteronomy, means “second law.” Chronicles and 2 Maccabees also condense and supplement material found in other books.

Sometimes God expanded on a previous work. This happened with Jeremiah. There was an original, shorter edition that was burned by King Jehoiakim, but God inspired a new edition that contained the original material as well as much new material (Jer. 36).

God did something similar in the deuterocanonical period. He inspired expanded editions of Daniel and Esther. The first includes three additional sections. One (“The Song of the Three Young Men”) is a hymn sung by Daniel’s companions. The other two (“Susannah” and “Bel and the Dragon”) display Daniel’s wisdom and show how God delivered him. In addition, the expanded edition of Esther includes sections that bring out more clearly the role of God. (The Hebrew edition, strikingly, doesn’t contain explicit references to God.)

So, bear in mind the distinction between the earliest version of a text and the canonical version.

 

Catholics and Textual Criticism

Like scholars in general, Catholic scholars are very interested in determining the earliest version of biblical texts, and so they also practice textual criticism. The Church is totally fine with this and positively encourages it. In 1943, Pope Pius XII wrote:

The great importance which should be attached to this kind of criticism was aptly pointed out by Augustine, when, among the precepts to be recommended to the student of the Sacred Books, he put in the first place the care to possess a corrected text. “The correction of the codices”—so says this most distinguished doctor of the Church—”should first of all engage the attention of those who wish to know the Divine Scripture so that the uncorrected may give place to the corrected.”

In the present day indeed this art, which is called textual criticism and which is used with great and praiseworthy results in the editions of profane writings, is also quite rightly employed in the case of the Sacred Books, because of that very reverence which is due to the divine oracles. For its very purpose is to insure that the sacred text be restored, as perfectly as possible, be purified from the corruptions due to the carelessness of the copyists and be freed, as far as may be done, from glosses and omissions, from the interchange and repetition of words and from all other kinds of mistakes, which are wont to make their way gradually into writings handed down through many centuries. . . .

Nor is it necessary here to call to mind—since it is doubtless familiar and evident to all students of Sacred Scripture—to what extent namely the Church has held in honor these studies in textual criticism from the earliest centuries down even to the present day (Divino Afflante Spiritu 17-18).

The Church thus approves of textual criticism. But what about the three passages that the correspondent asked about?

 

What Are the Three Passages?

The Comma Johanneum, the Pericope Adulterae, and the Longer Ending of Mark are three of the most famous textual variants in the New Testament.

The first—the Comma Johanneum or “Johannine comma” (a “comma” being a short piece of text, in this case) is a variant found in some manuscripts of 1 John 5:7-8. Here it is, with the text in question italicized:

For there are three that beare record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one. And there are three that beare witnesse in earth, the Spirit, and the Water, and the Blood, and these three agree in one (KJV, 1611).

Because this variant makes explicit mention of all three Persons of the Trinity, it became very popular as a text for defending the doctrine of the Trinity. However, as the science of textual criticism developed, it became clear that it may not have been in the original version of 1 John.

The Pericope Adulterae (pronounced per-IH-co-PAY ah-DUL-ter-AE; that is, “the passage concerning the adulteress”) is a variant printed in many Bibles as John 7:53-8:11, and—together with the Longer Ending of Mark—it is one of the two longest textual variants in the entire New Testament. As its name suggests, it’s the famous story about the woman caught in adultery and how Jesus refused to condemn her (“Let he who is without sin among you cast the first stone”).

The Longer Ending of Mark is a variant printed in many Bibles as Mark 16:9-20. It concerns things that happened after the Resurrection of Jesus, and it largely repeats and rephrases material found in the other Gospels and Acts.

 

The Johannine Comma

The Catholic Church does not have a teaching about whether these three variants were in the original editions of the books in question. It leaves that issue to scholars, and most scholars are of the opinion that none of the three were in the earliest versions.

However, this does not settle the question of their canonicity, because later editions may be the ones that God guided to become canonical (as in the case of Jeremiah, Daniel, and Esther).

In the case of the Comma Johanneum, the Magisterium has not taught it to be canonical, and—given the textual evidence against it being in the original—it is not included in most modern Catholic Bibles.

For example, it is not in the revised version of the Latin Vulgate—the translation that the Holy See itself uses. Similarly, it is not in the New American Bible: Revised Edition, which is published by the U.S. bishops.

Neither translation even includes a footnote mentioning the Johannine Comma.

 

The Pericope Adulterae and the Longer Ending of Mark

When it comes to the Pericope Adulterae and the Longer Ending of Mark, the matter is more complicated. Here is what the Council of Trent said:

But if any one receive not, as sacred and canonical, the said books entire with all their parts, as they have been used to be read in the Catholic Church, and as they are contained in the old Latin Vulgate edition . . . let him be anathema (Decree Concerning the Canonical Scriptures).

That’s an infallible definition. The question is what the definition means when it says the books found in the Vulgate need to be accepted as sacred and canonical “entire with all their parts.”

This does not mean that we can’t do textual criticism to determine the original readings. That matter was discussed by Pius XII in Divino Afflante Spiritu (see sections 21-22).

The statement is principally directed against Protestants who were challenging the canonicity of parts of Daniel and Esther (see above), which they rejected as apocryphal. In fact, the whole reason that Trent chose to define the canon was to deal with Protestant challenges to various books of the Old Testament.

That was Trent’s clear intent, but in the discussions that led up to the council fathers voting on this decree, there also was discussion of certain New Testament passages, including the Longer Ending of Mark and the Pericope Adulterae (see Hubert Jedin, A History of the Council of Trent, Volume II, ch. 2).

The subject of whether these passages are also included in Trent’s definition thus will depend on how clearly the council fathers intended to define this matter.

The general rule concerning infallible definitions is:

No doctrine is understood as defined infallibly unless this is manifestly evident (can. 749 §3).

One could argue that what is manifestly evident is that Trent wanted to define the canonicity of the books of the Bible including those passages in the Old Testament that were being disputed by Protestants but that it is not “manifestly evident” that they meant to define the canonicity of particular New Testament passages, in which case the matter would not be infallibly settled.

Because the Longer Ending of Mark and the Pericope Adulterae were mentioned in the background discussions leading up to the approval of the decree, most have concluded that they are defined.

Thus, the editors of the New American Bible have a note on the Longer Ending of Mark that states that it “has traditionally been accepted as a canonical part of the Gospel and was defined as such by the Council of Trent.”

Similarly, they also include a note on the Pericope Adulterae that says, “The Catholic Church accepts this passage as canonical scripture.”

On the other hand, Pope Benedict XVI wrote:

The ending of Mark poses a particular problem. According to authoritative manuscripts, the Gospel comes to a close with 16:8—“and they went out and fled from the tomb; for trembling and astonishment had come upon them; and they said nothing to any one, for they were afraid.” The authentic text of the Gospel as it has come down to us ends with the fear and trembling of the women. . . . In the second century, a concluding summary was added, bringing together the most important Resurrection traditions and the mission of the disciples to proclaim the gospel to the whole world (Mk 16:9–20) (Jesus of Nazareth vol. 2, 261-262).

Benedict thus seems to treat the Longer Ending of Mark as noncanonical, since he indicates it is not part of “the authentic text of the Gospel as it has come down to us.” (Also, in Church-related documents “authentic” means “authoritative,” and if a text is not authoritative, it is not canonical.)

Further, if he is correct that the Longer Ending was written in the second century, that would seem to place it after the apostolic age and make its canonicity further problematic.

One does not have to agree with Benedict, here, for as he famously wrote:

It goes without saying that this book is in no way an exercise of the magisterium, but is solely an expression of my personal search “for the face of the Lord” (cf. Ps. 27:8). Everyone is free, then, to contradict me. I would only ask my readers for that initial goodwill without which there can be no understanding (Jesus of Nazareth, vol. 1, Foreword).

In light of what is manifestly evident regarding Trent’s intention, and Pope Benedict’s statement regarding the ending of Mark, there is presently a question in my mind about whether Trent intended to define the canonicity of the New Testament passages that came up in its preliminary discussions.

To settle the question, I would need access to the texts of these discussions so that I could see exactly what was said and what preliminary votes were taken. Unfortunately, I have thus far not been able to obtain access to this information.

The Yearly Benedict/Francis: The Audiences

benedict-francisThe pope’s weekly audiences offer a fascinating look at topics that often aren’t covered in the major papal documents.

Unfortunately, in recent years, the folks at the Vatican web site have not been giving titles to the audiences that indicate their content. All you get (normally) is a list of dates.

To help me navigate these in the future, here is an annotated version of Pope Francis’s 2013 audiences that indicates their content, as well as Pope Benedict’s final audiences.

Although these are found in reverse-chronological order on the Vatican web site (like a blog!), I’ve put them in chronological order here, since most of them form a walk though the Apostles’ Creed for the Year of Faith.

Incidentally, papal audiences like these seem to be pre-written, way in advance.

This means that Pope Francis was almost certainly delivering texts at his Wednesday audiences that were prepared for Pope Benedict.

He clearly took liberties with them. Many passages in Pope Francis’s audiences were expressed in his own voice, rather than Pope Benedict’s.

Now that the Year of Faith is concluded, we’re likely to get our first pure taste of Pope Francis’s style of audiences in 2014.

For now, here’s a review of 2013 . . .

 

Pope Benedict XVI

Pope Francis

The Weekly Benedict (Wrap-up Edition): 10 March, 2013

This version of The Weekly Benedict covers material released in the last week from 22 February 2013 – 28 February 2013 (subscribe hereget as an eBook version for your Kindle, iPod, iPad, Nook, or other eBook reader):

Angelus

General Audience

Letter

Motu Proprio

Speeches

Papal Tweets

Thank you for your love and support. May you always experience the joy that comes from putting Christ at the centre of your lives.

pontifex, 28 February 2013

* All of Pope Benedict XVI tweets were deleted at at the start of Sede Vacante

The Weekly Benedict: 24 February, 2013

This version of The Weekly Benedict covers material released in the last week from 4 February 2012 – 17 February 2013 (subscribe hereget as an eBook version for your Kindle, iPod, iPad, Nook, or other eBook reader):

Angelus

General Audience

Homilies

Messages

Speeches

Papal Tweets

In these momentous days, I ask you to pray for me and for the Church, trusting as always in divine Providence.

@pontifex, 24 February 2013

The Weekly Benedict: 17 February, 2013

This version of The Weekly Benedict covers material released in the last week from 4 February 2012 – 17 February 2013 (subscribe hereget as an eBook version for your Kindle, iPod, iPad, Nook, or other eBook reader):

Angelus

General Audience

Homilies

Messages

Speeches

Tweets

During the season of Lent which begins today, we renew our commitment to the path of conversion, making more room for God in our lives.

@pontifex, 13 February 2013

Lent is a favourable time in which to rediscover faith in God as the foundation of our lives and of the Church’s life

@pontifex, 17 February 2013

Here’s how you can express your love for Pope Benedict

Would you like to express your love and gratitude to Pope Benedict for his service to the Church? Here is a way you can do it.

After I heard the news that Pope Benedict was renouncing the papacy, I felt moved to record a brief, from-the-heart video expressing my thoughts and feelings. (I don’t like the word “renounce” either, but it is the technically correct term, and it was used by Pope Benedict in his announcement.)

I decided to do the video unscripted, in the form of a video open letter to Pope Benedict, expressing my admiration for him and my gratitude for his service to the Church.

I know he doesn’t know who I am and that he may never see the video, but I wanted to do it anyway.

I have very much valued the service Pope Benedict has given the Church. I have been an admirer of his for many years before he was elected pope, and his service to the Church was already staggering.

When he agreed to shoulder the burden of being the successor of St. Peter, the vicar of Christ, I cheered!

I had been afraid to let my hopes get up that he would be elected pope, but he was!

He is an awesome teacher and a man of deep thought, profound piety, and amazing humility.

I will miss him terribly. I respect and accept his decision. But I could not let this occasion pass without expressing the burden of my heart.

Here’s the video . . .

Now that I’ve had my say, it’s time for yours.

After making the video, it struck me that it would be possible to get people’s expressions of love and gratitude to Pope Benedict after he leaves office. (He’ll be far too busy beforehand.)

Therefore, I invite you to use the comments box to express your prayers and best wishes to Pope Benedict.

After his departure, I will print your messages in a large-type, easy-to-read format and send it to him, along with a cover letter again expressing my own gratitude to him.

(Before sending it, I will also delete any inappropriate messages, so keep it positive.)

But please, do, let him know how much you love him and value his service as the successor of St. Peter and how you support him at this challenging time.

Thank you, and God bless you.

The Weekly Benedict: 10 February, 2013

This version of The Weekly Benedict covers material released in the last week from 16 January 2012 – 10 February 2013 (subscribe hereget as an eBook version for your Kindle, iPod, iPad, Nook, or other eBook reader):

Index of Source Links

List of direct document links on Vatican.va used.

Angelus

General Audiences

Homilies

Letters

Motu Proprio

Messages

Speeches

Papal Tweets

Every human being is loved by God the Father. No one need feel forgotten, for every name is written in the Lord’s loving Heart.

@pontifex, 30 January 2013

Today I have a special though for every religious: may they always follow Christ faithfully in poverty, chastity and obedience.

@pontifex, 2 February 2013

Today I have a special thought for every religious: may they always follow Christ faithfully in poverty, chastity and obedience.

@pontifex, 2 February 2013

Let us imitate the Virgin Mary in welcoming and guarding the word of Jesus, in order to recognize him as Lord in our lives

@pontifex, 3 February 2013

Everything is a gift from God: it is only by recognizing this crucial dependence on the Creator that we will find freedom and peace.

@pontifex, 6 February 2013

We must trust in the mighty power of God’s mercy. We are all sinners, but His grace transforms us and makes us new.

@pontifex, 10 February 2013

The Weekly Benedict: 27 January, 2013

This version of The Weekly Benedict covers material released in the last week from 16 January 2012 – 25 January 2013 (subscribe hereget as an eBook version for your Kindle, iPod, iPad, Nook, or other eBook reader):

Index of Source Links

List of direct document links on Vatican.va used.

Angelus

General Audiences

Letters

Messages

Speeches

Papal Tweets

Many false idols are held up today. For Christians to be faithful, they can’t be afraid to go against the current.

@pontifex, 23 January 2013

I join all those marching for life from afar, and pray that political leaders will protect the unborn and promote a culture of life.

@pontifex, 25 January 2013

What does Sunday, the day of the Lord, mean for us? It is a day for rest and for family, but first of all a day for Him.

@pontifex, 27 January 2013

The Weekly Benedict: 20 January, 2013

This version of The Weekly Benedict covers material released in the last week from 11 January 2012 – 20 January 2013 (subscribe hereget as an eBook version for your Kindle, iPod, iPad, Nook, or other eBook reader):

Index of Source Links

List of direct document links on Vatican.va used.

Angelus

General Audiences

Homilies

Speeches

Papal Tweets

Following Christ’s example, we have to learn to give ourselves completely. Anything else is not enough.

@pontifex, 9 January 2013

In this Year of Faith, may every Christian rediscover the beauty of being reborn in the love of God and living as his true children.

@pontifex, 13 January 2013

What happens in Baptism? We become united forever with Jesus, to be born again to a new life.

@pontifex, 13 January 2013

If we have love for our neighbor, we will find the face of Christ in the poor, the weak, the sick and the suffering.

@pontifex, 16 January 2013

What does the Lord ask of us as we work for Christian unity? To pray constantly, do justice, love goodness, and walk humbly with Him.

@pontifex, 20 January 2013

The Weekly Benedict: 13 January, 2013

This version of The Weekly Benedict covers material released in the last week from 17 December 2012 – 7 January 2013 (subscribe hereget as an eBook version for your Kindle, iPod, iPad, Nook, or other eBook reader):

Index of Source Links

List of direct document links on Vatican.va used.

Angelus

General Audiences

Messages

Speeches

Papal Tweets

Please join me in praying for Syria, so that constructive dialogue will replace the horrendous violence.

@pontifex, 7 January 2013

Nigerians have a special place in my heart, as so many have been victims of senseless violence in recent months.

@pontifex, 7 January 2013

May we defend the right of conscientious objection of individuals and institutions, promoting freedom and respect for all.

@pontifex, 7 January 2013

Following Christ’s example, we have to learn to give ourselves completely. Anything else is not enough.

@pontifex, 9 January 2013

In this Year of Faith, may every Christian rediscover the beauty of being reborn in the love of God and living as his true children.

@pontifex, 13 January 2013

What happens in Baptism? We become united forever with Jesus, to be born again to a new life.

@pontifex, 13 January 2013