Session FiveCorruption: Satan at Work

Types of Corruption – Accidental*

• Purely accidental – bad originals, insertion/omission, differing styles

• Homoeoteleuton – likeness of ending words, consecutive words, next line words, etc.

• Uncials – Upper case with no punctuation, confusion to placement of word in sentence

• Itacism (also Etacism) – mistakes caused by knowing the spoken word, and misspelling it in written form

• Liturgical Influence – mistaking a note or statement in a liturgical setting as scripture

*Burgon, J. W. ”Causes of Corruption of the Traditonal Text” p.10-88

Types of Corruption – Intentional

• Willful mutilation of scripture – remove (take away) that which doesn’t match false doctrine

• Editorial corrections to the biblical text – altering of (adding to) the text to reflect the copyist’s doctrine

Revelation 22:18-19 For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.

The Father of Corruption

Genesis 3:1 Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?

• At first mention Satan is called “more subtil”

• Satan casts doubt on the word of God from the beginning

The Father of Corruption

Galatians 1:6-8 I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel: Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.

The Father of Corruption

Revelation 2:8-9And unto the angel of the church in Smyrna write; These things saith the first and the last, which was dead, and is alive; I know thy works, and tribulation, and poverty, (but thou art rich) and I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan.

When Did Corruption Occur?

II Peter 3:16…they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction. • Corruption began before the Bible was

completed• Contrary to the testimony of modern

textual critics, the majority of (and worst) corruption occurred within the first two centuries after the Bible was written

• Where? Alexandria, Egypt*

*Grady, William P. ”Final Authority” p.73-96

Origen (185-254 A.D.)

• Influenced by “Alexandrian Christian Philosophy” as popularized by Clement (150-217 A.D.)

• He was influenced by gnostic doctrine– He interpreted scripture in a mystical

way – “The scriptures are of little use to those who understand them as they are written”

– He believed in universal salvation

• He was one of the first to refer to pastors as priests

Origen (185-254 A.D.)

• He wrote about 6,000 books which contain many thousands of biblical quotations

• His crowning work was his Hexapla – a six-column parallel Old Testament

• He frequently corrected the New Testament text– His method has become known as

“conjectural emendation” among textual critics

– This means to “change the text to what you think it should be”

Principle Players of Corruption

• Origen (185-254 A.D.)• Eusebius (260-339 A.D.) –

commissioned by Constantine to produce the Greek Eusebio-Constantine Bible

• Jerome (320-420 A.D.)– commissioned by Pope Damasus to

standardize the Latin text– His Latin Vulgate was the official

Catholic Bible through the Dark Ages

Corruption from Origen

Greek copies of

the originals

Eusebio-Constantine Bible (331

A.D.) “Official Greek”

Latin Vulgate (390-405 A.D.)

“Official Latin”

ORIGEN“The Father of Corrupt

Bibles”

Old Latin (150 A.D.)

Waldensian Bibles

Rheims-Douay English Version (1582-1610 A.D.)

“Official English”

Codex Vaticanus

(B)

Corrupted Latin Bibles

Pure Stream

Sinaiticus (א) and Vaticanus (B)

• Two uncial codices that date from around 340 A.D.

• Accepted by textual critics on the basis of their age

• The reason they have survived is a lack of use– Sinaiticus discovered in a trash can in

1844– Vaticanus stored in a library– They are both parchment manuscripts

• They came out of Alexandria bearing the influence of Origen and Eusebius and gnostic doctrine

Westcott and Hort

• B. F. Westcott (1825-1901 A.D.) and F. J. A. Hort (1828-1892 A.D.)

• Their work was done in an age of reason that denied the supernatural

• These two men produced a Greek text in 1881– They deny verbal inspiration– This text was based primarily on א and B

• The modern “science” of textual criticism is in large part due to their theory

English Perversions

Greek copies of

the originals

Nestle-Aland Text United

Bible Societies

Text

Westcott and Hort

Text

Vast majority of miniscule

manuscripts

The Received Text of

Erasmus

Hodges-Farstad Majority

Text

Eclectic Texts

Nestle Text

Pure Stream

KJV (1611)

RV (1881) ASV

(1901)

RSV (1946)

TEV (1966)

NIV (1973)

NKJV (1979)

LB (1967)

NASB (1963)

Corrupt Greek

manuscripts

Principle Procedures of Corruption

• Cast doubt– Appeal to human reason: Oldest = Best– King James Onlyers are too emotional,

therefore must be wrong– KJV doesn’t keep up with English language

changes

• Blame the messenger– King James not a good person– Translators not Baptist

• Hide their agenda – pre-imminence, recognition, money