late 4th to early 5th century Peshitta Manuscript

[Paul Younan]

I don't think it's confusion as much as it is purposeful deception, Akhi.

I'm not quite sure folks who have dedicated their lives to this sort of thing like Brock, Heal, Kiraz, Taylor, Juckel, etc. are perpetrating a conspiracy, Akhi. <!-- s --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/smile.gif" alt="" title="Smile" /><!-- s -->

While not speaking directly of the scholars who dedicate their research to Aramaic (I was referring to the general NT scholarship), but since you mentioned it ....

While it is hard to paint all of the above authors with the same general brush, I have to disagree with you, Akh. Anyone who treats the two distinct lines of text as if they were one contiguous textual tradition, does a disfavor not only to their reputation, but also to the truth.

Brock often times speaks and writes of the Peshitta without any differentiation between eastern vs. western transmission, as if it were a single entity. Kiraz used a hybrid "critical" text of the Gospels in his comparative edition, aligning it with the OSc and OSs, etc. What he should have done, in fact, was separate the two lines of transmission - they are not the same. Any co-mixture of the eastern text with the western dilutes it, and stains it.

Juckel is perhaps the most careful to differentiate, at least when he wrote the article detailing the variants in Codex Phillips 1388, he admitted it was a Monophysite text and that it was the product of a revisionary transmission history....we treated that topic a decade ago on this forum:

http://www.peshitta.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=685

As it was the Miaphysite Syriac Orthodox Church which was in permanent contact with Hellenistic culture and continuously revised their New Testament to bring it in better line with the Greek text and canon, this 'comparative edition' is dominated by materials of Syriac Orthodox provenance.

It was the formative period of the Miaphysite Church within the Greek Byzantine Oikumene, which was open to direct Greek influence on the Syriac New Testament and on existing Greek patristic translations.

That type of differentiation and clarity is what I appreciate. Calling something the "Peshitta" which is found in Egypt is at best, a disservice to the Peshitta as we know it in our eastern tradition, which by *all* accounts is vastly superior in faithful transmission.

I don't mind something found in Egypt, or Mardin, being called the "Peshitto", after their mangling of the proper pronunciation of the letter Aleph, but I don't like it being called the "Peshitta." It creates confusion. That text would not be allowed on our altars, nor would it be allowed to be read from.

+Shamasha