Thursday, November 20, 2014

70. the gospel of Marcion had Matthew 10:32 - 33

from David Inglis, "Also I say unto you, Whosoever shall confess me before men, him shall the Son of man also confess before the angels of God: [12:8] But he that denieth me before men shall be denied before the angels of God. [12:9] Tertullian refers to the corresponding passage in Mcg as follows: But this conclusion I can draw also from the following words: "For I say unto you, Whosoever shall confess me before men, him will I also confess before God." [12:8] … and this forewarning He offers, in order that He might subjoin a clause on the necessity of confessing Him: "Every one that denies me before men shall be denied before God" [12:9] … Tertullian quotes “before God” at the end of both verses, and Epiphanius confirms this shorter variant in v. 12:8: Instead of "he shall confess before the angels of God", Marcion says "before God". (Scholion 30) There is evidence that “the angels” was omitted in a very small number of mss. Willker reports the omission in 01*vid and 259, and that: According to the apparatus of NA, 01* omits [the angels] both times, verse 8 and 9. This is not correct. Timothy A. Brown confirmed this. The omission in verse 9 is also not in Tischendorf, Swanson and IGNTP. He also notes: Timothy A. Brown from the Sinaiticus transcription project wrote: "In verse 8 the letters twn ag are written by the first hand over an erasure. What the first hand originally wrote and then erased is not clear. The tou qu at the end of the line appears to have been written by a first hand and then reinforced by a later corrector since the article is certainly a first hand and traces of the associated nomen sacrum appear beneath the corrector's ink. - Amy Myshrall is the other transcriber in the Codex Sinaiticus Project. She has independently concluded the same correction scenario I've outlined above." The parallel verses in Mt read as follows: Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven.[Mt 10:32] But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven. [Mt 10:33] The existence of these verses makes it unlikely that Marcion removed “the angels of” from both verses to create the text that Tertullian saw. As noted by Willker: The omission is probably a harmonization to Mt. There is no reason why the angels should have been added secondarily. The omission by 01 is probably just accidental. It appears therefore that Tertullian saw in Mcg a version of v. 12:8-9 that is similar to what we see in Mt 10:32-33, except reading “God” rather than “my Father which is in heaven.” However, Epiphanius makes no comment regarding “Son of Man” in v. 12:8, nor anything regarding v. 12:9, so we assume that he still saw “God” in v. 12:8, but possibly saw the rest of these two verses as we now see them.


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