I'll try to explain this as simply as possible.
Everyone agrees that the original writings of scripture (known as the
autographs) have not survived nor come down to us. What we have are copies
of copies of copies, ecetera, ecetera. Through the years errors have been
made by the scribes who copied those manuscripts. Depending on the
geographical location of those manuscripts, certain errors could be detected
and the various manuscripts were classified into three or four groups known
as text families. The four commonly accepted textual families are the
Byzantine (also known as the Majority Text) which had their origin near
Constantinople, the Western which had their origins in North Africa and
Italy, the Alexandrian which had their origin in Egypt, and the Casarean,
which had their origin in Palestine. Until the the mid 1800's what was
available to were manuscripts based upon the Byzantine family of
manuscripts. Since the Byzantine empire existed for several centuries longer
than the Roman empire in palestine, Egypt and in Italy and continued to use
the Greek language, a greater number of manuscripts were copied of that
family. In fact, over 90% of the 5000 some Greek manuscripts belong to the
Byzantine family, hence the name Majority text. these were the manuscripts
that were used by the Reformers such as Tyndale, Luther and by the
translators of the Authorized Version (known here in the States as the KJV,
King James Version). They were acknowledged as the commonly accepted text
(known from the Latin phrase "Textus Receptus" i.e. the text received by all
scholars. This family of manuscripts contined to be the Greek New
Testament, until the mid 1800's when manuscripts of the other families were
brought to light and were examine by scholars who used them to form a new
basis for a Greek Testament, which is commonly refered to as the Critical
text, because of the judicious examination that went into the selection of
the critical readings that made up the manuscirpts. It is based primarily on
the manuscripts fromt he Alexandrian family, which are regared by most
scholars as the oldest of the four families and therefore those most like
the autographs. May good schoalrs disagree with that line of reasoning. But
the Scrivener and Stepahnus' texts are both editions of the Textus Receptus
while the UBS and Nestle-Aland, and Westcott & Hort Text mainly represent
the readings found in the Alexandrian family of manuscripts. Most of the
modern English Bible versions (since 1885) are based upon the manuscripts of
the critical text, with the only exception being the New King James Version
(NKJV) and a few other lesser known versions.
It's a wee bit more complicated than this, but this will serve to orient you
to the basic issues.
If you need more information or have specific questions, please don't
hesitate to contact me.
Kevin W. Woodruff
At 10:40 AM 6/18/97 -0700, you wrote:
>Hello...
>
>I am new to this forum and have been listening for only a couple
>of days.
>
>My name is Ben Loomes. I am a graduade in Composition (Music) at the
>University of Sydney, NSW, Australia.
>
>Your writing is good and some interesting issues are being handled.
>
>My major work when I graduated last year was a research paper looking
>at the works of one Australian Composer (Ian Shanahan) and his use of
>Gematria (Isosephia) and Sacred Geometry in his works.
>
>I am a Christian. (I hesitate at using any sort of adjective before
>that word...)
>
>I've done a lot of work on this subject, using many secondary sorces,
>but now I am interested in finding different versionn of the
>Greek New Testament. I have the Scrivener's one, and a Stephanus, but
>these seem quite different from your typical United Bible Society
>version.
>
>I know there is a reason for this. (What is it?)
>
>I want to get hold of a text which is most like the greek written by
>the writers of the day.
>
>What should I be looking for...?
>
>Can anyone direct me to a page?
>
>Or can anyone tell me what version is what?
>
>If anyone could does this for me I would be very thankful.
>
>With thanks,
>
>Ben Loomes.
>
>
>
Kevin W. Woodruff
Library Director/Reference Librarian
Cierpke Memorial Library
Tennessee Temple University/Temple Baptist Seminary
1815 Union Ave.
Chattanooga, Tennessee 37404
423/493-4252 (office)
423/698-9447 (home)
423/493-4497 (FAX)
Cierpke@utc.campus.mci.net (preferred)
kwoodruf@utkux.utcc.utk.edu (alternate)
http://funnelweb.utcc.utk.edu/~kwoodruf/woodruff.htm