Corpus-Paul

["Michael Thompson" <mbt2 AT cam.ac.uk>]

Frank Hughes wrote:

> Given what Koester showed in his dissertation, Synoptische Ueberlieferung
bei
> den Apostolischen Väter, namely that the 2nd century quotes of the
synoptic
> gospels don't match the Greek NT text that we now reconstruct, I often
wonder
> whether, if we had MSS. of the Pauline corpus dating before 200 C.E., we
would
> really have a firm text, or whether we would have rather different texts
of
> Paul perhaps in different regions or among church people of different
> theological persuasions.

The problem with this argument is that the purpose of the Fathers in the
texts Koester examined was not to preserve the gospel traditions they had
but to illustrate and support their arguments from them. We don't know if
they had the texts in front of them when they wrote or whether they quoted
from memory, or simply alluded to oral traditions. Certainly they use the
texts with freedom. How they would have felt about the incorporation of
changes in the 'authoritative' mss they had is another question.

The analogy with the texts of the gospels is a fair one though, in which
case don't we have some mss that go a little further back into the _early_
2nd c to give us a feel for flexibility and firmness of texts? But I don't
really want to bring the gospels into this unless someone wants to talk
about Paul's interest in Jesus!

Mike Thompson
Cambridge, UK

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