Textual variants in the Epistle of James

Textual variants in the Epistle of James are the subject of the study called textual criticism of the New Testament. Textual variants in manuscripts arise when a copyist makes deliberate or inadvertent alterations to a text that is being reproduced. An abbreviated list of textual variants in this particular book is given in this article below.

𝔓23 with text of James 1:10-12

Most of the variations are not significant and some common alterations include the deletion, rearrangement, repetition, or replacement of one or more words when the copyist's eye returns to a similar word in the wrong location of the original text. If their eye skips to an earlier word, they may create a repetition (error of dittography). If their eye skips to a later word, they may create an omission. They may resort to performing a rearranging of words to retain the overall meaning without compromising the context. In other instances, the copyist may add text from memory from a similar or parallel text in another location. Otherwise, they may also replace some text of the original with an alternative reading. Spellings occasionally change. Synonyms may be substituted. A pronoun may be changed into a proper noun (such as "he said" becoming "Jesus said"). John Mill's 1707 Greek New Testament was estimated to contain some 30,000 variants in its accompanying textual apparatus[1] which was based on "nearly 100 [Greek] manuscripts."[2] Peter J. Gurry puts the number of non-spelling variants among New Testament manuscripts around 500,000, though he acknowledges his estimate is higher than all previous ones.[3]

Legend

A guide to the symbols used in the body of this article.

Notable manuscripts

Notable textual variants

James 1:12

ο κυριος (the Lord) – P, 0246, Byz
κυριος (Lord) – C
ο θεος (God) – 2816, 33vid, 323, 945, 1739, vg, syrp
omitted – א, A, B, Ψ, 81, ff, cop

James 1:22

νομου (of the law) – C2, 88, 621, 1067, 1852
λογου (of the word) – rell

James 2:19

εἵς ἐστιν ὁ θεός – 𝔓74, א, A, 2464, itar, c, dem, div, p, s, z, vg syrp, copsa, bo, arm, eth
εἵς ἐστιν θεός – 945, 1241, 1739
εἵς θεὸς ἐστιν – B, 614, 630, 1505, 2412, 2495
εἵς ὁ ἐστιν θεός – C, 33, 81, 2992, syrh
ὁ θεὸς εἵς ἐστιν – Kmg, 049, 056, 0142, 88, 104, 181, 326, 436, 629, 1877, Byz, Lect
θεὸς εἵς ἐστιν – 330, 451, 2127
εἵς ὁ θεός – Cyril
ἐστιν θεός – Ψ
unus Deusff

James 2:20

αργη – B C 322 323 945 1739
νεκρα – א A C3 K P Ψ 049 056 0142 33 81 88 104 181 326 330 436 451 614 629 630 Byz
κενη – 𝔓74 itff

See also

References

  1. Adam Fox, John Mill and Richard Bentley: A Study of the Textual Criticism of the New Testament 1675–1729 (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1954), pp. 105–115; John Mill, Novum Testamentum Graecum, cum lectionibus variantibus MSS (Oxford 1707)
  2. Metzger and Ehrman (2005), p.154
  3. Peter J. Gurry, "The Number of Variants in the Greek New Testament: A Proposed Estimate" New Testament Studies 62.1 (2016), p. 113

Further reading

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