Text of the New Testament (continued) – Therivieleth

Text of the New Testament (continued)

40. The principles of WH are an extension of those of Semler and Griesbach, as described above (§ 35), and rest upon a classification of our authorities into families, and a discrimination between the merits of these families. It is in the Gospels and Acts that the textual phenomena are most plainly marked, and it is to them that the characteristics to be described apply most fully; but they are likewise true, in a lesser degree, of the other books of the NT. If the apparatus criticus of the Gospels be studied, it will be found that certain MSS and Versions tend to agree with one another, and to form groups distinguishable from other groups. Four such groups are in fact distinguished by WH, as follows; the reasons for the names assigned to them will appear shortly, (a) The Syrian family, often headed in the Gospels by the manuscripts A and C, but more fully and characteristically represented by the later uncials, such as EFKMS, etc., and by the great mass of the minuscules, by the Peshitta version, and by most of the Fathers from Chrysostom downwards; from this tamUy, in its fully developed form, is descended the TR. The Neutral family, of which the main representative is B, often supported by by LRTZ, by the minuscule Evan. 33, and some other minuscules in a lesser degree, by Boh. and sometimes Sah. and frequently by the quotations of Origen; in Acts, Epp., and Apoc, A and C generally join this group, (v) The Alexandrian family, a sort of sub-species of not continuously found in any one MS, but represented by the readings of some MSS of the P group when they differ among themselves, and especially when they differ from B; LT, and AC when they are not Syrian, may be taken as the leading members of the family. ( 5 ) The Western family, headed by D _among the uncials (with E’ in Acts and D2 in Paul.) and Evan. 473 among a small group of minuscules, but most authentically represented by the Old Latin and Old Syriac versions, and especially by k and Syr.-Sin. ; it also largely colours Sah., and is found in almost all the early Fathers, notably Justin, Irenseus, Cyprian, and Clement.

41. These being the main divisions which are found to exist among our authorities, the next step is to discriminate between them, so as to determine which is the most generally trustworthy. Here it is (in addition to the greater minuteness of the examination and analysis of the individual authorities) that the original and epoch-making character of the work of WH is most conspicuous. The first proposition — and one which strikes at the root of the claims of the TR — is this, that no specifically ‘Syrian’ reading occurs in the NT quotations of any Father before Chrysostom. In other words, wherever the Syrian family marks itself off from the others by a reading of its own, that reading cannot be shown to have been in existence before the latter part of the 4th century. The importance of this proposition is obvious, and it is noteworthy, as showing the value of Patristic evidence, that the proof of it rests wholly on the quotations found in the Fathers. The inevitable conclusion is that the Syrian text is a secondary text, formed (according to WH in Syria, and especially in Antioch) in the course of the 4th century. This secondary character is also established by an examination of representative Syrian readings (for these, see especially J. O. F. Murray’s art. ‘Textual Criticism of the NT’ in Hastings’ DB, Ext. Vol.). As compared with the rival readings of other groups, they show the ordinary signs of editorial revision, such as the modification of harsh or strange phrases, assimilation of one version of an incident with another, greater literary smoothness, and the like. A special proof of secondariness is found in what WH call conflate readings, when one group of authorities has one reading and another has a second, and the Syrian text combines the two. The shortest and simplest example is Luke 24:53. where BCL Boh. read eulogountes ton theon, D, OL, and Augustine ainountes ton theon, while A and the general mass of late uncials and minuscules have ainountes kai eulogountes ton theon. (For other examples of this type see Hort’s Introduction, and Murray, loc. cit.) The conclusion, therefore, is that the witnesses belonging to the Syrian family, although they predominate enormously in numbers, possess little intrinsic weight when opposed to witnesses of the other groups.

42. As between the remaining groups the discrimination is not so easy, and must be made by other methods. The Patristic evidence can show us that the Western text (originally so named because the principal representatives of it were the OL version, the Latin Fathers, and the bilingual MSS) was spread over all the principal provinces to which Christianity penetrated, — Syria, Egypt, Rome, Gaul, Africa, — and that it goes back as far as we have any evidence, namely to the middle of the 2nd century. On the other hand, it points to Egypt as the special stronghold of the Neutral text, and the sole home of the Alexandrian. All, however, are of such antiquity that the preference can be given to none on this ground alone. It is necessary, therefore, to look at the internal character of the several texts. Of the Western text WH say {Introd. § 170): ‘Any prepossessions in its favour that might be created by its imposing early ascendancy are for the most part soon dissipated by continuous study of its internal character.’ The chief characteristics with which they charge it are a love of paraphrase; a tendency to inter’ polate words, sentences, and even paragraphs; free changes or insertions of conjunctions, pronouns, and prepositional phrases; and generally an extreme licence in handling the original text. Alexandrian readings, on the other hand, consist mainly of slight linguistic changes, made in the interest of literary style; they are thus comparatively unimportant, and give rise to little controversy. Over against these various divergences stands the text which WH call Neutral, because it shows few or none of the signs of aberration which characterize the other groups. This text is found predominantly in B, the character of which is so superior that its evidence always deserves the most careful consideration, even when it stands alone.

43. Such is, in briefest summary, the theory with regard to the textual history of the NT propounded by WH. On its first promulgation it was bitterly assailed by the advocates of the TR; but against these its triumph, in the opinion of nearly all students of the subject, has been decisive. More recently the tendency has been to depreciate the pre-eminence of the /3 or Neutral Text, as being merely the local text of Egypt, and to exalt the or Western family, on the ground of its wide and early diffusion and the apparently primitive character of some of its special readings. A further topic of criticism has been the terminology of WH. The term ‘Syrian’ has been condemned as liable to be confused with ‘Syriac’; ‘Western’ as wholly misleading, since that type of text was widely prevalent in the East also, and probably took its rise thence; ‘Neutral’ as begging the question of the superior character of the family so described. These criticisms may be briefly dismissed; there is good foundation tor them, but they are matters of form rather than of substance. ‘Antiochian’ might be substituted for ‘Syrian’ with advantage, and the Egyptian status of the ‘Neutral’ text might be admitted without abandoning its claims to superiority; but no good substitute for ‘Western’ has yet been proposed. In some ways it would be better to abandon epithets altogether, and to call the several families by the names of the a-text, the /3-text, the y-text, and the {-text, as indicated in § 40; or the nomenclature of WH may be retained, but regarded simply as so many labels, devoid of any significant connotation.

44. It is more important to say something with regard to the comparative claims of the /3 and a texts in the first instance, and the and S texts subsequently. With regard to the former controversy, which raged with great warmth after the publication of the RV of the NT, the advocates of the or Syrian or TR (chief among whom were Dean Burgon, his disciple and literary heir the Rev. E. Miller, and the Rev. G. H. Gwilliam, the editor of the Peshitta) rest their case mainly on the numerical preponderance of the manuscripts of this type, which they take as indicating the choice, deliberate or instinctive, of the early Church, and as implying the sanction and authority of Divine Providence. But to argue thus is to maintain that the textual history of the Bible is fundamentally different from that of all other books of ancient literature, and that the reasoning faculties given to us by God, which are generally recognized as guiding us to the truth with regard to the textual history of classical literature, are not to be employed with regard to the textual history of the NT. There is nothing strange or abnormal in the rejection of a relatively large number of late authorities in favour of a relatively small number of ancient authorities; on the contrary, it is a phenomenon common to nearly all works of ancient literature that have come down to us, the sole difference being that the NT manuscripts, early and late, are far more numerous than those of any classical work, so that the ordinary phenomena are exhibited on a much larger scale. If once it be admitted that the ordinary principles of literary criticism are to be applied to the NT, then the rejection of the TR in favour of one of the earlier families follows as a matter of necessity. It may be added that the course of discovery since the publication of WH’s theory has furnished the best possible test of such a theory, that of wholly new and unforeseen witnesses, and that it has received therefrom much confirmation and no refutation. The discovery of the Sinaitic Syriac, the fuller scrutiny of the versions, the testing of the Patristic quotations (e.g. in the case of Ephraem Syrus, who was formerly supposed to have used the Peshitta), the papyrus and vellum fragments from Egypt and Sinai, the examination of more of the minuscule MSS, all these have brought additional support to readings of the P, y, and families, for which the evidence previously available was sometimes very scanty, while they have done nothing to carry back the date of the distinctively Syrian readings beyond the period assigned to them by WH, namely, the age of Chrysostom.

45. One point remains to be dealt with in this connexion, namely, the question of the origin of this ‘Syrian’ text, which thus dominated the NT tradition for considerably over a thousand years. The view of WH is that it was due to deliberate editorial revision, operating probably in two stages, the first revision taking place early in the 4th cent., the second at some time after the middle of that century. Against this hypothesis it has been objected that, if such revisions took place, we should have expected to find some record of them in early Christian literature. We know the names of several editors of the Greek OT during this very century [see Gr. Vbhsions oe OT] ; is it likely that two revisions of the NT could have been executed and yet have left no trace in history? It has been urged that there is no record of how another great textual change was carried out, namely, the substitution in the Greek OT of Theodotion’s version of Daniel for that of the LXX; and it is no doubt true that where the whole available literature likely to deal with such a subject is so scanty, the argument from silence is very precarious. Still it must be allowed to carry some weight, and not a few critics would substitute tor Hort’s double revision a process of gradual change spread over a considerable period. Such a gradual change would be due to a general consensus of opinion as to the right way to deal with divergent texts, namely, to combine them when possible, and otherwise to soften down harshnesses, to harmonize contradictions, and to give greater smoothness to the literary style. In favour of this hypothesis it may be noted that the MSS themselves show signs of a gradual and progressive development of the a text. The earliest MSS which (in the Gospels) can be classed with this family, A and C, exhibit its characteristics sporadically, not continuously, and not infrequently side with MSS of the P and { families against readings found in the overwhelming mass of later witnesses. The 6th cent. MSS, N2*, show the a text in a somewhat more advanced stage; but it Is not until we reach the later uncials, such as EFKMSn, that we find it fully developed in the form which we know as the TR. But whether we adopt the hypothesis of a definite revision or that of a gradual process of change in order to account for the existence of the a text, the fad of the existence of such a text remains,and its character as a secondary text of relatively late origin must be taken to be one of the established results of criticism.

46. The ordinary English student of the Bible is able readily to appreciate the points at issue in the controversy between the a and P texts, because they are substantially represented to him by the differences (so far as they are differences in text, and not merely in rendering) between the AV and the RV; for though the RV does not go the whole way with the ‘Neutral’ text, nevertheless its textual departures from the AV are in that direction, and give an adequate general idea of its character. In dealing with the S text, however, there is no such ready means of realizing its character, since it is not embodied in any English version, or even in any edition of the Greek text.* Its features must be gathered by an inspection of the apparatus crilicus of such works as the ‘Variorum’ edition of the English Bible, or the Oxford edition (with Sanday’s appendixes) of the Greek. Even here it is not all plain sailing, since no one MS gives a full and consistent representation of the S text, and the authorities which are predominantly of this character not infrequently disagree with regard to particular readings. Generally it may be said that the Old Syriac (especially Syr.-Sin.) and Old Latin (especially e, and Cyprian) represent the oldest form of the a text, while Codex Bezae (D), its chief champion among Greek MSS, has it in a more advanced (and more extravagant) form.

From these some idea of its divergences from the a and p texts may be gathered (though it must be remembered that sometimes a and S are found in agreement against j3, owing to the eclectic compilers of a having adopted a S readingfrom the alternatives presented to them; and sometimes, on the other hand, /3 and 5 concur in the preservation of some early reading which has been dropped or altered in a). Thus OL and OS (with nB) omit ‘firatbom’ in Mt V^, and the words ‘bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you’ and ‘despitefully use you’ in Matthew 5:44. while D in both cases has the omitted words; Syr.-Cur. has the doxology to the Lord’s Prayer, while D and most OL MSS omit it; OS omits Matthew 16 and 17:21 (with nB), while OL and D retain both; in Matthew 18:11. D, OL, and Syr.-Cur. a^ree with the a group in retaining the verse, while Syr.-Sin. sides with the P group in omitting it; after Matthew 20:28 a long additional passage (akin to Luke 14:8–11) ia inserted in D*, OL, and Syr.-Cur. (Syr.-Sin. is defective). Mark 16:9–20 is omitted by k and Syr.-Sin., inserted by D, Syr.- Cur., and most MSS of the OL. At Luke 6 D inserts the incident of the man working on the Sabbath day, but OS is defective here, and OL has no trace of it; in Luke 9:55 the TR is derived from the S text (D, OL, Syr.-Cur.), but Syr.-Sin. agrees with the |3 group in omitting the words ‘and said. Ye know not what spint ye are of,’ etoj D and some OL MSS omit Luke 22. while other OL MSS and OS transpose w."- to this place; Syr.-Sin. omits Luke 22:43, 44. but D, OL, and Syr.-Cur. retain them; in Luke 23:48 some words are added to the end by OS and g^‘, in Luke 24:6, 12, 36, where D and OL have remarkable omissions (which WH are inclined to accept, even against the testimony of B), both MSS of OS contain the omitted passages; but they concur with D and OL in omitting 24:40. These examples serve to show both the character of the & text and the way in which its authorities are divided among themselves, — a point of considerable importance; while m Acts the divergences of the text (here mainly represented by D and OL, the OS not being extant) are even greater, so much so as to have given rise to the hypothesis that it represents a different edition of the book, due to the author himself .t The vagaries of individual members of the S group are occasionally still more striking than those which have been quoted; as when two OL MSB (o and g^) insert in Matthew 1:15 the legend (apparently from the Ebiomte Gospel) of the great light which flashed from Jordan at the baptism of Jesus, or when D c and Sah. state (at Luke 23:53) that the stone at the mouth of the sepulchre was ‘such as scarce twenty men could roll.’ In addition to these substantial additions to or alterations of the text, the verbal divergences are very numerous, proving that an excessive Uoence was taken, by scribes or editors, m dealing with the Gospel text.

47. Until quite recently, the special variants of the a text were almost universally regarded as aberrations, which no one would think of accepting as readings of the original text. It is true that WH were disposed to believe that the passages omitted by the ‘Western’

A partial exception is furnished by Blaas’ texts of Mt., Lk., and Acts.

t For a fuller list of notable S-readinga, both m Ew. and Acts, see Kenyon, Handbook, pp. 76, 131-134, 293-299. authorities in the later chapters of Lk. are no authentic part of the Evangelist’s original work, but are additions made at a very early date; but this is the only case in which they accepted testimony of this class as superior to that of B and its allies, and few other scholars would at that time have gone even so far as they did. For some time after the promulgation of WH’s theory, the conflict raged over the comparative merits of the a and /3 types of text; and it was only as the superiority of the latter was more and more established that scholars began to investigate more fully the characteristics and claims of the remaining family (ignoring y, as merely a sub-species of p), for which a very high antiquity could be demonstrated. The claims of the 8 text received a considerable stimulus from the publication of more of the OL MSS (especially k), and above all from the discovery of Syr.-Sin., which is perhaps the most important single member of the group. Further attention was attracted to it by Blass’ attempt to show that the 5 text in Lk. and that in Acts represent different editions of those books, issued by Luke himself at different dates. At the present day, not a few scholars are inclined to attach considerable weight to the evidence of this family, and to hold that the /3 text, no less than the a, is due to editorial revision, and that the original form of the NT text is to be looked for in the OL and OS to a much greater extent than was previously supposed possible.

48. The main argument in favour of the S text is its great age and wide circulation, as demonstrated by the Patristic evidence of the 2nd and 3rd centuries. It has to be borne in mind, however, that purity of text is due not so much to great age as to care in transmission, and that where such care has been wanting, corruption is both rapid and far-reaching. The papyrus MSS of the Greek classics, written in the first two centuries of the Christian era, which have recently come to light in large numbers, are almost always less accurate than the vellum MSS of the lOth’and 11th cents. ; the reason no doubt being that the papyri are generally cheap copies, circulating among private individuals in the upper provinces of Egypt, while the vellum MSS represent the tradition of the great libraries, in which transcripts would be made more accurately and revised more carefully. So with regard to the early Christian literature: we can well imagine that during the century and a half following the composition of the books, when Christianity was an unauthorized religion, liable to persecution and the destruction of its books, and when Christians themselves looked for a speedy Second Coming of the Lord, there would be little care and little opportunity for the precise collation of manuscripts, and a great possibility of verbal and even material variation in transcription. It is quite intelligible, therefore, that through the greater part of the Christian world inaccurate copies would circulate, and that’ the more careful preservation of the true text would run in a comparatively narrow channel. And if there was one part of the world in which such care might more than elsewhere be expected, it was Egypt, and especially Alexandria, the home of Greek textual criticism, and the home also of the Greek version of the OT. Hence, if the internal evidence points to the ;3 text as the most accurate and authentic in character, the inference to be drawn therefrom is not materially shaken when we find signs that its birthplace was in Egypt, and that its early circulation was in that country, while texts of various shades of the 8 type were prevalent elsewhere. That such was the character of the /3 text was the deliberate opinion of WH, who were perfectly aware of the early and wide attestation of the 8 text; and their conclusion is supported by the quite independent investigations of B. Weiss, whose elaborate study (on very different lines) of the texts of the principal uncials led him to the conclusion that, whereas all the rest show marked indications of editorial revision in varying degrees, the text of B, though by no means tree from scribal blunders, has the strongest signs of authenticity and originality. It is also to be remembered that it is impossible to form a coherent text of the 6 type. The witnesses differ so much among themselves that it is easier to find a majority of them against any reading of that type than in favour of it. This appears even in Blass’ attempt to form a 8 text of Lk. and Acts, and in the other books the task is still more hopeless. Readings of the 8 type, in short, have much more the character of results of a common tendency, working more or less independently in different places under similar circumstances, than of the descendants from a common original.

49. The natural conclusion, therefore, would seem to be that the /3 text still holds the position of superiority which was secured for it by the searching criticism of WH ; and this, on the whole, is probably the prevalent view to-day. At the same time it must be admitted that individual readings of the 8 class deserve more respectful consideration than heretofore. Reverting once more to the results obtained in the analogous field of classical literature, the evidence of early papyri, while it generally confirms the superiority of the MS or MSS which modern criticism has selected as the best of any given author, nevettheless tends to show that the truth is not always to be found in any one witness or group of witnesses. The best MSS sometimes make mistakes, and in such cases the true reading may be preserved in MSS which as a rule are inferior. To this possibility the critic must always be alive, and all the more so when the alternative reading is certainly a very early one, as those of the 6 family often must be. Consequently an editor of the NT, though he would do well to pin his faith generally to the |8 family, is bound also to consider readings of the 8 type on their merits; and that especially when support is found for them from more than one branch of the 8 family. The Latin and Syriac branches of the family often differ; but when they agree, the reading which they support must certainly go back to a very early date. The Codex Bezae, the principal Greek member of the family, represents its characteristics in a somewhat extreme form, and readings supported by it alone must be regarded with much suspicion; but in combination with OL and OS it becomes a very important witness. If, in the future, earlier copies of the Gospels than are at present known to us should come to light, they may very probably represent the characteristics of this group to some extent; but it will still remain to be considered whether they seriously affect the pre-eminence of the small but select body of authorities to which WH gave, and gave justifiably, as it would seem, the name of ‘Neutral.’

50. For literature bearing on the earlier sections of this article see notes at the end of 55 9, 16, 24, 30, 32. ‘The history and bibliography of textual criticism are best set out in Tregelles’ Account of the Printed Text of the NT (1854); Scrivener’s Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the NT (4th ed . 1894) ; and G regory ‘s Prolegomena to Tisohendort’s edition (1894), and Textkritikdes NT (,1900). Shortersummariesof the historical matter, with fuller discussions of the textual problem as it stands since Westcott and Hort, will be found in Kenyon’s Handbook to the Textual Criticism of the NT (1901), and Nestle’s Introduction to the Textual Criticism of the Greek NT (Eng. tr. from the 2nd German ed. 1901); the latter is particularly good for bibUographioal information. Hort’s Introduction (forming vol. li. of The NT in the Original Greek, by B. F. Westcott and F. J. A. Hort, 1881) is, of course, invaluable for its statement of the principles of textual criticism, and for its exposition of the epoch-making theory of these two scholars. Murray’s article in the Ext. Vol. of Hastings’ DB is an elaborate vindication of WH’s position, based largely upon the materials left behind by Hort. For an introduction to the subject on the smallest possible scale, Prof. K. Lake’s Text of the NT (1900) can be strongly recommended.

The fullest apparatus criticus at present available is that in Tischendorf’s NT Grace’, 1869-72. A very serviceable select apparatus is given in Sanday’s appendixes to the Oxford Greek Testament (1889), which also includes a full poUation of WH. For English readers a select apvaraius is provided in Eyre & Spottiswoode’s Variorum Bible (NT by Sanday, Clarke, and Goodwin, revised in 1888). Of revised texts the most important are (1) Westcott and Hort (vol. i. of the work cited above, also printed separately); (2) The Greek Testament with the readings adopted by the Revisers of the A V (Oxford, 1881, edited by E. Palmer); (3) Weymouth’s Resultant Greek Testament (1886), based upon a comparison of all the principal editions from Lachmann to the RV; (4) Nestle’s edition, based originally (Stuttgart, 1898) on a comparison of Tischendort, WH, and Weymouth, on tlieprincij)fe of following always the reading of the majority, and giving select variants (without the authorities forthem) at thefoot; in latereditions (1901, etc.) Weiss has been substituted for Weymouth. Nestle’s text has since 1904 been adopted by the British and Foreign Bible Society, with a different apparatus, giving every variation of any importance from the TR and th^ text underlying the RV. It is now, therefore, easy to obtain a text of the NT based upon the best available witnesses, as arrived at by a consensus of the most competent critics, and unquestionably superior in accuracy and authenticity to the TR. A new edition of the NT, on a large scale, which promises to be of great importance, is being prepared by Prof. H. voa Soden. F. G. Kenyon.

Thadd

Thadd iEUS.— This is the name of one of the Twelve Apostles as given in Matthew 10:3. Mark 3:18. He is doubtless to be identified with the ‘Judas [son] of James,’ who appears in the Lukau lists (Luke 6:16, Acts 1:13; so RV, but AV renders ‘brother of James’), and with the ‘Judas, not Iscariot,’ of John 14:22. though some Syrian writers have made this last Judas to be the same as the Apostle Thomas (syrsin reads here ‘Thomas,’ syrcor reads ‘Judas Thomas’), Thomas being confessedly only a surname, ‘the Twin.’

In all four lists Thaddasus (or Judas) comes next to Simon the Canansean or Zealot, and may not improbably have been his brother or intimate friend (cf. the variant ‘Judas Zelotes’ in Matthew 10:3. noted below). It is the opinion of almost all modern scholars that neither is to be identified with any of the Brethren of our Lord, though Dom Chapman has lately published an elaborate argument to the contrary (JThSt vii. 412).

Instead of, or in addition to, ‘Thaddaeus,’ we find the variant Lebbseus. In Mark 3:18. Codex Bezae (D) and some Old Latin MSS have ‘Lebb«us’; but all the best authorities, Including syrsi" (syr<:>» is wanting here), have ‘Thaddseus,’ and this is doubtless right. In Matthew 10:3 the oldest Greek MSS ( K B), the Vulgate, the Coptic, and some Old Latin MSS have ‘Thaddseus,’ while D, supported by the valuable Old Latin k and some other MSS, has ‘Lebbieus.’ Some other Old Latin MSS have ‘Judas Zelotes,’ and syr^io has ‘Judas son (sic) of James’ (syri™^ is wanting here). Some inferior MSS and several Versions combine ‘Lebbseus’ and ‘Thaddaeus,’ as AV (‘L. whose surname was Th.’); but this is clearly a later explanation, and must be rejected. We see, then, that in Mt. ‘Thaddasus’ has the best attestation, and this alone is read in RV, from which ‘Lebbaeus’ has completely disappeared. But how could ‘Lebbaeus’ have been invented? It has been suggested (a) that some early scribe, taking ‘Thaddaeus’ and ‘Lebbaeus’ to be names of kindred meaning, the former from an Aramaic word denoting ‘breast,’ the latter from another denoting ‘heart,’ confused the two; or (6), with greater probability, that ‘Lebbffius’ Is a form of ‘Levi,’ introduced by some scribe who did not know that Levi and Matthew were the same person. It does not affect these explanations if, with Dalman, we hold that these derivations are in fact wrong, for the scribes were not necessarily qualified to be good philologers.

After NT times Thaddeus (Syr. Taddai) was often confused with Addai, who was said to be one of the Seventy disciples, and who, being sent to Edessa, healed Abgarus (see Smith-Wace, Did. Chr. Biog. iv. 875). In a list of Apostles given in Lagarde’s Appendix to the Aposlphc Con5(t(u(io7is(p.283),Thadd8eu3,’whoi3 Lebbaeus andJudas,’ is distinguished from ‘Judas of JameSj’ and is said to have E reached at Edessa, to have been buned in Egypt, and to ave been crucified. A. J. Macleah.

THANK -OPPEBING.— See Sacrifice, 12.

Tharra

See Teresh.

Thassi

The surname of Simon the Maccabee (1 Maccabees 2:3). The meaning of the word is quite uncertain. As likely an interpretation as any is ‘the zealous.’

Theatre

The name is Greek ait. ‘a place for viewing’ [a spectacle]), and the thing appears to be of Greek origin also. From the cities of Greece proper, theatres spread all over the Greek and Roman world. The .auditorium consisted regularly of a semicircular cavity cut on the side of a hill, much broader at the upper end than the lower. The seats were placed concentrically, being commonly carved out of the rock. The part level with the ground, the orchestra, was occupied by the choir. The stage and scene were on the diameter, and were of artificial construction, being very often like the front of a temple. The theatres were used for public meetings, as being generally the largest buildings in the cities (Acts 19:29, 31 ; cf . also art. Ephesus).

A. SOUTER.

Thebaic Version

See Text of NT, § 27.

Thebes

See No.

Thebez

A fortified city, in the reduction of which Abimelech met his death (Judges 9:50. 2 Samuel 11:21). It is described by Eusebius and Jerome as 13 miles from Neapolis, on the road to Scythopolis. This is almost certainly the present TObas, a prosperous village in a fruitful open valley, 10 miles N.E. of Nablus, on the ancient highroad to Beisan. E. W. G. Masterman.

Theft

See Crimes and Punishments, § 6.

Thelersas

See Tel-habsha.

Theodotion

See Greek Versions of OT, p. 319’>.

Theodotus

1. One of the messengers sent by Nicanor to Judas Maccabaeus (2 Mao 14"). 2. The author of a plot to assassinate king Ptolemy PhUopator, which was frustrated by Dositheus (3 Maccabees 1:2).

THEOFHILUS Qit. ‘beloved of God’).— The person to whom St. Luke’s two works are addressed (Luke 1:3. Acts 1:1). That Theophilus stands for a real person and is not a general name for the Christian reader is made probable by the title ‘most excellent,’ which, when strictly used, implies equestrian rank (Ramsay, St. Paul p. 388). It is used alsojof Felix (Acts 23:26 24:3) and of Festus (26:25). But some take the title as a mere complimentary address, and therefore as telling us nothing of Theophilus himself. If it is used strictly, we may agree with Ramsay that Theophilus was a Roman official, and the favourable attitude of St. Luke to the institutions of the Empire is in keeping with this idea. If so, Theophilus would be the Christian, not the Roman, name of the person addressed. A. J. Maclean.

Theras

Theras (1 Es 8")=Ahava (wh. see), Ezra 8.

Therivieleth

See Telmelah.