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Delve into our New Testament Textual Commentary Articles. Enhance your Bible study with scholarly insights and interpretations.
The emphasized words, although by now a very familiar quotation, are omitted from the RV and most other modern versions; it was also omitted by the Wycliffe (1380) and Rheims (1582) versions. This clause is not found in א B D L W Ξ ƒ1, several cursives, and Latin, Sahidic, and many Syriac and Boharic MSS. It is present in A Θ Ψ ƒ13, and some Italic MSS.
Many (perhaps most) modern versions emulate the Revised Version and simply omit the sentence in question without any explanatory comment. This is a complete sentence, and yet it did not receive, in the Textus Receptus editions, a verse number of its own. It does not appear here in the majority of important codices, such as א B C D L W Δ Θ and Latin, Sahidic, and some Syriac and Boharic manuscripts. It does, however, appear in some significant manuscripts, including ƒ1,13, A, two very old Latin manuscripts, and some Syriac and Boharic manuscripts, and with slight differences in minuscule 33 (9th century).
The words πολλοὶ γάρ εἰσιν κλητοί, ὀλίγοι δὲ ἐκλεκτοί (for many are called but few chosen) have probably been added at the end of this verse by copyists who remembered another parable which has these words at the end (see 22:14). It is possible, but less likely, that these additional words are original and were accidentally omitted by a copyist whose eye jumped from the end of the word ἔσχατοι to the end of the word ἐκλεκτοί.
The Western text has an addition after v. 28 that was adopted by the Byzantine text and lies behind the AV rendering, “And when he had said these words, the Jews departed, and had great reasoning among themselves.” The addition was probably made because of the abrupt transition from v. 28 to v. 30.
P74 א A B H L P 049 cop lack the following from vss 6-8, which read, according to (E) Ψ Maj 33 614 1739 it (syr): “We wanted to judge him according to our own Law. 7 But Lysias the commander came along, and with much violence took him out of our hands, 8 ordering his accusers to come before you.” The earliest and most reliable manuscripts have the shorter reading. The interpolation is a classic example of a scribe trying to fill in what he perceives to be gaps in the text.
Verse 34 is not contained in the earliest and diverse manuscripts (P74 א A B E Ψ Maj syrp copbo), while vs. 34 is contained in two different forms in other manuscripts (C 33 614 1739 syr** copsa) “But it seemed good to Silas to remain there” and (P127vid D it,w) “But it seemed good to Silas to remain with them, so Judas traveled alone.”
If the verse was an original part of Luke’s text, there is no good reason for explaining why it would have been omitted in so many ancient manuscripts and versions. Rather, this verse is a classic example of scribal gap-filling, in that it supplied the apparent gap left by the unanswered question of the previous verse (“The eunuch said, ‘Look, here is water! What is to prevent me from being baptized?’ ”).
Some translations add verses and phrases that are not in the oldest and most reliable available Bible manuscripts. Many modern translations either omit those later additions or acknowledge that those additions lack support from the most authoritative sources. Many of these were added hundreds of years after the Bible author wrote his book.
The earliest and most reliable manuscripts (P75 א A B L W Δ Θ Ψ f1 33 cop,bo[122]) does not contain 17:36, while later manuscripts (D f 700 it syr) does contain verse 36, “Two men will be in the field; one will be taken, and the other will be left.”
Variant Reading(s): differing versions of a word or phrase found in two or more manuscripts within a variation unit (see below). Variant readings are also called alternate readings.
