p. 77 | A QUESTIONABLE READING by G. W. A.

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 6, 1879

A QUESTIONABLE READING.

By G. W. A.

Some time since a brother wrote to the Review asking for an explanation in regard to a reading of Rev. 22:14, which differs essentially from the common version. The text says, “Blessed are they that do his commandments.” The reading referred to is, “Blessed are they that have washed their robes.”

To this we would say, There is a material difference between the two readings, but which is the older and better one is purely a matter of textual criticism.

In regard to this passage, Dean Alford, the well-known English critic, in his “Notes for English Readers,” says: “The difference in the two readings is curious, being in the original that between Poiountes tas entolas auton, keeping the commandments of him, and Plunontes tas stolas auton, washing the robes of them;” And he adds: “Either of which might easily be mistaken for the other.”

Dean Alford has edited a Greek New Testament from the old manuscripts, and his note is of value, as it shows how such a reading might occur; for to both the eye and ear these two readings are quite similar.

William Greenfield, A. M., the able editor of the Greek New Testament now commonly used, has marked the reading in question as “inferior to the received text.”

The Syriac New Testament confirms the common version, and reads, “Blessed are they that do his commandments.” It is interesting to add that this old version, according to Horne, Michaelis, and not a few other critics, was made in the last part of the FIRST CENTURY, and has been handed down to us through a line entirely independent of the Greek New Testament. When we remember that the apostle John wrote the Apocalypse and his gospel in the very close of the first century, the reading of the Syriac version becomes intensely interesting.

The papal manuscript B, in the library at Rome, reads, “Blessed are they that do his commandments.” This is an important witness. See further remarks in the Scotch Commentary, by Jamieson and Fausset.

The Coptic version, made in the third century for the Christians of Egypt, reads as above, thus further confirming our time-honored translation.

Tertullian, an old Latin church father, of North Africa, born so early as A. D. 160, is a powerful witness for the received reading. In the “Writings of Tertullian,” vol. iii. p. 109, he gives the text in question thus: “Blessed are they who act according to the precepts, that they may have power over the tree of life, and over the gates, for entering into the holy city.” Such a witness is of nearly the same importance as a New-Testament manuscript of the same date.

And, finally, Cyprian, bishop of Carthage, A. D. 248, reads the text exactly the same as our good old translation. From “The Writings of Cyprian,” vol. ii. p. 122, we copy his exact words thus: “Blessed are they that do his commandments.”

It should here be remarked that the testimony of Cyprian antedates every New-Testament manuscript by a hundred years, and the use of the text in question by Tertullian is more than a century earlier still.

Now, let it be noted that all the above are very early ancient testimonies. Also, such able critics as Dr. Adam Clarke, the well-known commentator, and Dr. Bloomfield, who edited a Greek New Testament with English notes, take no notice of this entirely different reading. And the revised German Testament of Luther, the French of Martin, the Swedish, Italian, Danish, Holland, and Portuguese versions, with a long list of English translations, and the Latin version of Arius Montanus, edited by Leusden, all confirm the good old reading which says: “Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.”

G. W. A.