Codex Sinaiticus - the facts

Unbound68 said:
They must've known what was coming, and wanted to make the discussion as disjointed and distracting as possible.

Did you notice Waite chuckling and smiling as he gave Daniels two thumbs up at the end?.... as if to say "I'll pull you from the fire buddy."
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No, I’d probably turned around or if not I was focused elsewhere. I was about to level him with his claim that Tischendorf had stained the manuscript when Simonides was clear he saw it in 1852 already stained to make it look older. Since Tischendorf was never there between 1844 and 1853, it couldn’t have been him unless one argues that he did it in 1844 (why would he?).

It is standard procedure to take the FIRST version of a story as the uncontaminated version and investigate it from there. The SART team is an embarrassment to logic and common sense as every member of that group KNOWS Simonides had nothing at all to do with it. Simonides said what he said in the 1862 version because he was lying and thus didn’t know how complicated collation is or the fact Hermas really was complete or a dozen other things. When these points were raised, he simply changed his story EXACTLY AS LIARS DO!!!

I’d like to see every member of the SART team hooked up to a polygraph and answer questions. Then we’d know whether they’re lying or merely self-deluded (“it’s not a lie if you believe it” as one Queens resident told Jerry Seinfeld).

In the end, they know Simonides had nothing to do with it. Look how complicated they’re having to make this with each revelation. Then again we are talking about at least one individual who believes hundreds if not thousands of NASA workers conspired to fake the moon landing, too.
 
Conan said:
Vaticanus is thought to be earlier because it does not have the Eusebian Canons, unlike Sinaiticus, which has them from the first hand.
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The Eusebian canons were added to Sinaiticus by the first hand, but not added to the whole document, as they aren't in Luke.

Conan said:
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It is posited by Skeat that both Sinaticus and Vaticanus were both the immediate consequence of Constantine's order for 50 bibles for Constantinople, and originated in the same scriptorium, although it is conceded that Sinaticus never reached Constantinople, after it was abandoned, most probably in Caesarea.

However much of the history of Vaticanus is speculation. Vaticanus was likely soon viewed as defective (as was Sinaiticus) and so was left unused for a long period, whereever it ended up, prior to its defects being remedied at a much later date (possibly in Constantinople).

-----------
Skeat Collected Writings by Elliot JK (Dating and origin of codex vaticanus)
p.286

Among Skeat’s persuasive arguments is the constant message that
no-one working in this area should forget that Codex Sinaiticus and
Codex Vaticanus are from the same scriptorium. The common ori-
gins of Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus have been regarded
as axiomatic from the days of Tischendorf through Lake to the present
and no responsible New Testament scholar should ignore this
fact. Among his proofs are:

i) The very close resemblance of the colophon design at the end
of Deuteronomy (in Codex Vaticanus) with that at the end of
Mark in Codex Sinaiticus.15 [This Skeat identifies as his strongest
argument and one which must be understood and recognised.]

ii) Possibly Codex Sinaiticus shares a scribe with Codex Vaticanus.
Two of their hands may be identical. This is a disputed point
because the re-inking of Codex Vaticanus at a later date (probably
ninth-tenth centuries) makes it difficult to examine carefully
the hand of the original scribes. Tischendorf thought hand D of
Codex Sinaiticus was the same as hand B of Codex Vaticanus
but Milne and Skeat argued16 that the closest resemblance was
between scribe D of Codex Sinaiticus and scribe A of Codex
Vaticanus and that, even if they are not the same, “the identity
of the scribal tradition stands beyond dispute”. Cavallo agreed
with Milne and Skeat. However, this is not a point Skeat himself
would now wish to dwell upon.

[We must remember that the colophon designs were not reinked,
although the lettering was.]

iii) Another relevant consideration is the fact that Vaticanus and
Sinaiticus both end their text of Mark with the same verse. One
of the features of Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus is that
they, virtually alone among New Testament manuscripts, end
Mark at 16:8 (even though it is plausible that the scribe of Codex
Vaticanus was hesitant to do so.)17 Sinaiticus does not provide
any evidence for the continuing of the text after verse 8, and
did not do so even before the re-writing of the bifolium, the
error which provoked the re-writing being in the text of Luke 1.

[Skeat posits that Vaticanus was sent to Constantinople from Caesarea.]

p.291
As far as competing places of origin for the composition of the
two manuscripts are concerned (i.e. other than Caesarea), the strongest alternative
(and the one favoured in the introduction to the new facsimile) is Alexandria.
That is often based on the several grounds. These are noted below with counter-arguments attached:

1) The suggestion has been made that Codex Vaticanus was one of
the Bibles sent from Alexandria by Athanasius to Constans has
already been referred to. But if Vaticanus had been sent from
Alexandria to Niš (Serbia) we need to ask how, when and why it got to
Rome in the fifteenth century.

2) The text of Vaticanus resembles the text-type of certain third century
Egyptian manuscripts, notably P75. But this need not be a
decisive argument in favour of Alexandria and against Caesarea.
As Zuntz reminds us, Caesarea was a centre of Alexandrian
scholarship—the two cities were not so far from each other: we
need think only of the link from Origen through Pamphilus to
Eusebius himself. Also to be remembered is the fact that manuscripts
older than Vaticanus and Sinaiticus are papyri, which virtually
all come from Egypt. We do not have comparable third century
witnesses from other places, such as, for example, Caesarea.

3) Hexaplaric influences in Vaticanus such as the addition of obeli
and asterisks in Isaiah, Zechariah, Malachi and Jeremiah are sometimes
given as evidence of an Egyptian provenance. But they
reflect only Egyptian influence that could plausibly have reached
Caesarea through the person of even Origen himself.

4) Earlier arguments, by Lake and others, emphasise that certain
features of the script of Codex Sinaiticus are Egyptian (the alleged
Coptic mu, a cursive xi and a strangely formed omega) but these
have been dismissed by no less an authority than Cavallo and
by Milne and Skeat as not decisive.
 
cjab said:
The Eusebian canons were added to Sinaiticus by the first hand, but not added to the whole document, as they aren't in Luke.
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But they existed when Sinaiticus was made. They are absent from Vaticanus.

It is posited by Skeat that both Sinaticus and Vaticanus were both the immediate consequence of Constantine's order for 50 bibles for Constantinople, and originated in the same scriptorium, although it is conceded that Sinaticus never reached Constantinople, after it was abandoned, most probably in Caesarea.

However much of the history of Vaticanus is speculation. Vaticanus was likely soon viewed as defective (as was Sinaiticus) and so was left unused for a long period, whereever it ended up, prior to its defects being remedied at a much later date (possibly in Constantinople).

-----------
Skeat Collected Writings by Elliot JK (Dating and origin of codex vaticanus)
p.286

Among Skeat’s persuasive arguments is the constant message that
no-one working in this area should forget that Codex Sinaiticus and
Codex Vaticanus are from the same scriptorium. The common ori-
gins of Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus have been regarded
as axiomatic from the days of Tischendorf through Lake to the present
and no responsible New Testament scholar should ignore this
fact. Among his proofs are:

i) The very close resemblance of the colophon design at the end
of Deuteronomy (in Codex Vaticanus) with that at the end of
Mark in Codex Sinaiticus.15 [This Skeat identifies as his strongest
argument and one which must be understood and recognised.]

ii) Possibly Codex Sinaiticus shares a scribe with Codex Vaticanus.
Two of their hands may be identical. This is a disputed point
because the re-inking of Codex Vaticanus at a later date (probably
ninth-tenth centuries) makes it difficult to examine carefully
the hand of the original scribes. Tischendorf thought hand D of
Codex Sinaiticus was the same as hand B of Codex Vaticanus
but Milne and Skeat argued16 that the closest resemblance was
between scribe D of Codex Sinaiticus and scribe A of Codex
Vaticanus and that, even if they are not the same, “the identity
of the scribal tradition stands beyond dispute”. Cavallo agreed
with Milne and Skeat. However, this is not a point Skeat himself
would now wish to dwell upon.

[We must remember that the colophon designs were not reinked,
although the lettering was.]

iii) Another relevant consideration is the fact that Vaticanus and
Sinaiticus both end their text of Mark with the same verse. One
of the features of Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus is that
they, virtually alone among New Testament manuscripts, end
Mark at 16:8 (even though it is plausible that the scribe of Codex
Vaticanus was hesitant to do so.)17 Sinaiticus does not provide
any evidence for the continuing of the text after verse 8, and
did not do so even before the re-writing of the bifolium, the
error which provoked the re-writing being in the text of Luke 1.
Click to expand...

Vaticanus left a whole blank column for the words. The scribe of Vaticanus was well aware of the ending of Mark. He left space for them. And were not the original sheets removed and replaced in Sinaiticus at the end of Mark begining of Luke?

DigiVatLib

digi.vatlib.it digi.vatlib.it
[Skeat posits that Vaticanus was sent to Constantinople from Caesarea.]

p.291
As far as competing places of origin for the composition of the
two manuscripts are concerned (i.e. other than Caesarea), the strongest alternative
(and the one favoured in the introduction to the new facsimile) is Alexandria.
That is often based on the several grounds. These are noted below with counter-arguments attached:

1) The suggestion has been made that Codex Vaticanus was one of
the Bibles sent from Alexandria by Athanasius to Constans has
already been referred to. But if Vaticanus had been sent from
Alexandria to Niš (Serbia) we need to ask how, when and why it got to
Rome in the fifteenth century.

2) The text of Vaticanus resembles the text-type of certain third century
Egyptian manuscripts, notably P75. But this need not be a
decisive argument in favour of Alexandria and against Caesarea.
As Zuntz reminds us, Caesarea was a centre of Alexandrian
scholarship—the two cities were not so far from each other: we
need think only of the link from Origen through Pamphilus to
Eusebius himself. Also to be remembered is the fact that manuscripts
older than Vaticanus and Sinaiticus are papyri, which virtually
all come from Egypt. We do not have comparable third century
witnesses from other places, such as, for example, Caesarea.

3) Hexaplaric influences in Vaticanus such as the addition of obeli
and asterisks in Isaiah, Zechariah, Malachi and Jeremiah are sometimes
given as evidence of an Egyptian provenance. But they
reflect only Egyptian influence that could plausibly have reached
Caesarea through the person of even Origen himself.

4) Earlier arguments, by Lake and others, emphasise that certain
features of the script of Codex Sinaiticus are Egyptian (the alleged
Coptic mu, a cursive xi and a strangely formed omega) but these
have been dismissed by no less an authority than Cavallo and
by Milne and Skeat as not decisive.
Click to expand...
 
Conan said:
But they existed when Sinaiticus was made. They are absent from Vaticanus.
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.....in the view of some scholars; but were added at a later time, as Tischendorf opined. At any rate "no canon tables survive in Sinaiticus either at the mutilated beginning of the codex or at the start of the New Testament" [source]
 
Conan said:
academic.oup.com

The Date of Codex Sinaiticus

Abstract. Codex Sinaiticus is generally described as one of ‘the great fourth century majuscule Bibles’, and its construction is often assigned to a more p
academic.oup.com academic.oup.com
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I cited this article at the beginning of the thread. Not sure it reaches any proper conclusions, except discrediting other scholars and the contention that the text is inauthentic.
 
Here we see the utter implausibility of Simon-inikos's (the pathological liar's) story, by simply asking the right question!

The Saturday Review of Politics, Literature, Science and Art
Volume 17, 1864

March 19, 1864, The Saturday Review [Page] 359

“Simonides—a boy of fifteen as it was first understood, but at any rate, according to his subsequent explanation, no more than nineteen—was set to work by his uncle Benedict, at Athos, in the end of 1839, to write out a copy of the Bible in uncial letters of the ancient form. A printed edition of the Greek, published at Moscow, was collated with these ancient manuscripts and the printed Codex Alexandrinus, so as to be cleared of many errors, and then given to Simonides to transcribe. The work was finished before the end of 1839. What was he to produce, according to his story? We should suppose a fair transcript, as neat and undistinguished as possible; and a transcript from a printed Bible, which had received occasional corrections from these old manuscripts and the Alexandrian manuscript. [But] What did be produce? A manuscript of which the pages are covered with kinds of ugly corrections and alterations—alterations made in all manner of characters and inks, and often making havoc of the original writing; a manuscript which looked more like a foul copy, with its rough attempts and its interlineations and scribblings, than a fair transcript. Then, copying from a printed edition, he produces a new order of the books, and, without note or remark, two additional books which had long disappeared from the Canon. Next, the whole spelling and grammar adopted in printed books were changed—not in a few instances, but in a wholesale and systematic manner. Moreover, a text is produced of the most singular and unexpected character. After it has been subjected to the closest examination by those who know most about the matter, it is said to be a text which, if it is not a transcript from an original of the highest antiquity and interest, would require for its construction such a wide acquaintance with antiquity, and with facts about antiquity and ancient manuscripts only discovered within the lust twenty years, as none but the ripest scholar could possibly have brought to the task. Lastly, the transcript was not intended to be passed off as an ancient manuscript; but, without the smallest intention to deceive, this youth of nineteen produced, according to his account, in a few months, a volume of 1,400 pages, comprising nearly four millions of uncial letters, unconsciously counterfeited in a fashion surpassing the exploits of any literary forger known, and so resembling all ancient manuscripts in those minute and varied points which are tests of antiquity as to have misled the best critics in Europe. It would require much more distinct evidence that Simonides has yet offered, and much clearer explanations than he has yet given of the singular look of his proceedings —his long previous silence, and his inability to fix on any decisive tests in works which he should know so thoroughly — to overcome the difficulties presented by the appearance and character of the manuscript.”

NOTE: "But" in brackets, and emphasis added by me.

https://www.google.co.nz/books/edit...AAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&pg=PA358&printsec=frontcover
​

These questions "What was he to produce - according to his story?" vs "[But] What did he produce?" really gets to the heart of the matter, and is one of the reasons why I'm utterly unconvinced by the Kallinik-ides/Simonid-ikos' story.
 
cjab said:
I cited this article at the beginning of the thread. Not sure it reaches any proper conclusions, except discrediting other scholars and the contention that the text is inauthentic.
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It does not discredit any scholars or even suggest that the text is inauthentic. Thank you for the link!
 
Simonides' (the pathological liar's) story, does not match the manuscript, so much so, he had to keep telling more and more lies as time went on (adding to his story)...until he had to pretend death to escape his devilish disgrace.
 
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Steven Avery said:
The project was aborted as a failure, and Kallinikos chided Simonides on that point.
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I think it would be wise for you to abort your project (not as a failure - but because IT IS A FAILURE) in case you receive the same fate as Simonides, i.e. utter disgrace and eternal ignominy (let alone the consequences on Judgement Day for consciously aiding and abetting - 2 Timothy 2:26 - one of the world's worst liar's in all history).
 
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Conan said:
It does not discredit any scholars or even suggest that the text is inauthentic. Thank you for the link!
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Read my post again "....except discrediting other scholars AND the contention that the text is inauthentic."

i.e. it also discredits the contention that the text is inauthentic. (An OK result!)

But Nongbri does discredit "The most thorough students of the codex, H. J. M. Milne and Theodore C. Skeat, [who] concluded that the codex was produced after the development of the Eusebian canon numbers but ‘before the middle of the [fourth] century’"; as much of Nongbri's article is a concerted attack on their work and their conclusions.
 
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Maestroh said:
No, I’d probably turned around or if not I was focused elsewhere. I was about to level him with his claim that Tischendorf had stained the manuscript when Simonides was clear he saw it in 1852 already stained to make it look older. Since Tischendorf was never there between 1844 and 1853, it couldn’t have been him unless one argues that he did it in 1844 (why would he?).

It is standard procedure to take the FIRST version of a story as the uncontaminated version and investigate it from there. The SART team is an embarrassment to logic and common sense as every member of that group KNOWS Simonides had nothing at all to do with it. Simonides said what he said in the 1862 version because he was lying and thus didn’t know how complicated collation is or the fact Hermas really was complete or a dozen other things. When these points were raised, he simply changed his story EXACTLY AS LIARS DO!!!

I’d like to see every member of the SART team hooked up to a polygraph and answer questions. Then we’d know whether they’re lying or merely self-deluded (“it’s not a lie if you believe it” as one Queens resident told Jerry Seinfeld).

In the end, they know Simonides had nothing to do with it. Look how complicated they’re having to make this with each revelation. Then again we are talking about at least one individual who believes hundreds if not thousands of NASA workers conspired to fake the moon landing, too.
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Yeah, I saw that movie, Capricorn I! Except it was about a faked Mars landing. And, interestingly enough, one of the stars was O. J. Simpson! ? ? ?.

Hey, I got a great theory about Tischendorf and Simonides – they were both time-travelers! They travel back in time to adjust (or correct) the other's corruptions of the space-time continuum! ? (Sounds good, anyway! ?)

Merry Christmas, all!
--Rich
 
RiJoRi said:
Yeah, I saw that movie, Capricorn I! Except it was about a faked Mars landing. And, interestingly enough, one of the stars was O. J. Simpson! ? ? ?.

Hey, I got a great theory about Tischendorf and Simonides – they were both time-travelers! They travel back in time to adjust (or correct) the other's corruptions of the space-time continuum! ? (Sounds good, anyway! ?)

Merry Christmas, all!
--Rich
Click to expand...
Merry Christmas!
 
TwoNoteableCorruptions said:
I think it would be wise for you to abort your project (not as a failure - but because IT IS A FAILURE)
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Nash. Every week we are finding additional textual evidence that is demonstrating the late date of Sinaiticus. This is an important corroboration to the historical and manuscript evidences.

This forum serves its purpose in helping to examine data, while I :) at the contra harumph and posturing.
 
Steven Avery said:
Nash. Every week we are finding additional textual evidence that is demonstrating the late date of Sinaiticus.
Click to expand...
No scholar credits your evidence as demonstrating this.

Steven Avery said:
This is an important corroboration to the historical and manuscript evidences.
Click to expand...
No-one credits your "corroboration" except to take note of your KJVO circle as being the fanatical arm of a historical movement devoted to the Textus Receptus, which is, scholastically, an unsophisticated position inferior to the Majority Text view defended by Pickering. Indeed the academic basis of the Textus Receptus camp is indefensible as against the Majority Text View. But further, the Majority Text View is theologically indefensible, as leading to such questions as: why did God leave the early Christians in Egypt without a valid version of the scriptures?

See extracts below from The Majority Text and the Original Text: Are They Identical? Daniel B. Wallace.

On February 21, 1990, Wilbur N. Pickering, president of the Majority Text Society, gave a lecture at Dallas Theological Seminary on the majority text and the original text. He took the position that the two were virtually identical. On February 23 Daniel B. Wallace responded which led to the aforementioned article:

__________________________

"In recent years a small but growing number of New Testament scholars have been promoting what appears to be a return to the Textus Receptus, the Greek text that stands behind the New Testament of the King James Version. But all is not what it appears. In reality, those scholars are advocating “the majority text”—the form of the Greek text found in the majority of extant manuscripts. That the Textus Receptus (TR) resembles the majority text is no accident, since in compiling the TR Erasmus simply used about a half dozen late manuscripts that were available to him. As Hodges points out:

"The reason for this resemblance, despite the uncritical way in which the TR was compiled, is easy to explain. It is this: the textual tradition found in Greek manuscripts is for the most part so uniform that to select out of the mass of witnesses almost any manuscript at random is to select a manuscript likely to be very much like most other manuscripts. Thus, when our printed editions were made, the odds favored their early editors coming across manuscripts exhibiting this majority text."​
​
But the TR is hardly identical with the majority text, for the TR has numerous places where it is supported by few or no Greek manuscripts. Precisely because advocates of the majority text can dissociate themselves from the TR in these places, their argumentation is more sophisticated—and more plausible—than that of TR advocates....Three points in the current debate will be discussed: (1) the theological premise of the majority text theory..........

The theological premise of the majority text theory

For many advocates of the majority text view, a peculiar form of the doctrine of the preservation of Scripture undergirds the entire approach. Their premise is that the doctrine of the preservation of Scripture requires that the early manuscripts cannot point to the original text better than the later manuscripts can, because these early manuscripts are in the minority.

Pickering embraces such a doctrine [1] linking the preservation of Scripture to the majority text in such a way that a denial of one necessarily entails a denial of the other: “The doctrine of Divine Preservation of the New Testament Text depends upon the interpretation of the evidence which recognizes the Traditional Text to be the continuation of the autographa.”[2] i.e. “If we reject the majority text view, we reject the doctrine of preservation.”

Pickering has charged Hort with being prejudiced against the Byzantine texttype from the very beginning of his research: “It appears Hort did not arrive at his theory through unprejudiced intercourse with the facts. Rather, he deliberately set out to construct a theory that would vindicate his
preconceived animosity for the Received Text.”[8]

In other words, according to Pickering, it seems that the Christian’s presupposition is that the majority text is the original text. Apparently to jettison the majority text would be a departure from orthodoxy for many of its advocates. If so, then whatever the merits of this viewpoint are—and there are many—it must be stressed that as long as majority text advocates hold this view of preservation, no amount of evidence will convince them that reasoned eclecticism is right, because the majority text view is “a statement of faith.”[10] And as Pickering has so clearly articulated, this is not just a presupposition—it is a doctrine.[11]

[cont.]

[1] Wilbur N. Pickering, “An Evaluation of the Contribution of John William Burgon to New Testament Textual Criticism” (ThM thesis, Dallas Theological Seminary, 1968), p. 86.
[2] Ibid., p. 91.
[8] Wilbur N. Pickering, The Identity of the New Testament Text, 2d ed. (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1980), p. 32. No one today would deny that this was Hort’s starting point. Indeed, modern textual critics have recognized that Hort depended entirely too much on Aleph and B—so much so that the UBS edition has adopted scores of readings that are attested by the Byzantine texttype (and other witnesses) against these two codices. Precisely because modern textual critics do not share the same rigid presupposition that Hort embraced, they are able to see the value of readings not found in these two uncial texts. In this respect majority text advocates’ presuppositions govern their methods far more drastically than do reasoned eclectics’ presuppositions. In fact majority text advocates often see the issue as so black and white that if even one majority text reading were proved false, their whole theory would collapse. Hort held the opposite (no distinctive Byzantine reading is original), and majority text advocates continue to write in a triumphant manner when they can prove Hort wrong on this point, usually assuming that reasoned eclecticism is thereby falsified.
[10] Pickering, The Identity of the New Testament Text, p. 154.
[11] It is noteworthy that Pickering has changed his wording between his master’s thesis and The Identity of the New Testament Text. What is called “the doctrine of Preservation” in his thesis has become, at most, a “presupposition” in Identity. This euphemistic alteration masks what the real issue is: to deny the majority text is to embrace heresy. In one place he even states, “In the author’s opinion, those conservative schools and scholars who have propagated Hort’s theory and text (Nestle is essentially Hortian) bear a heavy responsibility for the growing doubt and disbelief throughout the Church. The ‘neo-evangelical’ defection on Scriptural inerrancy is a case in point” (“An Evaluation of the Contribution of John William Burgon to New Testament Textual Criticism,” p. 90). In this sweeping statement, he has condemned B. B. Warfield and D. A. Carson, the vast bulk of scholars in the Evangelical Theological Society (whose doctrinal statement strongly affirms inerrancy), and almost all the faculty of Dallas Seminary—not to mention the first reader of his own thesis, S. Lewis Johnson, Jr.

 
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[cont.]

But [Pickering] gives no further argument, no exegesis. His one clear statement about preservation is this: “God has preserved the text of the New Testament in a very pure form and it has been readily available to His followers in every age throughout 1900 years.”[14] No proof text is given, just a bare statement.[15]

____________________

Daniel Wallace counters this:

First, Scripture does not state how God has preserved the text. It could be in the majority of witnesses, or it could be in a small handful of witnesses. In fact theologically one may wish to argue against the majority: usually it is the remnant, not the majority, that is right.[17]

Second, assuming that the majority text is the original, then this pure form of text has become available only since 1982.[18] The Textus Receptus differs from it in almost 2,000 places—and in fact has several readings that have “never been found in any known Greek manuscript,” and scores, perhaps hundreds, of readings that depend on only a handful of very late manuscripts.[19] Many of these passages are theologically significant texts.[20] Yet virtually no one had access to any other text from 1516 to 1881, a period of over 350 years. In light of this it is difficult to understand what Pickering means when he says that this pure text “has been readily available to [God’s] followers in every age throughout 1900 years.”[21] Purity, it seems, has to be a relative term.

Third, again assuming that the majority text is the original and that it has been readily available to Christians for 1,900 years, then it must have been readily available to Christians in Egypt in the first four centuries. But this is demonstrably not true. Literally scores of studies in the last 80 years have demonstrated this point.[22] Due to space considerations only one recent doctoral dissertation will be cited. After carefully investigating the Gospel quotations of Didymus, a fourth-century Egyptian writer, Ehrman concludes, “These findings indicate that no ‘proto-Byzantine’ text existed in Alexandria in Didymus’ day or, at least if it did, it made no impact on the mainstream of the textual tradition there.”[23] Pickering speaks of the early Alexandrian witnesses as “polluted” and as coming from a “sewer pipe.”[24] Now if these manuscripts are really that defective, and if this is all Egypt had in the first three or four centuries, then this peculiar doctrine of preservation is in serious jeopardy, for those ancient Egyptian Christians had no access to the pure stream of the majority text. If one defines preservation in terms of the majority text, one ends with a view that speaks poorly of God’s sovereign care of the text in ancient Egypt.

&etc,

[14] Pickering, “An Evaluation of the Contribution of John William Burgon to New Testament Textual Criticism,” p. 90.
[15] Although Pickering provides no proof text for his view of preservation, he views it as the logical corollary to inspiration: “If the Scriptures have not been preserved then the doctrine of Inspiration is a purely academic matter with no relevance for us today. If we do not have the inspired Words or do not know precisely which they be, then the doctrine of Inspiration is inapplicable” (ibid., p. 88). Elsewhere he argues that uncertainty over the text not only makes inspiration inapplicable, but also untrue (“Mark 16:9–20 and the Doctrine of Inspiration,” p. 1). There are several fallacies in this thinking, both on a historical level and on a logical one. Historically only since 1982 has The Greek New Testament according to the Majority Text (hereafter referred to as the Majority Text) been available. Consequently, assuming that it is an exact reproduction of the autographs, for almost 2,000 years the doctrine of inspiration was inapplicable. Logically three observations may be made: (a) The equation of inspiration with man’s recognition of what is inspired (in all its particulars) virtually puts God at the mercy of man and requires omniscience of man. The burden is so great that a text critical method of merely counting noses seems to be the only way in which man can be “relatively omniscient.” In what other area of Christian teaching is man’s recognition required for a doctrine to be true? (b) The argument that reasoned eclecticism does “not have the inspired Words” implies that textual critics must constantly resort to conjectural emendation—i.e., to reinvent the original from thin air as it were. But this is not a valid charge. Reasoned eclectics simply do not resort to conjectural emendation—there is textual basis for the readings they select. Consequently, it is certain that the original wording is found either in the text or in the apparatus. (c) Even majority text advocates “do not know precisely” which words are original in every place, as Pickering himself admits (The Identity of the New Testament Text, p. 150). Actually this kind of argument is more befitting defenders of the Textus Receptus. Since it backfires for majority text advocates, it has no place in the discussion.
[17] Harold W. Hoehner suggested this argument and analogy (personal interview).
[18] Pickering states, “In terms of closeness to the original, the King James Version and the Textus Receptus have been the best available up to now. In 1982 Thomas Nelson Publishers brought out a critical edition of the Traditional Text (Majority, ‘Byzantine’) under the editorship of Zane C. Hodges, Arthur L. Farstad, and others which while not definitive will prove to be very close to the final product, I believe. In it we have an excellent interim Greek Text to use until the full and final story can be told” (The Identity of the New Testament, p. 150).
[19] Bruce M. Metzger, The Text of the New Testament, 2d ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1968), p. 100.
[20] E.g., 1 John 5:7–8 and Revelation 22:19.
[21] Pickering was unaware there would be so many differences between the Textus Receptus and Majority Text when he wrote this note. Originally his estimate was between 500 and 1,000 differences (“An Evaluation of the Contribution of John William Burgon to New Testament Textual Criticism,” p. 120). But in light of the 2,000 differences, “purity” becomes such an elastic term that it is removed from being a doctrinal consideration.
[22] Pickering has not evidenced awareness of these. Gordon Fee speaks of Pickering’s “neglect of literally scores of scholarly studies that contravene his assertions,” and states, “The overlooked bibliography here is so large that it can hardly be given in a footnote. For example, I know eleven different studies on Origen alone that contradict all of Pickering’s discussion, and not one of them is even recognized to have existed” (“A Critique of W. N. Pickering’s The Identity of the New Testament Text: A Review Article,” Westminster Theological Journal 41 [1978–79]: 415).
[23] Bart D. Ehrman, Didymus the Blind and the Text of the Gospels (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1986), p. 260 (italics added). What confirms this further is that in several places Origen, the great Christian textual scholar, speaks of textual variants that were in a majority of manuscripts in his day, yet today are in a minority, and vice versa. Granting every gratuitous concession to majority text advocates, in the least this shows that no majority text was “readily available” to Christians in Egypt.
[24] Pickering, “An Evaluation of the Contribution of John William Burgon to New Testament Textual Criticism,” p. 93.
 
Everyone should read Pickering's latest work. The Identity of the New Testament Text IV Paperback – October 7, 2014

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Family 35: Original Text of the New Testament Exposition of Evidence Paperback – April 19, 2021
by Marcelo Freitas (Author), Wilbur N Pickering (Author)

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Conan said:
Everyone should read Pickering's latest work. The Identity of the New Testament Text IV Paperback – October 7, 2014

The Identity of the New Testament Text IV: Pickering Phd, Wilbur N: 9780989827355: Amazon.com: Books

The Identity of the New Testament Text IV [Pickering Phd, Wilbur N] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. The Identity of the New Testament Text IV
www.amazon.com
Click to expand...
So Pickering is still dedicated to his argument in favor of the majority text, reflecting the Byzantine tradition (or archetype).

p.79 of the above:

"But what if we were to entertain the hypothesis that the Byzantine tradition is the oldest and that the "Western" and "Alexandrian" MSS represent varying perturbations on the fringes of the main transmissional stream? Would this not make better sense of the surviving evidence? Then there would have been no "Western" or "Egyptian" archetypes, just various sources of contamination that acted in such a random fashion that each extant "Western" or "Egyptian" MS has a different 'mosaic'. In contrast, there would indeed be a "Byzantine" archetype, which would reflect the original. "​

"The mean text of the extant MSS improves century by century, the XIV being the best, because the worst MSS were not copied or worn out by use; whereas the good ones were used and copied, and when worn out, discarded."​

A principal argument on p.78 is:

"In his book Aland's discussion of the transmission of the NT text is permeated with the assumption​
that the Byzantine text was a secondary development that progressively contaminated the pure​
Egyptian ("Alexandrian") text.[2] But the chief "Alexandrian" witnesses, B, A (except e) and ℵ (The​
Text, p. 107), are in constant and significant disagreement among themselves; so much so that​
there is no objective way of reconstructing an archetype. 150 years earlier the picture is the same;​
P45, P66 and P75 are quite dissimilar and do not reflect a single tradition. In A.D. 200 "there was no​
king in [Egypt]; everyone did what was right in his own eyes", or so it would seem."​

[2] K. Aland, "The Text of the Church?", Trinity Journal, 1987, 8NS:131-144 [actually published in 1989], pp. 142-43.​

One incongruity is that it isn't clear if any of the so-termed "Alexandrian" uncials derive from Egypt: the source of perdition according to Pickering, where the copyists "did not know Greek" (which is an assumption that is not proven).
 
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