Start with the basics:
Are you acknowledging that the two quotes of Chrysostom show that his Bible had at 1 Timothy 3:16:
“God was manifest in the flesh”
Let me introduce some
cribbed facts:
There are three different versions of this particular verse in the manuscripts.
Θεὸς ἐφανερώθη ἐν σαρκί,
ἐδικαιώθη ἐν Πνεύματι,
ὤφθη γγέλοις,
ἐκηρύχθη ἐν ἔθνεσιν,
ἐπιστεύθη ἐν κόσμῳ,
νελήφθη ἐν δόξῃ.
God was revealed in the flesh,
vindicated in [the] spirit, seen by angels,
preached among the nations,
believed on in the world,
and received up in glory.
(EOB:NT)
In the Sinaiticus (4th c.), Alexandrinus (5th c.), Ephraimi (5th c.), Augiensis (9th c.), and Boernerianus (9th c.) codices, the relative pronoun ὅς takes the place of Θεὸς. The NASB editors and (presumably) others have chosen this particular reading over the majority reading.
In his Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (2nd ed.), Bruce Metzger explains the presence of Θεὸς in some manuscripts as being due to either transcription error or deliberately for stylistic reasons:
Thus, no uncial (in the first hand) earlier than the eighth or ninth century (Ψ) [Athous Lavrensis] supports θεός; all ancient versions presuppose ὅς or ὅ; and no patristic writer prior to the last third of the fourth century testifies to the reading θεός. The reading θεός arose either (a) accidentally, through the misreading of OΣ [the pronoun] as ΘΣ [abbreviation for θεός], or (b) deliberately, either to supply a substantive for the following six verbs, or, with less probability, to provide greater dogmatic precision.
p. 574
Among the Greek Church Fathers who cited this particular passage are Gregory of Nyssa (335-394 AD), John Chyrsostom (347-407 AD). The oldest Codex which Metzger cites is the Sinaiticus, which scholars date to between 330 and 360 AD. Thus, it is arguable which of the witnesses is more historical.
_______________________
I concede that many Trinitarians assert Alexandrinus contains the "God" rendition, but many say it was retouched. It's very strange that Woide, who edited this Codex in 1785, remarked that he had seen traces of the original stroke in 1765 which had ceased to be clearly visible twenty years later. How inconvenient is that? The "original stroke" is likely to have involved a retouching, as per Sinaiticus. Moreover, if the "original stroke" was so faded, as constrasted with the rest of the Alexandrinus text, isn't it likely to have been
not contemporaneous with the original text?
One of two things is most likely here. Either the hyper Trinitarians, Gregory of Nyssa, John Chyrsostom & the Cappadocian Fathers generally, all devoted stalwarts of High Trinitarianism, themselves contributed to "God was manifest in the flesh" interpretation, and thereby influenced an amendment to the existing biblical texts, or later copyists amended their quotations to conform with the Byzantine text rendition.
Personally I credit the former, given the witness of Severian who would not have done other than quote the bible literally. Such would have been unthinkable for him. The change to the text seems to have happened concomitantly with the reinvigoration of the Nicene Creed by Theodosius in 4th century. But it was localized in the Greek, initially. For "almost all of the ancient non-Greek versions appear to read “who” or “which” instead of “God” in this passage: namely, the Old Latin, Latin Vulgate, Coptic, Peshitta-Syriac, Gothic, Armenian and Ethiopic translations." [
source]
They really are crystal clear.
After that acknowledgement , we can discuss his interpretation.
Sure the words are crystal clear in the homily
as handed down.
There is no extralegal surprise here, since 99% of our extant Greek mss. Have that text.
Now I can see why you don't like Sinaiticus: it's the only really old
Greek biblical manuscript with Ὃς.
