The Revival of a Century-Old Claim

The author’s definite objective to establish the superiority of the Textus Receptus over the texts used by the translators of the Revised Version constitutes one of the main contentions of his book. This is shown by the following extract taken from the chapter entitled “The Bible Adopted by Constantine and the Pure Bible of the Waldenses,” pages 23-24:RABV 10.2

“This chapter will show that the Textus Receptus was the Bible in possession and use in the Greek Empire, in the countries of Syrian Christianity, in northern Italy, in southern France, and in the British Isles in the second century. This was a full century and more before the Vaticanus and the Sinaiticus saw the light of day. When the apostles of the Roman Catholic Church entered these countries in later centuries they found the people using the Textus Receptus; and it was not without difficulty and a struggle that they were able to displace it and to substitute their Latin Vulgate. This chapter will likewise show that the Textus Receptus belongs to the type of these early apostolic manuscripts that were brought from Judea, and its claim to priority over the Vaticanus and Sinaiticus will be established.”RABV 10.3

It is decidedly informative to discover that this contention of the author is simply the revival of an effort made more than a hundred years ago to establish this same claim. A book was printed in 1815 (the author being “The Rev. Frederick Nolan, a Presbyter of the United Church”), with the title, “An Inquiry Into the Integrity of the Greek Vulgate, or Received Text of the New Testament; in Which the Greek Manuscripts are Newly Classed, the Integrity of the Authorized Text Vindicated, and the Various Readings Traced to Their Origin.”RABV 11.1

In passing, it may be remarked that the striking similarity in objective, between the two books of 1930 and a century previous, as well as the very expression on the title page of the 1815 volume,—“The Authorized Text Vindicated,”—is to say the least a singular coincidence.RABV 11.2

This work by Mr. Nolan is lauded by the author on pages 40 and 41, and is again referred to on pages 42 and 49. Great confidence is reposed by the author in Mr. Nolan’s contentions, and he says, relative to the conviction of his precursor:RABV 11.3

“He felt certain that researches in this direction would demonstrate that the Italic New Testament, or the New Testament of those primitive Christians of northern Italy whose lineal descendants the Waldenses were, would turn out to be the Received Text.” (p. 40.)RABV 11.4

Mr. Nolan’s own claim is clearly set forth in a summary of his views in the following quotation:RABV 11.5

“In fine, a very short process enables us to prove, that the tradition which supports the authority of this text the Textus Receptus has continued unbroken since the age of the apostles. The coincidence of the Vulgar (Common) Greek of our present editions with the old Italick translation, enables us to carry up the tradition to the times of St. Jerome. The testimony of this learned father enables us to extend the proof beyond this period, to the times of Lucianus, in whose age the Byzantine text equally constituted the Vulgate or common edition. And the character of Lucianus, and the course which he pursued in revising the sacred text, connects this proof with the times of the inspired writers, who could alone impress that authority upon one text, which, by bringing it into general use, rendered it, from the primitive ages down to the present day, the Greek characters here or Greek Vulgate.”—“An Inquiry Into the Integrity of the Greek Vulgate,” pp. 126, 127.RABV 12.1

It is a significant fact that the labored effort of Mr. Nolan, characterized by frequent and easily assumed conclusions to establish his main contention, was strongly and effectually contradicted by scholars of his time, and that it made so little impression upon the history of the Bible that it is scarcely referred to in recent times by the recognized scholars who have dealt with this subject. It may be well which to add here that the Nolan volume which was printed sixteen years before Lachmann, followed by an illustrious line of textual investigators, had ventured into the hitherto largely neglected field of the study of Greek manuscripts of the New Testament with the purpose of establishing a text based upon original authorities.RABV 12.2