We have this bias in the Modern world that what is most authentic and true is what is determined to be the oldest.
We see this in biblical studies, where scholars seek to identify the most original, oldest version of a text. In my Greek New Testament, the apparatus at the bottom of the page gives a rating of different textual variants, based on how original/old a word or passage is judged to be.
In most translations of the Bible, a board of scholars makes an assessment about which ancient texts are the oldest and makes that the basis for the main text. Other choices get demoted to the footnotes. (You can read about the criteria they used for their decisions in the Preface at the very beginning of most Bibles, which almost no one ever reads.)
Implicit (at least) in this approach is an assessment that changes to the text judged to have been made later are less authentic. They may even be considered corruptions of the more pure original. Sometimes these are scribal errors. Sometimes they are embellishments or clarifications. But often they are viewed as deliberate, conspiratorial, perfidious, and malicious attempts to twist the text for political or other reasons.
The problem here is that, in order to identify the oldest version of a text, scholars have to apply various methodologies and criteria, which themselves carry often unexamined assumptions rooted in the biases and prejudices of post-Enlightenment philosophy and science. The “older-is-more- authentic-and-therefore-better” assumption is one of these. Another is “we can determine what is older by the application of our methodology.”
But of course, they can’t. What they give us is an educated guess based on what their tools are designed to ascertain. Then they proclaim this to be “older.” And sometimes the evidence is obvious. For instance, if a 2nd century theologian quoted a verse from the gospels, then we know that that verse is at least that old. But for the majority of textual variants, the evidence is nowhere near that conclusive, and scholars have to make inferences and posit hypotheses.
But here’s the thing: Any complete text translators settle on never actually existed. There is no complete ancient manuscript that matches the current critical text. It is a hodgepodge of pieces deemed older than other pieces; but there was never a text that had all the same pieces.
Therefore, I want to challenge this whole thing. I suggest that the “authentic” is not necessarily what is assessed to be “oldest,” but what is received in an ongoing process of historical/contextual development. That development includes the product of the application of Modern scientific tools… but this is but one of many contemporary expressions of the text, developed to meet some contemporary needs.
Here’s an analogy: What is “authentic pizza”? In one view, authentic pizza might be the version culinary historians determine to have been invented by some original baker, probably somewhere in Italy, perhaps hundreds of years ago. It would be interesting. But would it be the pizza that people would order on Friday night? Does that matter?
Was pizza horribly defiled and unconscionably corrupted when someone added a topping? No. (Not even pineapple….) It was simply subject to a living process of continual development within a community of people who loved pizza. I personally believe that perfection was attained with thin crust New York pizza; I object to adding anything more exotic than pepperoni. But I am willing to accept other pizza lovers, even if they prefer the Chicago deep-dish version.
Like pizza, the Bible belongs to a continuing community. It is a living text, not a dead artifact to be theorized about and presented in some pristine, preserved condition. Things that are alive change and develop; they maintain a balance between continuity and adaptation. Caterpillars become butterflies, not motorcycles. A some point pizza stops being pizza and becomes a salad or a casserole or whatever.
The development of the biblical text within the community of people who loved and followed Jesus was not necessarily adulteration, corruption, or defilement; it is what happens when a community authentically grapples with and applies a text to its own situation and time. Maybe it is precisely something that has been cooked, spiced, contextualized, added to, commented upon, used, improved, and expanded, in, through, and by a faithful community over time, that is most authentic.
We see such development within the text of the Bible itself, and it continued over the centuries until institutional canonization, which is when changes to the text largely stopped. But the development continued in the way the text was understood, interpreted, applied, translated, paraphrased, and heard.
Some think the perfect “New York pizza” moment was reached by the early fathers of the Church. Others say it is the interpretation of the Roman Catholic Magisterium that is authoritative. Some say it was during the Reformation that finally understood it best. And still others suggest that the text remains alive today, and we are still learning and hearing valuable new things from it that apply to our time.
Clearly, authenticity is determined by the living community of disciples that lives in the Holy Spirit, receives the text with joy and respect, and applies it to its life and time. It is the Spirit in the community that maintains and guards the continuity, which is revealed in discipleship.
Authenticity, then, is not a matter of scholarship but of discipleship. The versions and interpretations of the Bible that are most authoritative are those which inspire, inform, critique, shape, and guide people in following Jesus Christ. In short, it is the quality of our lives as disciples that witnesses to the authenticity of the Bible.
The most authentic Bible is the one that brings you to actual discipleship. For Jesus Christ is the final criterion of authenticity. He is the Word of God to which the Scriptures witness. The proof is in your life and that of the gospel community in which you participate.
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