The Supreme Importance Of The Doctrine Of Election And The Eternal Security Of The Elect As Taught In The Gospel Of John -- By: Stephen M. Reynolds
Journal: Westminster Theological Journal
Volume: WTJ 28:1 (Nov 1965)
Article: The Supreme Importance Of The Doctrine Of Election And The Eternal Security Of The Elect As Taught In The Gospel Of John
Author: Stephen M. Reynolds
WTJ 28:1 (Nov 65) p. 38
The Supreme Importance Of The Doctrine Of Election And The Eternal Security Of The Elect As Taught In The Gospel Of John
The original reading of John 10:29 according to the best textual critics had the relative pronoun and the comparative adjective in the neuter singular, ὅ and μεῖζον. The meaning is, “What my Father has given me is greater than all”. The Vulgate agrees, having quod and maius, but the Greek Textus Receptus has ὅς and μείζων, with the meaning, “My Father who has given (them) to me is greater than all”.
The sixteenth and seventeenth century Protestant translators, Tyndale (1535), The Great Bible (1539), Geneva Bible (1560), Bishops’ Bible (1568), and King James Bible (1611), followed the Textus Receptus. Wycliffe followed the Vulgate which in this case appears to be right. Calvin’s Commentary shows that he was using the Textus Receptus.
After the results of modern textual criticism began to be known, with Alford, Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, and Eberhard and Erwin Nestle, deciding for ὅ and μεῖζον, one would have supposed translators would take this reading very seriously. Richard Francis Weymouth (1903) did so, but translated μεῖζον as “more precious”, reading, “What my Father has given me is more precious than all besides”. In a footnote he added: “More precious] Or, ‘more (to me).’ Lit. ‘greater (in my esteem).’” There is no apparent reason for the idea expressed in this footnote.
Edgar J. Goodspeed in The New American Translation (1923) also followed this reading, translating, “What my Father has intrusted to me is of more importance than everything else”.
The New Testament in Basic English likewise follows this reading, having, “That which my Father has given me has more value than all”. There is a strong tendency, however, among other translators, to ignore this reading or to give it marginal notation only. For example, the Revised Standard Version, (1946) and the New English Bible (1961) follow the Textus Receptus and give only footnotes to the reading preferred by Alford, Tischendorf, Westcott and Hort, and the Nestles.
WTJ 28:1 (Nov 65) p. 39
James Moffatt (1922), Charles B. 4Villiams (1937), the Berkeley Version published under the editorship of Gerrit Verkuyl (1945), and J. B. Phillips (1952) ignore. the reading with ὅ and
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