The Greek text in the New Testament was not corrupted.
The Greek text in the New Testament was not corrupted.
§ 354. By almost the same arguments with which we proved the integrity of the Hebrew text in the Old Testament, the integrity of the Greek text in the New Testament can also be demonstrated. We are prevented from claiming that corruptions of the sort that would cause its authentic authority to be undermined have been inflicted on it: (1) By the sweetness of divine providence. God revealed His Word and wanted it to be consigned to writing for this purpose not only in the Old Testament but also in the New: that it be the norm and rule according to which all doctrines of the Church should be examined. But now, that which has the nature of a rule and norm ought to be free of corruption.
(2) By equality of nature. The nature of the books of the Old and New Testaments is equal without exception: With regard to the efficient cause, because both were written by holy men of God at the impulse of the Holy Spirit. With regard to the material cause, because both describe divine revelation and divine mysteries. With regard to the formal cause, because both have canonical and divine authority in the Church. And with regard to the final cause, because both were published to instruct people for salvation through the uncorrupted teaching of faith and behavior. But if in the case of the books of the Old Testament their integrity does stand, as we have shown earlier, this likewise should not be denied to the books of the New Testament.
(3) By the faithfulness of the Church in asserting the purity of Scripture. Just as Paul testifies that “the oracles of God were entrusted” to the Jews—namely, those written down in the books of the Old Testament (Rom. 3:2)—so, too, we can say with regard to the early Christian Church that the oracles of God written down in the books of the New Testament were entrusted to it. You see, it received the autographs from the evangelists and apostles and faithfully preserved them in the patriarchal churches so that they could correct the copies and other texts according to the contents of the autographs.
(4) By the painstaking attention of devout teachers in removing the corruptions of heretics. Although “heretics have tried to corrupt many things,” Bellarmine writes, “nevertheless Catholics have never been lacking who detected their errors and did not allow the sacred books to be corrupted” (De verbo Dei, bk. 2, c. 7). Marcion took out many things from the whole New Testament and changed them, according to Tertullian (Contra Marcion., bk. 5). Epiphanius (Haeres. 42), however, took note of almost all of them, and we have them in correct form in our Greek codices. The Arians had taken out “the Spirit is God” from John’s Gospel (c. 4[:24]); Ambrose, however, pointed it out and took note of it (De Spiritu s., bk. 3, c. 11), and all our Greek codices have this testimony. The statement of 1 John 5[:8], “There are three who bear witness in heaven,” etc., the Arians removed from some manuscripts, but the watchful diligence of devout teachers of the Church restored it, which we have shown in our Disp. prior. on this passage.
(5) By the absurdity of the consequence. If the Greek text in the New Testament had been corrupted, we would no longer have the first and chief origin of the Christian faith pure and uncorrupted, because one cannot hope for greater purity from the streams than from their sources. Study that is dependent on an examination of the sources would be useless; divine providence would have been lacking in something necessary to the Church, etc. Because all this is absurd, so also is that absurd from which such consequences follow.
(6) By the judgment of the more sensible Papists. Thomas More, in his Epist. ad Dorpium pro defens. Erasmi, p. 411:
Certainly, to speak truly, to me it does not seem at all credible that any nation wished to conspire to corrupt the Greek books. I am not saying that this could not have happened. Jerome may have seen it on the part of the Jews. He certainly frees the Greeks from this suspicion of falsehood. There is also the fact that in those matters about which they have controversies with us, their books agree with ours. The question has never been about the letter but about the meaning of the letter. Now then, what could anyone contrive, or why would they falsify other things, when they have left us those things that alone they would have wanted to corrupt?
Sixtus Senensis, Bibl. sanct., bk. 7, haeres. 1, p. 580: “We say, this Greek codex that is now read in the Church is the same one that the Greek Church used at Jerome’s time and long before, back to the days of the apostles. It is true, pure, genuine, and contaminated by no defect of falsehood, as a continual reading of all the Greek fathers shows clearly.”