The Dream of a Perfect Text: Textual Criticism and Biblical Inerrancy in Early Modern Europe

This fascinating article (shared by the author on academia.edu) traces the early history of textual criticism during the Renaissance and Reformation, and the accompanying rise of inerrantism.

(This is the article from which I quoted at last week's interagency Consultation on Translation Consultant Training and Certification in Dallas.)

Extracted text from Hendel__The_Dream_of_a_Perfect_Text__2017_.pdf:

Sibyls, Scriptures, and Scrolls John Collins at Seventy VOLUME 1 Edited by Joel Baden Hindy Najman Eibert Tigchelaar With the assistance of Laura Carlson James Nati Olivia Stewart Shlomo Zuckier

LEIDEN | BOSTON For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV Contents VOLUME 1 Publications of John J. Collinsxv List of Contributorsxli Introduction1 Between Athens and Jerusalem, on the Wings of a Dove?4 Susan Ackerman The Social Location of the Scribe in the Second Temple Period22 Samuel L. Adams Heraclituss Homeric Problems and Midrash Genesis Rabbah: Comparisons and Contrasts38 Philip Alexander The Identification of the Wicked Priest Reconsidered: The Case for Hyrcanus II68 Kenneth Atkinson Whats in a Name? Naming the Unnameable in Philo and John85 Harold W. Attridge Redactor or Rabbenu? Revisiting an Old Question of Identity96 Joel S. Baden Old Testament Ethics: Story or Style?113 John Barton Future Food and Future Feasting: Tracing the Idea of the Meal in the World to Come in Qumran Literature127 Claudia D. Bergmann Casting Lots and Distributing Territories: The Hellenistic Background of the Book of Jubilees and the Genesis Apocryphon148 Katell Berthelot For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NVcontents viii Authority and PropagandaThe Case of the Potters Oracle167 Stefan Beyerle How Jesus Became Uncreated185 Gabriele Boccaccini Thrskeia in 4 Maccabees209 Daniel Boyarin The Visualisation of the Sacred at Qumran225 George J. Brooke The Wisdom of the Nations and the Law of Israel: Genealogies of Ethnic Diffference in Ben Sira and the Mekhilta241 Joshua Ezra Burns Zechariah, Zerubbabel, and Zemah: Ideological Development in Early Postexilic Judah261 Laura Carlson The Divine Assembly in Genesis 111276 Richard J. Cliffford The Enochs of Genesis 4 and 5 and the Emergence of the Apocalyptic Enoch Tradition293 John Day Genre Analysis and Early Christian Martyrdom Narratives: A Proposal314 Michal Beth Dinkler The Disappearing God in Ezekiel the Tragedian337 Robert Doran Scent of a Woman: The Influence of Lady Wisdom on 2 Maccabees 7:2029352 Antonios Finitsis Preserving the Cult of Yhwh in Judean Garrisons: Continuity from Pharaonic to Ptolemaic Times375 Anne Fitzpatrick-McKinley For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NVcontents ix If a Case is Too Bafffling for You to Decide... (Deuteronomy 17:813): Between Constraining and Expanding Judicial Autonomy in the Temple Scroll and Early Rabbinic Scriptural Interpretation409 Steven D. Fraade Of Doves, Fish, and Goddesses: Reflections on the Literary, Religious, and Historical Background of the Book of Jonah432 Eckart Frahm Fire and Water? Apocalyptic Imagination and Hellenistic Worldview in 2Peter451 Jrg Frey Wheres Enoch? The Mythic Geography of the Qumran Book of Giants472 Matthew Gofff Josephus and Jewish Ethnicity489 Erich S. Gruen Cutting the Cord with the Familiar: What Makes 4Q265 Miscellaneous Rules Tick?509 Charlotte Hempel The Dream of a Perfect Text: Textual Criticism and Biblical Inerrancy in Early Modern Europe517 Ronald Hendel I Am the Judge: Judgment in the Apocalypse of Abraham542 Matthias Henze Mother Zion in Baruch 4:55:9 and 2 Baruch 112: A Study of Diffferent Models of Intertextuality558 Karina Martin Hogan Scribal Innovation and the Book of Tobit: A Long Overdue Discussion579 Naomi S. S. Jacobs What is Serekh ha-Yahad (S)? Thinking About Ancient Manuscripts as Information Processing611 Jutta Jokiranta For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NVcontents x Deity and Divine in the Hebrew Bible and in the Dead Sea Scrolls636 Reinhard G. Kratz Simeon and Levis Attack on Shechem, or: The Mystery of MS C of the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs655 James Kugel What Really Troubled Andronikos? A Note on P.Polit.Iud. 1673 Rob Kugler Who were the Advisers of the King? A Comparative Study of Royal Consultants in Mesopotamia and in Israel688 Helge S. Kvanvig Solomon in the Garden of Eden: Autonomous Wisdom and the Danger of Discernment714 Peter T. Lanfer VOLUME 2 Inner- and Extra-Jewish Polemics: The Parting of the Way Once Again727 Armin Lange Ask What You Wish: The Intersection between Economic Freedom and Cosmopolitanism in 1 Esdras747 Kyong-Jin Lee The Place of the Early Printed Editions of Josephuss Antiquities and War (14701534) in the Latin Textual Tradition765 David B. Levenson and Thomas R. Martin Conceptualizing Spirit: Supernatural Meteorology and Winds of Distress in the Hebrew Bible and the Ancient Near East826 Ingrid E. Lilly Covenantal Nomism and the Hebrew Bible845 Timothy H. Lim From Zedekiah to the Messiah: A Glimpse at the Early Reception of the Sprout857 Christl M. Maier For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NVcontents xi Ethnicity and Essentialism in and about Ezekiels Tragedy874 Stewart Moore Perfecting Translation: The Greek Scriptures in Philo of Alexandria897 Hindy Najman and Benjamin G. Wright The Community Rule or Rules for the Communities? Contextualizing the Qumran Serakhim916 James Nati The Thanksgiving Hymns of 1QHa and the Construction of the Ideal Sage through Liturgical Performance940 Judith H. Newman Beautiful Theories: Approaching Deut 21:19 as Ritual Performance and Narrative Medium958 Susan Niditch Desires Crossing Boundaries: Romance and History in Josephuss Antiquities973 Maren R. Niehofff Lost Historical Traditions: Between Josephus and the Rabbis991 Vered Noam Defects, Holiness, and Pollution in Biblical Cultic Texts1018 Saul M. Olyan Anthropology, Pneumatology, and Demonology in Early Judaism: The Two Spirits Treatise (1QS 3:134:26) and Other Texts from the Dead Sea Scrolls1029 Mladen Popovi Les Essniens et la croyance la rsurrection: de leschatologie zoroastrienne aux notices de Josphe et dHippolyte1068 mile Puech Metacritical Thoughts on Transcendence and the Definition of Apocalypse1096 Rebecca Raphael For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NVcontents xii The Passive Qal in the Hebrew of the Second Temple Period, especially as Found in the Wisdom of Ben Sira1110 Eric D. Reymond A Twentieth-Century Irishmans First Century Palestine: George Moores The Brook Kerith1128 Zuleika Rodgers Blake, Enoch, and Emerging Biblical Criticism1145 Christopher Rowland The Origins of the Book of Isaiah1166 Konrad Schmid The Poetics of Abjection in Psalm 441187 Carolyn J. Sharp The End of Military Campaigns: Gamala and Masada in The Jewish War of Josephus1217 Gregory E. Sterling I Will Speak...with My Whole Person in Ecstasy: Instrumentality and Independence in the Sibylline Oracles1232 Olivia Stewart Airing the High Priests Dirty Laundry: Understanding the Imagery and Message of Zechariah 3:171247 Ryan E. Stokes Thrice Nahum 3:810: MT, LXX, and 4Q385a 17 iiNew Proposals1265 Eibert Tigchelaar Textual Criticism of Hebrew Scripture in the 20th Century1278 Emanuel Tov The Role of Charity in the Testament of Job1298 Jonathan R. Trotter The Samaritan and Masoretic Pentateuch: Text and Interpretation(s)1314 Eugene Ulrich For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NVcontents xiii Masada World Heritage Site: Josephus the Narrator Defeated1330 Jan Willem van Henten Mastema in the Qumran Literature and the Book of Jubilees1346 James C. VanderKam Women, Worship, Wilderness, and War: Celibacy and the Constructions of Identity in the Dead Sea Scrolls1361 Cecilia Wassen Resonances of Jeremiah in Daniel 91386 Robert R. Wilson The Angels Self-Revelation in Tobit 121399 Gza G. Xeravits Peace from the Ashes: Commemorating the Wars in the East, the Centre, and the West of the Roman Empire during the Long Year of the Four Emperors (6870 CE)1418 Jrgen K. Zangenberg Hu Ezra Alah mi-Bavel: Ezra as an Exemplar of Babylonian Superiority in Rabbinic Literature1453 Shlomo Zuckier Index1473 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2017|doi 10.1163/9789004324749_030 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV The Dream of a Perfect Text: Textual Criticism and Biblical Inerrancy in Early Modern Europe Ronald Hendel Variants are arts of the devil. Laurentius Fabricius (1625) Among John Collinss many virtues is his ability to combine critical scholar- ship with theological reflection without simplification or compromise. This is a rare talent. Usually theological topics provide an opportunity for scholars to retail well-worn pastoral themes. John consistently surprises by pursuing what he calls critical biblical theology, which embraces historical criticism as a basis for biblical theology.1 In this respect John goes against the grain of recent trends in biblical theology, which often regard critical scholarship with suspicion and seek rapprochement with confessional theology and tradi- tional apologetics. His joining of critical scholarship with critical theology is a refreshing counterpoint to these trends. As a contribution to the project of critical biblical theology, I will address the interplay between philology and theology in what I call the dream of a per- fect text in early modern Europe. This textual obsession produced monumen- tal efffects in biblical scholarship and Christian theology, giving rise to a new critical method and, perhaps ironically, a new doctrine of biblical inerrancy. This was an era when text-critical details were tightly bound with theological disputes, when textual variants were mobilized as weapons in sectarian con- troversy about heresy and salvation. In this period, as Richard Muller observes, the birth of the high orthodox doctrine of Scripture was framed by debate over the critical approach to the text.2 It may not seem obvious how the problem of textual variants could yield simultaneously the modern method of textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible and the modern doctrine of biblical inerrancy. As we will see, mundane textual details had surprising consequences. 1 J. J. Collins, Is a Critical Biblical Theology Possible? in idem, Encounters with Biblical Theology (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2005), 1123 at 2223. 2 R. A. Muller, Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics: The Rise and Development of Reformed Orthodoxy, ca. 1520 to ca. 1725. Vol. 2. Holy Scripture: The Cognitive Foundation of Theology (2d ed.; Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2003), 372.Hendel 518 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV This story I will tell has three phases: (1) the rise of early modern textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible in the era of Christian humanism; (2) the inten- sified stakes of text-critical issues in the Protestant-Catholic controversy after Trent; and (3) the nexus between the rise of the orthodox doctrine of biblical inerrancy and the modern method of textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible.3 The story has many more players and details than I can address; hence this is a broad brush account that attends to the major sweep of these mostly forgotten events, which nonetheless still resound in our present academic and theologi- cal discourses. 1 Textual Criticism and Christian Humanism The first work that systematically applied the Renaissance model of textual criticism to the Hebrew Bible was Agostino Steucos Veteris Testamenti ad veritatem Hebraicam recognitio (The Old Testament Revised to the Hebrew Truth), published in 1529.4 It provides a systematic comparison of textual vari- ants in the Pentateuchfocused on the Vulgate, MT, and the Septuagint, and with reference to the Targums and medieval commentariesin order to lay the foundation for a corrected edition of the Vulgate Pentateuch. Like Jerome and most of Steucos contemporaries, he regarded the MT as the unchanging and perfect original text, the Hebraica veritas, and he argued for correcting the wayward Vulgate readings accordingly. Steuco was an excellent Hebraist and was well versed in the techniques of classical textual criticism formulated by Italian Renaissance textual critics, most notably Angelo Poliziano.5 An example of Steucos text-critical skill is his discussion of a variant in Gen 14:7, presented in modern form as follows: 3 The textual criticism of the New Testament is less important than the Hebrew Bible in the second two phases of this story; for its importance in the first phase, see D. K. Shuger, After Allegory: New Testament Scholarship in the Renaissance, in idem, The Renaissance Bible: Scholarship, Sacrifice, and Subjectivity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), 1153; and J. H. Bentley, Humanists and Holy Writ: New Testament Scholarship in the Renaissance (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983). 4 Venice: Aldine, 1529; 2d ed.; Lyons: Gryphium, 1531. Pagination is to the second edition. On Steuco, see R. K. Delph, Emending and Defending the Vulgate Old Testament: Agostino Steucos Quarrel with Erasmus, in Biblical Humanism and Scholasticism in the Age of Erasmus (ed. E. Rummel; Leiden: Brill, 2008), 297317. 5 On Polizianos importance in the history of textual criticism, see A. Grafton, Joseph Scaliger: A Study in the History of Classical Scholarship. Vol. 1: Textual Criticism and Exegesis (Oxford: Clarendon, 1983), 944.The Dream Of A Perfect Text 519 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV MT V (regionem) (field, region) ] * LXX (, rulers) (graph / ) Steucos astutely observesfollowing Polizianos methodthat this is a paleographical variant, triggered by a graphic confusion between dalet and re. He writes: Consider, I urge you, the variety that is discovered even in the Hebrew manuscripts. For without a doubt the Septuagint translators seemed to have read not but with the letter resh. For as has often been said, there is the greatest similarity between these two letters.... Most certainly then they did not read the word with a dalet but with a resh. I myself marvel at this variety, and this causes me to suspect that many other things throughout the Bible have been altered.6 I note that the Greek reading reflects not only the graphic confusion of dalet and re, but also a secondary change of he to yod, yielding the construct plu- ral form . This two-step development indicates that the variant was more likely a product of a Hebrew scribe than the Greek translator. This observation supports Steucos conclusion.7 But the main point is Steucos marvel at this variety as he perceives the possible extent of readings that throughout the Bible have been altered by such scribal slips. Despite his text-critical skills, Steuco presupposes that the MT is a perfect text, always correct, and therefore any variants in the LXX or Vulgate are trans- lators or copyists errors. This assumption of textual perfectionthe equation of one extant text with the Hebrew truthis a philological and historical impossibility. Scribal errors and changes occur in all of the manuscript tradi- tions of the Hebrew Bible, and in any given case it is impossible to forecast which manuscript or versionif anypreserves the best (or to be more precise, the earliest inferable) reading. But the assumption that one text of the Bible was correct and all the others corrupt was widespread in Steucos time, and it persists in some circles to this day. It is diffficult to think about the 6 Trans. Delph, Emending, 309. Steuco, Veteris Testamenti, 229: Animadvertite quaeso varietatem, quae etiam in codicibus Hebraicis reperitur. Nam Septuaginta procul dubio, non , sed per resc legisse videntur. Est enim ut saepe dictum est, maxima inter eas duas literas similitude.... Certissime igitur non dalet, sed resc legerunt. Mirorque ipse hanc varietatem. Eaque res facit etiam ut suspicer, pleraque alia tota Biblia immutata esse. 7 The Samaritan Pentateuch, which was not available in 1529, agrees with MT in this reading. The Syriac Peshitta, which was similarly unavailable, agrees with the LXX.Hendel 520 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV Hebrew Bible as a text that is dispersed among many manuscripts and ver- sions, and whose readings, in some cases, are lost forever. Steuco was a Catholic humanist, which entails certain theological orienta- tions. He occasionally peppered his philological discussions with theological invective against the Protestants, as when he defends the ritual sacred offfices (sacris offficiis) in the Bible that provide warrant for Catholic institutions.8 He also defended the authority of the Vulgate, which he aimed to improve, not replace. He criticized on theological grounds his colleague Sante Pagninis Latin translation of the Hebrew Bible (1527), which could be seen as replac- ing the Vulgate. Paul Grendler summarizes Steucos objection: [it] gave the enemies of true religion, especially Jews, the impression that Christians were weak in their faith.9 Clearly, textual criticism was bound up with theological afffirmations of authority and truth. Textual perfection and power were thor- oughly intertwined. Despite his conventional theological views, Steucos textual criticism had vocal opponents. The scholastic theologians at the universities of Paris, Louvain, Salamanca, and elsewhere resisted the pull of sacred philology. As Erika Rummel comments, the [scholastic] defenders of the Vulgate Bible argued that it was an inspired text and thus flawless in every respect.10 Hence there was no reason to improve its text. Knowledge of the original languages was not necessaryand was indeed an impedimentto its full understand- ing. As Pierre Cousturier, a theologian at the Sorbonne, fulminated (against Erasmus): We do not need a knowledge of foreign languages for an understanding of Holy Writ and for this reason it is vain and frivolous to spend time on learning them. Nor is it necessary to learn them for the purpose of pro- ducing a new translation of Scripture, for the Vulgate translation is quite suffficient....It is completely insane and smacks of heresy for anyone to afffirm that one should sweat over foreign languages for this purpose.11 Linguistic and philological knowledge were a lure to heresy, not a means to textual (or doctrinal) purification. The texts perfection was guaranteed by 8 Steuco, Veteris Testamenti, 557, at Num 8. 9 P. F. Grendler, Italian Biblical Humanism and the Papacy, 15151535, in Rummel, Biblical Humanism, 22776 at 247. 10 E. Rummel, The Humanist-Scholastic Debate in the Renaissance and Reformation (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995), 125. 11 Ibid., 113.The Dream Of A Perfect Text 521 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV theology. Textual criticism was beyond the pale, an unthinkable concept except by the completely insane. The rhetorical tone indicates the importance of the underlying issues involving the texts authority for those whose institutional authority derives from the perfect text. Erasmus, the most acute textual critic of the age, had a diffferent criticism of Steucos work. In a letter to Steuco in 1531, he argued that some variants in the LXX, reflecting old Hebrew readings, were superior to the readings in MT. In other words, MT is not in every instance the Hebraica veritas. We can infer other superior Hebrew readings. Erasmus supports his philological point with a characteristic polemical thrust, which offfers a preemptive defense against the accusation of impiety. He writes: Now if the Hebrew words are not ambiguous, then one must believe that the Septuagint translators read something diffferent than we have. Indeed is it any wonder if anywhere I follow the Septuagint version, since in a number of places the apostles and evangelists do likewise?12 Erasmus crafts his text-critical eclecticism such that his position seems to be supported by the evangelists and apostles. But Erasmuss philological method was theologically explosive, since it was subversive of the theological authority of the Vulgate and of its orthodox defenders. Yet Erasmus was not a Hebraist, and therefore to Steuco goes the laurel for initiating a new era in the textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible. Erasmus correctly notes that Steucos text-critical method is marred by his allegiance to the Hebrew truth of MT. He rightly saw that the best readings are distributed among multiple texts. At this time the issue of textual variants was relatively minor, confined mostly to the desire of Christian humanists to improve the Vulgate. But the theological stakes surrounding these text-critical issues were about to shift. The controversies within Christian humanism were eclipsed by the growing Protestant heresy. Textual criticism became an explo- sive agent in the Catholic-Protestant religious wars. 2 Textual Wars: 15461600 In response to the Protestant heresy of Luther and his followers, the Council of Trent issued the following decree in 1546 concerning the authoritative version of Scripture: 12 Trans. Delph, Emending, 316.Hendel 522 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV This same holy Council...ordains and declares that the old Vulgate edi- tion, which has been approved for use in the Church for so many centu- ries, is to be taken as authentic in public lectures, disputations, sermons, and expositions, and that no one should dare or presume to reject it under any circumstances whatsoever.13 The decree was carefully worded to avoid the complicated issue of textual cor- ruptions in the Vulgate and to avoid denigrating the Hebrew text of the Old Testament and the Greek text of the New.14 The Councils position was that the Vulgate had been the customary Bible of the Roman Catholic Church for roughly a thousand years, and by long usage was held to be reliable in mat- ters of faith and doctrine. Because it was the traditional textand thereby linked with Church tradition and authorityit had earned its status as the authoritative text. The decree essentially raised the Vulgates de facto status to de jure. The main purpose of the decree was to assert the authority of the tradi- tional Scriptureand, by extension, the traditional authority of the Church against the Protestants and their bevy of vernacular translations. Behind the scenes there was controversy over the omissions and ramifica- tions of this decree. The Commission of Cardinals in Rome was highly critical. According to a letter by Cardinal Alessandro Farnese: In its opinion it would have been better to leave out the chapter on the authenticity of the Vulgate, but since it has been drawn up we must look for ways and means to tone it down, that is, to explain it further, for it is impossible to deny that in many passages the Vulgate departs from the certain Hebrew and Greek text and fails to render its meaning.15 But the Vulgate decree was not toned down. Its status as authentic (authen- tica) was afffirmed, notwithstanding its corruptions and variants. 13 Trans. R. J. Blackwell, Galileo, Bellarmine, and the Bible (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1991), 182. The decree, issued on April 8, 1546, reads: Insuper eadem sacro- sancta synodus...statuit et declarant, ut haec ipsa vetus et vulgata editio, quae longo tot saeculorum usu in ipsa ecclesia probate est, in publicis lectionibus, disputationibus, praedicationibus et expolitionibus pro authentica habeatur, et ut nemo illam rejicere quovis praetextu audeat vel praesumat. 14 See H. Jedin, A History of the Council of Trent. Vol. 2: The First Sessions at Trent, 154547 (London: Nelson, 1961), 7598. 15 Quoted in Jedin, History, 9697.The Dream Of A Perfect Text 523 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV The Protestant critique was severe. In his 1547 pamphlet presenting his Antidote to the Council of Trent, John Calvin denounced the Vulgate decree as erroneous and barbarous: The sacred oracles of God were delivered by Moses and the Prophets in Hebrew, and by the Apostles in Greek.... [Those] who are acquainted with the languages perceive that this version [the Vulgate] teems with innumerable errors; and this they make manifest by the clearest evi- dence. On the other hand, the Fathers of Trent contend, that although the learned thus draw the pure liquor from the very fountain, and convict the infallible Vulgate of falsehood, they are not to be listened to.16 Calvin concludes his treatise with the damning conclusion: The sum is, that the spirit of Trent wished, by this decree, that Scripture should only signify to us whatever dreaming monks might choose.17 The textual wars had begun. The first wave of Catholic responses to Protestant criticism tended to radi- calize the Vulgate decree. In his 1558 treatise, De optimo scripturas interpretandi genere (On the Best Way of Interpreting Scripture),18 the Dutch theologian William Lindanus (Guillaume van der Linden) revived the Scholastic argument that the Vulgate was the reliable text of the Bible. He asserted that the Hebrew and Greek texts had been corrupted by Jews and other heretics, whereas the Vulgate, made from uncorrupted manuscripts, had been faithfully preserved in the Catholic Church.19 Lindanus recycled the traditional Christian calumny against the Jewsthat they falsified Scripture out of hatred for Christianityand redirected it against 16 J. Calvin, Acts of the Council of Trent: With the Antidote (1547), in idem, Tracts Relating to the Reformation, (trans. H. Beveridge; 3 vols.; Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 1849), 3:71. 17 Ibid., 76. 18 Cologne: Cholinum, 1558. On Lindanus, see V. Baroni, La Contre-Rforme devant la Bible: La question biblique (Lausanne: Concorde, 1943), 13941. 19 The title of chapter 3, book 1, is indicative (Lindanus, De optimo, 19): Hebraicam Lectionem hodiernam non esse germanam & genuinam, sed adulteratam (The Hebrew Readings of Today are not Authentic and Genuine, but Adulterated). Lindanus offfers as evidence a fragment of Psalm 13 that he believed had escaped corruption (p. 20 = Leiden Ms. Or. 4725, a twelfth-century Christian Psalter that has some Latin readings retroverted into Hebrew). Benito Arias Montano refuted Lindanuss analysis in his appendix volume to the Antwerp Polyglot (1572); see now E. van Staalduine-Sulman, Where is God? Romans 3:1318 as an Addition to Psalm 14, in Tradition and Innovation in Biblical Interpretation (eds. W. Th. Van Peursen and J. W. Dyk; Leiden: Brill, 2011), 10610.Hendel 524 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV the Protestants. Interestingly, this calumny (formulated first by Justin Martyr in his Dialogue with Trypho) was originally an explanation for the textual vari- ants between the Septuagint and MT.20 Now it was mobilized in the attack on MT in defense of the Vulgate. Lindanus added a notable scholarly argument: as Elijah Levita had carefully argued in 1538, the vowel points in MT were an invention of the medieval Masoretes.21 Lindanus included this argument in his denunciation of MT: What more harsh could be said against Hebrew codices deformed in vari- ous ways by the Jews through the effforts of Rabbis maddened by hatred of Christ, and those Jews who punctuated the Bible who are not trustwor- thy enough that you may safely believe them?22 One of the few texts that Lindanus cites as an anti-Christian corruption in MT is the diffficult text of Psalm 22:17.23 The variant is as follows: M (like a lion) ] 5/6evPs G () V (foderunt) (they dug?) (graph / ) The text does not make sense under either reading: Like a lion, my hands and my feet or They dug (?) my hands and my feet. The Syriac Peshitta translates pierced, which appealed to Christian readers as a prophecy of the crucifixion. But the textual diffference consists of a yod/waw variation, which is a simple graphic error.24 The Septuagint rendering (followed in the Vulgate) is prob- ably a guess, based on the Hebrew root / , to dig. There is no reason to 20 Lindanus, De optimo, 28; see Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, 7173, 83; and I. M. Resnick, The Falsification of Scripture and Medieval Christian and Jewish Polemics, Medieval Encounters 2 (1996): 35354. 21 Lindanus, De optimo, 18; see C. D. Ginsburg, ed. and trans., The Massoreth Ha-Massoreth of Elias Levita (London: Longmans, 1867), 12134. 22 Ibid., 32: Quid enim contra Hebraicos codices a Iudaeis varie Rabbinorum Christi odio rabidorum opera deformatos dicatur durius, Iudaeos istos punctorum Biblis afffictorum authores non satis fidos, ut eis tuto credas? 23 Ibid., 2930. See similarly J. Calvin, Commentary on the Book of Psalms, trans. J. Anderson (3 vols.; Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 184549; Latin original, 1557). 1:373: [there are] strong grounds for conjecturing that this passage has been fraudulently corrupted by the Jews. 24 As correctly observed by L. Cappel, Critica sacra (Paris: Cramoisy, 1650), 257; see below.The Dream Of A Perfect Text 525 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV impute a deliberate corruption in any version. In my view we cannot reconsti- tute the original reading.25 It is lost forever. There is irony in Catholic polemicists arguing for the corruption of MT in favor of Jeromes Vulgate, for it was Jerome who sought to return to the Hebraica veritas of MT. But this irony was lost on these religious controversialists. The high stakes in the Catholic-Protestant polemics created contorted positions on both sides. The most accomplished and influential Catholic polemicist was Robert Bellarmine, whose multi-volume Disputationes de controversiis christianae fidei adversus hujus temporis haereticos (Disputations on the Controversies over Christian Faith against the Heretics of the Present Time) set a new stan- dard of erudition in this debate.26 The first book, De verbo Dei (On the Word of God, 1586), addressed the issue of the Vulgate versus the Hebrew and Greek texts. Bellarmine sensibly dismissed the argument that the variants were due to Jewish connivance. He correctly argued that there are scribal errors in all biblical texts and versions: The Hebrew Scriptures have not been generally corrupted by the effforts or malice of the Jews; nor, however, are they absolutely intact and pris- tine. Rather, they do contain some errors, which crept in partly through the negligence or ignorance of the copyists, especially since in Hebrew it is easy to make errors in some similar letters, such as and ; and ; , , 25 Modern proposals include the root , to be/become ugly (attested in Ben Sira 11:2, 13:22), whose biform means reproach, despise in 4QpNahum frag. 34, col. 3.4 (see D. Flusser, apud M. Kister, Some Observations on Vocabulary and Style in the Dead Sea Scrolls, in Diggers at the Well: Proceedings of a Third International Symposium on the Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Ben Sira [Leiden: Brill, 2000], 13765 at 14041); and the root , to be/become short, attested in Akkadian and Syriac (see M. L. Barr, The Crux of Psalm 22:17c: Solved at Long Last?, in David and Zion [ed. B. F. Batto and K. L. Roberts; Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2004], 287306). For other recent proposals (in my view, all implausible), see G. Vall, Psalm 22:17B: The Old Guess, JBL 116 (1997): 4546; B. A. Strawn, Psalm 22:17b: More Guessing, JBL 119 (2000): 43951; and K. Swenson, Psalm 22:17: Circling around the Problem Again, JBL 123 (2004): 63748. 26 R. Bellarmine, Disputationes de controversiis christianae fidei adversus hujus temporis hae- reticos (3 vols.; Inglestadt, 158693). Citations are to R. Bellarmine, Opera omnia (6 vols.; Naples: Giuliano, 185662). On Bellarmine, see J. de la Servire, La thologie de Bellarmin (Paris: Beauchesne, 1908); and Blackwell, Galileo.Hendel 526 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV and ; and ; and partly through the ignorance of the Rabbis who added the vowel-points.27 This position, however, was aimed against the Protestants; for if the Hebrew Bible was sometimes unreliable, then the Protestant principle of sola scrip- tura was flawed. One needed a theological authority behind the text. For Bellarmine, this authority was the Church. The problem of textual errors can only be resolved by an inerrant Church. Perhaps surprisingly, Bellarmine raised the stakes in this debate by investing the contents of the Bible with more, not less, perfection. This perfection height- ened the necessity of the Churchs interpretive power. Whereas the Council of Trent had repeatedly referred to the Bibles authority in rebus fidei et morum (in matters of faith and morals/mores), Bellarmine argued that the Bible was without error in all matters: There can be no error in Scripture, whether it deals with faith or with morals/mores, or whether it states something general and common to the whole Church, or something particular and pertaining to only one person.28 This expands the traditional concept of biblical authority, which previouslyboth in Catholic and Protestant traditionwas focused on fides et mores. Bellarmine anticipates the objection to his novel expansion by arguing as follows: In Scripture there are many things which of themselves do not per- tain to the faith, that is, which were not written because it is necessary [for salvation] to believe them. But it is necessary to believe them because they were written.29 He further explains his position: In the Scriptures not only the 27 Trans. adapted from N. Malcolm, Hobbes, Ezra, and the Bible: The History of a Subversive Idea, in idem, Aspects of Hobbes (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 383431 at 417; Bellarmine, De verbo 2.2 (Opera, 1.65): Scripturas hebraicas non esse in universum depra- vatas, opere vel malitia Judaeorum; nec tamen esse omnino integras et puras, sed habere suos quosdam errores, qui partim irrepserint negligentia vel ignorantia librariorum, prae- sertim cum in hebraeo facile sit errare ob literas quasdam simillimas, quales sunt; and : and : , , and : and partim ignorantia Rabbinorum qui addiderunt puncta. 28 Trans. Blackwell, Galileo, 31; Bellarmine, De conciliis 2.12 (Opera, 2.62): in Scriptura nullus potest esse error, sive agatur de fide, sive de moribus, et sive afffirmetur aliquid generale, et toti Ecclesiae commune, sive aliquid particulare, et ad unum tantum hominem pertinens. 29 Trans. Blackwell, Galileo, 32; Bellarmine, De verbo 4.12 (Opera, 1.140): in Scripturis plurima sunt, quae ex se non pertinent ad fidem, id est, quae non ideo scriptua sunt, quia neces- sario credenda erani, sed necessario creduntur, quia scripta sunt.The Dream Of A Perfect Text 527 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV opinions expressed, but each and every word pertains to faith. For we believe that not one word is useless or not used correctly.30 As Richard Blackwell observes, this was a new expansion of the doctrine of Scriptural authority: His remarks expand the concept of matters of faith considerably by introducing a startling standard of exegesis, which was new to the debate. We will call this the principle of de dicto truth. The mere fact that something has been said in the Scriptures makes it not only certainly true but a matter of faith, assuming that its meaning is clearly established. The subject matter in the biblical statement is irrelevant.... As a result every statement in Scripture, once its correct literal meaning has been established, is a de fide truth. And, of course, the power to determine the correct literal meaning is ultimately located in the Church.31 As Blackwell notes, Bellarmines high view of biblically authorized truth was crucial in his later condemnation of Galileo.32 It also had major consequences in the Catholic-Protestant debate.33 Previously, the Protestants had not held a doctrine of uniform biblical inerrancy. As Roland Bainton observes, for Luther inspiration did not insure inerrancy in all details. Luther recognized mistakes and inconsistencies in 30 Trans. Blackwell, Galileo, 31; Bellarmine, De conciliis 2.12 (Opera, 2.62): in Scriptura non solum sentential, sed etiam verba omnia, et singular ad fidem pertinent. Credimus enim nullum esse verbum in Scriptura frustra, aut non recte positum. 31 Blackwell, Galileo, 105. 32 Ibid., 105109. 33 Bellarmine was not the only post-Tridentine theologian working out a theory of de dicto truth; cf. the Salamanca theologian Domingo Baez, Scholastica commentaria in primam partem angelici doctoris D. Thomae (Venice: Concordiae, 1585), 6364: Spiritus Sanctus non solum res in Scriptura contentas inspiravit, sed etiam singular verba quibus scrib- erentur, dictavit atque suggessit (The Holy Spirit not only inspired the things contained in Scripture, but also dictated and suggested every word with which it was written); cited in U. Horst, Der Streit um die Autoritt der Vulgata: zur Rezeption des trienter Schriftdekrets in Spanien (Coimbra: Coimbra Editora, 1983), 163. See also A. Nichols, The Shape of Catholic Theology: An Introduction to Its Sources, Principles, and History (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1991), 117: [St.] Thomas theory could have been developed in either a maximalizing or a minimalizing direction. Either one could stress that God really is the principal effficient cause, or one could stress that the human writer really is the instru- mental effficient cause. In fact, his teaching was developed in a maximalizing direction and so was turned into the theory of verbal dictation [in the sixteenthseventeenth centuries].Hendel 528 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV Scripture and treated them with lofty indiffference because they did not touch the heart of the Gospel.34 Where minor errors occur, as when Matthew 27:9 mistakenly cites Jeremiah instead of Zechariah, Luther responds: Such points do not bother me particularly.35 Similarly, in his commentaries Calvin is not bothered by errors in the text where they are unrelated to matters of faith and salvation.36 He acknowledges minor errors without anxiety, as in the contra- dictions among the Gospels: It is well known that the Evangelists were not very concerned with observing the time sequences.37 Calvin and Luther also drew on the traditional doctrine of accommodation.38 Regarding the world-picture of Gen 13, Calvin commented, Moses is by no means to be blamed, if he, considering the offfice of schoolmaster as imposed upon him, insists on the rudiments suitable to children.39 In Scripture, God accommodates his discourse in order that it be understandable to uneducated people. As Paul Helm explains Calvins concept of accommodation, It is an accommodation because Calvin believes that such a statement is not strictly true.40 A comparable flexibility occurs, as Brian Gerrish observes, in those interesting places where Calvin speaks not of the fallibility of the text, but of its historical relativity, including directives in the New Testament that are no longer relevant, such as Christian communism, the regulation of usury, and Pauls directives on masculine hairstyle.41 In sum, for the Reformers the Bibles inerrancy is where it needs to beon matters of faith and doctrine, and on 34 R. H. Bainton, The Bible in the Reformation, in The Cambridge History of the Bible. Vol. 3: The West from the Reformation to the Present Day (ed. S. L. Greenslade; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1963), 137 at 12. 35 Ibid., 13. 36 See B. A. Gerrish, The Word of God and the Words of Scripture: Luther and Calvin on Biblical Authority, in idem, The Old Protestantism and the New: Essays on the Reformation Heritage (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982), 5168 at 6263. 37 J. Calvin, Commentaires sur le Nouveau Testament. Tome I: Sur la concordance ou harmonie compose de trois vanglistes (Paris, Meyrueis, 1854), 319 (at Luke 8:19): on sait bien que les Evanglistes ne se sont pas gures arrestez observer lordre des temps. Cited in W. J. Bouwsma, John Calvin: A Sixteenth Century Portrait (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 12122. 38 See generally, S. D. Benin, The Footprints of God: Divine Accommodation in Jewish and Christian Thought (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993). 39 J. Calvin, Genesis, trans. J. King (Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 1847; repr. 1984), 141 (at Gen 3:1); see similarly at Gen 1:56, 1416, 22, 31; 2:8, 10; 3:23. 40 P. Helm, John Calvins Ideas (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 394. 41 Gerrish, Word, 300 n. 76.The Dream Of A Perfect Text 529 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV historical events basic to the history of salvation.42 The doctrine of uniform inerrancy in the literal sense across all details is an innovation of the Catholic- Protestant polemics after Trent. Protestant theologians responded to Bellarmines innovation in kind, afffirm- ing the uniform inerrancy of Scripture for their own apologetic ends. The most distinguished Protestant response to Bellarmine was by William Whitaker, the Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge. His 1588 Disputatio de sacra scriptura; contra huius temporis papistas (translated as Disputation on Holy Scripture, Against the Papists) was widely influential among Protestant and Catholic theologians.43 As a counterpoint to Bellarmines nesting of the Bibles inerrancy with the Churchs, Whitaker emphasized the sovereignty of an iner- rant Scripture: Scripture is as it were the queen and mistress which ought to rule and govern human infirmity, and to which our whole intellect, all teach- ing, every thought and opinion, should be conformed in dutiful submission.44 He agreed on the high perfection of the Bible, but rejected the interpretive authority of the Church. The Protestant high doctrine of biblical inerrancy was formulated as a polemical rejoinderan inverse echoof the Catholic posi- tion. Whitaker avers: Say they, the church never errs; the pope never errs. We shall shew both assertions to be false in the proper place. We say that scripture never errs.45 Whitaker extended the inerrancy of Scripture to include the detailed per- fection of the Hebrew text. He argued that the Vulgate is a tissue of scribal and translational errors, while the Hebrew Bible is unblemished. He responded point by point to Bellarmines examples of scribal errors in the MT, argu- ing that in each the Hebrew is correct.46 For example, in the case of Psalm 22:17, he argues that there is no error in MT, since the Masorites themselves afffirm that it was so written [as ] in some corrected copies, and he cites 42 I do not mean to imply that the Reformers had a consistent view of inspiration or Scripture. Luther could also say, Gott ist in allen seinen Worten, ja Syllaben (God is in every word, every syllable; Tischreden no. 1983). As Gerrish comments (Old Protestantism, 177): Neither of them [Luther and Calvin] had a comprehensive theory of religious lan- guage: Calvins principle of accommodation, for instance, was used chiefly as a problem- solving device, to be rolled out only when needed. 43 Cambridge: Thomas, 1588; Eng. trans., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1849; pagi- nation from the latter. On Whitaker, see P. Lake, Moderate Puritans and the Elizabethan Church (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), 5866, 93115; Muller, Post- Reformation, 107108. 44 Whitaker, Disputation, 66364. 45 Ibid., 476. 46 Ibid., 15860.Hendel 530 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV others who have seen such copies.47 With similar erudite arguments, he coun- ters Bellarmines other examples of corruptions in MT (at Isa 9:6; Jer 23:6; Ps 22:17; Ps 19:5; and Exod 2:22).48 I submit that Whitaker is wrong on Ps 19:5, where (their line) in MT is a simple corruption of (their voice), as reflected in the Greek (cf. Ps 19:4).49 However, Whitaker has the better argument in the other instances. Whitaker concludes: These then are the passages which Bellarmine was able to find fault with the originals; and yet in these there is really nothing to require either blame or corrections.50 The only textual change he acknowl- edges is the shift from the old Hebrew script to the square script at the time of Ezra. Hence his afffirmation that we possess the original text of the Hebrew Bible: We must hold, therefore, that we have now those very scriptures which Moses and the other prophets published, although we have not, perhaps, pre- cisely the same forms and shapes of the letters.51 Whitaker held that the Hebrew Bible in the MT is inerrant in all things, including text and vocalization. The perfection of the text supported a perfect divine discourse. Here we see the leveling of the whole Bible to a state of per- fection. The previous distinction between matters of faith and morals/mores and matters unconnected to salvation was no more. It was all one divine dis- course, each word dictated by God and necessarily true. The textual wars put at risk the Reformation doctrine of sola scriptura, which entailed the clarity, self-suffficiency, and self-interpreting quality of Scripture. The orthodox Protestants mounted a defense behind a uniform doc- trine of inerrancy, including the sense, the words, and even the vowels of the Hebrew text.52 Amandus Polanus enunciated the mature orthodox doctrine in his Syntagma Theologiae Christianae (System of Christian Theology): 47 Ibid., 159. As the translator notes, Whitaker is referring to the Masora magna at Num 29:9, . This masora is in the Second Rabbinic Bible, which was Whitakers authority; see M. H. Goshen-Gottstein, ed., Biblia Rabbinica: A Reprint of the 1525 Venice Edition, Edited by Jacob Ben Hayim Ibn Adoniya (Jerusalem: Makor, 1972), 364. 48 The latter involves a harmonistic expansion in some MSS of LXX, Syr, and V, which sup- plies the birth and naming of Mosess second son, Eliezer, harmonized from Exod 18:4. Whitaker correctly observes that this is a secondary plus. 49 This scribal error may be described as a near-haplography of ; see the commentaries. 50 Whitaker, Disputation, 160. 51 Ibid., 117. 52 On the controversy over the age of the vowel points, see R. A. Muller, The Debate over the Vowel Points and the Crisis in Orthodox Hermeneutics, in idem, After Calvin: Studies in the Development of a Theological Tradition (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 14654.The Dream Of A Perfect Text 531 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV The Old Testament Scripture was transmitted by God through the proph- ets, not only with respect to the sense, but also with respect to the words, and therefore also with respect to the vowels, without which the words cannot be clear.53 The perfection of Scripture goes all the way through. In all of its details, Polanus proclaims, Sacred Scripture...is infallibly certain.54 Polanuss colleague, the Hebraist Johannes Buxtorf, afffirmed the truth and purity of the Hebrew text in his edition of the Biblia Rabbinica (1619): We have left the Hebrew text in the most ancient truth of its purity and sub- stance.... It is impious either to add or remove anything, or to change it in any way whatsoever.55 Buxtorf eschewed textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible because it clashed with his orthodox commitments. For Buxtorf and the orthodox Protestant theologians, the attribution of error of any kind opened a theological abyss. As Laurentius Fabricius wrote in a letter to Buxtorf in 1625, Variants are arts of the devil.56 3 Sacred Criticism and Its Discontents: 16201680 The Catholic scholar Jean Morin, who produced the editio princeps of the Samaritan Pentateuch, acidly described the Protestant problem concerning the Hebrew text: If mistakes abound in that which is the only foundation of their faith, this faith is certainly completely ruined and absolutely sterile.57 This is, in retrospect, a clear exaggeration. However, orthodox Protestant 53 Amandus Polanus, Syntagma Theologiae Christianae (Hanover: Aubrii, 1615), 486: Quia Scriptura Veteris Testamenti est a Deo per Prophetas tradita, non tantum quoad sensum, sed etiam quoad verba, ac proinde etiam quoad vocales, sine quibus verba nulla constare possunt. On Polanus, see H. Faulenbach, Die Struktur der Theologie des Amandus Polanus von Polansdorf (Zrich: EVZ-Verlag, 1967), and on this passage, 110. 54 Polanus, Syntagma, 17: Sacrae Scripturae...est infallibiliter certa. 55 Quoted in S. G. Burnett, From Christian Hebraism to Jewish Studies: Johannes Buxtorf (15641629) and Hebrew Learning in the Seventeenth Century (Leiden: Brill, 1996), 227 n. 111: Textum Hebraeum in antiquissima & verissima sua puritate & substantia...reliquimus. Impius enim, quisquis ei aliquid vel addiderit vel detraxerit, aut quovis modo in eo quid mutaverit. 56 Letter to Buxtorf, August 24, 1625; quoted in Burnett, Hebraism, 237, n. 167: Variae sunt artes Diaboli. 57 Letter of 1653; quoted in D. Barthlemy, Studies in the Text of the Old Testament (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2012), 23.Hendel 532 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV theologians and scholars agreed in the main with this proposition. Thus, when Morin published his Exercitationes ecclesiasticae in utrumque Samaritanorum Pentateuchum (Ecclesiastical Engagements in the Samaritan Pentateuch, 1631), in which he argued that the Samaritan Pentateuch was older than and superior to MT, turmoil ensued.58 Morins chief argument was paleographi- cal: the Samaritan text is written in old Hebrew script, which preceded the Aramaic script used in MT. This script chronology is correct, but the inference that the Samaritan text is necessarily older than MT is not. In any case, Morin joined his philological argument to the old calumny: the Protestants were using a Hebrew text corrupted by the Jews.59 The solution to the quandary of variantsnow including old Hebrew vari- ants from the Samaritan textwas meticulously detailed in Louis Cappels Critica sacra, sive de variis quae in sacris Veteris Testamenti libris occurrunt lecti- onibus (Sacred Criticism, or on the Various Readings that Occur in the Sacred Old Testament) completed in 1634 but not published until 1650.60 Cappel was a Protestant Hebraist, but more importantly a brilliant philologist who had absorbed the latest methods of textual criticism as practiced by Joseph Scaliger, Isaac Casaubon, and their students.61 As Steuco had done a century earlier, Cappel put textual criticism of the Hebrew on a new scholarly level. Cappel collected and analyzed the many variant readings in the MT (includ- ing parallel texts and the ketiv/qere), the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Septuagint and other versions (Targums, Peshitta, Vulgate) and argued that one should use all of these sources in an analytically rigorous way to reconstitute the origi- nal text. His reasoning is exemplary: 58 J. Morin, Exercitationes Ecclesiasticae in utrumque Samaritanorum Pentateuchum (Paris: Vitray, 1631); see R. T. Anderson and T. Giles, The Samaritan Pentateuch: An Introduction to Its Origin, History, and Significance for Biblical Studies (Atlanta: SBL, 2012), 15459. 59 Morin added an eccentric wrinkle, arguing that Kabbalistic exegesis motivated many of the scribal changes. 60 Paris: Cramoisy, 1650. On Cappel, see F. Laplanche, Lcriture, le sacr et lhistoire: rudits et politiques protestants devant la Bible en France au XVIIe sicle (Amsterdam: Holland University Press, 1986), 181290; B. Chiesa, Filologia storica della Bibbia ebraica (2 vols.; Brescia: Paideia, 2002), 35675. 61 See Laplanche, Lcriture, 91100; Grafton, Scaliger; 176: Scaliger transformed the art of criticism. He showed that a critical edition could not rest on a genealogical examination of the extant manuscripts alone. Rather, it had to rest on a reconstructed history of the textual tradition; and where the oldest manuscripts were no longer extant, errors in the surviving ones and even literary evidence had to be called into play. He had thus arrived at the fundamental insight of nineteenth-century German critics...who made Scaligers method the accepted one.The Dream Of A Perfect Text 533 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV It is not possible to define with certainty which Codex should be pre- ferred to the other.... That is to say, the arguments cannot be derived from extrinsic factors, but are intrinsic and inherent.... [T]he reading is undoubtedly better and preferred, which in itself produces a truer sense, plainer, more suitable, consonant, commodious, more coherent in its consequences and antecedents, and closer to the writers mind and scope of instruction.62 Cappel here rejects the concept of one manuscript as the perfect text, and formulates the principle that internal factorsincluding style and contextual fitare the criteria that govern the text-critical evaluation of variants and conjectural emendations. In his book, Cappel invents the modern method of textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible. He clearly enunciates the hermeneutical orientation of critical scholarship: We are not here contending with authority, but with reason.63 Cappel granted that the Hebrew Bible was a sacred and authoritative text. In this he was a perfectly pious Protestant. However, he correctly maintained that it was humanly transmitted, and therefore susceptible to scribal errors, which it was the task of the textual critic to detect and, where possible, cor- rect. This injected a human dimension into the biblical text that was unsettling to the orthodox. Further, it meant that theologians had to cede some of their authority to scholars. Both points were resisted. The Protestant orthodox now had to contend not only with Catholics, but also with a Protestant scholar who elevated reason to an unprecedented position. Correcting the text of Homer or Cicero was one thing, but correcting the Word of God was something new and diffferent. As Muller observes, It seemed now as if the textual underpinnings of the Reformations sola scriptura were being chipped away from within the ranks of the Reformed.64 62 Cappel, Critica, 303: Cum itaque hac ratione certo definiri non possit uter Codex alteri sit praeferendus....quarenda nempe sunt argumenta non extrinsecus assumpta, sed intrin- seca & insita....Ea nempe lectio indubitato melior est, atque praeferenda, quae sensum parit in se veriorem, planiorem, aptiorem, concinniorem, commodiorem, consequenti- bus & antecedentibus magis cohaerentem, menti & scopo scriptoris propiorem atque congruentiorem. See Chiesa, Filologia, 36465. 63 Ibid., 396: Non enim hic auctoritate sed ratione pugnamus. 64 Muller, Vowel Points, 149.Hendel 534 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV In some respects this rift replays and deepens the previous clash between scholastics and humanists. The former saw no use for languages when study- ing Scripture, because the Holy Spirit was suffficient. A century later, no one contested the value of knowing the languages. That battle had been lost. Bellarmine and Whitaker were arguing about the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. So now were Cappel and his opponents, both Protestant and Catholic. Since his position impugned the authority of the Vulgate and Church tradition, Rome placed his books on the Index of Prohibited Books. The Protestant response was even more intense. Buxtorfs son, Johannes Jr., also an eminent Hebraist, described Cappels book as most pestilential poison in his critique, Anticritica: seu Vindiciae Veritatis Hebraicae: Adversus Ludovici Cappelli Criticam quam vocat Sacram, eiusq. defensorem: Quibus Sacrosanctae Editionis Bibliorum Hebraicae Authoritas, integras, & sinceritas, a variis eius strophis, & sophismatis (Anti- Critica, or Vindication of the Hebrew Truth against the Criticism called Sacred by Louis Cappel and his Defenders, by Whom the Sanctity of the Authoritative Hebrew Edition of the Bible, Complete and Sincere, [is Impugned] by his Various Tricks and Sophistry, 1653).65 The orthodox had a learned champion, but the polemics were stronger than the philology. The harsh orthodox response to Cappels work was codified in a doctrinal confession issued by the Swiss Reformed Church in 1675, the Formula consen- sus ecclesiarum Helveticarum (usually referred to as the Helvetic Consensus Formula).66 It reads in part: The Hebrew original of the OT which we have received and to this day do retain as handed down by the Hebrew Church...is, not only in its consonants, but in its vowels...not only in its matter, but in its words, inspired by God. It thus forms, together with the original of the NT, the sole and complete rule of our faith and practice; and to its standard, as to a Lydian stone, all extant versions, eastern or western, ought to be applied, and wherever they difffer, be conformed.... Therefore, we are not able to approve of the opinion of those who believe that the text which the Hebrew original exhibits was determined by mans will alone, and do not hesitate at all to remodel a Hebrew reading which they consider 65 Basel: Regis, 1653. The quote is from the dedication: pestilentissimum Venenum. On Buxtorfs response to Cappel, see Laplanche, Lcriture, 299, 30713. 66 See M. I. Klauber, The Helvetic Formula Consensus (1675): An Introduction and Translation, Trinity Journal 11 (1990): 103123.The Dream Of A Perfect Text 535 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV unsuitable, and amend it from the versions of the LXX and other Greek versions, the Samaritan Pentateuch, by the Chaldaic Targums, or even from other sources. They go even to the point of following the corrections that their own rational powers dictate from the various readings of the Hebrew original itselfwhich, they maintain, has been corrupted in var- ious ways; and finally, they afffirm that besides the Hebrew edition of the present time, there are in the versions of the ancient interpreters which difffer from our Hebrew text, other Hebrew originals. Since these versions are also indicative of ancient Hebrew originals difffering from each other, they thus bring the foundation of our faith and its sacred authority into perilous danger.67 This is a repudiation of textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible, because any change to the textcorrections that their own rational powers dictate from the various readingscreates a double problem: it elevates human judgment and rational inquiry to a place unreachable by theology, and it defines the Bible as an imperfect source of salvation. This is impiety or worse, which bring[s] the foundation of our faith and its sacred authority into perilous danger. The Helvetic Consensus Formula was the last orthodox Reformed confes- sion. As Muller observes, the level of dogmatic detail...manifests, if nothing else, the profound trauma experienced by the orthodox theories of the inspi- ration, interpretation, and authority of Scripture in the face of a rising tide of textual and historical criticism of the Bible.68 Even the vowel points were sac- rosanct, for, as Muller notes, If the vowel points were in fact a late invention [as Cappel had confirmed], then tradition had invaded Scripture!69 Moreover, the invading tradition was Jewish. If the authority of the Bible rested on the verac- ity of medieval Jewish Masoretic sages, then the foundation of our faith was indeed in peril. If the vowel points were a late addition, the Hebrew Bible was perspicuous only if Jewish tradition was reliable. The doctrine of sola scriptura rested on tradition after all. The orthodox response was an extreme Masoretic fundamentalism, buttressed by a rejection of text-critical scholarship. 67 Ibid., 11516. 68 Muller, Post-Reformation, 92. 69 Ibid., 94. See further J. Joosten, Le dbat sur la vocalisation massortique de la Bible dlie Levita Louis Cappel, (forthcoming), where he emphasizes Cappels distinction between the vowel signs (which are medieval) and the vocalization tradition (which is ancient). The importance of this distinction was generally lost in the heat of Catholic-Protestant controversy.Hendel 536 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV However, the Helvetic Consensus Formula was never actually a consensus. Many Swiss divines refused to sign, and it was eventually withdrawn.70 It was the high mark of biblical inerrancy in Protestant orthodoxy, but it quickly faded into obscurity. A revised version of inerrancy, formulated by the Swiss theologian Francis Turretin (Franois Turretini), became instead the orthodox standard. Many of its arguments remain in place today in conservative evangelical doctrine.71 In his Institutio theologiae elencticae (Institutes of Disputational Theology, 16751685),72 Turretin presents a detailed defense of inerrancy which takes into account the existence of variants in the MT manuscripts. He does not con- cede much to Cappel, but he modifies the extreme Masoretic fundamentalism of the Helvetic Consensus by granting a limited validity to textual criticism. Turretin grants that scribal errors happen, even in MT. But God has pre- vented their proliferation to the point that the original is unrecoverable. Because of this divine providence, textual criticism can recover the original, inspired text of Scripture. He writes: 70 See M. I. Klauber, The Demise of Reformed Scholasticism and the Abrogation of the Helvetic Formula Consensus of 1675, in idem, Between Reformed Scholasticism and Pan-Protestantism: Jean-Alphonse Turretin (16711737) and Enlightened Orthodoxy at the Academy of Geneva (Cranbury, NJ: Associated University Presses, 1994), 14364. 71 The current standard, the 1978 Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy, blends Turretins views with those of the nineteenth-century Princeton theologians; see http://library.dts. edu/Pages/TL/Special/ICBI_1.pdf. Interestingly, Article 16 explicitly denies these histori- cal roots: We deny that inerrancy is a doctrine invented by Scholastic Protestantism, or is a reactionary position postulated in response to negative higher criticism. (The latter clause refers to the nineteenth-century Princeton theologians response to German bibli- cal criticism.) This denial of the historical roots of the modern doctrine of inerrancy is remarkable. On the relationship between Turretin and the Princeton theologians, see the nuanced comments of M. A. Noll, Introduction, in idem, ed., The Princeton Theology 18121921: Scripture, Science, and Theological Method from Archibald Alexander to Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1983), 2830; see also Ronald Hendel, The Fundamentals, in idem, The Book of Genesis: A Biography (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2013), 18695. 72 3 vols.; Geneva: Tournes, 16791685. Cited from F. Turretin, The Doctrine of Scripture: Locus 2 of Institutio theologiae elencticae (ed. and trans. J. W. Beardslee; Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1981). On Turretin, see also R. A. Muller, Scholasticism Protestant and Catholic: Francis Turretin on the Object and Principles of Theology, in idem, After Calvin, 13744.The Dream Of A Perfect Text 537 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV Although we attribute absolute integrity to Scripture, we do not hold that the copyists and printers have been inspired, but only that the provi- dence of God has so watched over the copyists that, although many errors could have entered, they did not, or at least they did not enter the codices in such a manner that they cannot easily be corrected by comparison with other copies or with [other parts of] Scripture itself. So the basis of the purity and integrity of the sources does not rest on the inerrancy of human beings but on the providence of God.73 For Turretin, textual criticism is valid because it is fully sacred criticism, super- intended by divine providence. God limits the extent of error, such that it may be easily remedied and the perfect text restored. But Turretin makes an important caveat. Only variants in manuscripts and printed editions of MT are valid evidence for the original Hebrew text. The variants in the Samaritan Pentateuch and the old translations (Septuagint, Vulgate, etc.) are deviations from the Hebrew original. Here Turretin main- tains the exclusions detailed in the Helvetic Consensus Formula. He denies the possibility that discrepancies between the old versions and the present Hebrew text were variant readings of Hebrew manuscripts diffferent from ours.74 Textual criticism is an inner-MT afffair. As a consequence of the effficacy of a (limited) textual criticism, Turretin maintains that the Catholic critics of sola scriptura are wrong. The existence of textual variants does not make the Hebrew Bible an imperfect vessel of faith. Through the restorative efffect of an orthodox critica sacra, the Bible retains its inerrant authority: The question is whether the original text, in Hebrew or in Greek, has been so corrupted, either by the carelessness of copyists or by the malice of Jews and heretics, that it can no longer be held as the judge of contro- versies and the norm by which all versions without exception are to be judged. The papists afffirm this; we deny it.75 Turretin accepts the legitimacy of a limited, inner-MT textual criticism that restores the perfection of the original text. 73 Turretin, Doctrine, 6263 (5.10). 74 Ibid., 140 (12.8). 75 Ibid., 113114 (10.3).Hendel 538 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV But there remains a problem. What if textual criticism does not always suc- ceed in restoring the original text? What if one cannot determine whether a waw or a yod is correct in a given reading? Turretin gives no ground to this objection. For the orthodox, the text must be perfect, and therefore if errors exist, its perfect state must be restorable. Gods providence is the causal nexus that ensures this end. But there remains a hint of anxiety in Turretins emphatic response to this problem: Unless unimpaired integrity is attributed to Scripture, it cannot be regarded as the sole rule of faith and practice, and a wide door is opened to atheists, libertines, enthusiasts, and others of that sort of profane peo- ple to undermine its authority and overthrow the foundation of salva- tion. Since error cannot be part of the faith, how can a Scripture which is weakened by contradictions and corruptions be regarded as authentic and divine? Nor should it be said that these corruptions are only in mat- ters of little significance, which do not afffect the fundamentals of faith. For as soon as the authenticity of Scripture has been found wanting, even if it be in a single corruption [of the text] that cannot be corrected, how can our faith any longer be sustained? If corruption is conceded in mat- ters of little importance, why not also in others of more significance?76 All error must be uprooted, else Scripture loses its unimpaired integrity. Atheists and libertines are at the door, and not a single unremedied textual corruption can be conceded. Turretins orthodoxy requires an inerrant text. If it cannot be achieved, then chaos ensues. In this weighty formulation of Reformed orthodoxy, textual criticism carries a heavy load. It must be hedged by divine providence in order to reproduce a perfect text. 4 Conclusions The dream of a perfect text in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is a story worth tellingalthough I have only sketched the highlightsbecause the discipline of biblical scholarship still works largely within the conceptual space carved out by these controversies. In particular, the modern discipline of textual criticism and the orthodox Protestant doctrine of biblical inerrancy have a shared origin in early modern arguments about textual variants in the 76 Ibid., 60 (5.7).The Dream Of A Perfect Text 539 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV Hebrew Bible. Since then, textual criticism has become institutionalized as a non-theological practice, and most theologians are unaware of its inner work- ings. Yet the empirical realia of texts and variants were once central in theo- logical discourse, providing a fulcrum for deep rifts in early modern culture. The conceptual changes were long lived. As Muller observes, approaches to the biblical text were afffected by many factors, including the return to the sources (ad fontes) in Renaissance thought and the loss of the multiple figural senses of Scripture: The alteration of approach to the text brought on by the combination of Renaissance and Reformation mastery of ancient languages with the loss, over many centuries, of the quadriga [the four senses of Scripture] and related allegorical patterns of exegesis, pressed hard against the received doctrines.77 As a consequence of the rise of scholarship and the loss of Scriptures figural senses, the orthodox were hard-pressed to defend their traditional doctrines. The rise of a concept of uniform inerrancy of the plain sense was a response to these and similar forces. As Cardinal Bellarmine asserted, biblical author- ity and truth now extended across every verse, irrespective of its relation to faith and morals. The Protestant orthodox seconded this doctrinal innovation. Muller writes: The orthodox response...included the insistence that there is nothing in Holy Scripture of no importance and that even in relatively minor details, the Holy Spirit had preserved his amenuenses free from error, leading them always and in all things...into a most certain, unfailing, and constant truth.78 This response was new to the Post-Tridentine era. It was not wholly discon- tinuous with previous views, but was a heightening beyond the previous insis- tence on inerrancy in matters of faith and doctrine. The Catholic-Protestant controversy, based in part on the problem of textual variants, yielded the high doctrine of biblical inerrancy. As Philip Benedict sums up, Controversy with Catholicism and the need to defend established positions had produced the 77 Muller, Post-Reformation, 523. 78 Ibid., 306, quoting Johannes Hoornbeeck.Hendel 540 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV doctrine of the literal inerrancy of the biblical text.79 Text-critical issues were at the center of these fraught discourses about the perfect text. Clearly, Muller observes, certainty had to be grounded somewhereand the options offfered were the individual exegete, the church and its tradition, and the Bible.80 The assertion that the Bible is absolutely inerrant in all details betrays the anxiety of the Protestant orthodox in their desire for certainty. Their view of biblical authorityand of their own authority as theologians was threatened by the claims of textual critics, Catholics, and other heretics. Their defensive response was to intensify the doctrine of sola scriptura to the point that every word, construed as a plain fact, must be immune from error. Ironically, this position was mirrored by those on the opposite side of the theological spectrum. The freethinkers of the early Enlightenment turned the orthodox position into an argument against Christianity. If any detail in the Bible is in error, they argued, then the whole system fails. Jonathan Swift ridiculed this position in his 1708 pamphlet, An Argument Against Abolishing Christianity.81 His satirical critique applies equally to the high orthodox doc- trine of inerrancy. The following anecdote hinges on a textual variant in the New Testament, the Johannine Comma in 1 John 5:78, which is a late scribal insertion referring to the Trinity. Swift writes: The freethinkers consider it [the Bible] as a sort of edifice, wherein all the parts have such a mutual dependence on each other, that, if you happen to pull out one single nail, the whole fabric must fall to the ground. This was happily expressed by him, who had heard of a text brought for proof of the Trinity, which in an ancient manuscript was diffferently read; he thereupon immediately took the hint, and, by a sudden deduction of a long sorites [a string of syllogisms], most logically concluded, Why, if it be as you say, I may safely whore and drink on, and defy the parson.82 79 P. Benedict, Christs Churches Purely Reformed: A Social History of Calvinism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002), 301. 80 Muller, Post-Reformation, 307. 81 J. Swift, An Argument to Prove that the Abolishing of Christianity in England May, as Things Now Stand, be Attended with Some Inconveniences, and Perhaps not Produce Those Many Good Efffects Proposed Thereby (1708), in The Works of Dr. Jonathan Swift (Edinburgh: Donaldson, 1774), vol. 1, 22541. 82 Ibid., 23940.The Dream Of A Perfect Text 541 For use by the Author only | 2017 Koninklijke Brill NV This outcome is what the freethinkers hoped for and the orthodox feared. If the masses found errors in the Bible they would defy the parson. But it is a ridiculous attitude in either case. The Bible is not a system of logical proposi- tions, which is falsifiable by a single error. It is a diffferent kind of book. The dream of a perfect text is simply that, a dream. None of our texts are perfect, and textual criticism is not an inquiry that yields perfect results. It is a historical and philological discipline whose results are always corrigible, subject to refinement and further argument and analysis. This is why criti- cal editions need to be redone periodically. Our techniques do not guarantee perfection, only probable or warranted arguments. At the risk of stating the obvious, it is not superintended by divine providence. Cappels position, that textual criticism is a human enterprise based on reason and scholarship, has weathered the orthodox attempt (by Turretin and others) to subordinate it to a theological standard of perfection. Textual critics do what we can, but it is wrong to expect or demand a perfect text. If a doctrine of biblical inerrancy requires a perfect text, then this require- ment cannot be met by textual critics or a modern critical edition. We live in a world where perfection is a passing dream, and uncertaintyHeisenbergian or otherwiseis our epistemic condition. This is not a negative, since perfec- tion is arguably boring. In textual criticism as in life, as Wallace Stevens writes, The imperfect is our paradise.83 83 W. Stevens, The Poems of Our Climate, in idem, The Palm at the End of the Mind: Selected Poems (ed. H. Stevens; New York: Vintage, 1972), 158. My thanks to Jan Joosten for valuable comments, and to Ellen Oliensis for help with some tangled Latin.