The Bible has something to say about the families of manuscripts that underlie our English language Bibles. In Acts chapter 27, the exciting story of Paul's voyage and shipwreck, we discover which of the manuscript families is most reliable, and which of our Bibles we can be confident is an accurate transmission of God's word to us.
By W. D. Penfield. Originally published on Substack, December 15, 2021.
Introduction
This is my first Substack article, and the first of a series. Instead of starting with a bang, I’m leading with what can be one of the dullest topics in Christian study: textual criticism.
Textual criticism is the field of scholarly research into the ancient manuscripts from which our Bibles are translated.
The Bible has a few things to say about the subject. Fortunately for those of us easily bored, those things are woven into a rip-roaring adventure story: the account of the apostle Paul’s voyage and shipwreck in Acts 27.
Before we get into that, let’s pull our own ships up to the dock, call for the longshoremen, and load our cargo holds with a little dull background information. Hang in there. Things will get exciting soon.
How we got our Bibles
When we first hear the phrase “original autograph,” we might think of a celebrity’s signature on a photo, a baseball, or some other collectible item. In the field of textual criticism, “original autograph” means an original document handwritten by the original author, such as Moses, the scribes, the Bible prophets, the apostle Paul, or another of the apostles or original Bible authors.
None of those actual originals exist today. They wore out centuries ago. What are now called “original manuscripts” are copies of copies of copies of the original autographs, handed down through centuries.
Those copies of copies of copies were all made by hand and carefully proofread, checked, and rechecked in order to preserve the text of the original autographs. Inaccurate copies were discarded or destroyed. In some cases they were simply set aside and not used.
As the manuscripts were collected and passed down through time, they first traveled a single road. But a couple of centuries after Christ, a fork in the road appeared. From then on, there were two roads, each road traveled by its own family of manuscripts.
The two families traveling those two different roads squabble. The texts of the two families often disagree.
So which of the two families on which road is more accurate? Which of the two can we be confident is most faithful to the original autographs written centuries ago? Which can we be confident delivers God’s very words to us?
We don’t have to look to scholars or publishers or get involved in the complex, contentious (and sometimes dark) world of textual criticism to sort it out. The Bible itself will tell us.
More about the two families
As just mentioned, there are two main families of manuscripts from which our Bibles are translated. Complicating things, those two families have several different names. We’re going keep things simple and stick with just one name for each of the two families.
The first family is the Byzantine family.
The second family is the Alexandrian family.
The Byzantine family of texts is also called the Majority Text, Traditional Text, Ecclesiastical Text, Constantinopolitan Text, Antiocheian Text, or Syrian Text. (Source)
Most surviving old manuscripts—by a very large margin—belong to the Byzantine family. That’s why it’s called the Majority text. It was very popular back in the day.
The Alexandrian family of texts is also called the Minority Text, because, as you might guess, it lacks the overwhelming number of “witnesses” (existing manuscripts and fragments) that support the majority Byzantine text family.
The Alexandrian family is not only in the minority, it’s way in the minority, comprising only five percent, more or less, of extant (existing) ancient Bible manuscripts and fragments.
However, most of our Bibles today are translated from this minority. Over the last century, the Alexandrian text family became very popular among scholars, Bible translators, Bible publishers, and most churches and their leaders.
How in the world did that happen? We’ll get to that.
First though, how can we know which of our Bibles is translated from which text family? It’s easy to tell:
The King James Version and other Reformation-era Bibles are translated from Textus Receptus [the “Received Text”], a Greek text… [compiled] by Erasmus and based on various manuscripts of the Byzantine type. (Source)
There’s only one Reformation-era Bible in general use today, although in many circles it has fallen out of favor. It’s the King James Bible. It’s the only widely available English language Bible based on the Byzantine family of texts.
All other Bibles in circulation today were translated from the Alexandrian family of texts, or the Alexandrian family was consulted and used in producing them.1
If you have some knowledge of these things, you might be jumping ahead and thinking, “Oh, great. This writer is one of those ‘King James only’ guys.” No, I’m not. I’m a King James mainly guy. As we go along I’ll show you some good reasons for that.
I’ll also show you that the Bible has a surprisingly positive thing to say about the Alexandrian text family. I’ll be sure to point it out when we get to it.
A note on expounding the Bible
Way down the list of definitions of the word type in the Merriam-Webster dictionary app is this one: “4 a : a person or thing (as in the Old Testament) believed to foreshadow another (as in the New Testament).”
Prophecy in the Bible directly depicts future events. But the Bible is also filled with stories that are types, allegories, metaphors, and foreshadows of future things and of certain people and their works.
Jesus famously used parables to illustrate and teach spiritual principles and truths.
These are puzzles to challenge us. There’s much enlightenment and joy to be found in solving them.
It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter.
– Proverbs 25:2
Current usage of the word “allegory” presumes the original events of an allegory are fictional—a story made up as an illustration. But in the Bible, real historical events are often types and foreshadows of future real events, and illustrations of real truths and principles.
And this is true of the events in Acts 27.
Okay, that’s it for background. Our ships are loaded and ready to sail. Up next, a voyage across the sea and through time begins!
The New King James Version is advertised as based on the Byzantine text family. However, the translators and publisher included Alexandrian text family readings in the margins of the NKJV.↩
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