On the Question of European sources for the Translation of the New Testament by Epiphanius Slavinetsky and Euthymius Chudovsky (1670–1680s): Greek Manuscripts and Printed Editions

Abstract

The article provides a textual analysis of the Rule of the Singing of the Psalter The subject of the research is the marginal notes in the Greek-Slavonic New Testament (GIM, Syn. Greek 473), translated by Epiphany Slavinetsky and in the 1670–1680s corrected by Evfimy Chudovsky. These notes allow us to clarify the origin of the Greek readings that form the critical apparatus of the manuscript. It was established that the source of such readings is two Greek manuscripts of the Gospel brought from Athos to Moscow by Arseny Sukhanov (GIM, Syn. Greek 274 and Syn. Greek 399). The printed Greek editions used in the process of correcting the New Testament by Evfimy included Robert Estienne’s Editio Regia of 1550 and the Frankfurt edition of the Septuagint of 1597 with a unique reference apparatus, which presents the results of a collation of several Greek printed editions and manuscripts. The marginalia of Evfimy Chudovsky coincide with the Greek readings indicated in the Frankfurt Septuagint. Comparison of the readings from Greek sources with the Church Slavonic texts of the Chudov New Testament and the Constantinople Gospel, also used during the correction, allows us to characterize Evfimy’s methodology of biblical text criticism as scholarly and philological, taking into account the experience of Western European biblical editions of the 17th century.