Textual Emendations Research Articles

Understanding The Parable of Unjust Steward in Luke 16:1-13 in the Context of Nigeria Politicians and Some Church Leaders

The parable of the unjust steward in Luke 16:1-13 is well known for its vexing exegetical difficulties. Who is the kyrios of v. 8? Why would he praise a dishonest steward? How could Jesus possibly hold the steward up as an example for his followers? What is the relationship of verses 8b-13 to the rest of the parable? Traditionally Luke 16:1-13 has been understood as portraying a steward who cheats his master but who is commended for his wisdom, a quality to be imitated by Christ's disciples in their use of material possessions in light of the coming eschatological kingdom. But the difficulties in the parable have elicited variety of challenges to this consensus. In answer to the question of how a master could praise a dishonest steward, some scholars have postulated on socioeconomic grounds that the steward's actions were not really unjust at all and that he was merely releasing his commission. Others have seen the parable as a clear case of irony or have appealed to textual emendation or mistranslations of an Aramaic original. Furthermore most scholars deny that vv. 8b-13 have anything to do with the original Parable and that the parable has anything to do with wealth. This paper examines Nigerians politicians that looted the treasury yet some of our fathers in the Lord instead of rebuking them after they have destroyed the Economy they still praise and celebrate them as national Heroes. The paper concludes that it is not a crime to be wealthy but it must be acquired in a godly way and should be used to assist the poor and to propagate the kingdom of God on earth.

Eurydice and the Birth of Macedonian Power by Elizabeth Donnelly Carney

Reviewed by: Eurydice and the Birth of Macedonian Power by Elizabeth Donnelly Carney Leanna Boychenko Eurydice and the Birth of Macedonian Power. By Elizabeth Donnelly Carney. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2019. Pp. 200. Hardback, $65.00. ISBN: 978-0-190-28053-6. Carney's book on the life of Eurydice of Macedon is an important contribution to our knowledge of royal women. More broadly, it is an extremely useful overview of the political situation in Macedon in the time before Alexander. Like many ancient women, Eurydice is largely defined by her relationship to men: daughter of Sirras, wife of Amyntas III, mother of Philip II and grandmother of Alexander the Great. Eurydice lived at a fascinating time—when Macedon's emerging power gave it a seat at the international table—and was a key player in the events that led to her sons' rise to power (her two elder sons ruled before Philip II), supporting them against other possible successors to the throne. Carney examines her public role, the earliest known for a Macedonian royal woman, but in the end we are left with more questions than answers, not least the question of whether some sources have anything to do with Eurydice's life at all (for instance, the so-called Tomb of Eurydice in Vergina, whose occupant is unknown). This book is short, 117 pages before the notes, and falls into six chapters. The introduction contextualizes Eurydice's life and gives an overview of our sources, Macedonian monarchy and the roles of women in Macedon. Carney also builds on Daniel Ogden's term "bastardizing," pointing out that while Ogden correctly points to the public smearing of a potential successor's birth as a propagandistic tool, frequently the successor's mother was the target, thus explaining the stories about Eurydice in which she is an adulterer and murderer of her two elder sons. Indeed, this analysis can be more broadly applied to other women in the ancient world and makes this book worth reading for that contribution alone. Chapter 2 looks at Eurydice's marriage to Amyntas III and his rule. Especially interesting is the discussion of Eurydice's contested ethnicity and its implications. The rule of her sons is covered in the third chapter, ending with Philip II's consolidation of power and legitimacy. Chapter 4 examines Eurydice's relationships with her sons and reports of her adultery and filicide. It also contains discussion of a [End Page 369] speech of Aeschines (2.27-9), in which he paints Eurydice as a "super mother" (75) responsible for bringing international support to her sons, essentially guaranteeing their safety and rise to power in Macedon. This is the strongest evidence for her political action and public importance, but is buried in the middle of the book (and chapter). The fifth chapter, focused on her public image in her lifetime, looks at dedications, monuments, physical images and inscriptions. Particularly striking is an epigram preserved in Plutarch's corpus (Plut. Mor. 14b-c) concerning Eurydice's education. According to the epigram, she learned to read and write when her sons were in their adolescence. Carney is mostly interested in a textual emendation, which would change the dedication of the epigram to female citizens (and not the Muses) as well as the location of the original inscription (no physical copy exists). I would have liked to read more about what this could tell us about the education of women and literacy in Macedonia. It is also worth considering that this epigram may not be genuine and instead is part of later reception of the queen. Finally, the last chapter concerns Eurydice's public image after her death and is mostly focused on the Tomb of Eurydice, possibly the queen's final resting place. At the end of this chapter, Carney briefly introduces some intriguing topics that deserve more attention: the importance of the name Eurydice in myth and in history; the name-change of her great-granddaughter Adea to Eurydice and what this tells us about Eurydice's legacy; Odyssean figures as models for Macedonian monarchs and Eurydice's connection to Penelope. I wish they had been dealt with more...

Revising the Eighteenth-Century Novel

Revising the Eighteenth-Century Novel

Jeffrey S. Krohn. Mormon Hermeneutics: Five Approaches to the Bible by the LDS Church

Jeffrey S. Krohn. <i>Mormon Hermeneutics: Five Approaches to the Bible by the LDS Church</i>

1 and 2 Samuel

This replacement volume in the Tyndale commentary series by V. Philips Long offers a much lengthier (by nearly 200 pages) and more advanced scholarly treatment of 1–2 Samuel replacing Joyce Baldwin’s 1988 320-page earlier contribution, which was an excellent volume itself, albeit perhaps overly brief as per the previous approach of the Tyndale series. Long shows his penchant for close readings of the narrative texts of Samuel throughout this volume, including his approach to characters and characterizations as is seen in his treatments, for example, of characters such as Samuel, Saul, David, and Yahweh. While Long provides only transliterations of the Hebrew text (along with translations of such), these are far more extensive than the previous edition and could challenge readers not trained in Hebrew, even in transliterated form. The use of transliterations is a curious feature of many OT commentaries seeking a mediating position between usability and critical discussions.One of the helpful features that Long provides in his reading of 1–2 Samuel is tracing his proposed central theological theme across the books of Samuel: kbd “glory, weightiness, honor” (pp. 27–29). This thematic element helps to stitch together the many stories in the ways they are told, extending and integrating the lexical range of kbd. While there may be quibbles about potential theological themes that are in focus across these books, this approach still takes seriously the ways in which the final form of the text makes use of this element without suggesting it is the only one (p. 23). It provides a helpful, fresh reading of the texts as Long notes ways it informs the shape of the stories.Further, Long’s careful attention to notions of character and characterization assists his readings of these texts beginning with an introduction to some of the issues in the introduction (pp. 13–23). This approach allows for a contrastive reading against and benefiting from other such readings that may, for instance, depict Saul as either undone by Samuel despite his best efforts or a witless buffoon who can never seem to do anything correctly according to the editor. Long sees such readings as “revisionist” (pp. 16–17) and proposes a more complex characterization, suggesting the text is “at best, ambivalent” about the character of Saul through many of the early stories of Saul (pp. 127–28).Various critical discussions are offered throughout the commentary that have likely contributed to this much longer replacement volume. While the primary base text for the commentary is the Hebrew Masoretic Text (MT), Long follows many other commentators in allowing for each individual text critical issue to be dealt with on its own basis of external and internal criteria for evaluation and proposed reading (see pp. 23–25 for his brief explanation of this.) As part of these processes, Long proposes and engages a number of textual emendations to the MT, which is not surprising given the state of the MT for 1–2 Samuel (e.g., pp. 45, 126–27, 152–53, 158–59, 176–78, 274).Another of his contributions to critical discussions of 1–2 Samuel pertains to attenuation to proposed literary structures and cues as a means of hearing the texts in relation to one another. While he notes ways, for instance, that Mephibosheth’s claims in support of David seem more likely than the counterclaims of Ziba (2 Sam 19:24–30), Long seems to miss the canonical shaping which allows the reader to hear this incident backward in light of the revealing decision of Solomon’s wisdom (1 Kgs 3), though only the later narrative voice indicates the right choice, and the Samuel narrative voice does not (pp. 425–28).This contribution to the Tyndale series points in a more nuanced and critical direction than the earlier volumes of the Tyndale series. Long provides depth of engagement in numerous critical examinations of the text and the history relative to the text of 1–2 Samuel. This work may move some parts beyond usefulness for the less educated pastor and layperson but will certainly help students and more academically geared ministers and laypersons toward understanding the text and its many nuanced complications. But this volume is still a welcome update as a potential replacement volume for the earlier Baldwin contribution. The expanded nature of Long’s contribution and the constructive and critical readings throughout provide the interpreter a welcome hearing overall of the texts of 1–2 Samuel that will provide useful tools for a more advanced study of the texts in preaching, teaching, and writing.

Revisiting Baratre in Drn 3.955

In this study, we re-apprise Bockemüller’s largely ignored textual emendation of the unattested and likely corrupted baratre of DRN 3.955 to barathrum. Here we also attempt to supply internal and external evidence for Bockemüller’s correction of the strange vocative noun since that information remains wanting. In short, barathrum is shown to be a viable improvement since it coheres with theme and usage internal to the poem and is defensible externally when compared to similar vocative constructions and terms of abuse.

The Profit of a Land and the Purpose of a King: The Translation and Interpretation of Ecclesiastes 5:8

Abstract The MT of Eccl 5:8 presents challenges of lexicography, grammar, and syntax, in addition to exegetical and text-critical difficulties. This article surveys some attempts to interpret Eccl 5:8 without resorting to textual emendation, and then proposes a new translation and analysis of the MT in its exegetical context. Ecclesiastes 5:8 delineates the benefit of a land or country as being found “in the whole” rather than in one of its component parts. While one will observe governmental corruption in an individual “province” (v. 7), Qoheleth observes that a national governing structure, embodied in a king, brings the benefit of political stability, which ultimately enables an agrarian society to flourish.

The Mother of the Infant King, Isaiah 7:14: ʿalmâ and parthenos in the World of the Bible; A Linguistic Perspective by Christophe Rico and Peter J. Gentry

Reviewed by: The Mother of the Infant King, Isaiah 7:14: ʿalmâ and parthenos in the World of the Bible; A Linguistic Perspective by Christophe Rico and Peter J. Gentry Sehoon Jang christophe rico and peter j. gentry, The Mother of the Infant King, Isaiah 7:14: ʿalmâ and parthenos in the World of the Bible; A Linguistic Perspective (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2020). Pp. xiii + 217. Paper $48. Christophe Rico and Peter J. Gentry seek to offer a comprehensive treatment of the Hebrew word ʿalmâ and its Greek rendering parthenos in Isa 7:14, a controversial term that has occasioned countless debates and still leaves us with much uncertainty. R. deals primarily with the main part of the biblical book, and G. with the last section of Appendix II. Both R. and G. are willing to remain unsympathetic with and even to audaciously fly in the face of a nearly universal scholarly consensus that ʿalmâ refers to a young girl. Rico initially poses the question, "Does the word ʿalmâ refer to a virgin, a married [End Page 122] woman, or a young girl?" (p. 4), adumbrating the primary goal of this research. He then commences his study of ʿalmâ with a concise overview of the history of the developing connotations of parthenos in ancient Greek. He asserts that, during the Hellenistic era, parthenos appears to have referred exclusively to a virgin as the final development in the meaning of the word. He offers a full-scale analysis against the universal consensus that ʿalmâ designates "a young woman." The consensus is based primarily on an etymological study of ʿalmâ the exclusive role of bĕtûlâ as "virgin," the occurrence of ʿalmâ in Prov 30:19, and Jewish tradition. R. finds any etymological approach to ʿalmâ problematic if it fails to keep the semantic value of the word in mind. He contends that ʿalmâ is utilized as a hyponym of bĕtûlâ "if the meaning of ʿalmâ joins the respective values of the terms bətûlâ and naʿărâ" (p. 30). He pays close attention to a difficult problem with the appearance of ʿalmâ in Prov 30:19, suggesting a possible solution that ʿalmâ could be emended as ʿlm(y)w connoting "in youth," a textual emendation that is said to be supported by several ancient versions. Furthermore, an extensive investigation of traditional Jewish interpretations of ʿalmâ especially five rabbinic sources from the eleventh to fourteenth centuries, leads him to confirm his conclusion that the word means "virgin." In the last part of the book, R. provides a wide-ranging examination of the meaning of ʿalmâ from a semantic perspective. In particular, he focuses on the Psalms, especially the title of Psalm 46, where ʿălāmôt is exceptionally set forth as an instrumental instruction related to the soprano voice. In his judgment, the musical usage of ʿalmâ in the Psalms plays a significant role in maintaining the argument that ʿalmâ connotes "virgin." Finally, R. offers a painstaking analysis of the structure of Isaiah 1-12, especially the Immanuel cycle (7:1-8:18), where the mysterious mention of ʿalmâ and her child is significantly highlighted. Given the elusive identity of ʿalmâ in the cycle, R. comes to the conclusion that Isa 7:14 ought to be understood as the prediction of a birth by a young virgin that will take place in the distant future (p. 155). This unflinching position is subsequently reinforced by G., whose updated treatment of Isa 7:14, including his critical response to H. G. M. Williamson (review of La mère de l'Enfant-Roi, Isaïe 7,14: 'ʿalmâ' et 'parthenos' dans l'univers biblique; Un point de vue linguistique, by Christophe Rico, CBQ 76 [2014] 338–39), is presented in Appendix II, with the succinct claim that Isa 7:14 must be construed as "a direct prediction for the distant future" (p. 217). This research is a significant contribution to a linguistic study of the Hebrew word ʿalmâ rendered as parthenos in the LXX of Isa 7:14. R. and G.'s approach to ʿalmâ provides valuable insights into the history of the reception of the meaning of the word...

Genesis 49:4—The Route of Facile Textual Emendation vs. Appreciation for Literary Brilliance

Abstract This article responds to M. J. Albanese, “What the Holy Seed Defiled: The Textual Problem of Genesis 49:4,” VT 69 (2019): 1‒18. Instead of proposing textual emendation to solve the so-called “problem” in Gen 49:4, the present article uses a literary-stylistic approach to argue in favour of the Masoretic Text (MT).

Reading Milton reading Shakespeare politically: what the identification of Milton’s First Folio does and does not tell us

ABSTRACT The question of how Milton read Shakespeare has been put in a new light by the astonishing identification in 2019 of Milton’s copy of the Shakespeare First Folio in the Free Library of Philadelphia. The Philadelphia First Folio contains over 600 instances of lines and passages that have been scored or bracketed and over 120 instances of textual emendation, convincingly ascribed to Milton’s hand, most probably between the late 1620s and the early 1640s. This essay considers how much the markings in the Folio can tell us, focusing on the method of textual collation on display, which is cause for reflection on how Shakespeare was viewed in learned circles in early Stuart England. It also considers what the Folio is not able to tell us about how Milton engaged with Shakespearean drama politically, both in his prose and the poems, including Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained.

Bede: On First Samuel trans. by Scott DeGregorio and Rosalind Love

Reviewed by: Bede: On First Samuel trans. by Scott DeGregorio and Rosalind Love Meredith Cutrer Scott DeGregorio and Rosalind Love, trans., Bede: On First Samuel (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2019), 572 pp. It is rather remarkable, given the amount of attention that the well-known Northumbrian monk Bede (d. 735) has long received in academic circles, that some of his lengthiest and most innovative exegetical works are only now being fully translated into English. Such is the case with the recent contribution to Bedan scholarship by Scott DeGregorio and Rosalind Love, On First Samuel. Their newest book makes this valuable piece of the prolific monk's oeuvre, which the authors have deemed Bede's "most monumental commentary" (vii), widely available to modern audiences for the first time. As is customary with the Translated Texts for Historians series, the commentary contains a substantial introduction, an extensively annotated, accessible translation, along with two appendices ("Notes on Textual Emendations" and "Interpolations in Book 4") and two indices. The book commences with a laudably well-balanced introduction that is on the whole not so technical as to be esoteric while still engaging thoughtfully, and at times critically, with key Bedan scholarship. The introduction features discussion on the expected topics, including the commentary's sources, historical context, major themes, and Latinity. The highlight for this reviewer, however, was an especially engaging discussion of Bede's distinctive exegetical techniques featured in On First Samuel as part of the authors' broader aim of highlighting aspects of the commentary that distinguished it from Bede's other writings. [End Page 246] Bede was composing On First Samuel in 716 CE, the same year Monkwearmouth-Jarrow's abbot Ceolfrith, having resigned his position, died en route to Rome. For Bede, Ceolfrith's death was such a momentous event that it warranted a lengthy statement in book 4's prologue, helpfully providing a reference point for the commentary's dating. Having firm evidence for a date for at least part of the text's composition makes On First Samuel exceptional among Bede's eighteen extant commentaries. The commentary offers a number of other distinguishing features as well, each explicated to varying degrees by DeGregorio and Love: it is the first complete commentary on 1 Samuel in the Latin or Greek exegetical tradition; it is Bede's longest Old Testament commentary; and it is the only Bedan commentary to feature both a historical chapter heading and an allegorical summary at the start of each of the text's forty-three segments. Perhaps most notably, however, On First Samuel is a commentary boasting some of Bede's most remarkable and inventive exegetical methods, a point the authors analyze at some length. Bede's liberal employment of allegorical exegesis is, of course, commonplace in On First Samuel as it is in his other exegetical writings. However, as DeGregorio and Love note, there are two types of exegesis Bede uses in On First Samuel that are particularly noteworthy: "concordance exegesis" and "impersonation exegesis." While Bede was not the first to utilize concordance exegesis—an exegetical technique often relying on a word that two otherwise unrelated passages may share that causes the verses to be linked in the exegete's mind—DeGregorio and Love observe his anomalous utilization of it in On First Samuel, wherein he employs it "extensively and often inventively" (26). Even more interestingly, the introduction examines an exegetical style that DeGregorio and Love have labeled "impersonation exegesis" (33). This method is one Bede does not employ elsewhere and is seemingly unique to Bede. On First Samuel contains approximately seventy examples of Bede placing the words of Old Testament figures as direct speech spoken by New Testament individuals. Bede does not explain why he took this novel approach to 1 Samuel, but the authors propose a plausible theory: Bede, working on his Song of Songs commentary simultaneously, wherein he follows longstanding tradition of interpreting the Song of Songs as a dialogue between two lovers, saw in On First Samuel the chance to utilize a similarly dialogic method, albeit with a more imaginative approach in On First Samuel than he did in his Song of Songs commentary. DeGregorio and Love's insights pertaining to Bede...

Reading Catullus 113 as the Vilification of Pompey's Ex-Wife Mucia

AbstractWritten in 55 BCE,carmen113 seemingly uses the first two consulships of Pompey to measure a decline in moral standards, with one unfortunate woman as the yardstick of sexual profligacy. It closes with a focus on marital infidelity. The epigram should be read as a savage attack upon Mucia, the one-time wife of Pompey. This paper affirms her identity by postulating a punning wordplay on Mucia and C(a)ecilia that made this identification clear to the poet's readership. No textual emendation is required. It is also proposed that the observation regarding adultery, no mere aphorism, queried the legitimacy of one or more of Pompey's children.

The Theft of the Pārijāta Tree in Early Sanskrit Sources

The Pārijātaharaṇa or theft of the magical Pārijāta tree is a well known episode in the life of the Hindu god Kṛṣṇa. The earliest Sanskrit sources of the incident consist largely of short or passing references to the deed, and mainly understand the seizure of the tree to have involved a fight between Kṛṣṇa and Indra. The actual episode is narrated in the critical text of the HV, but there no fight occurs. This piece follows up on and responds to a recent publication in this journal in which the narrative discontinuity surrounding the Pārijātaharaṇa is treated briefly in connection with the problem of textual emendation. After identifying and contextualizing the relevant epic passages, I take up the key sources of the myth in the following centuries, and reflect briefly on the issue of the Sanskrit tradition's own work of narrative emendation, as well as some of the implications thereof for readers and translators.

The Book of Caverns in Theban Tomb 33

This article summarizes, updates, and adds to past research performed by the author on the copy of the Book of Caverns in the early Late Period Theban Tomb 33 (TT 33) of the chief lector priest Petamenophis. The first part is devoted to the reception of Caverns in the late Third Intermediate Period / early Late Period. It describes the source of Petamenophis’s copy as being the result of an “archaeo-philological” endeavor: a collation of a copy related to the copy in the Osireion and a copy from the tomb of Ramesses VI (KV 9). A series of sections discusses the reception as being primarily shaped by the aim for an “authentic” reproduction (notably with additions to the benefit of a deceased), however, also by emendation, update, and creativity. Besides the necessary updates to the personalized textual and pictorial additions that were originally created for the Ramesside kings, we find moderate orthographical, lexicographical, and grammatical changes, as well as a few changes to the images. We can also identify a few cases of textual emendations, conjectures, and additions. The second part of the article presents and discusses the sophisticated layout of the copy of Caverns on the walls of the rooms XVII–XIX in TT 33, which indexically (C.S. Peirce) mirrors the journey of the sun god—and with him Petamenophis—from west to east through the netherworld.

호세아 6장 7절 ‘아담처럼’ 또는 ‘아담에서처럼’, 히브리어 전치사 ke 의 의미론적 용법

Hosea 6:7, “But like Adam they transgressed the covenant; there they dealt faithlessly with me”(ESV). The phrase “like Adam” is questionable, whether it is a personal name or a local term. Until now, scholars suggested very different ideas: (1) Adam as a proper name, (2) Adam as a city name, (3) the ancient city Admah on the base of a textual emendation, and (4) ‘dirty’ on the base of a textual emendation. In order to solve this problem, the researcher takes the usage of the Hebrew preposition kə as his starting point. Its usage could be divided to nine rubrics. R1: comparison, R2: similarity, R3: imitation, R4: situational repetition, R5: mental realization, R6: announcement and fulfillment, R7: demand and fulfillment, R8: temporal use (immediate sequence), and R9: quantitative use. According to a philological argument, the relevant prepositional use of Hosea 6:7a should be definitively ascribed to R4. Also, this conclusion can be asserted by verbal- syntactical (asyndesis) and syntactical (casus pendens) analyses.

La tradizione manoscritta della Metaphrasis in Theophrastum di Prisciano Lido

The aim of this paper is to trace the history of the manuscript tradition of the Metaphrasis in Theophrastum by the Greek philosopher Priscian of Lydia (6th cent. CE), with a view to constituting a new critical edition of the text. A detailed analysis of the eight extant codices shows that Laur. Plut. 87. 20 is the common ancestor of the others. Nevertheless, Monac gr. 461 should also be given due consideration, since it testifies to Marsilio Ficino’s textual emendations, which are also reflected in his Latin translation of the Metaphrasis.

Textual Wanderings: Homeric Scholarship and the Written Landscape of Strabo's Geography

This article examines Strabo's attitude towards Homeric scholarship, textual emendation and the wanderings of mythical heroes. By exploring the interconnections between these themes, three broader aspects of the Geography are elucidated: the relationship between Homeric and historical truth and fiction, Strabo's self-fashioning as a late Hellenistic scholar, and the significance of interpretations of past heroic wanderings as a means of exploring present geopolitical concerns. The discussion focuses upon two particular case studies: the travels of Jason and the Argonauts and the wanderings of Aeneas. Ultimately, through this examination Strabo emerges as a liminal figure who firmly straddles the divide between the worlds of past Hellenistic textual scholarship and Imperial Greek literature.

What Is an “Ideological Emendation” (Really)? Taurus T27 and Middle Platonist Philologia Philosophica

The aim of this paper is to deeply rethink the traditional notion of “ideological emendation”. By taking Taurus T27 as a test-case, I shall emphasise that Taurus’ intervention on Timaeus 27c5 is the result of a conjecture, and that such an emendation meets the requirements for a philological conjecture on Plato’s text. Indeed, Taurus’ fragment, which is usually taken as a typical example of “ideological emendation”, only reflects an effort to recover what Plato actually wrote, and is nothing but a textual emendation. Accordingly, the ideological core of such an emendation is what must lie at the basis of any conjecture, that is an attempt to re-establish (what is assumed to be) Plato’s text in accordance with his consistent doctrine.

Texts, Manuscripts, Versions, Canon

Texts, Manuscripts, Versions, Canon Eric F. Mason, Christopher T. Begg, Rory K. Pitstick, and Fred W. Guyette 1662. [Canon; Josephus; DSS] Jonathan G. Campbell, “Josephus’s Twenty-Two Book Canon and the Qumran Scrolls,” The Scrolls and Biblical Traditions, 19–45 [see #2018]. C. observes that many recent scholars have moved away from older assumptions about a tripartite Jewish canon in late Second Temple period Judaism, postulating instead that several factors show that certain texts were esteemed as Scripture but that a closed canon was not yet in view. C. then challenges the claim by S. Mason that comments by Josephus in Ag. Ap. 1.37–43 prove that a 22-book canon with a fixed text was indeed standard in the 1st cent. a.d. C. reviews Mason’s arguments and concludes that Josephus’s own approach is inconsistent throughout his corpus and that his comments in Ag. Ap. 1.37–43 must be read as polemical rhetoric in response to Alexandrian textual scholarship on the Greek cultural canon.—E.F.M. 1663. [Tobit] Kamil Jan Kowalski, “Aramejskie rękopisy Księgi Tobita z Qumran (4Q196–200)—historia i egezegeza [The Aramaic Manuscripts of the Book of Tobit from Qumran (4Q196–200): History and Exegesis],” BibAn 7 (2017) 323–45. The year 1995 was a pivotal one for research on the Book of Tobit as the year in which the Aramaic manuscripts of the book that had been discovered at Qumran were first published. In this article, K. traces the history of the manuscripts’ discovery in Qumran Cave 4 in 1952, the following long process leading to their publication, and the effect of that publication on the renewal of Tobit scholarship. The article’s first part describes the initial publication of the manuscripts and subsequent works in which the texts of the manuscripts were cited together with translations of these. In his next section, K. provides details concerning the current condition of the manuscripts and reviews their respective contents. Next, he explores the topic of the intertextuality of the book, here focusing on Greek and Latin intertextual references known prior to 1952. The fourth section of K.’s article presents a status quaestionis concerning selected issues in Tobit scholarship and how these have been impacted by the discovery and publication of the manuscripts 4Q196–200. In particular, he revisits the questions of the original language of the Book of Tobit, its unity, as well as its origins and the influence of ANE culture (particularly the Words of [End Page 588] Ahiqar) upon its structure and content. The final part of the article compares the Aramaic fragments of the book from Qumran with its two extant Greek versions—one longer, the other shorter—and provides a summary of K.’s major findings. The purpose of the article is to highlight the significance of the discovery and publication of 4Q196–200 for stimulating research on the Book of Tobit and to survey the history of that research from 1952 until today. [Adapted from published abstract—C.T.B.] 1664. [DSS; Biblical Text Criticism] Corrado Martone, “All the Bibles We Need: The Impact of the Qumran Evidence on Biblical Lower Criticism,” The Scrolls and Biblical Traditions, 47–64 [see #2018]. M. notes that classical scholarship differs from biblical scholarship by not distinguishing between what the latter often calls “lower” criticism and “higher” criticism; and points to the DSS as providing important reminders about the importance of philology. M. also critiques the contemporary hesitancy regarding textual emendation even when problems are obvious in a text. In this connection, he surveys several passages in which earlier proposals for emendations were later confirmed by Qumran manuscripts and points out that modern translation committees often follow readings in Qumran texts (rather than the MT) without disclosing their reasons for doing so.—E.F.M. 1665. [Targums; Ephrem] Craig E. Morrison, “Il cuore perfetto ( ) di Abramo nella letteratura targumica e cristiana antica,” RSB 26 (2014) 431–51. In this survey of the exegetical treatments of Abraham’s “merit” (Genesis 22) found in various Targums and Ephrem of Nisibis, M. considers interpretations in the Targums in light of their...

A Battle Against Pain? Aristotle, Theophrastus and the Physiologoi in Aspasius, On Nicomachean Ethics 156.14-20

Abstract Aspasius, In en 156.14-22, commenting on en 7.14, 1154b7-9, reports that Theophrastus joins Aristotle’s battle against the so-called physiologoi in trying to disprove their belief in the ubiquity of pain. I argue that there are theoretical and exegetical difficulties in Aspasius’ comment which have not been noticed by scholars and cannot be fixed by textual emendation. In fact, In en 156.14-22 can be regarded neither as a reliable interpretation of Aristotle, nor as an authentic source for Theophrastus’ thought.