THE SCRIBE AS INTERPRETER: A NEW LOOK AT NEW TESTAMENT TEXTUAL CRITICISM ACCORDING TO READER RECEPTION THEORY by PHILIP WESLEY COMFORT submitted in accordance with the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF LITERATURE AND PHILOSOPHY in the subject THEORY OF LITERATURE at the UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH AFRICA PROMOTER: PROF R C GRABE JOINT PROMOTER: DR J H PETZER NOVEMBER 1996 Contents Prefa ce . . . • . . • . . • . • . . • . . . . • . . . • . . i Section One Reader Reception Theory and New Testament Textual Criticism Chapter One Literary Theory and New Testament Textual Criticism • . . • 1 Chapter Two Application of the Theoretical Paradigm . • . . . . . . . . 31 Chapter Three The Horizon of Expectations of Christian Egyptian Scribes • 74 Section Two Analysis of Gospel Manuscripts From Egypt . . . . . . . . . 92 Chapter Four An Examination of Scribal Reception through an Analysis of Significant Singular Readings of Papyrus 45, a Gospel Manuscript from Aphroditopolis, Egypt • • • . • • • . 100 Chapter Five An Examination of Scribal Reception through an Analysis of Significant Singular Readings of Papyrus 66, a Johannine Manuscript from Jabal Abu Manna, Egypt . . 152 Chapter Six An Examination of Scribal Reception through an Analysis of Significant Singular Readings of Papyrus 75, a Gospel Manuscript from Jabal Abu Manna, Egypt . • • • . . • 227 Chapter Seven Observations and Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 6 6 Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 9 5 Photographs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 9 8 i Prefa ce The purpose of this thesis is to show that reader reception aesthetics can be applied to the field of study called New Testament textual criticism, inasmuch as reception theory provides a different approach to explaining textual variants. The reception theory I have implemented focuses on the interaction between the scribe and the text, as the scribe engaged with the written text as an active reader and thereby became a co-producer of a new, personalized text. For normal readers, this interaction would usually have only been a mental interchange--that is, nothing of the interaction would have been recorded. But for scribes, who produced manuscript copies as they read, this interaction was often recorded in the form of singular textual variants (i.e., variant readings found only in one manuscript}. These scribes left a written record of how they had actually "read" the text differently from any one before them or after them. Literary theorists tell us that the written words as interpreted by an actual reader or readers is the literary text. In other words, while the words on the page remain constant, the aesthetic object (which is the concretized literary text) is subject to change. For printed literary works, it is true that the words on the page remain constant; but this is not so for ancient literary works (in manuscript form) because the wording was also changed as the concretization changed. As such, ancient manuscripts provide an excellent source for studying individual concretizations in a historical context. By studying the singular variants in these manuscripts, we can attempt to understand the producer of that text--the scribe--as an actual reader. This is where the literary ii theories of Jauss are so helpful, for Jauss focused on actual historical readers who brought with them their own "horizon of expectations" to the text, which also has its own horizon. The process of reading brings a meeting of the two horizons, which can result in frustration or fusion. When scribes were frustrated by the text they read, they could adjust their horizon of expectations to that of the text or they could change the text to satisfy their expectations. These changes often involved the filling in of perceived gaps or blanks in the narrative. The literary theorist, Wolfgang Iser, helps us understand how the text itself prompts such blank-filling. These blanks were often filled in with creative, individualized readings. In this thesis I implement the theories of Jauss and Iser (which are detailed in the opening chapters of this thesis) in an effort to determine whether literary theory might be useful in providing an additional or perhaps an alternative means of analyzing and understanding textual variants. To accomplish this goal, my thesis is divided into two sections: the first section deals with the literary theory of reader reception as it pertains to Christian Egyptian scribes living in the second and third centuries A.D.; the second section provides a detailed analysis of the actual receptions and textual variants produced by three Christian Egyptian scribes--i.e., those who produced the Gospel papyrus manuscripts known as P45, P66, and P75. The first chapter of the first section provides a rationale for utilizing the literary theories of Hans Robert Jauss and Wolfgang Iser in the study of New Testament textual criticism. In the second chapter I apply their theoretical paradigms to New Testament textual criticism--especially of the Gospels, which are the main focus of my study. In the third chapter, I have attempted iii to describe the horizon of expectations of Christian Egyptian scribes living in the second and third centuries. This chapter provides a general sketch of what constituted their literary lives as Christian scribes living in Egypt. This generalized picture serves me well in my attempt to reconstruct the specific portfolio of each of the three scribes (analyzed in chapters four through six), which should then furnish some details for adjusting the generalized picture or coloring it in. The second section is devoted entirely to the study of the reader receptions of three specific scribes as manifest in singular variants (i.e., these are variant readings that appear in no other manuscripts and therefore must be the creation of the scribe). The fourth chapter deals with the individual receptions of the scribe of P45, who produced a codex containing all four Gospels and Acts somewhere around 200 A.D. The fifth chapter focuses on the singular variants of the second-century scribe of P66, a codex containing the Gospel of John. (In this chapter I also analyze the work of another scribe who worked on this manuscript--the corrector. But his role is minor.) The sixth chapter presents an analysis of the singular variants of the scribe of P75, a codex written around 200 A.D., containing Luke and John. The purpose of analyzing the individual receptions of these three scribes is to formulate specific observations about each of their concretizations and thereby gain knowledge about each of ' their transcriptional idiosyncrasies. Furthermore, the analysis could shed some light on what aspects of reader reception these scribes may have shared in common. This final analysis constitutes the final part of this thesis- chapter seven. 1 Section One Reader Reception Theory and New Testament Textual Criticism Chapter One Literary Theory and New Testament Textual Criticism thesis involves a merging of two discipl Ines rarely Thi~ associated and not easily combined. The disciplines are reader-reception criticism and New Testament textual criticism. The very essence of textual cr~tlcism would seem to defy any appropriation of reader-reception criticism. but that Is because textual criticism is usually perceived as dealing only with the text and not the reader. However. textual criticism could benefit from the same kind of Influence ·that has happened recently in literary studies. As many literary critics have shifted their focus from the text itself readers of.the text In an attempt to~the t~ comprehend plurality of Interpretation. so textual critics could analyze variant readings in the textual tradition as being the products of different "readings" of the text created by the scribes who produced them. Reader- receptioA theory can serve as a balance to textual criticism because It adds a new perspectlve--the reader·s. And I n t he case o f New Tes t amen t t ex t u a I s t u d I es . i t provides a tool for studying the activity of scribes as actual readers. Reader reception theories have come to the fore in the past thirty years. The change of focus in I iterary theory to the reader exhibits a significant shift from text-oriented studies (as presented in formal ism and structural ism) to studies concerned with the dynamic relationship between 2 the reader and the text. The focus has shifted from the autonomy of the text to the interact I on between the text and the reader. such studies concentrate on how the text affects the reader and how the reader a new ma~es con tr I but Ion In the process of concret izlng a 11 terary text. 'Reader, reception theories were given a proper theoretical ' . foundation by the literary theorists. Wolfgang Iser and Hans Robert Jauss. both of the Unlyerslty of Constance In Ge r many . I s e r de v e 1 op e d t h e c o n c e P t o f · t h e Lm p I i e d r ea de r t 0 . s t u d y t he i n t e r a c t i on between t he t ex t and reader, whereas Jauss developed the theory of the aesthetics of reception according to diachronic shifts In the horizon of expectations of historical readers. These two theories are very pertinent to my study of variant seadlngs created throughout the course of the textual transmission of the New Testament text because they provide the theoretical constructs for· an investigation of actual reader receptions. The purpose of Jauss' worl<, In particular. Is to provide •'/. theories that'facllltate the empirical study of the reception;· of I lterary worKs. According to Jauss (1989:123-124). the Constance school was completely oriented at f lrst on problems of reception or effect. then evolved more and more Into a theory of literary communication. In his own words, evolution of their theory was as follows: ~auss• Foremost for me was the question concerning the experience of art, or what could be called aesthetic p r ax I s . wh I ch u n de r I I es a I I man I f es t a t I on s o f a r t as productive (poiesls), activity actlvl~y rec~ptive and communicative activity (Katharsls). (alsthesls)~ F r om t h I s I t f o I I owed t ha t t h e an a I y s I s o f t h e I mp I I e d reader had to be supplemented by the analysis of the historical reader. and the reconstruction of the Immanent horizon of expectations, which the worK Implies or anticipates. had to be supplemented by the reconstruction of the social horizon of experience, which the reader supplies or brings from his or her 3 own historical "Lebenswelt" (I ife world). The classical dichotomy of fiction and reality resolved into the dialectical relationship of theme and horizon. Jauss' observation seems to indicate that the school first developed the notion of the Implied reader (In lser's paradigm). and then the real. historical reader (In Jauss• paradigm). Real readers are historical, flesh and blood readers. They are not the same as the "impl led reader." who is the reader envisaged In the mind of the author and ev9Ked to respond to the worK by a succession of I iterary clues. Actual readers grasp the Intended perception of the text from the clues given. and actual readers concretize the physical artefact as an aesthetic object. Actual readers can be described on the basis of documents constructed from social and historical Knowledge, as well as from I lterary conventions of the time. In my forthcoming ana·1ys1s of three Egyptian Christian scribes CP45. P66. P75) I will attempt to reconstruct ~heir horizon of expectation by treating them as actual historical readers in Jauss•s sense of the term. I will attempt to explain their textual practices by abstracting the process of reading underlying their decisions to introduce This means that I will be illustrating a process of variants~ reading-whereby the variants may be interpreted as tndlcat'lons that actual readers were trying their best to comply with textual constraints in an attempt to determine textual meaning. As such. these scribes can be viewed as actual readers who were trying to comply with the instruction of lser•s implied reader (in the sense of both textual construct and structured act) as being that reader that would ideally meet all textual requirements and that would exhaust textual meaning. The scribes of P45, P66, and P75 were actual readers, 4 who have I e f t f or us a I e g a c y of some of t he I r r ea c t I on s t o the written text of the New Testament by changes they made i n t he t ex t as t hey r ea d i t . F o r mode r n I i t e r a r y wo r Ks (since the time of printing), the words on the page remain cons tan t : but th I s I s not so for an c I en t I I t er a r y wo r Ks ( I n manuscript form) because the wording was also changed as the concretization changed and scribes sought to fill In perceived gaps. These provide an excel lent docum~nts source for studying ancient reader reception of the New Testament text. lser•s Textual Indeterminacy Wolfgang lser's observations about reader-reception are applicable to scribal-reception, inasmuch as scribes actively participated in textual meaning through concretlzatlon. Textual critics can gain great understanding about textual variants by studying this concretizatlon process, especially as It applies to textual Indeterminacy and the fill Ing of textual gaps~ But before I launch into a discussion about lser's concept of textual Indeterminacy it must be noted that Iser was indebted to Roman lngarden, a Pol lsh phi who did intensive studies in the cognition of losop~er I I t er a r y- wo r Ks . I n garden ' s v i ew was that a I i t er a r y wo r K was not ·autonomous but was an intensional object that depended on the cognition of the reader. As an i n t en s i on a I ob j e c t . a I i t e r a r y wo r K can n o t f i I I I n a I I t h e deta·ils; the-· reader is-required to do this .. During the reading process. the reader must concretize the gaps by using his or her imagination to give substance to textual omission and/or indefiniteness. Since this substantiation is a subjective and creative act, the concretlzation will assume many variations for different readers.