Nestle 1904 (BFBS) in Unicode

[Jonathan Robie]

Diego made quite an entrance with his first post to B-Greek:

I transcribed the image files into unicode text. The outcome is available at https://sites.google.com/site/nestle1904/ in public domain.

Hey, thanks for doing that! This is a high quality text that is early enough to be in the public domain, and a number of people have been thinking this needs to be done. And welcome to B-Greek!

[Jonathan Robie]

Incidentally, here is a good scan of the Nestle 1904:

http://archive.org/details/biblentgreektext00nestuoft

But the internet reviewers sure make a lot of weird comments about this text ;=>

[Barry Hofstetter]

Incidentally, here is a good scan of the Nestle 1904:

http://archive.org/details/biblentgreektext00nestuoft

But the internet reviewers sure make a lot of weird comments about this text ;=>

It looks like the reviews were hijacked by militant representatives of the King James Version Only crowd. The person cited in the first review, Gail Riplinger, has to be read to be believed (that any sane person could actually write such drivel and get any other sane person to take her seriously). If you have escaped such people so far, consider yourself under the blessing of Providence. Those reviews may be safely ignored...

[Evan Blackmore]

Every time I see one of those webpages, I am sorely tempted to add a post asserting that the works of Tischendorf were actually written by Francis Bacon, revealing in code that Elvis Presley is alive and well and the victim of a hideous conspiracy.

The only thing that holds me back is the sure and certain knowledge that someone, somewhere, would believe me.

[RandallButh]

On a related question, the history of the Nestle tradition,
does anyone know in which edition the respelling occurred?
Westcott-Hort and the original Nestle where using manuscript based spellings, resulting in forms like Πειλᾶτος and Δαυειδ.

At some point in the history of iterations the Nestle(-Aland) text was respelled, allegedly to bring it in line with the first century but in actuality to bring it in line with "20th century Erasmian."


[[PS: Metzger "Text of the NT" didn't help on dating our published spelling changes.
In fact, it was "retro", erroniously stating (p 190) "During the early centuries of the CHristian era certain vowels and diphthongs of the Greek language lost their distinctive sounds and came to be pronounced alike." No wonder NT people are often out of touch with the first century Koine. While Metzger's statement is true for υ-ψιλον and ητα, it gives a *katachronistic reading (*reading a period like 1st century in light of an earlier period like 7-5 BCE, opposite of anachronistic),e.g., 1st century readings are for ει=ι, οι=υ, αι=ε, ω=ο. η and υ were distinct in the first century.]]

[Stephen Hughes]

The person cited in the first review, Gail Riplinger, has to be read to be believed (that any sane person could actually write such drivel and get any other sane person to take her seriously).

Having just watched Gail Riplinger's arguements which that blogger refers us to. Let me share my thoughts.

By way of methodology, GR's arguements disolve many distinctions between religious movements, cultural memes (from many times and places) and linguistic data (such as one could find from reference works without actually knowing the languages discussed) in order to construct evidence to make the points that she is trying to. Her discussion of ideas that she doesn't agree with ("heresies") and extensive discussions and examples allows her audience to re-create the the practices and beliefs of groups and individuals that she disagrees with far more easily (and in more detail) than either of the heresiologists Iranaeus or Ephiphanius ever presented for their readers. There are many claims to her discovering the truth of things, but actually most of what she has "discovered" are actually freely available in course about various religious movements - and especially in courses about the context of Early Christianity or about comparative religious movements or 19th century sprititual movements, which are open to students (often at Master's level) in seminaries or the ancient history departments of public Universities. The presentation of ideas at a tertiary institution is made completely without the shock-value that underpins GR's approach.

I'm glad that I arrived at an inclination towards the TR and the Majority Text tradition for reasons other than those presented by GR. Coherent and non-offensive arguements such as those in the appendix of Maurice A. Robinson and William G. Pierpont 2005 edition of the Byzantine Text would perhaps ultimately proffer the reading of the TR (and hence the Authorised Version) better than GR's "arguements".

[Jonathan Robie]

Every time I see one of those webpages, I am sorely tempted to add a post asserting that the works of Tischendorf were actually written by Francis Bacon, revealing in code that Elvis Presley is alive and well and the victim of a hideous conspiracy.

The only thing that holds me back is the sure and certain knowledge that someone, somewhere, would believe me.

[David Lim]

The only thing that holds me back is the sure and certain knowledge that someone, somewhere, would believe me.

And also call you an end-time miracle!

[Wieland Willker]

On a related question, the history of the Nestle tradition,
does anyone know in which edition the respelling occurred?
Westcott-Hort and the original Nestle where using manuscript based spellings, resulting in forms like Πειλᾶτος and Δαυειδ.

At some point in the history of iterations the Nestle(-Aland) text was respelled, allegedly to bring it in line with the first century but in actuality to bring it in line with "20th century Erasmian."

This happened from the 12th to the 13th edition, when Erwin Nestle joined the team.