Text of the Gospel of Mark: Lake Revisited
BABELAO 3 (2014), p. 145-169 + Appendix, p. 171-289 © ABELAO (Belgium) The « Caesarean » Text of the Gospel of Mark: Lake Revisited By Didier Lafleur IRHT - Paris n the field of history and practice of New Testament textual criticism, two major stages were initiated during the last cen- tury by Kirsopp Lake. The first of these was the publication, Iin 19 02, of a survey concerning Codex 1 of the Gospels and its Allies, in the Texts and Studies series (7:3). The second stage was the pub- lication, in 1928, with Robert P. Blake and Silva New, of « The Caesarean Text of the Gospel of Mark » in the Harvard Theological Review (21:4). For the first time, the authors emphasized the exist- ence of such text on the basis of three major pieces of evidence: the Greek manuscripts, the patristic witnesses and the Oriental versions. Since then, the question of the « Caesarean » text-type has been a very disputed matter. It still remains an important tex- tual issue.1 1 This paper was first presented during the Society of Biblical Literature Annual Meeting 2012, Chicago, November 18. 146 D. LAFLEUR Our plan is not to discuss here about the « Caesarean » text and its subsequent developments, but to mainly focus the genesis of Lake’s publication. The survey of his preliminary works will help us to better consider, after a short account of Lake’s biobibliography, the way he followed until the 1928 « Caesarean Text of the Gospel of Mark » and which methodology he used. We will then emphasize one of the three pieces of evidence quot- ed by the authors, the evidence of the Greek manuscripts as de- scribed in their tables of variants.
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