Front Matter

Cambridge University Press 978-1-107-12536-0 - Biblical Criticism in Early Modern Europe: Erasmus, the Johannine Comma and Trinitarian Debate Grantley Mcdonald Frontmatter More information

BIBLICAL CRITICISM IN EARLY MODERN EUROPE

Mediaeval western theologians considered the Johannine comma (1 John 5:7–8) the clearest biblical evidence for the Trinity. When Erasmus failed to fi nd the comma in the Greek manuscripts he used for his New Testament edition, he omitted it. Accused of promot- ing Antitrinitarian heresy, Erasmus included the comma in his third edition (1522) after seeing it in a Greek codex from England, even though he doubted the manuscript’s authenticity. Th e resulting disputes, involving leading theologians, philologists and controver- sialists, such as Luther, Calvin, Sozzini, Milton, Newton, Bentley, Gibbon and Porson, touched not simply on philological questions but also on matters of doctrine, morality, social order and toleration. While the spuriousness of the Johannine comma was established by 1900, it has again assumed iconic status in recent attempts to defend biblical inerrancy among the Christian Right. A social history of the Johannine comma thus provides signifi cant insights into the recent Culture Wars.

Grantley McDonald is a postdoctoral fellow at the Universität Wien, and leader of the research project ‘Th e court chapel of Maximilian I: between art and politics’. His research has been distinguished with prizes from the Australian Academy of the Humanities (Canberra) and the Praemium Erasmianum Foundation (Amsterdam). His recent work has focused on print, religious radi- calism and censorship.

© in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-1-107-12536-0 - Biblical Criticism in Early Modern Europe: Erasmus, the Johannine Comma and Trinitarian Debate Grantley Mcdonald Frontmatter More information

BIBLICAL CRITICISM IN EARLY MODERN EUROPE Erasmus, the Johannine Comma and Trinitarian Debate

GRANTLEY MCDONALD Universität Wien

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www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781107125360 © Grantley McDonald 2016 Th is publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published 2016 Printed in the United States of America by Sheridan Books, Inc A catalog record for this publication is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Names: McDonald, Grantley, author. Title: Biblical criticism in early modern Europe : Erasmus, the Johannine comma and Trinitarian debate / Grantley McDonald. Description: New York : Cambridge University Press, 2016. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifi ers: LCCN 2015042174 | ISBN 9781107125360 (hardback) Subjects: LCSH: Bible – Criticism, interpretation, etc. – Europe – History. | Erasmus, Desiderius, –1536. | Bible. John, 1st, V, 7–8 – Criticism, Textual. | Trinity – History of doctrines. Classifi cation: LCC BS 500. M 345 2016 | DDC 224/.940486–dc23 LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015042174 ISBN 978-1-107-12536-0 Hardback Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URL s for external or third-party Internet Web sites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Web sites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

F o r Henk Jan de Jonge sine quo non

I know not a Passage in all the New Testament so contested as this. Edmund Calamy, 1719 It is rather a danger to religion than an advantage to make it now lean upon a bruised reed. Th ere cannot be better service done to the truth than to purge it of things spurious. Isaac Newton, 1690 To use a weak argument in behalf of a good cause, can only tend to infuse a suspicion of the cause itself into the minds of all who see the weakness of the argument. Such a procedure is scarcely a remove short of pious fraud. Richard Porson, 1790

Contents

List of Figures page ix Foreword xi Acknowledgements xiii List of Abbreviations xv

Introduction: Th e birth of the Trinity 1 1. Erasmus 13 1 . Th e Complutensian bible and the politics of sacred philology 13 2. English opposition to Erasmus: Edward Lee 16 3. Spanish opposition to Erasmus: Jacobus Stunica 22 4. Erasmus’ reading of the comma 29 5. John Clement and Codex Montfortianus 35 6. Frater Froyke 37 7. Running with the hares, hunting with the hounds: Erasmus’ contradictory attitude towards the comma 41 Summary 54 2 . Th e Johannine comma in sixteenth-century bibles after Erasmus 5 6 1 . Th e comma in sixteenth-century Greek editions 56 2 . Th e comma in sixteenth-century Latin editions 58 3. Syriac and Arabic editions 60 4. Lutheran reactions to the dispute over the comma 62 5. Zwinglian reactions to the dispute over the comma 68 6. English translations 69 Summary 70 3. Raising the ghost of Arius: the Johannine comma and Trinitarian debate in the sixteenth century 71 1. Miguel Servet 73 2. Philipp Melanchthon and the Lutheran turn towards the comma 75 3. Jean Calvin and the non-essential comma 78 4 . Th e Johannine comma in post-Tridentine Catholicism 81 vii

viii Contents

5. Anabaptists, Erasmus and the comma 86 6. East-central European Antitrinitarians of the later sixteenth and seventeenth centuries 94 7 . Th e comma in the Eastern Orthodox churches 111 Summary 115 4. From Civil War to Enlightenment 117 1 . Th e beginnings of the Socinian controversy in England 130 2. John Milton 134 3 . Th omas Hobbes 136 4. Critique of the textus receptus and the shadow of heresy: Etienne de Courcelles and Jeremias Felbinger 138 5. Richard Simon and the development of the historical-critical method 144 6 . Th omas Smith 156 7. Isaac Newton, ‘a Bigot, a Fanatique, a Heretique’ 159 8. John Mill 181 9. William Whiston 186 10. Samuel Clarke 194 11. Th omas Emlyn 209 12. Jonathan Swift: satire in the service of orthodoxy 214 13. Richard Bentley: between confi dence and despair 218 14. David Martin and the rediscovery of Codex Montfortianus 228 15. New editions of the New Testament: Wells, Mace, Bengel, Wettstein, Bowyer, Harwood 241 16. Johann Salomo Semler 255 17. Johann Jacob Griesbach 258 18. John Wesley: the appeal to pietism 260 19. Edward Gibbon, George Travis, Georg Gottlieb Pappelbaum, Richard Porson and Herbert Marsh 266 Summary 276 5 . Th e Johannine comma in the long nineteenth century 279 1 . Th e scientifi c study of Codex Montfortianus 283 2. Erasmus and English Unitarianism 287 3. Erasmus and the Johannine comma in the struggle for Catholic emancipation 291 4. Critical advances: Lachmann and Tischendorf 292 5. Renewed defence of the textus receptus 294 6. Westcott, Hort and the Revised Version 296 7 . Th e Johannine comma and the Catholic modernist crisis 300 Summary 311 Conclusion 312

Appendix: translation of Erasmus’ annotations on the Johannine comma (1516–1535) 315 Bibliography 323 Index 375

Figures

1.1. Dublin, Trinity College ms 30 (Codex Montfortianus), 439r page 28 1.2. Dublin, Trinity College ms 30 (Codex Montfortianus), 12v 36 1.3. Th eodore of Gaza, In hoc volumine haec insunt. Introductivae grammatices libri quatuor (Venice: Aldus, 1495), α2r 38 2.1. Title woodcut from Johannes Cochlaeus, Septiceps Lutherus (Leipzig: Schumann, 1529). Bayerische Staatsbibliothek München, 4º Polem. 676 65 2.2. Abraham worships the Trinity. Cambridge, St John’s College ms K26, 9r 66 3.1. ‘Tres sunt qui testimonium dant’, Antiphonarium Romanum (Venice: Giunta, 1596), 41v. Bayerische Staatsbibliothek München, Liturg. 22 87 3.2. ‘Ligaeus’. From Ferenc Dávid and Giorgio Biandrata, Refutatio scripti Georgii Maioris ([Cluj-Napoca]: [n. p.], 1569), H5r. Universitätsbibliothek Leipzig, Syst. Th eol. 1956/1 100 3.3. ‘Lycisca’. From Ferenc Dávid and Giorgio Biandrata, Refutatio scripti Georgii Maioris ([Cluj-Napoca]: [n. p.], 1569), H5v. Universitätsbibliothek Leipzig, Syst. Th eol. 1956/1 101 3.4. ‘Est, et non est’. From Ferenc Dávid and Giorgio Biandrata, Refutatio scripti Georgii Maioris ([Cluj-Napoca]: [n. p.], 1569), H6r. Universitätsbibliothek Leipzig, Syst. Th eol. 1956/1 102

Foreword

Outside the domain of critical scholarship, textual criticism is generally regarded as the highly technical and dull pastime of a small minority of scholars who bury themselves in dusty corners, without external connec- tion or relevance to living issues. Grantley McDonald’s study of Erasmus and the textual and theological problems surrounding the ‘Johannine comma’ (1 John 5:7–8) gives the lie to that assumption. In a fascinating study of Erasmus’ response to the dis- puted Johannine text, McDonald traces the remarkable history of debate in the centuries that followed. Th is history is intimately intertwined with doctrinal debates on the Trinity, becoming particularly acute with the rise of Unitarianism. It is also strangely interconnected with Erasmus’ own initial rejection of the comma and his later inclusion of it in a further edition of the Greek New Testament – subsequent generations using this ambiguity to support radically diff erent conclusions. Th e book tells an engrossing story of acrimonious debate in which text-critical issues become the basis of hardening and opposing views on central theological issues. Beneath this story lies the wider cultural issue of the place of tolerance and diversity within society, and the often rival claims of science and religion. Today, the Johannine comma is widely dismissed by New Testament scholars as a later interpolation in the text of 1 John. Th is is true of main- stream scholarship across the theological and denominational spectrum, regardless of the approach to Trinitarian theology and despite the question of whether, and to what extent, the doctrine of the Trinity emerges from the pages of the New Testament. Nonetheless, the basic issues of interpretation are still pertinent. Does a single image of God emerge from the multiple portraits in the Bible? How is Christian doctrine to be elucidated in dialogue with the diverse writings of Scripture? Equally pertinent in today’s world – not only within but also beyond the bounds of the Judaeo-Christian tradition – is the ever-present question xi

xii Foreword of how to interpret sacred texts. Protecting treasured texts from the kind of investigative study that is brought to bear on any literary text can lead to a fundamentalism where questioning by the reader is prohibited and offi cial interpretations alone are permitted. McDonald’s study in reception history, with its lucid prose, its schol- arly precision and its engaging style, tells an engrossing tale that makes for lively, thoughtful and challenging reading. Dorothy A. Lee Trinity College University of Divinity Melbourne

Acknowledgements

I rang the bell at Lambeth Palace Library and stamped my feet with anticipation. I was working on sixteenth-century Platonism, and at last I was to get my hands on the rare work Tractatus aliquot Christianae religionis by Johann Sommer, who set out to demonstrate that several Christian doctrines had been stolen from Plato. As I followed Sommer straight into the heart of the Antitrinitarian debates of the sixteenth century, I noticed with fascination that a number of his arguments depended on text-critical issues, such as the authenticity of the Johannine comma. Researching further, I found several stimulating articles on early modern biblical philology by Henk Jan de Jonge. I wrote to Prof. de Jonge with some questions, and before long he had put off his retirement to supervise me as a PhD candidate at the University of Leiden. Without his keen eye, critical intelligence, uncompromising standards and generosity, this book would never have been written, and it is presented to him in gratitude. I also thank the members of my examination committee – Jan Krans, Johannes Magliano-Tromp, Hans Trapman, Ernestine van der Wall, Jürgen Zangenberg and especially the eagle-eyed Miekske van Poll-van de Lisdonk – who all improved the result. As I reworked the text for publication, Andrew Turner, Henk Jan de Jonge, Keith Elliott, Mordechai Feingold and Johannes Brandl kindly read the draft and saved me from some mistakes, and Teunis van Lopik drew my attention to several sources I had missed the fi rst time around. Laura Morris, Alexandra Poreda and Kanimozhi Ramamurthy were effi cient and helpful midwives at CUP. To all of them, and to the anonymous readers for the Press, I say thank you. My heartfelt thanks go also to the many friends and colleagues who gave their support, time, assistance and advice: Elizabethanne Boran, Massimo Ceresa, the late Patrick Collinson, Elisabeth Gieselbrecht, Royston Gustavson, Dieter Harlfi nger, Rob Iliff e, Martin Heide, Leofranc Holford-Strevens, Jeff rey Kurtzman, Barbara Crostini Lappin, Dorothy Lee, Andrea Lindmayr-Brandl, Andrew McKenzie-McHarg, Scott xiii

xiv Acknowledgements Mandelbrote, Vivian Nutton, Sandy Paul, Leigh Penman, Jac Perrin, Julian Reid, Joshua Rifkin, Erika Rummel, Gian Piero Siliquini, Stephen Snobelen, Mark Statham, Josef Struber, Naomi van Loo, Klaus Wachtel, Timothy Wengert and Piotr Wilczek. My thanks are also due to the Centre d’Études Supérieures de la Renaissance (Université François-Rabelais de Tours), Le Studium (CNRS Orléans), KU Leuven, Trinity College Dublin and the Universität Salzburg for institutional support while I was writing this study. Th anks also go to the many libraries which allowed me access to their invalu- able collections of rare books or provided scans: Universiteitsbiblio- theek, Amsterdam; Bibliothèque municipale, Avranches; Öff entliche Bibliothek der Universität, Basel; Library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge; Library of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge; Library of Trinity College, Cambridge; University Library, Cambridge; Library of Trinity College, Dublin; Marsh’s Library, Dublin; Th e National Archives, Kew; Universiteitsbibliotheek, Leiden; Universitätsbibliothek, Leipzig; Universiteitsbibliotheek and Maurits Sabbe Bibliotheek, KU Leuven; British Library, London; Lambeth Palace Library, London; Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich; Universitätsbibliothek, LMU Munich; Bodleian Library, Oxford; Library of Corpus Christi College, Oxford; Library of Magdalen College, Oxford; Library of New College, Oxford; Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris; Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Rome; Stiftsbibliothek St Peter, Salzburg; Württembergische Landesbibliothek, Stuttgart; Herzog August Bibliothek, Wolfenbüttel; Biblioteka Uniwersytecka, Wrocław; Zentralbibliothek, Zürich. My thanks also go to the Praemium Erasmianum Foundation, which unexpectedly distinguished this dissertation with a generous research prize. And thanks to my family, near and far, who have patiently kept hold of one end of the string while I set off into the labyrinth in search of monsters.

Abbreviations

ASD . Opera Omnia Desiderii Erasmi. Amsterdam: North Holland/Elsevier, 1969–2008; Leiden: Brill, 2009–. ASD VI-4. Epistolae Apostolicae (secunda pars) et Apocalypsis Iohannis . Ed Andrew J. Brown. Leiden: Brill, 2012. ASD VI-8. Annotationes in Novum Testamentum, 1–2 Cor . Ed. Miekske L. van Poll-van de Lisdonk. Amsterdam: North Holland/Elsevier, 2003. ASD VI-10. Annotationes in Novum Testamentum, 1. Tim.–Ap. Ioh. Ed. Miekske L. van Poll-van de Lisdonk. Leiden: Brill, 2014. ASD IX-2. Apologia respondens ad ea quae Iacobus Lopis Stunica taxaverat in prima duntaxat Novi Testamenti aeditione . Ed. Henk Jan de Jonge. Amsterdam: North Holland, 1983. ASD IX-4. Apologia qua respondet duabus invectivis Eduardi Lei; Responsio ad annotationes Eduardi Lei; Manifesta Mendacia . Ed. Erika Rummel. Responsio ad disputationem cuiusdam Phimostomi de divortio . Ed. Edwin Rabbie. Amsterdam: North Holland/ Elsevier, 2003. BAV. Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana. BL. London, British Library. BnF. Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France. BSB. Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek. CCCM. Corpus Christianorum. Continuatio Mediaevalis . 285 vols. Turnhout: Brepols, 1971–2014. CCSL . Corpus Christianorum. Series Latina . 176 vols. Turnhout: Brepols, 1953–2014. CE. Contemporaries of Erasmus: A Biographical Register of the Renaissance and Reformation . Ed. Peter xv

xvi Abbreviations G. Bietenholz and Th omas B. Deutscher. 3 vols. Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1985–1987. Correspondence . Th e Correspondence of Erasmus . Trans. R. A. B. Mynors and D. F. S. Th ompson, annotat. Wallace K. Ferguson and Peter G. Bietenholz. 11 vols. Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1974–1994. CSEL . Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum latinorum . 96 vols. Vienna: Tempsky, 1866–. CR . Corpus Reformatorum . Ed. Karl Gottlieb Bret- schneider et al. 101 vols. Halle, Braunschweig and Zürich: [various publishers], 1834–1959. CW . Collected Works of Erasmus. Toronto: Toronto University Press, 1974–. DM . Th omas Herbert Darlow and Horace Frederick Moule. Historical Catalogue of the Printed Editions of the Holy Scripture in the Library of the British and Foreign Bible Society . 2 vols. London: Bible House, 1903–1911. GA. Gregory-Aland manuscript numbers, given according to Aland et al. , Kurzgefaßte Liste der griechischen Handschriften des Neuen Testaments . 2nd ed. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1994. LB . Desiderius Erasmus, Opera Omnia . Ed. Jean Le Clerc. 10 vols. Leiden: Van der Aa, 1703–1706. MGH . Monumenta Germaniae Historica . Hannover: Hahn; Weimar: Böhlau; Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1826–. ODNB. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Ed. H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Howard Harrison. 60 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004. OER . Th e Oxford Encyclopedia of the Reformation . Ed. Hans J. Hillebrand. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. Omnia Opera . Desiderius Erasmus, Omnia Opera . 9 vols. Basel: Froben, 1538–1540. Opus Epist . Opus Epistolarum Des. Erasmi Roterodami . Ed. Percy S. Allen, H. M. Allen and H. W. Garrod. 12 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1906–1958. PG. Patrologiae cursus completus. Series Graeca . Ed. Jacques-Paul Migne. 161 vols. Paris: Seu Petit-Montrouge, 1857–1866.

Abbreviations xvii PL. Patrologiae cursus completus. Series Latina . Ed. Jacques-Paul Migne. 221 vols. Paris: Garnier, 1844–1905. Text und Textwert . Text und Textwert der griechischen Handschriften des Neuen Testaments . Ed. Kurt Aland et al . Berlin: De Gruyter, 1987–2013. Numbers given in brackets after a biblical citation refer to a Teststelle and Lesart assigned by Text und Textwert . Vetus Latina. Catalogue numbers for manuscripts of the Vetus Latina, given according to Bonifatius Fischer, Verzeichnis der Sigel für Handschriften und Kirchenschriftsteller . Freiburg: Herder, 1949. WA . Martin Luther, Werke. Kritische Gesamtausgabe. Weimar: Böhlau, 1883–. I Schriften (58 vols), 1883–1983 [WA ]; II Tischreden (6 vols), 1912–1921 [TR ]; III Die deutsche Bibel (12 vols), 1906–1961 [DB ]; IV Briefe (18 vols), 1930–1985 [Br ].

Unless otherwise stated, biblical citations in English are taken from the New Revised Standard Version, copyright © 1989 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. All other translations, except where specifi cally noted, are my own. When cit- ing early modern English texts, I silently expand abbreviations (ye , yt , wch and so on). Years are given as beginning on 1 January.