The "Trinity" Passage in 1 John

[Kevan]

In another thread, tjmiller wrote

It might be opportune to look at some of the principal textual witnesses for the “Trinitarian comma” of I John 5:7-8, “And there are three who give testimony in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost. And these three are one. And there are three that give testimony on earth…”

The Trinitarian comma is present (with some minor textual variations) in the following:
vg(mss) - a few Latin Vulgate manuscripts: 6-8th C.;
citations by St. John Cassian (d.433);
it(m) - 8th C. Latin collection of Patristic biblical citations;
it(c) - Latin Codex Colbertinus: 12th C.
MS61 - 15th C. Grk NT: first known Grk. NT w/Trin. comma;

The passage is absent in:
Codex Sinaiticus -most ancient copy of entire Grk.NT: 4thC
B - Codex Vaticanus: 4th.C., most of the Greek OT & NT;
citations by SS. Irenaeus (d.203), Hippolytus (d.235), Cyprian(d.258), Dionysius of Alexandria (d.265), Hilary of Poitiers (d.368), Athanasius (d.373), et al.;
A - Codex Alexandrinus: 5th C., most of the Greek NT;
syr(p) - Peshitta, or Syriac Vulgate versions: 5th C.;
syr(h) - Philoxenian-Harclean Syriac versions: 6-7th C.
cop(sa) - Sahidic-Coptic versions: 6-8th C.

Even should they have no experience with textual criticism, I wonder what conclusion readers of this thread would come to as to the authenticity of the passage in question, just on the basis of the MS evidence here presented? TC can be a fun detective game!

Readers of that thread did not rise to the challenge, so I thought it might be good to bring the topic here and see who’s interested.

As a Fundamentalist, my own opinion regarding the evidence that tjmiller presented is this: the passage appears in later MSS (“manuscripts”), but it is absent in the earlier ones. So it seems that the passage was not originally in John’s letter. That is also the common position among mainline Fundamentalism (but not among the KJV-only crowd).

HOWEVER, I seem to recall reading Catholic sources that said the Church does accept the passage’s genuinness.

What do others of you say? Should this passage be included in the Catholic Bible? Does the Church speak regarding this?

 

[Lazerlike42]

I do not believe that the Catholic Church recognizes this passage.

 

[scriabin]

This is a direct quote concerning these Bible verses from Ludwig Ott’s Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, (1954) page 56:

“As they have been adopted in the official Vulgate editions, and have been used by the Church for centuries, they may be regarded as an expression of the Church’s teaching. Further, they enjoy a status as a testimony of Tradition. Even if the passage be not a genuine constituent part of the Vulgate, it is nevertheless authentic, that is, free from error dogmatically. In the year 1897 the Congregation of the Inquisition declared that the genuineness of the passage could not with certainty be denied or doubted. In recent times the doubts concerning its authenticity have grown and the Holy Office, in 1927, declared that, after careful examinatiion of the whole circumstances, its genuineness could be denied.”

Interestingly, he identified only these bracketed words as in doubt, “And they are Three who give testimony [in Heaven: the Father, the Word and the Holy Ghost. And these Three are One. And there are Three that give testimony on earth.]”

 

[Daniel_Marsh]

“Erasmus promised that he would insert the Comma Johanneum, as it is called, in future editions if a single Greek manuscript could be found that contained the passage. At length such a copy was found–or made to order” (Bruce Metzger, The Text of the New Testament).

 

[mercygate]

I put this one right up there with "For Thine is the Kingdom, and the Power and the Glory . . . " Perhaps inserts to an earlier text but (thank God), not a theological problem.

This is an issue for palaeographers to natter over but should not cause us ordinary blokes to lose so much as a single wink of sleep.

 

[Daniel_Marsh]

Lazerlike42:

I do not believe that the Catholic Church recognizes this passage.

Fact, is this would have been a great text to quote during the Arian Controversy, but it is not quoted by the church fathers that I know of.

The Textual Problem in 1 John 5:7-8
By: Daniel B. Wallace , Th.M., Ph.D.

This longer reading is found only in eight late manuscripts, four of which have the words in a marginal note. Most of these manuscripts (2318, 221, and [with minor variations] 61, 88, 429, 629, 636, and 918) originate from the 16th century; the earliest manuscript, codex 221 (10th century), includes the reading in a marginal note which was added sometime after the original composition. Thus, there is no sure evidence of this reading in any Greek manuscript until the 1500s; each such reading was apparently composed after Erasmus’ Greek NT was published in 1516. Indeed, the reading appears in no Greek witness of any kind (either manuscript, patristic, or Greek translation of some other version) until AD 1215 (in a Greek translation of the Acts of the Lateran Council, a work originally written in Latin). This is all the more significant, since many a Greek Father would have loved such a reading, for it so succinctly affirms the doctrine of the Trinity.2 The reading seems to have arisen in a fourth century Latin homily in which the text was allegorized to refer to members of the Trinity. From there, it made its way into copies of the Latin Vulgate, the text used by the Roman Catholic Church.
…
The Trinitarian formula (known as the Comma Johanneum) made its way into the third edition of Erasmus’ Greek NT (1522) because of pressure from the Catholic Church. After his first edition appeared (1516), there arose such a furor over the absence of the Comma that Erasmus needed to defend himself. He argued that he did not put in the Comma because he found no Greek manuscripts that included it. Once one was produced (codex 61, written by one Roy or Froy at Oxford in c. 1520),3 Erasmus apparently felt obliged to include the reading. He became aware of this manuscript sometime between May of 1520 and September of 1521. In his annotations to his third edition he does not protest the rendering now in his text,4 as though it were made to order; but he does defend himself from the charge of indolence, noting that he had taken care to find whatever manuscripts he could for the production of his Greek New Testament. In the final analysis, Erasmus probably altered the text because of politico-theologico-economic concerns: he did not want his reputation ruined, nor his Novum Instrumentum to go unsold.
…
Significantly, the German translation done by Luther was based on Erasmus’ second edition (1519) and lacked the Comma. But the KJV translators, basing their work principally on Theodore Beza’s 10th edition of the Greek NT (1598), a work which itself was fundamentally based on Erasmus’ third and later editions (and Stephanus’ editions), popularized the Comma for the English-speaking world. Thus, the Comma Johanneum has been a battleground for English-speaking Christians more than for others.

bible.org/page.asp?page_id=1186

 

[tjmiller]

Erasmus likely inserted the passage, not due to some imagined “pressure from the Catholic Church”, but rather due to the pressure of his none too small scholarly ego.

 

[Fidelis]

The Textual Problem in 1 John 5:7-8
By: Daniel B. Wallace , Th.M., Ph.D.

This longer reading is found only in eight late manuscripts, four of which have the words in a marginal note. Most of these manuscripts (2318, 221, and [with minor variations] 61, 88, 429, 629, 636, and 918) originate from the 16th century; the earliest manuscript, codex 221 (10th century), includes the reading in a marginal note which was added sometime after the original composition. Thus, there is no sure evidence of this reading in any Greek manuscript until the 1500s; each such reading was **apparently ** composed after Erasmus’ Greek NT was published in 1516. Indeed, the reading appears in no Greek witness of any kind (either manuscript, patristic, or Greek translation of some other version) until AD 1215 (in a Greek translation of the Acts of the Lateran Council, a work originally written in Latin). This is all the more significant, since many a Greek Father would have loved such a reading, for it so succinctly affirms the doctrine of the Trinity.2 The reading seems to have arisen in a fourth century Latin homily in which the text was allegorized to refer to members of the Trinity. From there, it made its way into copies of the Latin Vulgate, the text used by the Roman Catholic Church.
…
The Trinitarian formula (known as the Comma Johanneum) made its way into the third edition of Erasmus’ Greek NT (1522) because of pressure from the Catholic Church. After his first edition appeared (1516), there arose such a furor over the absence of the Comma that Erasmus needed to defend himself. He argued that he did not put in the Comma because he found no Greek manuscripts that included it. Once one was produced (codex 61, written by one Roy or Froy at Oxford in c. 1520),3 Erasmus apparently felt obliged to include the reading. He became aware of this manuscript sometime between May of 1520 and September of 1521. In his annotations to his third edition he does not protest the rendering now in his text,4 as though it were made to order; but he does defend himself from the charge of indolence, noting that he had taken care to find whatever manuscripts he could for the production of his Greek New Testament. In the final analysis, Erasmus **probably ** altered the text because of politico-theologico-economic concerns: he did not want his reputation ruined, nor his Novum Instrumentum to go unsold.
…
Significantly, the German translation done by Luther was based on Erasmus’ second edition (1519) and lacked the Comma. But the KJV translators, basing their work principally on Theodore Beza’s 10th edition of the Greek NT (1598), a work which itself was fundamentally based on Erasmus’ third and later editions (and Stephanus’ editions), popularized the Comma for the English-speaking world. Thus, the Comma Johanneum has been a battleground for English-speaking Christians more than for others.

There’s a lot of subjective analysis involved here, folks, so remember to take that into consideration.

 

[Kevan]

tjmiller:

Erasmus likely inserted the passage, not due to some imagined “pressure from the Catholic Church”, but rather due to the pressure of his none too small scholarly ego.

I don’t understand. How would pressure from his ego motivate him to insert a passage if he thought it spurious?

 

[tjmiller]

The ego moves in mysterious ways, its disorders to perform.

Any biography of the self-absorbed renascence man Erasmus should suffice to explain.

However it got there, we must all agree that the passage is spurious. It is a good Trinitarian reflection, to be sure - but there can be no doubt that it is not Sacred Scripture.

 

[Kevan]

tjmiller:

Any biography of the self-absorbed renascence man Erasmus should suffice to explain.

Biographies can be really big books. Isn’t there an easier way?

Erasmus issued an edition of the Greek NT without the Johannine comma because it did not appear in any of his Greek MSS. “Church authorities” (so I’m told) objected, since the passage was in the Latin Vulgate and the Vulgate had been good enough for the whole Church for many centuries. Of course, Erasmus knew that.

Then Erasmus issued another edition of his Greek NT which included the passage.

I just can’t figure out where you’re coming from when you attribute the change to his ego. Seems to me, if he thought the passage spurious, he included it because he knew which side of his bread was buttered. (And, for that matter, he didn’t want to end up fried one day .)

 

[tjmiller]

Well done, Kevan.
Perhaps we need an “Erasmus” thread?
The fact remains that the Trinitarian Comma is unobjectionably false.We all know it. In respect to the learned interpolator Erasmus, I herewith recuse myself from attributions as to his motive. But he was a scholarly snob, like me.

 

[banjo]

Augustine suggested that by his time (c.400) it had become an established marginal gloss.

A footnote in the RSV-CE regards it as a marginal gloss that found its way into the text.

 

[Semper_Fi_1]

Kevan:

I don’t understand. How would pressure from his ego motivate him to insert a passage if he thought it spurious?

I don’t think that’s probable either. It’s likely that it could have been commentary which was what we consider today a “footnote”, but before verses and chapters were inserted into the Bible, some monks in monasteries could have easily misinterpreted it as actually part of Sacred Scripture.