Date: Friday 2 May 1997 13:12:02
From: William Arnal <warnal@chass.utoronto.ca>
To: "Stephen C. Carlson" <scarlson@washdc.mindspring.com>
cc: "Crosstalk (list)" <crosstalk@info.harpercollins.com>
Subject: Re: GOThomas

On Fri, 2 May 1997, Stephen C. Carlson wrote:

> Perhaps #5 can appeal to analogy.  I think that the stronger analogy
> is in the transmission of Thomas itself from the Greek fragments to the
> Coptic version, rather than appeals to the transmission of the synoptic
> textual tradition in wither Greek or Coptic.  I'm currently looking in
> detail how the text of POxy 1, 654, and 655 is transmitted.  I'm not
> finished, but it looks like the transmission is fairly good (for POxy
> 1) and not much at all corrupted by synoptic parallels.  If this holds
> up, then case #5 is relatively less likely than case #1.

I don't understand this AT ALL. How can you examine the transmission
of the text of Thomas when there's almost zero textual evidence? How
can one assume that the Greek POxy fragments represent the textual
tradition out which the Coptic grew? There's no reason whatsoever to
assume this. In fact, I'm not sure that there's any reason to assume
that all the POxy fragments derive from the same MS tradition.

> It's possible that the textual corruptions could have moved the
> text of Thomas in the other direction, away from the synoptics.
> In other words, textual corruptions could just as well obscure
> the overall patter of dependence.  One must first (which is what
> I am currently doing) determine first the tendencies of Thomasine
> tradition, by painstakingly examining the transmission from Greek
> to Coptic in the texts of Thomas we actually do have before
> speculating on the Greek texts of Thomas we don't have.  My own
> preliminary impression is that harmonizations to Luke is simply
> not as common as some make it out to be.  Harmonizations to Matthew,
> however, is a different issue and need to be considered.

I can't help but think this is a waste of time, for the reasons
noted above. It's an interesting idea, and I HOPE a productive one,
but I can't see how you know that the Greek we have is the source of
the Coptic we have. Too dicey, I think.

> If either #1 (Thomas' use of Luke) or #2 (Luke's use of Thomas) applies,
> then independence is eliminated as an option.

No, it's only eliminated in the case of the saying in question.

Bill