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A marginal note adds: "Gr. Men of good pleasure", the proposed Greek text being en
anthropois eudokias. Scrivener, himself one of the Revisers, speaks of this text and
translation as one that "can be arrived at, only through some process which would make
any phrase bear almost any meaning the translator might like to put upon it". Every
known copy of the Gospels, excepting only the Sinaiticus, Alexandrian, Vaticanus and
Bezae, contains the words as found in the Received Text of the A.V. Even the Sinaiticus
and the Bezae were corrected in ancient times and brought into conformity with the
Received Text; and the Alexandrian on another page perpetuates what is known as the
"Morning Hymn", in which the Received Text is preserved. It will be seen, therefore,
that even these MSS cannot be ranged against the A.V. The A.V. reading is found in the
two Syriac Versions, and in the Coptic, while the Armenian, Georgian, Ęthiopic,
Slavonic and Arabian versions all testify to the truth of the A.V. The Latin copies and
the Gothic versions alone agree with the R.V. reading.
"It therefore comes to this: We are invited to make our selection between every other
copy of the Gospels, every known Lectionary, and (not least of all) the ascertained
ecclesiastical usage of the Eastern Church from the beginning, on the one hand; and the
testimony of four codices, without a history or a character, which concour in upholding a
patent mistake, on the other" (Dean Burgon).
Added to this, we have twenty-nine "Fathers", ranging from the 2nd century to the
8th, as well as eighteen names whose actual identity and date are open to question.
"It will be perceived that 18 ancient authorities have been added to the list, every whit
as competent to witness what was the text of Luke 2: 14 at the time when A, B, Aleph
and D were written, as Basil or Athanasius, Epiphanius or Chrysostom themselves."
Moreover, the wide-spread character of the testimony is all in its favour. The
"Fathers" who testify to the Received Text lived in Gaul, Constantinople, Asia Minor,
Antioch, Syria, Palestine, Alexandria, Cyprus and Crete.
"If the articulate voices of so many illustrious Bishops, coming back to us in this way
from every part of ancient Christendom and all delivering the same unfaltering
message--if this be not allowed as decisive on a point of the kind just now before us,
pray let us have it explained to us, what amount of evidence will men accept as final . . .
The history of the reading advocated by the Revisionists is briefly this. It emerges into
notice in the 2nd Century; and in the 5th disappears from sight entirely" (Dean Burgon).
In order to leave no loophole, "to leave no dark corner standing for the ghost of a
respectable doubt hereafter to hide in", Dean Burgon has patiently compared various
readings of the context of Luke 2: 14 as given in the five MSS which have had such an
influence over the R.V. We will not weary the reader with an exhibition of this labour of
love. The Dean discovered within these 15 verses (Luke 2: 1-15) no less than 56
different "readings" and 70 differences from the cursive MSS. 19 words are omitted,
4 added, 17 substituted, 10 altered, and 24 transposed. With such evidence before us, we
can heartily sympathize with the Dean when he says:
"And now--for the last time we ask the question--With what show of reason can the
unintelligible eudokias (of Aleph A B D) be upheld as genuine, in defiance of the whole