apostolicfathers0201clem - Carmel Apologetics

11 8 EPISTLES OF S. IGNATIUS.
Latin, and thus to point to the scribe rather than to the editor. But
whoever may have been their author, they are valueless for critical
purposes.
A primary test of correctness in the readings of the Long
recension is conformity with the pre-existing text of the Middle form
on which it was founded ;
and this test the characteristic readings of
the Nydprugck ms generally fail to satisfy, thus condemning themselves.
As a rule also, they diverge from the old Latin version. In a very few
cases indeed they may seem to be confirmed by this version ; e.g. in
the curious substitution of avOevriKov for aOiKTov, and irpoKpiv^TaL for
TrpoKcirat, Philad. 6, where the Latin has principatus, praejudicatiir.
If
these readings be not, as we are tempted to suspect, emendations of
the editor who had the Latin version before him,.they must be more
ancient than this version ;
but even then they are condemned by reference
to the text of the Middle form, which has olOlktov and irpoKurai
like the other mss of the Long recension.
The eccentric readings of this ms must therefore be set aside. But
on the other hand it contains an ancient element of some value ;
and
cannot be altogether neglected, though
it
requires
to be used with discrimination.
8. Constantinopolitanus This is
[g4]. the important MS from which
Bryennios first published the Epistles of S. Clement in their complete
form (a.d. 1875), and is described accordingly in my 6'. Clement of
Rome I.
p. 121 sq (ed. 2). It bears the date a.d. 1056. The Ignatian
Epistles begin on fol. 81 with the Epistle of Mary to Ignatius, and
occur in the order which is usual in this recension.
I am indebted to the great kindness of Bryennios, now Metropolitan
of Nicomedia, for a collation of the Ignatian Epistles in this ms,
procured for me through the mediation of our common friend
Dr Hieronymus Myriantheus, Archimandrite of the Greek Church
in London. The collation is made with the text of the Ignatian
Epistles in Migne's Patrologia Graeca. Where there was any chance
of a variation escaping the eye of a careful collator, I
have recorded the
fact that the reading of this ms is inferred ex silentio. Bryennios also
furnished Funk with a collation for his work, and I have compared this
with my own for the present edition.
The MS maintains the same character in the Ignatian
letters which
has been noticed in the Epistles of Clement. Here, as there, it exhibits
manifest traces of a critical revision, which detracts from its authority.
But after due allowance made for this editorial interference,
it remains
an important aid to the criticism of the text ;
and moreover it has a
special
value as being the only Greek ms which preserves the thirteen