The Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels Vindicated and Established.
By the late J. W. Burgon. Arranged, completed, and edited by Edward Miller. (G. Bell and Sons.)—We have no intention of criticising this work. Such a task would be quite impossible within the limitations necessarily imposed on the notices given in these columns. We shall do no more than indi- cate the position taken up by Mr. Miller, as representing his own views and those of Dean Burgon. This is best done by an example, and no example could be better than St. Mark xvi. 9-20. Mr. Miller marshals the evidence for and against, and reviews it at some length in pp. 295-307. As for the omission of the passage in the Codices Vaticanus and Sinaiticus, he alleges that the evidence of the MSS. shows that the scribe had the passage before him and deliberately omitted it. But this is not incon- sistent with Dean Alford's theory that the passage is very early, but not contemporary with the rest of the Gospel. The adverse internal evidence he dismisses in about a dozen lines, with nothing but the general remark that this argument may be pushed too far. His own theory, or rather one of two alternative theories, is that St. Peter dictated the Gospel to the Evangelist, and was hurried off to trial and execution as soon as he had uttered the words 4003o;vro -yap, and that St. Mark was unwilling to alter this fragmentary ending, but still felt it necessary to add a general conclusion. Readers who may wish to see the question discussed from the point of view adverse to the Burgon- Miller hypothesis are referred to the Church Quarterly Review for October, 189G.
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