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Encyclopedia Britannica

SODEN, HERMANN, FREIHERR VON (1852- )

This article appears in Volume V25, Page 340 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: SIV-SOU

SODEN, HERMANN, FREIHERR VON (1852- ) , German biblical scholar, was born in Cincinnati on the 16th of August 1852, and was educated at the university of Tubingen. He was minister of Dresden-Striesen in 1881 and in 1887 became minister of the Jerusalem

Church

in Berlin. In 1889 he became prima-dement in the university of Berlin, and four years later was
appointed extraordinary professor of divinity. His earlier works include Philipperbrief (1890); " Untersuchungen uber neutest. Schriften " in the Protest. Jalirb. theolog. Studien and Schriftkommentar (1895-1897); Und was tut d. evangel. Kirche? (3rd. ed. 189o); Reisebriefe aus Palastina (2nd ed. 19or); Palastina and seine Gesch. (2nd ed. 1.904); Die wichtigsten Fragen im Leben Jesu (1904); Urchristliche Literaturgesch. (1904). His most important book is Die Schriften des neuen Testaments, in ihrer altesten erreichbaren Textgestalt hergestellt auf Grund ihrer Textgeschichte (Berlin, Bd. I., 1902-1910); certainly the most
important

work

WORK

on the text of the New Testament which had been published since Westcott and

Hort

HORT, FENTON JOHN ANTHONY (1828–1892)

's New Testament in the

Original

ORIGINAL

Greek (see BIBLE: New Testament).
Von Soden introduces, besides a new notation of MSS. (see Bible, N.T. MSS. and versions), a new theory of textual history. He thinks that in the 4th century there were in existence three recensions of the text, which he distinguishes as K, H and I, with the following characteristics and attestations.
K corresponds roughly to Westcott and

Hort

HORT, FENTON JOHN ANTHONY (1828–1892)

's Syrian Antiochian text ; it was probably made by Lucian in the 4th century. This was in the end the most popular form of text, and is found in a more or less degenerate state in all

late

LATE

MSS. The purest representatives are 61(tl), 675 (V), 92, (461), 94, IO27 (S), 1126 (476 = scrivener's k) 6179 (661). Later recensions of K are called K" and K'', and there are also others of less importance which represent the combination of K with other texts.
H represents Westcott and Hort's Neutral and Alexandrian texts between which von Soden does not distinguish.
It is found in eleven MSS. in varying degrees of purity: SI(B), S2
(10,33 (C), 36 (4'), S 48 (33), 626 (Z), 656 (L), 676 (0) 61026 (892),
S 371 (1241) and a 376 (579). Between these MSS. there is no very intimate connexion except between S I and S 2 (B and .c) which represent a common

original

ORIGINAL

(51-2). 51-2 is the best representative of H, but it has been contaminated by the Egyptian versions, and sometimes by the K and I texts and by Origen, though not to any

great

GREAT

extent.
The other H MSS. are none of them equal in value to the two

great

GREAT

uncials. They have all been influenced by K, I, and by the text of,parallel passages, to a greater extent than 61-2, or than either of the two witnesses to 6'-2, but some of them have less Egyptian corruption.
The origin of the H text must be regarded as unquestionably Egyptian, in view of the fact that it was used by all the Egyptian

Church

writers after the end of the 3rd century, and von Soden adopts the well-known hypothesis, first made popular by Bousset, that it represents the recension of Hesychius.
I does not quite correspond to anything in Westcott and Hort's

system

SYSTEM

, but has points of contact with their " Western " text. It is found in a

series

SERIES (a Latin word from serere, to join)

of subgroups of MSS. known as H', J, Ia, and others of less importance (about eleven subgroups are suggested). Of these H' is a family containing Cod. I and its allies (S 254, 6346, S 457, S 467, &c.), 6288 (22) and some allied MSS. 6203 (872), 6183 and 6 1131; J is the well-known Ferrar group; and Ia contains S 5 (D), 693 (565).6 133 (700), 6168 (28), 050 and some others. It is necessary to note that von Soden is able to place D in this group because he regards it as owing many of its most remarkable readings to contamination with the Latin version. I is, according to von Soden, a Palestinian recension connected with

Eusebius

, Pamphilus and Origen.
After establishing the text of I, H and K; von Soden reconstructs an hypothetical text, I-H-K, which he believes to have been their ancestor. He then tries to show that this text was known to all the writers of the 3rd and 2nd centuries, but has naturally to account for the fact that the quotations of these writers and the text of the early versions often diverge from it. The explanation that he offers is that the Diatessaron of

Tatian

TATIAN (2nd cent. A.D.)

was widely used and corrupted all extant texts, so that the Old Syriac, the Old Latin, the quotations of Irenaeus, Clement, Tertullian and others may be regarded as various combinations of the Tatianic text and I-H-K. Finally, he tries to show that the Tatianic text is itself in the main merely a corrupt form of I-H-K altered in order to suit the necessities of

Tatian

TATIAN (2nd cent. A.D.)

's plan.
For criticism of this important theory up to 1909 see Nestle's Einfuhrung in das griechische neue Testament, pp. 274-278 (3rd ed., Gratingen, 1909), and K. Lake's Professor H. von Soden's Treatment of the Text of the Gospels, Edinburgh, 1908). (K. L.)

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