Codex Bezae

From Bible Encyclopedia

Codex Bezae or Codex Cantabrigiensis (D), was published at Cambridge, at the expense of the University, by Dr. Kipling. These editions exhibit their respective prototypes, line for line,and word for word, to a degree of similarity hardly credible. The types were cast for the purpose, in alphabets of various forms, that they might be varied with those of the manuscript, and represent it more exactly ; and the ink was composed to suit the color of the faded pigment. Nothing equal to them had appeared in the , world of letters.

This copy was presented in 1581 to the university of Cambridge, by Beza, who procured it from the monastery of St. Irenaeus at Lyons, where it had long lain neglected. It is a Greek and Latin MS. of the four gospels and the Acts of the Apostles, written on parchment in folio. Its age is probably the seventh century, though the majority of critics have assigned it to the fifth. It would appear from internal evidence to have been written by a Latin, for the nature of the accompanying version favours this opinion. Kipling, Hug, and Schulz think that it was written in Egypt, but Scholz has given some reasons for assigning it to the South of France that are not destitute of weight. Credner assents to the latter opinion as far as the MS. is concerned, whilst he thinks that the text is of Jewish-Christian origin, and attributes it to Palestine. With regard to the quality of its readings much has been said, and great diversity of opinion has prevailed. The text is neither so corrupt as Matthaei would induce us to believe, nor so excellent as others would persuade us to think. The late Bishop Middleton published a dissertation on this MS. at the end of his work on the Greek article, in which he exhibits an undue tendency to depreciate it as of little critical value. In this he was probably influenced by Matthaei, whose edition of the Greek Testament he admired, and lauded far more than its merits justified. A splendid facsimile of this codex was published by Dr. Kipling at Cambridge, 1793, 2 volumes folio. On the whole, we are disposed to place considerable value on the readings of this copy, although it has been corrected by different hands. Instead of the Greek having been accommodated to the Latin, the Latin has often been forcibly adapted to the Greek, which gives it an insipid character.