Johann Jakob Griesbach
Encyclopedia
Johann Jakob Griesbach German
biblical textual critic, was born at Butzbach, a small town in the state of Hesse
, where his father, Konrad Kaspar (1705–1777), was pastor. Griesbach's fame rests upon his work in New Testament
criticism, in which he inaugurated a new epoch.
His solution to the synoptic problem bears his name, but the Griesbach hypothesis has been largely discredited in favor of the Two-Gospel hypothesis
.
, and at the universities of Tübingen, Leipzig
and Halle, where he became one of J. S. Semler
's most ardent disciples. It was Semler who induced him to turn his attention to the textual criticism of the New Testament. At the close of his undergraduate career he undertook a literary tour through Germany, the Netherlands
, France and England. In England he may have met Henry Owen
whose seminal work Observations on the Four Gospels (1764) is listed among the books of Griesbach's estate, although he does not seem to have acknowledged any indebtedness to Owen.
On his return to Halle, Griesbach acted for some time as Privatdozent, but in 1773 was appointed to a professorial chair; in 1775 he went to the University of Jena
, where he spent the rest of his life (though he received calls to other universities).
first appeared at Halle, in three volumes, in 1774-1775. The first volume contained the first three Gospels, synoptically arranged; the second, the Epistles and the book of Revelation
. All the historical books were reprinted in one volume in 1777, the synoptical arrangement of the Gospels having been abandoned as inconvenient. Of the second edition, considerably enlarged and improved, the first volume appeared in 1796 and the second in 1806 (Halle and London). Of a third edition, edited by David Schulz, only the first volume, containing the four Gospels, appeared (1827).
For the construction of his critical text Griesbach took as his basis the Elzevir
edition. Where he differed from it he placed the Elzevir reading on the inner margin along with other readings lie thought worthy of special consideration (these last, however, being printed in smaller type). To all the readings on this margin he attached special marks indicating the precise degree of probability in his opinion attaching to each. In weighing these probabilities he proceeded upon a particular theory which in its leading features he had derived from J. A. Bengel
and J. S. Semler, dividing all the manuscripts into three main groups – the Alexandria
n, the Western and the Byzantine
.
A reading supported by only one recension he considered as having only one witness in its favour; those readings which were supported by all the three recensions, or even by two of them, especially if these two were the Alexandrian and the Western, he unhesitatingly accepted as genuine. Only when each of the three recensions gives a different reading does he proceed to discuss the question on other grounds.
See his Symbolae criticae ad supplendas et corrigendas variarum N. T. lectionum collectiones (Halle, 1785, 1793), and his Commentarius criticus in textum Graecum N. T., which extends to the end of Mark
and discusses the more important various readings with great care and thoroughness (Jena, 1794 if.).
Among the other works of Griesbach (which are comparatively unimportant) may be mentioned his university thesis De codicibus quatuor evangelislarum Origenianis (Halle, 1771) and a work upon systematic theology
(Anleitung zur Kenntniss der populären Dogmatik, Jena, 1779). His Opuscula, consisting chiefly of university "Programs" and addresses, were edited by Gabler
(2 vols, Jena, 1824).
See the articles in Herzog-Hauck, Realencyklopädie, and the Allgemeine deutsche Biographie.
For Griesbach's hypothesis concerning the interrelation of the Gospel accounts of Matthew, Mark and Luke, and its modern variant, see Griesbach hypothesis.
A selection of the Papers presented at the Colloquium appraising Griesbach's life, work and influence, aimed "to indicate why an understanding of this scholar's contribution to New Testament criticism is important both for the history of New Testament scholarship and for contemporary research", together with the text in Latin and in English translation of The Dissertation of J. J. Griesbach, Doctor of Theology and Principal Professor in the University of Jena, in which he demonstrates that the entire Gospel of Mark has been extracted from the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, written in the name of the University of Jena (1789–1790), now revised and furnished with many additions, are to be found in Bernard Orchard
and Thomas R. W. Longstaff (ed.), J. J. Griesbach: Synoptic and Text-Critical Studies 1776-1976, Volume 34 in the SNTS Monograph Series (Cambridge University Press, hardback 1978, paperback 2005 ISBN 0-521-02055-7).
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
biblical textual critic, was born at Butzbach, a small town in the state of Hesse
Hesse
Hesse or Hessia is both a cultural region of Germany and the name of an individual German state.* The cultural region of Hesse includes both the State of Hesse and the area known as Rhenish Hesse in the neighbouring Rhineland-Palatinate state...
, where his father, Konrad Kaspar (1705–1777), was pastor. Griesbach's fame rests upon his work in New Testament
New Testament
The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....
criticism, in which he inaugurated a new epoch.
His solution to the synoptic problem bears his name, but the Griesbach hypothesis has been largely discredited in favor of the Two-Gospel hypothesis
Two-gospel hypothesis
The Two-Gospel Hypothesis is a proposed solution to the Synoptic Problem. The hypothesis, , was introduced in its current form by William Farmer in 1964. The synoptic problem concerns the pattern of similarities and differences between the three Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke...
.
Education and career
Griesbach was educated at FrankfurtFrankfurt
Frankfurt am Main , commonly known simply as Frankfurt, is the largest city in the German state of Hesse and the fifth-largest city in Germany, with a 2010 population of 688,249. The urban area had an estimated population of 2,300,000 in 2010...
, and at the universities of Tübingen, Leipzig
University of Leipzig
The University of Leipzig , located in Leipzig in the Free State of Saxony, Germany, is one of the oldest universities in the world and the second-oldest university in Germany...
and Halle, where he became one of J. S. Semler
Johann Salomo Semler
Johann Salomo Semler was a German church historian and biblical commentator.-Youth and education:He was born at Saalfeld in Electoral Saxony, the son of a poor clergyman. He grew up in pietistic surroundings, which powerfully influenced him his life through, though he never became a Pietist...
's most ardent disciples. It was Semler who induced him to turn his attention to the textual criticism of the New Testament. At the close of his undergraduate career he undertook a literary tour through Germany, the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
, France and England. In England he may have met Henry Owen
Henry Owen
The Reverend Dr. Henry Owen was a Welsh theologian and Biblical scholar. Perhaps his most significant contribution to biblical scholarship is his discussion of the date of publication and the form and manner of the composition of the four canonical gospel accounts...
whose seminal work Observations on the Four Gospels (1764) is listed among the books of Griesbach's estate, although he does not seem to have acknowledged any indebtedness to Owen.
On his return to Halle, Griesbach acted for some time as Privatdozent, but in 1773 was appointed to a professorial chair; in 1775 he went to the University of Jena
Friedrich Schiller University of Jena
Friedrich Schiller University of Jena , is a public research university located in Jena, Thuringia, Germany....
, where he spent the rest of his life (though he received calls to other universities).
New Testament text critic
Griesbach's critical edition of the New TestamentNew Testament
The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....
first appeared at Halle, in three volumes, in 1774-1775. The first volume contained the first three Gospels, synoptically arranged; the second, the Epistles and the book of Revelation
Book of Revelation
The Book of Revelation is the final book of the New Testament. The title came into usage from the first word of the book in Koine Greek: apokalupsis, meaning "unveiling" or "revelation"...
. All the historical books were reprinted in one volume in 1777, the synoptical arrangement of the Gospels having been abandoned as inconvenient. Of the second edition, considerably enlarged and improved, the first volume appeared in 1796 and the second in 1806 (Halle and London). Of a third edition, edited by David Schulz, only the first volume, containing the four Gospels, appeared (1827).
For the construction of his critical text Griesbach took as his basis the Elzevir
House of Elzevir
Elzevir is the name of a celebrated family of Dutch booksellers, publishers, and printers of the 17th and early 18th centuries. The duodecimo series of "Elzevirs" became very famous and very desirable among bibliophiles, who sought to obtain the tallest and freshest copies of these tiny...
edition. Where he differed from it he placed the Elzevir reading on the inner margin along with other readings lie thought worthy of special consideration (these last, however, being printed in smaller type). To all the readings on this margin he attached special marks indicating the precise degree of probability in his opinion attaching to each. In weighing these probabilities he proceeded upon a particular theory which in its leading features he had derived from J. A. Bengel
Johann Albrecht Bengel
Johann Albrecht Bengel , Lutheran pietist clergyman and Greek-language scholar known for his edition of the Greek New Testament and his commentaries on it.-Life and career:Bengel was born at Winnenden in Württemberg, Germany....
and J. S. Semler, dividing all the manuscripts into three main groups – the Alexandria
Alexandria
Alexandria is the second-largest city of Egypt, with a population of 4.1 million, extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea in the north central part of the country; it is also the largest city lying directly on the Mediterranean coast. It is Egypt's largest seaport, serving...
n, the Western and the Byzantine
Byzantium
Byzantium was an ancient Greek city, founded by Greek colonists from Megara in 667 BC and named after their king Byzas . The name Byzantium is a Latinization of the original name Byzantion...
.
A reading supported by only one recension he considered as having only one witness in its favour; those readings which were supported by all the three recensions, or even by two of them, especially if these two were the Alexandrian and the Western, he unhesitatingly accepted as genuine. Only when each of the three recensions gives a different reading does he proceed to discuss the question on other grounds.
See his Symbolae criticae ad supplendas et corrigendas variarum N. T. lectionum collectiones (Halle, 1785, 1793), and his Commentarius criticus in textum Graecum N. T., which extends to the end of Mark
Gospel of Mark
The Gospel According to Mark , commonly shortened to the Gospel of Mark or simply Mark, is the second book of the New Testament. This canonical account of the life of Jesus of Nazareth is one of the three synoptic gospels. It was thought to be an epitome, which accounts for its place as the second...
and discusses the more important various readings with great care and thoroughness (Jena, 1794 if.).
Among the other works of Griesbach (which are comparatively unimportant) may be mentioned his university thesis De codicibus quatuor evangelislarum Origenianis (Halle, 1771) and a work upon systematic theology
Systematic theology
In the context of Christianity, systematic theology is a discipline of Christian theology that attempts to formulate an orderly, rational, and coherent account of the Christian faith and beliefs...
(Anleitung zur Kenntniss der populären Dogmatik, Jena, 1779). His Opuscula, consisting chiefly of university "Programs" and addresses, were edited by Gabler
Johann Philipp Gabler
Johann Philipp Gabler was a German Protestant Christian theologian of the school of Johann Jakob Griesbach and Johann Gottfried Eichhorn....
(2 vols, Jena, 1824).
See the articles in Herzog-Hauck, Realencyklopädie, and the Allgemeine deutsche Biographie.
Gospel Synopsis
In 1776 Griesbach published his Greek Gospel synopsis of Matthew, Mark and Luke as a volume separate from his critical edition of the New Testament (cf. above), of which it had previously been a part, and thereby established the tool of a synopsis as an essential research aid in New Testament studies.For Griesbach's hypothesis concerning the interrelation of the Gospel accounts of Matthew, Mark and Luke, and its modern variant, see Griesbach hypothesis.
Johann Jakob Griesbach Bicentenary Colloquium 1776-1976
To mark the bicentenary of the publication of Griesbach's Gospel synopsis as a separate volume a group of distinguished international biblical scholars met in July 1976 at Münster/Westphalia for The Johann Jakob Griesbach Bicentenary Colloquium 1776-1976.A selection of the Papers presented at the Colloquium appraising Griesbach's life, work and influence, aimed "to indicate why an understanding of this scholar's contribution to New Testament criticism is important both for the history of New Testament scholarship and for contemporary research", together with the text in Latin and in English translation of The Dissertation of J. J. Griesbach, Doctor of Theology and Principal Professor in the University of Jena, in which he demonstrates that the entire Gospel of Mark has been extracted from the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, written in the name of the University of Jena (1789–1790), now revised and furnished with many additions, are to be found in Bernard Orchard
Bernard Orchard
Dom Bernard Orchard OSB MA was an English Roman Catholic Benedictine monk, headmaster and biblical scholar.-Early life and education:John Archibald Henslowe Orchard, the son of a farmer, was born in Bromley, Kent...
and Thomas R. W. Longstaff (ed.), J. J. Griesbach: Synoptic and Text-Critical Studies 1776-1976, Volume 34 in the SNTS Monograph Series (Cambridge University Press, hardback 1978, paperback 2005 ISBN 0-521-02055-7).
External links
- Symbolae criticae ad supplendas et corrigendas variarum N. T. lectionum collectiones (Halle, 1793)
- Novum Testamentum Graece (Londini 1809), vol. I
- Hē Kainē Diathēkē: Griesbach's text, with the various readings of Mill and Scholz (London 1859)