Zane C. Hodges - Majority Text

Majority Text

In 1985, Hodges published with Arthur L. Farstad the second edition of The Greek New Testament According to the Majority Text with Apparatus. The Byzantine text-type, or “Majority Text”, is considered by its advocates to be a more accurate rendering of the Greek New Testament, though the more commonly accepted New Testament text, called the Alexandrian text-type, which is used in the Nestle-Aland (N/A) text and the United Bible Societies Greek Testament (UBS), is based on more ancient New Testament fragments. Hodges argues:

The amount of variation between the manuscripts containing the Majority Text appears to be significantly less than the variations found in the papyrus texts of Egypt. This is to say that any two manuscripts containing the Majority Text are likely to differ with each other less than any two papyri might differ from one another. .. dditionally, many of the uncial (capital letter) manuscripts contain a predominantly Majority form of text. The Majority form, however, is much less well represented in the Egyptian papyri…Is it possible that the N/A and UBS editions of the New Testament represent only an approximation to an early form of text that once circulated in Egypt? Where is the evidence that this kind of text really existed elsewhere in the ancient world? …Perhaps the great numerical superiority of the Majority Text (80% in the minuscule manuscripts) is its own argument for the high antiquity of that text. All other explanations of its majority status lack real plausibility. Indeed, the predominance of this majority can actually be understood as the expected outcome of a normal and natural transmission of the New Testament manuscripts. (Zane Hodges & Earl Radmacher, The NIV Reconsidered: A Fresh Look at a Popular Translation, 1990 pp. 136, 137, 143, 144)