Johann Martin Augustin Scholz - Work

Work

In addition to his major work, his Novum Testamentum Graece (a text edition of the Greek New Testament), Scholz was also known for his efforts in Bible translation, in which he continued the work begun by Dominikus von Brentano and Anton Dereser.

Scholz's work in textual criticism was particularly appreciated by the British. He was able to add to the list of Greek manuscripts of the New Testament 616 new minuscule manuscripts. His additions to the list of uncials comprise only three fragments of the Gospels Wa, Y, and N. These manuscripts were partially examined and collated by him. Results of his work were published in 1830-1836.

Scholz's accession of new witnesses to the lists of New Testament manuscripts was extensive. He was responsible for adding codices 260-469 of the Gospels, 110-192 of the Acts, 125-246 of the Pauline epistles, 51-89 of the Apocalypse, 51-181 Evangelistaria, and 21-48 Apostoloi.

Scholz collated the entire text of five manuscripts: 262, 299, 300, 301 and 346. Other manuscripts he collated in large part: (260, 270, 271, 277, 284, 285, 298, 324, 353, 382 and 428).

Scholz divided all New Testament manuscripts into five families: two African (Alexandrian and Western), one Asiatic, one Byzantine and one Cyprian. He was the first to emphasize the importance of ascertaining the geographical provenance of a witness. That point was elaborated by Streeter in 1924 ("theory of local texts"). Scholz, after some tentative attempts at classifying manuscripts, rejected this theory and adopted Bengel's division into two families, which he called the Alexandrian and the Constantinopolitan. He initially favoured the Constantinopolitan (Byzantine) family of manuscripts, but in 1845 he retracted this preference for the Constantinopolitan.