Sleepy Scribes and Clever Critics

Novum Testamentum 57/1 (the first issue of 2015) has just been made available. It sports an article by our team (with Bart Kamphuis as its main author), which may help you see how we approach the study of New Testament conjectures here in Amsterdam. “Sleepy Scribes and Clever Critics. A Classification of Conjectures on the Text of the New Testament” (NovTest 57 (2015), 72-90) provides sophisticated tools for the analysis and evaluation of conjectures. Or if the abstract does the talking:

This article presents a classification of conjectures on the text of the New Testament. It focusses on the types of arguments used by conjectural critics. The argumentation for a conjecture basically comprises (1) the perception of a problem (or problems) in the transmitted text and (2) the suggestion of a cause (or causes) for the supposed scribal change. Type (or types) of perceived problems and of supposed causes are classified, and illustrated with a range of important conjectures.

Congratulations to Bart for this important step in his dissertation project and pour le plaisir de se voir imprimé.
Critical reactions are welcome, of course. In any case we hope the classification offered here will prove to be useful for many studiosi.