Another Important, Shorter Reading in the Byzantine Text

Earlier this year, I wrote about two important, shorter readings in the Byzantine text in 1 John 2.23; 3.1. I suggested that they were important because they both look to be simple omissions by parablepsis and so secondary readings. That said, I find it impossible to believe that the majority of manuscripts all independently agree in these omissions, which led me to conclude that

... in some cases, the Byzantine text goes back to a single exemplar that is not the autograph and not in agreement with our earliest extant Greek witnesses. These two cases also illustrate well the reality that no single text-type or manuscript has a corner on the original text all the time. In other words, why I’m a reasoned eclectic.

This past week I came across a similar case in John 19.3. Here is the text of vv. 2–3 in NA28

2 καὶ οἱ στρατιῶται πλέξαντες στέφανον ἐξ ἀκανθῶν ἐπέθηκαν αὐτοῦ τῇ κεφαλῇ καὶ ἱμάτιον πορφυροῦν περιέβαλον αὐτὸν 3 καὶ ἤρχοντο πρὸς αὐτὸνκαὶ ἔλεγον· χαῖρε ὁ βασιλεὺς τῶν Ἰουδαίων· καὶ ἐδίδοσαν αὐτῷ ῥαπίσματα.

2 And the soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on his head and clothed him in a purple robe. 3 And they were coming to him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” and struck him with their hands.

The evidence from the NA28 apparatus is:

1. — A D^s K Γ Δ Ψ ƒ¹ 892^s. 1241. 1424 𝔐 f q sy^p
2. καὶ ἤρχοντο πρὸς αὐτὸν 𝔓^66.90ℵ B L N W Θ ƒ¹³ 33. 565. 579. 700. ℓ 844 lat sy^h co

Unlike in the 1 John examples, here there is early support for the majority reading (A f q sy^p). But like those cases, the obvious explanation for the shorter reading is still omission caused by parablepsis (involving αὐτόν). The significance, again, is that we have here a shorter reading in the majority of manuscripts that goes back earlier but is still not likely to be original. And so, with apologies to MAR, it is yet one more reason why I am not a Byzantine prioritist.