Speaking of which, Carrier seems to understate this a little:Secret Alias wrote: ↑Mon Mar 27, 2023 10:33 am The idea that the Dialogue has lacunae and interpolations is standard in the discussion of Justin Martyr.
But there does seem to be at least one other "major" lacuna in Dialogue 74.Some of the set-up might be missing (in §141 Justin assumes this has all been a story he is relating to a certain Marcus Pompeius, which must have originally been set up in or before §1, but that’s now missing). But so far as we know there are no other major corruptions of the text (though minor ones are inevitable).
https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/33564632.pdf
On the other hand, the discussion of lacunae is not balanced by an equal discussion of interpolations, which are generally discussed as "minor ones" that are "inevitable," as Carrier puts it.As mentioned above, the text of the Dialogue comes to us in Paris 450, a medieval manuscript dated 1I September 1363. Unfortunately, the state of the text of Dialogue leaves something to be desired. Some have suggested that because there is no introductory dedication preceding the Dialogue that this has been lost from the original. 16' But there is more definite evidence of mutilation of the text. There appears to be a lacuna in Dial. 74.3 which Chadwick believes extended for several pages. There is a further lacuna in Dial. 73 where the exposition of Ps 96 is suddenly interrupted, never to be resumed again. There is also internal evidence that suggests the discussion between Justin and Trypho lasted two separate days. But the Dialogue, as we have it, shows no trace of either the end of the first day or the beginning of the second. In light of this, perhaps the words of Schneider are appropriate, "Solutions in this field are difficult and must be left to the technical experts. While it would be of immeasurable gain if the mutilations of the text could be resolved, they are fortunately not of such an extent as to make any attempt at evaluation and interpretation useless or grossly inaccurate."