Interpreting "the more difficult reading"

[gryan]

One of the principles of textual criticism is that "the more difficult reading" is more likely original. My question has to do the principles of reconstructing a more likely original interpretation to match "the more difficult reading." I read somewhere that the critical interpreter's goal is to make the seemingly difficult reading speak sensibly. If we have the more difficult reading, and it remains difficult to understand, then maybe we are trying too hard to harmonize it with the interpretation that inspired the variant reading. If we want to reconstruct the original meaning, we need to dare to have it clash with the meaning of the variants. Am I on the right track? How could I say this more clearly and succinctly. I am looking for a principle for discerning whether the interpretation of the more difficult reading is correct. It should make the obscure reading clear. Right? Is there a better way of putting it?

[gryan]

I think I found what I was looking for: Preferable to others is the reading for which the meaning is superficially more difficult, but which is, after thorough examination of context, profoundly sensible.

[Paul the Uncertain]

Congratulations for proposing a clear statement of the criterion. However, clarity only highlights the assumptions behind it: copying changes are apt to be intentional, and intentional evolution of narratives generally favors movement from the more intellectually and emotionally challenging to the less challenging.

Both legs are doubtful. A small change may be accidental and not discovered before the workpiece enters circulation. A change may be accidental and discovered, but deemed close enough to satisfy the copying contract.

As to intentional change, is there any general or Christianity-specific principle that evolution favors the unchallenging? As to Christian-specific, it seems many church doctrines become progressively more challenging, not less so.

For example, Jesus' mother's sexual history moves from her being the second Israelite woman said to have had a baby and sexual initiation in the wrong order, to her never having had sexual intercourse ever despite being the mother of several children after Jesus. Trinitarian doctrine similarly seems to move in the direction of challenge. Even to this day, major world churches divide over whether the Holy Spirit proceeds from Father and Son, or from the Father alone. What does either alternative even mean, except to specialists?

And in general? The poster child for the principle is Mark's depiction of Jesus' early healing of a leper. After the man asks politely for help, Jesus responds with (a) compassion or else (b) anger. Either way, Jesus heals the man, who then fails to follow Jesus' instructions about how to behave afterwards.

Anger before servicing the request is more challenging, but anger is within Mark's Jesus' emotional range, even when providing humanitarian assistance. The Syrophoenician woman who interrupts Jesus' vacation will attest to that. Psychic Jesus may foresee this man's disobedience, about which some anger might be readily expected. So, the clarified criterion seems to fit this situation well.

On the other hand, what is more challenging may also simply be more interesting. Maintaining audience interest is critical to having an audience at all.

A common modern occurrence in rehearsals of work for oral presentation is "Let's try that line this way." That is, even without changing the text, the performer is asked to read something with different nuance(s). A competent performer can impart to the word "compassion" any number of shadings, including a compassion arrived at only after effort to suppress anger at being interrupted, or as a "forward," anticipating the man's disobedience.

Now, imagine we have a work without intellectual property protection. We can change the text however we'd like, and still label it the same as other versions of the work. Nuanced compassion plays well (if it didn't, then we'd have to explain why it was the original choice just as much as we'd need to explain why it'd be chosen as an amendment). Either way, the word occurs in a sea of compassion; Jesus has already healed people from the general public, in groups.

Why wouldn't I change the bland word compassion, if that were the original, to encourage performers to depict nuanced compassion? Conversely, if Mark saw the interestingness of nuance from the get-go, why would I overrule him, redundantly pointing out the compassion that plainly surrounds the incident? If I did have some dimension of concern where it'd be "bad" to depict Jesus being testy, then why would I change this speech, but leave him impicitly calling a polite supplicant woman a b***h, rhymes with witch?

"Dumbing down" does occur, too, and no doubt improves some audiences' experience of a work. But the claim in favor of the criterion is that the possibility of dumbing down reliably imparts greater probability to the less challenging. That is by no means clear, neither in general nor as a Christian trait.

Ironically, the clear statement of the criterion entails an initial startled reaction reaction followed by an "on second thought" quietude. That is, the surprising comes to be appreciated over the obvious, and thereafter enjoys a stable place in the critics' estimate of the authentic text. All by itself, that's within an inch of being an argument for "difficult" readings so defined arising as improvements, and improvements by definition come later not sooner.

[gryan]

Paul the Uncertain: Thank you for you lucid and interesting essay! I like interacting with people who are smarter and better read than me on my topic of interest. It gives me hope that I will get beyond my little thought-circles. I broach the topic because I have a particular textual variant in mind. Here is a commentary on the variant by textual critic, Stephen Carlson (from his Duke PhD dissertation The Text of Galatians and Its History):

Gal 4:14 καὶ τὸν πειρασμὸν ὑμῶν μου τὸν ἐν τῇ σαρκί μου οὐκ ἐξουθενήσατε

τὸν πειρασμόν μου Ψ Chrys pesh hark 1611 Byz; C, P46
τὸν πειρασμὸν ὑμῶν 1739, A,  33, B, D* F G d b ×vg

The small change in the pronoun—from “your” to “my”—has a large effect. Instead of not disdaining their own trial with Paul’s flesh (presumably sickness, cf. v. 13), which scribes may have found to be obscure,* the Galatians did not disdain Paul’s trial in his own flesh. This change has the effect of highlighting Paul’s suffering for the sake of those he evangelizes.

*143 BUSCEMI 413; METZGER 527; MUSSNER 307 n.71. Both BETZ 224-225 n.56 and LONGENECKER 191 claim that τὸν πειρασμὸν ὑμῶν ἐν τῇ σαρκί μου is “grammatically awkward,” but its grammar and syntax seem straightforward enough (indeed, BUSCEMI 424 analyzes these phrases as proleptic)—it is the meaning of “your trial in my flesh” that is unclear.

Carlson registers the "startled reaction" of some critics (it is "grammatically awkward"), but it is followed by "an 'on second thought' quietude" ("its grammar and syntax seem straightforward enough"). And yet he ends by admitting that "the meaning" remains "unclear."

Several years ago, tantalized by Carlson's analysis of the text, I set out on a quest to recover a contextually clear (and thus more likely original) "meaning" of "the more difficult reading." I pondered and studied the text every day. Even though I'm not particularly gifted at reading NT Greek, with the help of commentaries and grammar texts, I persevered. It turns out that I had to deconstruct the grammar and syntax presumed by the prevailing interpretation (the prevailing interpretation exemplified by Carlson). Staying with the "startled reaction," and not settling into premature "quietude," was an important part of the process.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on my use of your language to describe my process?

[JoeWallack]

One of the principles of textual criticism is that "the more difficult reading" is more likely original. My question has to do the principles of reconstructing a more likely original interpretation to match "the more difficult reading." I read somewhere that the critical interpreter's goal is to make the seemingly difficult reading speak sensibly. If we have the more difficult reading, and it remains difficult to understand, then maybe we are trying too hard to harmonize it with the interpretation that inspired the variant reading. If we want to reconstruct the original meaning, we need to dare to have it clash with the meaning of the variants. Am I on the right track? How could I say this more clearly and succinctly. I am looking for a principle for discerning whether the interpretation of the more difficult reading is correct. It should make the obscure reading clear. Right? Is there a better way of putting it?

JW:
Boy have you come to the right place. The Difficult Reading Principle consists of two parts:

• 1) The Intrinsic (Internal Evidence) = Which is more likely original based on the rest of the writing.
  
  2) The Transcriptional (External Evidence) = Which is more likely original based on the reaction of copyists.

The one sentence definition you are looking for is for The Transcriptional = Which candidate is more likely to be the cause of the other?


Joseph

Skeptical Textual Criticism

[Paul the Uncertain]

gryan

Your use of "my" language is exemplary (meh, I was trying to unpack and paraphrase yours ).

That's a juicy little problem you've chosen. It's also a nice illustration how much the character of the "difficulty" may differ among cases and even within the same case. Nicely observed, too, that an aspect of the problem is avoiding too rapid achievement of quietude. Ironic that such haste is, finally, what the hypothetical copyist who changed the "difficult, but ultimately sensible" orginal is accused of.

As to the resolution of which pronoun belongs here, I freely confess that I haven't studied the question and I simply don't know.

Joe

"The reaction of the copyists" is typically not evidence, that is, not something that we have observed. It is instead an assumption, the named part of an argument about how to interpret evidence, where a later person imputes a cognitive state to earlier persons. The force of the argument hinges on the later person's audience agreeing that the imputation is likely to have held true for the earlier persons, with suitable behavioral consequences.

Any actual relevant observations, whether internal or external, are evidence for use by the later person who's making the argument. I agree with that, of course, and don't see any disagreement about that in what the OP has written.

Since the reported reaction of the critic is observed, I think it is reasonable to define the critic's argument accordingly. So it is with the OP's proposal:

Preferable to others is the reading for which the meaning is superficially more difficult, but which is, after thorough examination of context, profoundly sensible.

The difficulty, examination and conclusion in the above are experiences and actions of the critic. The argument rests on the hypothesis that some copyists would have had similar experiences when confronted with each version, but the copyist(s) facing the "more difficult" version would have reached a different conclusion about sensibility from the critic's.