Safeguard 19 Document-Type and Meaning-Control Sheet

Operational tool 2 of 12 for Safeguard 19.

Use this sheet before interpreting a historical text. The same words carry different public force in a private letter, adopted confession, church act, translation, or editorial note.

A. Identify the document

Author or issuing body: [Enter.]
Title: [Enter.]
Date: [Enter.]
Language: [Enter.]
Controlling edition or witness: [Enter.]
Source form: [facsimile / scan / OCR / transcription / modernized edition / translation / excerpt / secondary report].

B. Select document type

• [ ] Individual theological treatise
• [ ] Sermon or lecture
• [ ] Private letter or diary
• [ ] Public correspondence or open letter
• [ ] Confession or catechism
• [ ] Church act, judgment, or canon
• [ ] Minutes or committee report
• [ ] Translation
• [ ] Translators' preface or rules
• [ ] Critical or collected edition
• [ ] Editorial preface, heading, or note
• [ ] Review, reply, or polemical response
• [ ] Dictionary, grammar, or technical manual
• [ ] Other: [Describe.]

C. Select the meaning sought

• [ ] Individual authorial meaning in this work
• [ ] Original public meaning at adoption
• [ ] Operative institutional meaning
• [ ] Source-language meaning
• [ ] Meaning communicated by a historical translation
• [ ] First-generation reception
• [ ] Later denominational interpretation
• [ ] Editorial interpretation
• [ ] Modern constructive use

Do not combine these without separate findings.

D. Record public force

Answer each question.

1. Was the text adopted, authorized, received, or merely proposed?
2. Who possessed authority to issue it?
3. What action did the text perform: teach, confess, advise, authorize, condemn, translate, or record?
4. Is the surviving record final, draft, amended, or superseded?
5. Does a later editor add headings, punctuation, or arrangement?
6. Does a translation function as a public standard while remaining subordinate to an original?

E. Mark excluded inferences

Complete at least one sentence.

• This private text cannot by itself establish: [Enter.]
• This committee report cannot be treated as: [Enter.]
• This later edition cannot prove original typography or arrangement because: [Enter.]
• This translation cannot by itself decide the source-language term because: [Enter.]
• This later denominational reading does not establish original public meaning unless: [Enter.]

F. Control statement for publication

Document type: [type].
Meaning sought: [kind].
Public status: [adopted / private / proposed / editorial / other].
Controlling text: [edition and source form].
Excluded inference: [limit].

G. Reviewer confirmation

Before closing the record, ask a second reader to identify the claim the document can establish and the claim it cannot establish. Record the reviewer's name, date, and reason for agreement or correction. If the reviewer assigns a different document type or meaning category, preserve both judgments until the discrepancy is resolved. A completed control sheet should make the interpretive jurisdiction of the document visible to someone who has not read the surrounding project notes.

Stop rules

Stop if a private author is being substituted for an adopting body, a debate is being substituted for the final act, an editor is being quoted as the author, or a later reception is being presented as original meaning.

Study This Safeguard Further

Read Not Every Historical Text Is the Same and continue with the Primary-Text and Edition-Verification Form.

Toolkit navigation

Toolkit: Safeguard 19 Historical Meaning Toolkit
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