Erasmus and Scrivener: Expansion Articles · Article 5 of 8
The word back-translation can describe a real editorial act. It can also become a shortcut by which an entire Greek tradition is dismissed without being collated. The distinction is crucial.
To establish that a particular Greek form was retroverted from a Latin form, a writer must do more than point to a damaged manuscript at the end of Revelation. He must name the Greek form in Erasmus’s edition, identify the Latin wording claimed as its source, show why a Greek source or ordinary transmission is less likely, trace the reading through Erasmus’s later editions, and examine later Reformation texts. A vague count of “the last six verses” does none of that work.
The Number Is Not the Argument
The shifting enumeration is revealing. One writer says six verses, another five, another the “last few verses,” another one or two lines, and another points to a small number of forms. These claims cannot all be treated as interchangeable. A verse is not a wording; a wording is not an edition; and an edition is not the same thing as the church’s entire received text.
The final verses of Revelation are themselves well attested in Greek. The question is therefore not whether Erasmus created the passage or whether the church received it only when a printer supplied it. The question is whether specific forms at particular loci originated in a Latin-guided repair and, if so, what happened to them afterward.
Erasmus’s Report Requires a Two-Stage Account
Erasmus’s own statements point to a more complex history than a one-word verdict allows. He reported Latin assistance at the defective ending and later said that he directed a correction from an Aldine Greek edition. The historian must therefore distinguish the initial emergency, the printed form, the subsequent correction, and the later reception of particular readings.
That complexity is not special pleading. It is what source criticism looks like. It is improper for a critic to suppress the initial Latin reference; it is equally improper to suppress the later Greek-correction reference. The evidence has two stages because the history had two stages.
Later Reformation Editors Are Not a Decorative Footnote
The strongest version of the popular charge assumes a straight line from a local 1516 difficulty to the entire mature Received Text. But the printed tradition passed through more than one editor. Stephanus had access to additional Greek materials. Beza made editorial decisions and sometimes departed from predecessors. The Authorized Version translators worked with an inherited plurality of printed sources.
It would be astonishing if later editors never changed an early reading simply because Erasmus printed it once. But the historical answer cannot be supplied by astonishment in either direction. The actual comparison must be made. If a form was corrected, the claim of unbroken inheritance fails. If it remained, the reason must be investigated rather than presumed. Agreement may result from evidence, precedent, judgment, or a continuing error. The AV’s agreement cannot be retroactively treated as the cause of a Greek reading printed before the AV existed.
A Research Protocol
For every alleged retroversion, use this ledger:
| Question | Evidence required |
|---|---|
| What is the exact Greek form? | A cited 1516 reading, not a paraphrase of a verse. |
| What Latin wording is alleged as its source? | The actual Vulgate or Latin text, with the relevant form identified. |
| What is the earliest Greek support? | Manuscripts, editions, versions, or patristic evidence, with their relation evaluated. |
| What happened in later editions? | A collation of Erasmus’s later editions, Stephanus, Beza, and relevant Elzevir texts. |
| What conclusion follows? | Only the conclusion warranted by that specific evidence. |
This is not an evasion of difficult evidence. It is the minimum needed before an allegation becomes an historical conclusion.
Conclusion
The church’s doctrine of preservation should never be defended by denying that editors face hard cases. But neither should it be assaulted with a story whose numerical details change whenever it is repeated. The burden belongs to the person who claims a retroversion: show the form, source, transmission, and consequence. Until then, the slogan is not a refutation of the Received Text. It is an untested hypothesis.
Sources
Chris Thomas, “Erasmus’ Greek New Testament & Back Translation”; Desiderius Erasmus, Apologia qua respondet duabus invectivis Eduardi Lei, ASD IX-4, 54–55.