Categories of New Testament manuscripts
The manuscripts of the New Testament can be divided into five categories. This classification was proposed in 1981 by Kurt and Barbara Aland in the text of the New Testament.
Category I
Manuscripts of very special quality that represent the original text, such as the Alexandrian text. In this category, especially the papyri and uncial belong to 3 / 4 Century, but also some lowercase letters " provide a valuable old text, which then also with the capital letters can compete even in their top representatives. "
Category II
Manuscripts of exceptional quality from those of the Category I by foreign influence.
Category III
Manuscripts own character with self- text, which play an important role in the history of the text. This category includes the text families f1, f13.
Category IV
Manuscripts of the Western text-type (eg Codex Bezae ).
Category V
Manuscripts of the Byzantine text-type.
Distortion of the manuscripts of the New Testament
The manuscripts of the New Testament are designated by the sigla used in the following table. The leftmost column refers to the approximate dating of the manuscripts in the corresponding row. The Roman numerals I- V stand for the above-mentioned categories of manuscripts.
The preparation follows Aland ( see Literature ), page 167-171.
Abbreviations:
- Acta: Acta Apostolorum, latin name of the Acts of the Apostles
- Evv: Gospels
- P: Papyrus
- Paul: Paul's letters in the New Testament