A Textual Study of Family 1 in the Gospel of John

This textual study of the Gospel of John in seventeen Greek manuscripts offers a fresh investigation into the textual group known as Family 1. Since Kirsopp Lake’s 1902 study, Codex 1 of the Gospels and its Allies, Family 1 has been considered an important textual witness by all major critical editions of the the New Testament; however, with the exception of a recent study of Matthew (Amy Anderson, The Textual Tradition of the Gospels: Family 1 in Matthew), little further research has been conducted into the family’s text. By analysis of a full collation of John, this study examines manuscripts: Gregory-Aland 1, 22, 118, 131, 205abs, 205, 209, 565, 872, 884, 1192, 1210, 1278, 1582, 2193, 2372, and 2713. The study has confirmed the place of codices 1 and 1582 as core members of Family 1, but has demonstrated the existence of a new core subgroup, represented by codices 565, 884 and 2193, that rivals the textual witness of 1 and 1582. The discovery of this subgroup has broadened the textual contours of Family 1, leading to many new readings, both text and marginal, that should be considered Family 1 readings. The reconstructed Family 1 text with critical apparatus is based on the witness of this wider textual group and is offered as a replacement to Lake’s 1902 text of John.

Alison Welsby, University of Birmingham, United Kingdom.