Loading...I CONTINUE MY POSTS ON MY MENTOR BRUCE METZGER
As with all great men, Metzger was widely talked about among those who knew and revered him. There were lots of stories told about Metzger at Princeton Seminary. Someone should probably collect and publish them. I was especially interested in the stories, since I came to Princeton in order to study with him. Most of the stories were meant to be funny, and we always wondered which, if any of them, were “true” (in the sense that they really happened).
Far and away the most commonly told and best known story was the one I heard when I first arrived at the seminary in 1978. It is the story of Metzger and the Squirrel.
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Bruce Metzger is the author of several books including The Early Versions of the New Testament and The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, And Restoration.
Skubala, I wonder what the Greek word for “sucks” is!
Off hand, I don’t remember. You might check out Jeffrey Henerson’s book, The Macculate Muse.
I bet many gospel stories were transmitted and transmuted in a similar manner. One day, we may hear of the story of the great Metzger, the squirrel, and his Beloved Student named Bart Ehrman.
Were there squirrels in ancient Greece?
Well, they had a word for it! I’d have to dig around a bit to see though. (Isn’t there a story of a squirrel crawling up the shirt of a Spartan youth who was to be standing at attention at assembly?)
Maybe you’re joking with us, Bart?
In the case of another boy, when the time had arrived during which it was the custom for the free boys to steal whatever they could, and it was a disgrace not to escape being found out, when the boys with him had stolen a young fox alive, and given it to him to keep, and those who had lost the fox came in search for it, the boy happened to have slipped the fox under his garment. The beast, however, became savage and ate through his side to the vitals; but the boy did not move or cry out, so as to avoid being exposed, and left, when they had departed, the boys saw what had happened, and blamed him, saying that p407it would have been better to let the fox be seen than to hide it even unto death; but the boy said, B”Not so, but better to die without yielding to the pain than through being detected because of weakness of spirit to gain a life to be lived in disgrace.”25
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Plutarch/Moralia/Sayings_of_Spartans*/unknown.html
Does this say anything about the oral transmission of information 2,000 years ago?
Yup! Bingo!
Fascinating! I believe that may work its way into a sermon of mine before too long. It seems to have some great parallels to the synoptic gospels and the historical books of the old testament. Some would call the story unreliable – others would say each variation contains its own bit of “truth”. Thanks for sharing!
…very instructive… can’t wait for your next post…
Good story! 😀 Dan Wallace commented on it (and you) at http://bible.org/article/historical-metzger