In
textual criticism
Textual criticism is a branch of textual scholarship, philology, and literary criticism that is concerned with the identification of textual variants, or different versions, of either manuscripts (mss) or of printed books. Such texts may rang ...
, Christian interpolation generally refers to
textual insertion and textual damage to Jewish and pagan
source text
A source text is a text (sometimes oral) from which information or ideas are derived. In translation, a source text is the original text that is to be translated into another language.
More generally, source material or symbolic sources are ob ...
s during Christian scribal transmission.
Old Testament pseudepigrapha
Notable examples among the body of texts known as
Old Testament pseudepigrapha include the disputed authenticity of
Similitudes of Enoch and
4 Ezra
2 Esdras, also called 4 Esdras, Latin Esdras, or Latin Ezra, is an apocalyptic book in some English versions of the Bible. Tradition ascribes it to Ezra, a scribe and priest of the fifth century BC, whom the book identifies with the sixth-ce ...
which in the form transmitted by Christian scribal traditions contain arguably later Christian understanding of terms such as
Son of Man. Other texts with significant Christian interpolation include the
Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs and the ''
Sibylline Oracles
The ''Sibylline Oracles'' (; sometimes called the pseudo-Sibylline Oracles) are a collection of oracular utterances written in Greek hexameters ascribed to the Sibyls, prophetesses who uttered divine revelations in a frenzied state. Fourteen b ...
''.
Josephus
Notable disputed examples in the works of
Josephus
Flavius Josephus (; , ; ), born Yosef ben Mattityahu (), was a Roman–Jewish historian and military leader. Best known for writing '' The Jewish War'', he was born in Jerusalem—then part of the Roman province of Judea—to a father of pr ...
include Josephus' sections on
John the Baptist
John the Baptist ( – ) was a Jewish preacher active in the area of the Jordan River in the early first century AD. He is also known as Saint John the Forerunner in Eastern Orthodoxy and Oriental Orthodoxy, John the Immerser in some Baptist ...
and
James the Just which is widely accepted, and the ''
Testimonium Flavianum'', which is widely regarded as at best damaged.
[ Josephus: The Essential Writings - Page 265 Paul L. Maier - 1990 "scholars have long suspected a Christian interpolation, since Josephus would not have believed Jesus to be the ..."]
See also
*
Interpolation (manuscripts)
An interpolation, in relation to literature and especially ancient manuscripts, is an entry or passage in a text that was not written by the original author. As there are often several generations of copies between an extant copy of an ancient tex ...
References
{{reflist
Biblical criticism
Textual scholarship
Document forgery