In his Commentary on Matthew, where he discusses Jesus’ injunction to
the rich young man in Matthew 19:16-22 (Comm. Matt. 15.14, [GCS 40
385,7-390,35]), Origen enumerates the scribal errors that led to
discrepant narratives in the gospels. Origen then compares this problem
to that of various Hebrew Bible translations, a problem of diversity
that he managed by composing the Hexapla. Following these statements
about the Hexapla, Origen says that he did not dare to undertake a
similar project with the New Testament as he did with the Old for fear
of recriminations—a statement usually understood as a reluctance to
issue an edition of the New Testament. I suggest that another, but not
mutually exclusive, interpretation is that Origen was referencing a
reticence to produce a gospel harmony in parallel columns as he had done
with the Hexapla. The most famous invention to deal with divergent
gospel passages in antiquity was Eusebius’s gospel canons. But Eusebius
notes in his letter to Carpianus that he was preceded by Ammonius of
Alexandria, who had earlier attempted to resolve gospel discrepancies
apparently by producing an ancient synopsis with the Gospels in parallel
columns. Ammonius’s harmony thus may provide a precedent and possible
source for Origen’s statement here. Origen’s claim that he remained
hesitant to treat the New Testament as the Old more likely refers to a
gospel synopsis rather than a critical edition, even if the latter may
have been a constituent element.
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