La Trinidad al Alcance de Todos (página 3)

The gradual appearance of the comma in the manuscript
evidence is represented in the following tables:

The grammar in 1 John
5:7-8[edit]

In 1 John 5:7-8 in the Received Text, we see the words
"the-ones bearing-witness [plural masculine] in the heaven,
THE Father [singular masculine], THE Word and THE Holy Spirit
… the-ones bearing-witness [plural masculine] on the
earth, THE Spirit [singular neuter] and THE water and THE
blood."

Note: The words in bold print are the words of
the Johannine Comma.

In 1 John 5:7-8 in the Critical Text and Majority Text,
we see the words "the-ones bearing-witness [plural masculine],
THE Spirit [singular neuter] and THE water and THE
blood."

Johann Bengel,[132] Eugenius Bulgaris,[133] John Oxlee
[134] and Daniel Wallace,[135] who are highly credentialed in the
study of the Greek language, say that each plural masculine
article-participle phrase "the-ones bearing-witness" in 1 John
5:7-8 is a substantive and therefore must (and does) agree with
the natural number and gender (plural masculine) of the idea
being expressed (persons), and that the three subsequent
articular (preceded by an article) nouns in each instance are
appositional (added for clarification) nouns, and that the
article-participle phrase "the-ones bearing-witness" is either
plural masculine for persons because the three subsequent
appositional articular nouns "THE Father, THE Word and THE Holy
Spirit" are three persons or plural masculine for persons because
the three subsequent appositional articular nouns "THE Spirit and
THE water and THE blood" symbolize three persons, although
Bengel, Bulgaris, Oxlee and Wallace do not all agree on the
identity of the three persons that are symbolized by "THE Spirit
and THE water and THE blood."

Frederick Nolan [136] (and Robert Dabney [137] and
Edward Hills,[138] who repeat what Nolan says), who is not highly
credentialed in the study of the Greek language, claims that each
plural masculine article-participle phrase "the-ones
bearing-witness" in 1 John 5:7-8 is an adjective that modifies
the three subsequent articular nouns, and that it therefore must
(according to Nolan) agree with the grammatical gender of the
first subsequent articular noun in each instance. Nolan claims
that the masculine gender of each article-participle phrase
"the-ones bearing-witness" in 1 John 5:7-8 has to be based on the
masculine grammatical gender of the grammatically masculine
articular noun "the Father" in the Johannine Comma, and that
since there is no grammatically masculine noun in 1 John 5:7-8
when the Johannine Comma is not included in the text, therefore
the masculine gender of each article-participle phrase "the-ones
bearing-witness" in 1 John 5:7-8 is proof that John wrote the
Johannine Comma.

The problem with Nolan"s claim, other than the fact that
it is contrary to what Bengel, Bulgaris, Oxlee and Wallace say,
is that it is grammatically impossible, because the only way that
an article-adjective or article-participle phrase can agree with
the grammatical gender of a subsequent noun is to function as an
adjective that modifies the subsequent noun (or nouns), and in
order for that to occur, the subsequent noun (or nouns) must be
anarthrous (not preceded by an article), and the
article-adjective or article-participle phrase must agree in
case, number and gender (all three) with the subsequent
anarthrous noun (if there is one noun) or with the first
subsequent anarthrous noun (if there are multiple nouns), as in
the following examples.

(Received Text) John 6:57 … the living [nominative
singular masculine] Father [nominative singular masculine]
…

(Received Text) 1 Timothy 1:11 … the blessed
[genitive singular masculine] God [genitive singular masculine]
…

(Received Text) Titus 2:13 … the blessed
[accusative singular feminine] hope [accusative singular
feminine] and appearance [accusative singular feminine]
…

Compare:

(Received Text) Revelation 6:14 … every
[nominative singular neuter] mountain [nominative singular
neuter] and island [nominative singular feminine]
…

In 1 John 5:7-8, since the subsequent nouns are always
articular, and since the nominative plural masculine
article-participle phrase "the-ones bearing-witness" never agrees
in case, number and gender (all three) with the first subsequent
articular noun (either the nominative singular masculine
articular noun "the Father" or the nominative singular neuter
articular noun "the Spirit"), therefore the article-participle
phrase "the-ones bearing-witness" has to be a substantive in each
instance, and it has to agree with the natural number and gender
(plural masculine) of the idea being expressed (persons) in each
instance, as stated by Bengel, Bulgaris, Oxlee and
Wallace.

Here are all of the New Testament examples of an
article-adjective or article-participle or adjective-article
phrase functioning as a substantive, and therefore agreeing with
the natural number and gender of the idea being expressed, and
being followed by three appositional articular nouns.

(Received Text) Matthew 23:23 … the-things
weightier [plural neuter for things] of-the Law, THE judgment
[singular feminine] and THE mercy and THE faith
…

(Received Text) 1 John 2:16 … every the-thing
[singular neuter for things] in the world, THE lust [singular
feminine] of-the flesh and THE lust of-the eyes and THE pride
of-the life …

(Received Text) 1 John 5:7 … the-ones
bearing-witness [plural masculine for persons] in the heaven, THE
Father [singular masculine], THE Word and THE Holy Spirit …
8 … the-ones bearing-witness [plural masculine for persons
(symbolically)] on the earth, THE Spirit [singular neuter] and
THE water and THE blood …

(Critical Text and Majority Text) 1 John 5:7 …
the-ones bearing-witness [plural masculine for persons
(symbolically)], 8 THE Spirit [singular neuter] and THE water and
THE blood …

The same thing occurs in all of those grammatically
correct examples.

See also[edit]

• Textual criticism

• David Martin (French divine) – the French
  Bible translator who also defended the authenticity of the
  Comma Johanneum.

• Codex Ravianus

Other disputed New Testament
passages[edit]

• The Longer Ending of Mark

• Pericope Adulteræ

• Matthew 16:2b–3

• Christ's agony at Gethsemane

• John 5:3b-4

• Doxology to the Lord's Prayer

• Luke 22:19b-20

Notes[edit]

• Jump up ^ Early English versions that omitted
  the Comma were produced by Daniel Mace The New Testament
  in Greek and English, 1729; The Primitive New
  Testament, 1745 of William Whiston; A Liberal
  Translation of the New Testament, 1768 by Edward Harwood
  and also, in multiple editions starting in 1790, A
  Translation of the New Testament, with notes by Gilbert
  Wakefield. The New Testament in an Improved Version,
  1808 Thomas Belsham omits the verse, and the Paraphrastic
  translation of the Apostolical Epistles by Philip
  Nicholas Shuttleworth in 1829, followed by additional
  versions in the 1800s, including those of Edgar Taylor,
  Leicester Ambrose Sawyer, Robert Ainslee, George R. Noyes and
  Samuel Sharpe. Early paraphrases and commentaries that
  bypassed the heavenly witnesses were the short
  paraphrase-commentary section given by Isaac Newton and A
  Commentary on the three Catholick Epistoles of St. John
  by William Whiston in 1719. Examples of new translations,
  commentaries, AV updates and paraphrase editions that
  maintained the Comma were those of Daniel Whitby in 1703
  A Paraphrase and Commentary on the New Testament and
  John Wesley in 1755 Explanatory Notes on the New
  Testament and Thomas Haweis in 1795, A Translation
  of the New Testament from the Original Greek.

• Jump up ^ The Cambridge Paragraph Bible
  of the authorized English version, published in 1873,
  and edited by noted textual scholar F.H.A. Scrivener, one of
  the translators of the English Revised Version, set the Comma
  in italics to reflect its disputed authenticity. Few later
  Authorized Version editions retained this formatting. The
  AV-1611 page and almost all AV editions use a normal
  font.

• Jump up ^ For fuller details of this group
  see King James Versions and derivatives

• Jump up ^ Anthony Kohlmann answered as
  follows: "There are several ways of accounting for that
  omission and among others, it may be said, 1st, that this
  omission happened by the neglect of some ignorant copyists,
  who, after having written the first words of the 7th verse
  'there are three, that give testimony,' by a mistake of the
  eyes, skipped over the remaining part of the text, and passed
  on to the immediately following text, where the same words
  recur; for such mistakes often take place in transcribing,
  especially when the two verses and the two periods begin and
  end with the same words. Another reason of this omission is
  given by the author of the prologue to the seven Catholic
  epistles … (Vulgate Prologue section translation)… By
  these words he not obscurely alludes to the Marcionites or
  Arians, who designedly erased this verse from all the copies
  they could get into their hands; for they well understood
  that by that one testimony their cause was undone. With a
  like perfidy, St. Ambrose, (lib. iii de spiritu sancto cap.
  10.) reproaches the Arians, who had expunged these words from
  the Scriptures: Because God is a Spirit, 'Which
  passage, says the holy doctor addressing the Arians, you so
  well know to be understood of the Holy Ghost, that you have
  erased it from the copies of your scriptures, and would to
  God! you had only expunged it from yours and not also from
  those of the church." Anthony Kohlmann, Unitarianism
  philosophically and theologically examined, 1821,
  p.173

• Jump up ^ "The addition appears to rest on
  allegorical exegesis of the three witnesses in the text; it
  was probably written in the margin of a Latin MS and then
  found its way into the text; later still the order of the two
  sets of witnesses was inverted and the text was translated
  back into Greek and was included in a few Greek MSS." Ian
  Howard Marshall, The Epistles of John, p. 78
  1978.

• Jump up ^ . Henry Armfield on Grotius: "it
  was the opinion of Grotius that, so far from being apposite
  to the argument of the Greek Fathers, the text was introduced
  by the Arians, so that from the analogy of the adjoining
  verse they might argue that Father, Son, and Holy Ghost were
  one only in consent and not in essence." The Three
  Witnesses, the Disputed Text in St. John, 1883,
  p.36

• Jump up ^ "Jerome, for the same end, inserted
  the Trinity in express words into his version" p. 185 "And
  the first upon record that inserted it, is Jerome… he
  altered the public reading" An Historical Account of Two
  Notable Corruptions of Scripture The Recorder, 1803, Vol
  2, p. 192-194 full text p.184-253, written by Newton c. 1690.
  Newton adds "till at length, when the ignorant ages came on,
  it began by degrees to creep into the Latin copies out of
  Jerome's version." p.197 which he places very late.
  "Afterwards the Latines noted his variations in the margins
  of their books; and thence it began at length to creep into
  the text in transcribing, and that chiefly in the twelfth and
  following centuries, when disputing was revived by the
  schoolmen." p. 192 "it was inserted into the vulgar Latin out
  of Jerome's version" p. 207. Nonetheless, Newton does go
  earlier than Jerome at the same time for origins, saying of
  the Tertullian reference in "Against Praxeas" VI. "So then
  this interpretation seems to have been invented by the
  Montanists for giving countenance to their Trinity. For
  Tertullian was a Montanist when he wrote this ; and it
  is most likely that so corrupt and forced an interpretation
  had its rise among a sect of men accustomed to make bold with
  the Scriptures. Cyprian being used to it in his master's
  writings" Newton called the words of Tertullian and Cyprian
  an "interpretation so corrupt and stained". Apparently he saw
  a vector from their interpretation to a Jerome addition to
  scripture.

• Jump up ^ Simon's conjecture: "The same thing
  hapned to those who caused to print St. Athanasius's Works,
  with a Table of the passages of Holy Scripture, which are
  quoted therein (apparently a reference to the Synopsis of
  Scripture). They have set down at large there, the
  seventh verse of the first chapter of the first epistle of
  St. John, as if that holy man had quoted that place after
  that manner….(Simon references the Disputation against
  Arius at Nicea) .. I make no question but that this
  explication of St. Athanasius was the occasion that some
  Greek scoliates placed in the margin of their copies the
  formentioned note, which afterwards was put in the text. And
  that is more probable than what Erasmus thought concerning
  this matter, who was of opinion, that the Greek copies, which
  make mention of the witness of the Father, Son, and Holy
  Ghost, were more correct than the Latin copies. A
  critical history of the text of the New Testament, 1689,
  p.10. The Newton dissertation was written shortly after the
  Simon Critical History was published in
  English.

• Jump up ^ "As to the introduction of the
  spurious words into the text, Porson supposes that
  Tertullian, in imitation of the phrase, I and my Father
  are one, had said of the three Persons of the Trinity,
  which Three are One; that Cyprian, adopting this
  application of the words from Tertullian, said boldly, of the
  Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, it is written, And these
  Three are One; that in the course of two centuries, when
  this interpretation had been expressly maintained by Augustin
  and others, a marginal note of this sort, Sicut tres sunt
  qui testimonium dant in Caelo, Pater,&c, crept into
  the text of a few copies; that such a copy was used by the
  author of the Confession which Victor, the historian of the
  Council convened by Hunneric, has preserved ; and that
  such another was used by the historian of the books de
  Trinitate. The life of Richard Porson, M. A.: professor
  of Greek in the University of Cambridge from 1792 to 1808 by
  John Selby Watson Charles Forster responded that the mystical
  interpretation of the earthly witnesses arose through
  Augustine, and that Clement of Alexandria shows us the
  interpretation of verse 8 at the time of Cyprian. New Plea,
  Charles Forster, footnote p. 52-55

• Jump up ^ That this was written by Orme can
  be seen by his reference in Memoir of the
  Controversy, 1830, where he refers to "the present
  writer…". Also the "learned Critic" and "learned reviewer",
  who had "triumphantly met" the arguments.

• ^ Jump up to: a b Scrivener, while
  opposing verse authenticity, wrote in Plain Introduction in
  1861 "it is surely safer and more candid to admit that
  Cyprian read v. 7 in his copies, than to resort to the
  explanation of Facundus, that the holy Bishop was merely
  putting on v. 8 a spiritual meaning". And then Scrivener
  placed mystical interpretation as the root of Comma formation
  "although we must acknowledge that it was in this way v. 7
  obtained a place, first in the margin, then in the text of
  the Latin copies…mystical interpretation". In the 1883
  edition Scrivener wrote "It is hard to believe that 1 John v.
  7, 8 was not cited by Cyprian". Thus, Scrivener would be
  taking the position of a mystical interpretation by
  scribes unknown, working through the margin and later adding
  to the text, all before Cyprian. "they were originally
  brought into Latin copies in Africa from the margin, where
  they had been placed as a pious and orthodox gloss on ver. 8"
  p.654. Under this possible scenario the Comma "was known and
  received in some places, as early as the second or third
  century" (p. 652 1883-ed) which, in the Scrivener textual
  economy, would be analogous to Acts 8:37. Acts 8:37 has
  undisputed early citations by Irenaeus and Cyprian and yet is
  considered by Scrivener and most modern theorists as
  inauthentic. Despite allowing an early textual formation for
  the Unity of the Church citation, Scrivener quoted
  approvingly negative views of the Tertullian and Cyprian
  Jubaianum references. Scrivener also quoted Tischendorf about
  the weightiness of the Cyprian referencing gravissimus
  est Cyprianus de eccles. unitate 5.

• ^ Jump up to: a b Joseph Pohle in
  the The Divine Trinity: A Dogmatic Treatise accuses
  Cassiodorus of inserting the Comma into the Vulgate from
  early manuscripts. "The defense can also claim the authority
  of Cassiodorus, who, about the middle of the sixth century,
  with many ancient manuscripts at his elbow, revised the
  entire Vulgate of St. Jerome, especially the Apostolic
  Epistles, and deliberately inserted I John V, 7, which St.
  Jerome had left out." Divine Trinity, 1911 p.
  38-39

• Jump up ^ Although Pohle calls the Council of
  Carthage the "main argument" for authenticity, about Cyprian
  he notes "It is, as Tischendorf has rightly observed, by far
  the weightiest proof for the Comma Ioanneum. But it
  does not prove decisively that St. Cyprian used a New
  Testament text which contained the "Comma"; and if
  it did, it would by no means follow that the verse was
  written by St. John." William Laurence Sullivan argues contra
  the position of Elie Philippe in La Science
  Catholique, 1889, p. 238 that the Cyprian citation is
  "perhaps even peremptory" (conclusive, decisive). Sullivan
  asserts that if Cyprian's New Testament contained the Comma,
  the "probable inference would simply be that the
  interpolation is older than we thought." And that anyway,
  "this passage of the great African doctor does not suffice to
  prove that I John v-7 existed in his day." New York
  Review, The Three Heavenly Witnesses p.182,
  1907.

• Jump up ^ Earlier than the Künstle
  paper, Abbott Ambrose Amelli "unearthed ancient documents by
  means of which he believes he has succeeded in tracing the
  interpolation to a Priscillianist and therefore heretical
  source ; but before he is permitted to publish his
  results he has to await the pleasure of the Roman
  Inquisition." Austin West, Abbe Loisy and the Roman
  Biblical Commission, Contemporary Review, p.504, 1902
  Vol 81. Similarly Charles Briggs wrote that Abbe Martin and
  Dom Amelli had "more or less guessed and propounded,—
  that the 'Comma' was composed in Spain, in 390 a.d., by the
  Heresiarch Priscillian, to propagate his Pan-Christian
  Heresy; and that this gloss, slightly retouched, then found
  its way, in part rapidly, into the Latin New Testament."
  Charles Augustus Briggs and Friedrich von Hügel, The
  Papal Commission and the Pentateuch, p. 60, 1906. An
  example of the warm reception this theory of direct
  interpolation by Priscillian initially received is Caspar
  René Gregory, who wrote it "appears to have been put
  into the New Testament by Priscillian" Biblical
  World, The Greek Text in 1611, p.260, 1911. William
  Laurence Sullivan opined that while "the Comma fits into the
  Trinitarian heresy of Priscillian", he was "notoriously
  clever at expressing subtle heresy in apparently Catholic
  phraseology" and "is about to gain another title to an
  unfortunate immortality as the inventor of the text of the
  three heavenly Witnesses." New York Review, The
  Three Heavenly Witnesses p.182, 1907. One problem with
  Priscillian interpolation theories was that they make
  Priscillian guilty of a transparent forgery. Biblical Latin
  specialist John Chapman reacted sharply to the Priscillian
  interpolation idea "I do not at all agree with him
  (Künstle) that Priscillian actually interpolated the
  passage himself. He could hardly in that case have been so
  foolish as to quote it in his apology knowing that it would
  be declared apocryphal. He must have found it in his
  Bible…" Notes on the early history of the Vulgate
  Gospels, p. 163 1908.

• ^ Jump up to: a b Before the 1883
  publication of Liber Apologetics Priscillian was only known
  through the writings of his opponents. In 1905 Karl
  Künstle published Das Comma Ioanneum:auf seine
  herkunft untersucht a book that proposed that "the
  insertion of the comma into the text of the Epistle is due to
  Priscillian himself", as summarized by Alan England Brooke.
  Brooke references four difficulties with the Künstle
  theory cited in the 1909 paper by Ernest Babut., The
  International critical commentary on the Holy Scriptures,
  Alan England Brooke, 1912, p. 160. The Priscillian origin
  theory does show up in net articles today.

• Jump up ^ Since all scholars agree that the
  verse was in the Bible of Priscillian in the 4th century,
  references to 'medieval' for origin are anachronistic. e.g.
  In the Anchor Bible, Epistle of John(1982) p. 782,
  Raymond Brown writes that "The Vandal movements in the fifth
  century brought North Africa and Spain into close
  relationship, and the evidence listed above shows clearly
  that the Comma was known in those two regions between 380 and
  550". This date contradicts the idea of a medieval gloss
  origin.

• Jump up ^ In another paper, Daniel Wallace
  gives this explanation: "The passage made its way into our
  Bibles through political pressure, appearing for the first
  time in 1522, even though scholars then knew as they do now
  that it was not authentic. The early church did not know of
  this text…" Misquoting Jesus: The Story behind Who Changed
  the Bible and Why Christian Research Journal, 2006,
  vol 29, #3.

• Jump up ^ Voltaire, A Philosophical
  Dictionary: from the French, Volume 6'', 1824 edition,
  p. 290. Voltaire mixed up the two verses, as noted by John
  Hey, in his Lectures in Divinity, Vol 2, 1st ed in 1797,
  Appendix, "Concerning the Genuineness of 1 John v 7" p
  281.

• Jump up ^ "throughout the vast series of one
  thousand and four hundred years, which intervened between the
  days of Praxeas, and the age of Erasmus, not a single author
  whether Patripassian, Cerinthian, Ebionite, Arian,
  Macedonian, or Sabellian, whether of the Greek or Latin,
  whether of the Eastern, or Western church— whether in
  Asia, Africa or Europe, hath ever taxed the various
  quotations of this verse, which have been set forth in the
  preceding pages, with interpolation or forgery. Such silence
  speaks, most emphatically speaks, in favor of the verse, now
  in dispute. George Travis, Letters to Edward Gibbon,
  1785, p.319-320 The value of this opposing "evidence from
  silence" became a part of the verse debate, Richard Porson
  responding in his letters Letters to Mr. Archdeacon Travis,
  1790, p 372

• Jump up ^ Thomas Belsham: "every man of
  learning and inquiry knows, that the famous text 1 John v. 7.
  "There are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the
  Word, and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one," is an
  impious forgery: and to them it appears to be little less
  than blasphemy, to retain this forgery in a book which is
  represented to be inspired … Unitarians, therefore, are …
  discarding what they discover and conscientiously believe to
  be spurious and fictitious, that they conceive that they are
  by this conduct expressing the greatest possible veneration
  for them, and the unspeakable value which they set upon the
  pure, unadulterated Word of God." An address to the
  inquirers after Christian truth, 1813, p.4-5. Edward
  Nares replied to the Belsham claim "it is very rudely called
  'an impious forgery,' which it has certainly never been
  proved to be." Remarks on the Version of the NT edited by the
  Unitarians, 1814, p. 248. Earlier, in 1804, the editor of the
  works of Ebionite Joseph Priestley, John Towill Rutt, called
  the verse a "pious fraud", Works, Vol 14, 1804, p.34 although
  the wording of Priestley himself had been measured and not of
  that accusatory nature. The 1808 'Improved Version' had the
  equivocal "Virgilius Tapsensis .. by him it is suspected to
  have been forged.", an accusation discarded when the
  Priscillian citation was discovered.

• Jump up ^ In the latter 1800s, notable was
  Robert Blackley Drummond, biographer of Erasmus. Drummond
  referred to a "notable forgery" in Erasmus, his Life and
  Character, p. 318, 1873. And his The text concerning
  the Three Heavenly Witnesses: An interpolation was
  published by the British and Foreign Unitarian Association in
  1862. Drummond also wrote in the Theological Review,
  including comments on the New Plea by Charles
  Forster. The editor of the Theological Review was Charles
  Beard, son of John Relly Beard. John in the 1870 Theological
  Review listed ten Unitarian New Testaments, all without the
  verse, and used the phrase "manifest forgery".

• Jump up ^ Guyse, with acknowledgement to John
  Mill and the Matthew Henry Commentary of John Reynolds, also
  expresses some of the internal and stylistic arguments from
  the perspective of authenticity defense: "If we drop this
  verse, and join the 8th to the 6th, it looks too like a
  tautology, and the beauty and propriety of the connection is
  lost, as may appear to any that attentively read the 6th and
  8th verses together., leaving out the 7th; and they do not
  give us near so noble an introduction of the witnesses, as
  our present reading doth; no make the visible opposition to
  some witnesses elsewhere, as is manifestly suggested in the
  words, And there are three that bear witness in
  earth, ver 8. But all stands in a natural and elegant
  order, if we take in the 7th verse, which is very agreeable,
  and almost peculiar to the style and sentiments of our
  apostle, who, of all others, delights in these titles,
  the Father and the Word, and who is the
  only sacred writer that records our Lord's words, in which he
  speaks of the Spirit's testifying of him, and
  glorifying him by receiving of his things and
  shewing them to his disciples and says, I and my
  father are one. (John x. 30. xv. 26 and
  xvi.14)."

• Jump up ^ Exceptions to this common
  understanding include Johannes Bugenhagen (1485-1558), Pastor
  and student of Martin Luther, who called the verse an "Arian
  blasphemy", see Franz Posset. Hugo Grotius (1583-1645) in his
  NT Annotations considered the verse an Arian addition
  Neque vero Arianis ablatas voces quasdam, sed potius
  additas. And John Jones (Ben David) was a
  non-Trinitarian who defended the verse in the Monthly
  Review (1826). Others have considered the historical
  inclusion/omission debate to be far more nuanced as well.
  Edward Freer Hills (1912-1981) in the King James Version
  Defended Ch. 8, 1956 hypothesized that the verse may
  have been allowed to drop from the Greek line by Trinitarians
  who saw the verse as favorable to Sabellianism. See also
  Frederick Nolan (1784-1864) in Ch 6 of An Inquiry into
  the Integrity of the Greek Vulgate 1815. Nolan offers an
  explanation with similarities to the later Hills conjecture,
  including: "the orthodox were so far from having any
  inducement to appeal to this text, that they had every reason
  to avoid an allusion to it, as it apparently favored the
  tenets of their opponents … Sabellianism … absolutely
  derives support from the text of the heavenly
  witnesses".Inquiry, p.536-538 And "the preference shewn by
  the orthodox to the text of the earthly witnesses, over that
  of the heavenly, needs no palliation from the circumstance of
  the one text being unquestioned, and the other of doubtful
  authority, in the age when those points were debated." ibid
  p.551 Nolan thus claimed that "the negative argument adduced
  against 1 John v. 7. derives its entire strength from an
  inattention to the true state of that controversy, and the
  period for which it prevailed." ibid p.543 Thomas Turton,
  opposing verse authenticity, used this Nolan argument against
  the position of supporter Thomas Burgess, A Vindication
  of the Literary Character 1827, p. 257. And Henry Thomas
  Armstrong (1836-1898) in Chapter 4 of The three
  witnesses, the disputed text in st. John p. 29-37 (1883)
  offers an analysis of why orthodox Trinitarians could see the
  verse as unhelpful in doctrinal discussions, concluding that
  "to have arrayed the verse in the lines of their defence
  would have been simply a blunder in advocacy" (p. 37). The
  early usage by the non-Trinitarian Priscillian is also
  discordant to the common understanding, and led to the Karl
  Künstle theory that the verse was an non-Trinitarian
  Unionite interpolation.

• Jump up ^ An example from Porter, referencing
  the 1707 analysis of John Mill: "Mill is equally explicit
  with regard to many of the Fathers of the ancient Latin
  Church; for example, he admits that the following knew
  nothing of the three Heavenly Witnesses; the Author of the
  Treatise on the Baptism of Heretics, usually printed
  with the works of Cyprian; Novatian, in his book
  upon the Trinity; Hilary, who in his Twelve Books
  upon the Trinity, and other treatises against the Arians,
  accumulates together a great many quotations out of the
  sacred books, often less suitable to his purpose, but keeps a
  deep silence upon this text; Lucifer of Cagliari, in
  his book against Intercourse with Heretics;
  Phoeobadius in his book against the Arians;
  Ambrose, in his manifold writings against Arianism,
  in which he quotes the 6th and 8th verses at full length, but
  omits the 7th altogether; Jerome, who in his
  acknowledged works, never makes any mention of this clause.
  It is indeed insinuated that this passage was to be found in
  all the Greek MSS. though absent from all the Latin ones, in
  a Prologue to the Catholic Epistles, which pretends to have
  been written by Jerome; but Mill, Bengel, and others confess
  this prologue to be a forgery. Faustinus takes no
  notice of the text in his work upon the Trinity against the
  Arians; Augustine, in his book against Maximin the
  Arian, turns every stone to find arguments from the
  Scriptures to prove that the Spirit is God, …
  Eucherius of Lyons, in his Questions on the New
  Testament, repeats the same mystical explanation;
  Facundus of Hermiana, gives a similar gloss, and
  says the passage was so understood by Cyprian; Leo the
  Great, Junilius, Cerealis, and Bede, pass the
  7th verse unmentioned.

• Jump up ^ . Charles Forster in A new plea
  for the authenticity of the text of the three heavenly
  witnesses p 54-55 (1867) notes that the quote of verse 6
  is partial, bypassing phrases in verse 6 as well as verse 7.
  And that Clement's "words et iterum clearly mark the
  interpolation of other topics and intervening text, between
  the two quotations." Et iterum is "and again" in the
  English translation.

• Jump up ^ Travis references Jerome as writing
  approvingly of the confession. George Travis, Letters to
  Edward Gibbon, 1785 p. 108. The Latin is "Nobis unus Pater,
  et unus Filius ejus, verus Deus, et unus Spiritus Sanctus,
  verus Deus; et hi tres unum sunt; una divimtas, et potentia,
  et regnum. Sunt autem tres Personae, non duae, non una" Marc
  Celed. Exposit. Fid. ad Cyril apud Hieronymi Opera, tom. ix.
  p. 73g. Frederick Nolan, An inquiry into the integrity of
  the Greek Vulgate, 1815, p. 291.

• Jump up ^ In dismissing Phoebadius in this
  fashion, Griesbach was following Porson, whose explanation
  began, "Phoebadius plainly imitates Tertullian…and
  therefore, is not a distinct evidence", Letters to
  Archdeacon Travis, 1790, p. 247.

• Jump up ^ "The silence of Augustine, contrary
  to prevailing opinion, cannot be cited as evidence against
  the genuineness of the Comma. He may indeed have known it"
  Annotated bibliography of the textual criticism of the
  New Testament p. 113 Bruce Manning Metzger, 1955.
  Metzger was citing S. Augustinus gegen das Comma
  Johanneum? by Norbert Fickermann, 1934, who considers
  evidence from a 12th-century Regensburg manuscript that
  Augustine specifically avoided referencing the verse
  directly. The manuscript note contrasts the inclusion
  position of Jerome in the Vulgate Prologue with the
  preference for removal by Augustine. This confirms that there
  was awareness of the Greek and Latin ms. distinction and that
  some scribes preferred omission. Raymond Brown writes:
  "Fickermann points to a hitherto unpublished eleventh-century
  text which says that Jerome considered the Comma to be a
  genuine part of 1 John–clearly a memory of the Pseudo-Jerome
  Prologue mentioned above. But the text goes on to make this
  claim: 'St. Augustine, on the basis of apostolic thought and
  on the authority of the Greek text, ordered it to be left
  out.'" Epistles of John, 1982, p. 785.

• Jump up ^ Augustine scholar Edmund Hill says
  about a reference in The Trinity – Book IX that "this
  allusion of Augustine's suggests that it had already found
  its way into his text".

• Jump up ^ George Travis summarized of
  Augustinian passages: The striking reiteration, in these
  passages, of the same expressions, Unum sunt—Hi
  tres unum sunt—Unum sunt, and Hi tres qui unum
  sunt seems to bespeak their derivation from the
  verse…Letters to Edward Gibbon, 1794, p. 46

• Jump up ^ While mentioning the usage of Son
  instead of Word as a possible argument against Cyprian
  awareness of the Comma, Raymond Brown points out that
  Son "is an occasional variant in the text of the
  Comma" and gives the example of Fulgentius referencing "Son"
  in Contra Fabrianum and "Word" in Reponsio
  Contra Arianos, Epistles of John p. 784,
  1982.

• Jump up ^ This can be seen in The Greek
  New Testament(1966) UBS p. 824 by Kurt Aland. In 1983
  the UBS Preface p.x announced plans for a "thorough revision
  of the textual apparatus, with special emphasis upon evidence
  from the ancient versions, the Diatessaron, and the Church
  Fathers." The latest edition of UBS4 updated many early
  church writer references and now has Cyprian for
  Comma inclusion. This citation is in parenthesis, which is
  given the meaning that while a citation of a Father supports
  a reading, still it "deviates from it in minor details" UBS4,
  p. 36.

• Jump up ^ Bruce Metzger, who is used as the
  main source by many writers in recent decades, ignores the
  references entirely: "the passage … is not found (a) in the
  Old Latin in its early form (Tertullian Cyprian Augustine)",
  A textual commentary on the Greek New Testament, p.
  717, 1971, and later editions. James White references Metzger
  and writes about the possibility that "Cyprian .. could just
  as well be interpreting the three witnesses of 1 John 5:6 as
  a Trinitarian reference" A Bit More on the Comma
  3/16/2006(White means 5:8). White is conceptually similar to
  the earlier Raymond Brown section: "There is a good chance
  that Cyprian's second citation, like the first (Ad Jubianum),
  is Johannine and comes from the OL text of I John 5:8, which
  says, "And these three are one," in reference to the Spirit,
  the water, and the blood. His application of it to the divine
  trinitarian figures need not represent a knowledge of the
  Comma, but rather a continuance of the reflections of
  Tertullian combined with a general patristic tendency to
  invoke any scriptural group of three as symbolic of or
  applicable to the Trinity. In other words, Cyprian may
  exemplify the thought process that gave rise to the Comma."
  In a footnote Brown acknowledges "It has been argued
  seriously by Thiele and others that Cyprian knew the Comma".
  Epistles of John p. 784, 1982.

• Jump up ^ Two Francis Pieper extracts: "In
  our opinion the decision as to the authenticity or the
  spuriousness of these words depends on the understanding of
  certain words of Cyprian (p. 340)… Cyprian is quoting John
  10:30. And he immediately adds: "Et iterum de Patre et
  Filio et Spiritu Sancto scriptum est: "Et tres unum
  sunt"" ("and again it is written of the Father and the
  Son and the Holy Ghost: 'And the Three are One"") Now, those
  who assert that Cyprian is here not quoting the words 1 John
  5:7, are obliged to show that the words of Cyprian: "Et
  tres unum sunt" applied to the three Persons of the
  Trinity, are found elsewhere in the Scriptures than 1 John 5.
  Griesbach counters that Cyprian is here not quoting from
  Scripture, but giving his own allegorical interpretation of
  the three witnesses on earth. "The Spirit, the water, and the
  blood; and these three agree in one." That will hardly do.
  Cyprian states distinctly that he is quoting Bible passages,
  not only in the words: "I and the Father are one," but also
  in the words: "And again it is written of the Father and the
  Son and the Holy Ghost." These are, in our opinion, the
  objective facts." p.341 (1950 English edition). Similarly,
  Elie Philippe wrote "Le témoignage de saint Cyprien est
  précieux, peut-être même péremptoire dans
  la question." (The testimony of St. Cyprian is precious,
  perhaps even peremptory to the question.) La Science
  Catholique, 1889, p. 238.

• Jump up ^ .Henry Donald Maurice Spence, in
  Plumptre's Bible Educator wrote ".. there is little
  doubt that Cyprian, before the middle of the third century,
  knew of the passage and quoted it as the genuine words of St.
  John." James Bennett, in The Theology of the Early
  Christian Church: Exhibited in Quotations from the Writers of
  the First Three Centuries, with Reflections 41, p.136,
  1841, wrote "the disputed text in John's First Epistle, v. 7,
  is quoted … Jerome seems to have been falsely charged with
  introducing the disputed words, without authority, into the
  Vulgate; for Cyprian had read them in a Latin version, long
  before." Bennett also sees the "probability is strengthened"
  that the Tertullian reference is from his Bible. And Bennett
  rejects the Griesbach "allegorised the eighth verse" attempt
  "for they (Tertullian and Cyprian) here argue, as from
  express testimonies of Scripture, without any hint of that
  allegorical interpretation which, it must be confessed, the
  later writers abundantly employ". And the most emphatic
  position is taken by the modern Cyprian scholar, Ezio
  Gallicet of the University of Turin, in this book on
  Cyprian's Unity of the Church, La Chiesa: Sui
  cristiani caduti nella persecuzione ; L'unità della
  Chiesa cattolica p. 206, 1997. Gallicet, after
  referencing the usual claims of an interpolation from Caspar
  René Gregory and Rudolf Bultmann, wrote: "Dal modo in
  cui Cipriano cita, non sembra che si possano avanzare dubbi:
  egli conosceva il « comma giovanneo ».
  (Colloquially .. "there is no doubt about it, the Comma
  Johanneum was in Cyprian's Bible".)

• Jump up ^ Arthur Cleveland Coxe, annotating
  Cyprian in the early church writings edition, wrote of the
  positions denying Cyprian referring the Bible verse in Unity
  of the Church, as the "usual explainings away"
  Ante-Nicene Fathers p.418, 1886. And Nathaniel Ellis
  Cornwall referred to the logic behind attempts to deny
  Cyprian's usage of the verse (Cornwall looks closely at
  Porson, Lange and Tischendorf) as "astonishing feats of
  sophistical fencing". The Genuineness of I John v. 7
  p. 638, 1874.

• Jump up ^ Stanley Lawrence Greenslade,
  Early Latin Theology: Selections from Tertullian,
  Cyprian, Ambrose, and Jerome 1956, p. 164. The Latin is
  "si peccatorum remissam consecutus est, et sanctificatus est,
  et templum Dei factus est: quaero, cujus Dei? Si creatoris,
  non potuit, qui in eum non credidit: si Christi, non hujus
  potest sieri templum, qui negat Deum Christum : si
  Spiritus Sancti, cum tres unum sunt, quomodo Spiritus Sanctus
  placatus esse ei potest, qui aut Patris aut Filii inimicus
  est?"

• Jump up ^ The use of parentheses is described
  as "these witnesses attest the readings in question, but that
  they also exhibit certain negligible variations which do not
  need to be described in detail." Kurt Aland, The Text of the
  New Testament, 1995, p. 243.

• Jump up ^ Origen, discussing water baptism in
  his commentary on the Gospel of John, references only verse 8
  the earthly witnesses: "And it agrees with this that the
  disciple John speaks in his epistle of the spirit, and the
  water, and the blood, as being one."

• Jump up ^ In modern times, scholars on early
  church writings outside the textual battles are more likely
  to see the work as from Athanasius, or an actual account of
  an Athanasius-Arius debate. Examples are John Williams
  Proudfit Remarks on the history, structure, and theories
  of the Apostles' Creed 1852, p.58 and George Smeaton,
  The Doctrine of the Holy Spirit, 1882, p.
  272

• Jump up ^ Liber Apologetics given in
  Maynard p. 39 "The quote as given by A. E. (Alan England)
  Brooke from (Georg) Schepps, Vienna Corpus, xviii. The Latin
  is 'Sicut Ioannes ait: Tria sunt quae testimonium dicunt in
  terra: aqua caro et sanguis; et haec tria in unum sunt et
  tria sunt quae testimonium dicunt in caelo: pater, verbum et
  spiritus; et haec tria unum sunt in Christo
  Iesu.'"

• Jump up ^ Westcott comments "The gloss which
  had thus become an established interpretation of St John's
  words is first quoted as part of the Epistle in a tract of
  Priscillian (c 385)" The Epistles of St. John p.
  203, 1892. Alan England Brooke "The earliest certain instance
  of the gloss being quoted as part of the actual text of the
  Epistle is in the Liber Apologeticus (? a.d. 380) of
  Priscillian" The Epistles of St. John, p.158, 1912.
  And Bruce Metzger "The earliest instance of the passage being
  quoted as a part of the actual text of the Epistle is in a
  fourth century Latin treatise entitled Liber Apologeticus".
  Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament,
  p.717, 1971. Similar to these are William Sullivan, John
  Pohle, John Seldon Whale, F. F. Bruce, Ian Howard Marshall
  and others.

• Jump up ^ "It seems plain that the passage of
  St, Cyprian was lying open before the Priscillianist author
  of the Creed (Priscillian himself?) because he was accustomed
  to appeal to it in the same way. In Priscillian's day St.
  Cyprian had a unique position as the one great Western
  Doctor." John Chapman, Notes on the Early History of the
  Vulgate Gospels, 1908, p.264

• Jump up ^ Frederick Nolan summarizes the
  history and gives his view of the significance: "Between
  three and four hundred prelates attended the Council, which
  met at Carthage; and Eugenius, as bishop of that see, drew up
  the Confession of the orthodox, in which the contested verse
  is expressly quoted. That a whole church should thus concur
  in quoting a verse which was not contained in the received
  text, is wholly inconceivable: and admitting that 1 Joh v. 7
  was then generally received, its universal prevalence in that
  text is only to be accounted for by supposing it to have
  existed in it from the beginning." Inquiry, 1815, p. 296.
  Bruce Metzger, in the commentary that accompanies the UBS
  GNT, bypassed the context of the Council and the Confession
  of Faith, "In the fifth century the gloss was quoted by Latin
  Fathers in North Africa and Italy as part of the text of the
  Epistle" A Textual Commentary on the Greek New
  Testament, 1971, p.717 and 2nd ed. 1993, and 2002
  p.648.

• Jump up ^ John Scott Porter, Principles
  of Textual Criticism, 1848, p.509 Latin: Et Joannes
  evangelista ait; In principio erat verbum, et verbum erat
  apud Deurn et Deus erat verbum. Item ad Parthos ; Tres
  sunt, inquit, qui testimonium perhibent in terra, aqua
  sanguis el caro, et tres in nobis sunt. Et
  tres sunt qui testimonium perhibent in caelo. Pater, Verbum,
  et spiritus, et hi tres unum sunt. McCarthy, Daniel The
  Epistles and Gospels of the Sundays, 1866, p. 518. The
  full book is at Patrologiae cursus completus: Series
  latina Vol 62:359, 1800. Nathaniel Ellis Cornwall explains
  how Idacius Clarus, of the 4th century and an opponent of
  Priscillian, is internally accredited as the original author
  Genuineness Proved by Neglected Witnesses 1877, p.
  515. The work was originally published in 1528 by Sichard as
  Idacius Clarus Hispanus, Otto Bardenhewer,
  Patrology, the Lives and Works of the Fathers, p.
  429, 1908.

• Jump up ^ Fulgentius continues "Let Sabellius
  hear we are, let him hear three', and let him believe that
  there are three Persons. Let him not blaspheme in his
  sacrilegious heart by saying that the Father is the same in
  Himself as the Son is the same in Himself and as the Holy
  Spirit is the same in Himself, as if in some way He could
  beget Himself, or in some way proceed from Himself. Even in
  created natures it is never able to be found that something
  is able to beget itself. Let also Arius hear one; and let him
  not say that the Son is of a different nature, if one cannot
  be said of that, the nature of which is different. William A.
  Jurgens, The Faith of the Early Fathers, 1970 Volume
  3. pp. 291-292.

• Jump up ^ In the historic debate, Thomas
  Emlyn, George Benson, Richard Porson, Samuel Lee and John
  Oxlee denied these references as demonstrating the verse as
  in the Bible of Fulgentius, by a set of differing rationales.
  Henry Thomas Armfield reviews debate theories and history and
  offered his conclusion "Surely it is quite clear from the
  writings of Fulgentius, both that he had himself seen the
  verse in the copies of the New Testament; and that those with
  whom he argues had not the objection to offer that the verse
  was not then extant in St. John's Epistle." Armfield, The
  Three Witnesses, the Disputed Text, 1883, p.171.
  Armfield also reviews the Facundus and Fulgentius comparison
  in depth. Facundus and Fulgentius were often compared in
  their Cyprian references, with Facundus quoted in support of
  Cyprian being involved in a mystical
  interpretation.

• Jump up ^ At the time of the correspondence
  of Erasmus with Lee and Stunica, the Vulgate Prologue was the
  single principle early church writing evidence discussed.
  Evidences like Cyprian's Unity of the Church and the Council
  of Carthage were either unavailable or omitted in the dialog.
  Erasmus accepted this Prologue as from Jerome, and accused
  Jerome of falsifying the scripture.

• Jump up ^ When the theory was originally
  promulgated the earliest extant Vulgate with the Prologue was
  dated to no earlier than the 800s. Raymond Brown indicates
  modern attributions for the conjectured Prologue authorship
  as "Vincent of Lerini (d. 450) and to Peregrinus
  (Künstle, Ayuso Marazuela), the fifth-century Spanish
  editor of the Vg." The Epistles of John pp.782-783,
  1982.

• Jump up ^ Fuldensis could be accurately dated
  as very close to 546 AD, much closer to the lifetime of
  Jerome 347-420. Fuldensis was a manuscript copied under the
  ecclesiastical leadership of Victor of Capua. In Nov. 1897,
  Thomas Joseph Lamy in the American Ecclesiastical
  Review, The Decision of the Holy Office on the Comma
  Johanneum , reviewed on pp. 72-74 the Vulgate Prologue. Lamy
  emphasized how Codex Fuldensis strengthened the case for
  Jerome's authorship of the Prologue. Even before the
  Fuldensis discovery, Antoine Eugène Genoud in the
  Sainte Bible commentary described the reasons given
  for claiming a forgery as frivoles (i.e. frivolous).
  Sainte Bible en latin et en français, Volume 5,
  1839, pp.681-682.

• Jump up ^ The Latin is "Cui rei testificantur
  in terra tria mysteria: aqua, sanguis et spiritus, quae in
  passione Domini leguntur impleta: in coelo autem Pater, et
  Filius, et Spiritus sanctus; et hi tres unus est Deus" –
  Patrilogiae Cursus Completus, Series Latina by Migne, vol.
  70, col. 1373. HTML version at Cassiodorus Complexiones
  in Epistulas apostolorum English text based on Porson
  and Maynard p.46.

• Jump up ^ Lamy says that in going through 1
  John 5 Cassiodorus "mystically interprets water, blood and
  spirit as three symbols concerning the Passion of Christ. To
  those three earthly symbols in terra, he opposes the
  three heavenly witnesses in coelo the Father, the
  Son and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one God.
  Evidently we have here verse 7. Cassiodorus does not cite it
  textually, but he gives the sense of it. He puts it in
  opposition to verse 8, for he contrasts in coelo
  with in terra. The last words: Et hi tres unus
  est Deus can be referred only to verse 7, since
  Cassiodorus refers tria unum sunt of verse 8, to the
  Passion of Our Saviour… Maffei's conclusion is therefore
  justified when he says : Verse 7 was read not only in
  Africa, but in the most ancient and the most accurate Codices
  of the Roman Church, since Cassiodorus recommended to the
  monks to seek, above all else, the correct copies and to
  compare them with the Greek."

• Jump up ^ Shortly after the Maffei
  publication, in 1722, George Wade wrote of the significance
  of the Cassiodorus scholarship and reference: "And what have
  the Arians to say to this ? Is this a forged Piece of
  Cassiodorius ? No. Did he read it only in some corrupted
  copies of his own Age. The Character of the man will let us
  suspect this. How pressing is he with those of his Monastery
  to make use of the very best M.S. and such as had been
  carefully collated with, and corrected by the Greek Text.;
  nay not only so, but that, in all doubtful places, they
  should be govern'd by the Authority of two or three ancient
  copies…… let us never hear more of this verse, being
  intruded into the version of St. Jerom. Tis evident from
  innumerable places of these Commentaries, that St. Jerom's
  was not the Translation he made Use of, but one a great deal
  older; and yet it no less evidently appears, that this
  Passage was found in it. A short inquiry into the
  doctrine of the Trinity, as it is laid down in Holy
  Scripture, p. 86, 1722. George Wade also looked closely
  at the question as to whether this was actually Cassiodorus
  using the Greek writing of Clement of Alexandria, from 200
  AD, as indicated by the "learned Dupin".

• Jump up ^ Some see Testimonia Divinae
  Scripturae as earlier than Isidore. "Most learned
  critics believe to be more ancient than St. Isidore". John
  MacEvilly An Exposition of the Epistles of St. Paul, 1875,
  p.424, M'Carthy: "The question of authorship is not, however,
  important in our controversy, provided the antiquity of the
  document be admitted"

• Jump up ^ "For the Spirit too is truth just
  as the Father and the Son are. The truth of all three is one,
  just as the nature of all three is one, just as the nature of
  all three is one. For there are three in heaven who furnish
  testimony to Christ: the Father, the Word, and the Spirit.
  The Father, who not once but twice sent forth his voice from
  the sky and publicly testified that this was his uniquely
  beloved Son in whom he found no offence; the Word, who, by
  performing so many miracles and by dying and rising again,
  showed that he was the true Christ, both God and human alike,
  the reconciler of God and humankind; the holy Spirit, who
  descended on his head at baptism and after the resurrection
  glided down upon the disciples. The agreement of these three
  is absolute. The Father is the author, the Son the messenger,
  the Spirit the inspirer. There are likewise three things on
  earth which attest Christ: the human spirit which he laid
  down on the cross, the water, and the blood which flowed from
  his side in death. And these three witnesses are in
  agreement. They testify that he was a man. The first three
  declare him to be God." (p. 174)Collected Works of
  Erasmus – Paraphrase on the First Epistle of John
  Translator – John J Bateman

• Jump up ^ The text shown in this photograph
  is part of 1 John chapter 5, from mid-verse 3 to mid-verse
  10.

• Jump up ^ Stunica, one of the Complutensian
  editors, published in 1520 Annotationes Iacobi Lopidis
  Stunicae contra Erasmum Roterodamum in defensionem
  tralationis Noui Testamenti, which included half of a
  page on the heavenly witnesses. Later Erasmus correspondence
  on the verse included a letter to William Farel in 1524 in
  which Erasmus noted the lack of Greek manuscript support and
  the verse not being used in the Arian controversies. In 1531
  Erasmus corresponded with Alberto Pio, a critic of
  Erasmus.

• Jump up ^ Kettner referred to the heavenly
  witnesses as "the most precious of Biblical pearls, the
  fairest flower of the New Testament, the compendium by way of
  analogy of faith in the Trinity." Conybeare, History of
  New Testament Criticism, 1910, p. 71. In 1697 Kettner
  wrote Insignis ac celeberrimi de SS. trinitate loci, qui
  I. Joh. V, 7. extat, divina autoritas sensus et usus
  dissertatione theol. demonstratus and in 1713
  Vindiciae novae dicti vexatissimi de tribus in coelo
  testibus, 1 Joh. V, 7 and Historia dicti Johannei de
  Sanctissima Trinitate, I Joh.cap.V vers.7[

• Jump up ^ And, indeed, what the sun is in the
  world, what the heart is in a man, what the needle is in the
  mariner's compass, this verse is in the epistle.". (John
  Wesley, with appreciation to Bengelius, Explanatory Notes,
  1754)

• Jump up ^ The footnotes included "In 1689,
  the papist Simon strove to be free; in 1707, the protestant
  Mill wished to be a slave; in 1751, the Arminian Wetstein
  used the liberty of his times, and of his sect." The
  history of the decline and fall of the Roman
  empire

• Jump up ^ In 1822 Thomas Burgess published
  Adnotationes Millii which compiled in one spot writings on
  the verse sections by John Mill, Wetstein, Bengel, John
  Selden, Matthaei, John Fell and others.

• Jump up ^ Denounced by evangelist Thomas
  DeWitt Talmage in a speech covered in the New York Times
  "Taking up the Bible he turned to the fifth chapter of John,
  but passed it with the remark, 'I will not read that, for it
  has been abolished or made doubtful by the new revision.'The
  Revision Denounced; Strong Language from the Rev. Mr.
  Talmage, New York Times, June 6, 1881]. See
  also Peter Johannes Thuesen, In Discordance with the
  Scriptures: American Protestant Battles Over Translating the
  Bible 2002, p. 54.

• Jump up ^ Daniel McCarthy: …the first to
  expunge v. 7. altogether (J. D. Michaelis gives that honor to
  an 'Anonymous Englishman' who published the N. T, Greek and
  English, London, 1729, with a text revised on the principles
  of 'common sense'), but his rash example was followed
  unhappily by the three ablest critics of our own day, Scholz,
  a Catholic Prof, in Bonn, Lachmann, and Tischendorf; and
  approved by Wegscheid, Michaelis, Davidson, Horne, Alford,
  Tregelles, &c; so that it may be truly said the current
  of Protestant opinion in England and Germany is now as strong
  against, as it was for the genuineness of the controverted
  words even within this century. The change is unaccountable
  when we bear in mind that the evidence for the verse, both
  negative and positive, has been increasing every day, whilst
  the arguments against its authenticity were brought out as
  fully by Erasmus as by any modern critic. The Epistles
  and Gospels of the Sundays, 1866, p. 512. The Anonymous
  Englishman is Daniel Mace.

• Jump up ^ Oft-repeated is "that these words
  are spurious and have no right to stand in the New Testament
  is certain…" from Metzger's Textual Commentary on the
  Greek New Testament, 1971, p. 716.

• Jump up ^ Summarized with pictures on the web
  site KJVToday Umlaut in Codex Vaticanus, although
  the conclusion "an early scribe of Vaticanus at least knew of
  a significant textual variant here" is only one theory.
  Discussions have continued on the Evangelical Textual
  Criticism web site, the Yahoogroups textualcriticism forum
  and helpful is the web page of Wieland Willker, Codex
  Vaticanus Graece 1209, B/03 The Umlauts.

• Jump up ^ David Charles Parker, while lauding
  the 1881 Westcott and Hort "purified text", writes of "the
  ridiculous business of the Johannine Comma" Textual
  Criticism and Theology, 2009, p. 324. Parker writes of
  "the presence in a few manuscripts, most of them Latin". The
  actual number is many thousands of manuscripts. Daniel
  Wallace comments that the verse "infected the history of the
  English Bible in a huge way", referring to a "rabid path".
  The Comma Johanneum in an Overlooked Manuscript,
  July 2, 2010 James White, even while engaging in discussions
  on the Puritanboard forums, wrote "I draw the line with the
  Comma. Anyone who defends the insertion of the
  Comma is, to me, outside the realm of meaningful
  scholarship, unless, I guess, they likewise support the
  radical reworking of the entire text of the New Testament
  along consistent lines … plainly uninspired insertion." The
  Comma Johanneum Again March 4, 2006, also March 16, 2006. In
  an earlier day, Eberhard Nestle wrote that "The fact that it
  is still defended even from the Protestant side is
  interesting only from a pathological point of view."
  Introduction to the Textual Criticism of the Greek New
  Testament, 1901, p. 327, translation by William Edie
  1899 German of the German pathologisches.

• Jump up ^ Newton accused Jerome as being the
  likely source of the heavenly witnesses, asserting that
  Jerome "inserted the Trinity in express words into his
  version … the first upon record that inserted it, is
  Jerome: if the preface to the canonical epistles, which goes
  under his name, be his. … he altered the public reading".
  Nonetheless, Newton did acknowledge many other references in
  the time of the doctrinal battles, including "Eugenius bishop
  of Carthage, in the seventh year of Hunneric king of the
  Vandals, anno Christi 484, in the summary of his faith
  exhibited to the king … Fulgentius, another African bishop,
  disputing against the same Vandals, cited it again, and
  backed it with the fore-mentioned place of Cyprian … It
  occurs also frequently in Vigilius Tapsensis, another African
  bishop, contemporary to Fulgentius … the feigned
  disputation of Athanasius with Arius at Nice." The pre-Jerome
  Priscillian reference was unknown at the time. And Newton's
  handling of Cyprian is complex, as he accepted the Cyprian
  text linguistically, but rejected it textually only on the
  perceived lack of additional supporting evidences: "These
  places of Cyprian being, in my opinion, genuine, seem so
  apposite to prove the testimony of the Three in heaven, that
  I should never have suspected a mistake in it, could I but
  have reconciled it with the ignorance I meet with of this
  reading in the next age." As to the Newton historical summary
  quote above, George Travis addressed this in Letters to
  Edward Gibbon (1785) p. 264.

• Jump up ^ The Freisinger Fragments, dated
  from the 5th to 7th centuries, were published in 1876 by
  Zeigler and were not known at the time of this list of
  negative evidences in 1808. Similarly, the 7th-century dating
  of Codex Legionensis was not assigned until 20th
  century.

• Jump up ^ The Priscillian citation was
  discovered and published in the latter 1800s, fully refuting
  this unusual conjecture of Virgilius Tapsensis forgery. And
  leading to new, albeit short-lived, theories of Priscillian
  as the verse author, as described in the article.

• Jump up ^ In a commentary on the Epistle in
  later years, Luther relates to the heavenly witnesses as
  scripture: "This is the testimony in heaven, which is
  afforded by three witnesses—is in heaven, and remaineth
  in heaven. This order is to be carefully noted; namely, that
  the witness who is last among the witnesses in heaven, is
  first among the witnesses on earth, and very properly…
  (John) appeals to a twofold testimony :the one is in
  heaven, the other on earth.. this divine testimony is
  twofold. It is given partly in heaven, partly on earth: that
  given in heaven has three witnesses, the Father, Son, and
  Holy Ghost: the other, given on earth, has also three
  witnesses; namely, the spirit, the water, and the blood."
  Knittel pp. 93-95

• Jump up ^ 'r' in the UBS-4 also 'it-q' and
  Beuron 64 are apparatus names today. These fragments were
  formerly known as Fragmenta Monacensia, as in the
  Handbook to the textual criticism of the New
  Testament, by Frederic George Kenyon, 1901, p.
  178.

• Jump up ^ "The declaration adds that there
  was no intention of stopping investigation of the passage by
  Catholic scholars who act in a moderate and temperate way and
  tend to think the verse not genuine; provided, however, that
  such scholars promise to accept the judgment of the Church
  which is by Christ's appointment the sole guardian and
  custodian of Holy Scripture (Enchiridion Bibttcum. Documenta
  Ecdesiastica Sacrum Scripturam Spectantia, Romae, apud
  Librarian! Vaticanam 1927, pp. 46-47)". Explanation given in
  Under Orders The Autobiography of William Laurence
  Sullivan, p. 186, 1945. Sullivan had written an article
  in 1906 opposing authenticity in the New York
  Review.

References[edit]

• Jump up ^ NIV,NASB,ESV,NRSV
  translations

• Jump up ^ Nova Vulgata, Epistula I
  Ioannis. The Nova Vulgata has not been translated into
  English.

• Jump up ^ A compleat history of the canon and
  writers of the books of the Old and New Testament: Luis Ellis
  Du Pin p.79

• Jump up ^ Matthew Henry Commentary,
  Exposition of All the Books, Vol 5, 1803, p.
  644-645. The Commentary emphasized internal arguments for
  authenticity. 1 John completed by London minister John
  Reynolds after Henry passed, as explained on Puritanboard. A
  complementary genuine or spurious, expunged or
  admitted, section is given by John Hey in Lectures in
  Divinity, 1796, pp. 289-290.

• Jump up ^ Richard Simon, A critical
  history of the text of the New Testament, 1689
  p.123.

• Jump up ^ Rob Iliffe, Friendly Criticism:
  Richard Simon, John Locke, Isaac Newton and the Johannine
  Comma 2006, p. 143 in Scripture and
  Scholarship

• Jump up ^ William Craig Brownlee, On the
  Authenticity of 1 John v.7 Christian Advocate 1825,
  p. 167

• Jump up ^ Richard Porson, Letters to Travis,
  1829, p.61.

• Jump up ^ Thomas Turton, A Vindication of
  the Literary Character of Richard Porson, 1824, p.124.
  Griesbach: "Igitur comma controversum septimum praecipue, ne
  dicam unice, nititur testimonio, fide et auctoritate Vigilii
  Tapsensis, et librorum huic attributurum auctori, ante quem
  nemo clare id excitavit."

• Jump up ^ John Oxlee, On the Heavenly
  Witnesses, Christian Remembrancer 1822, p.
  135

• Jump up ^ John Selby Watson The life of
  Richard Porson 1861, p. 73

• Jump up ^ Scrivener, Plain
  Introduction, pp. 461-462, 1861.

• Jump up ^ Joseph Barber Lightfoot, On a Fresh
  Revision of the English New Testament, p.25, 1871.

• Jump up ^ Léon Labauche, God and
  man; lectures on dogmatic theology, 1916 p.
  43

• Jump up ^ Alan England Brooke, Critical
  and Exegetical Commentary on the Johannine Epistles, p.
  198, 1912

• Jump up ^ ibid p.163.

• Jump up ^ The Harvard theological
  review, Volume 15, 1922, p. 159

• Jump up ^ Raymond Brown, The Gospel and
  Epistles of John: A Concise Commentary p.120,
  1988.

• Jump up ^ Raymond Brown, Epistles of
  John, p.130, 1982.

• Jump up ^ Jaroslav Pelikan, Whose Bible
  Is It? A Short History of the Scriptures, Penguin Books
  Ltd, 2005, p. 15

• Jump up ^ Bruce Metzger writes: "Apparently
  the gloss arose when the original passage was understood to
  symbolize the Trinity (through the mention of three
  witnesses: the Spirit, the water, and the blood), an
  interpretation that may have been written first as a marginal
  note that afterwards found its way into the text." A
  Textual Commentary of the Greek New Testament
  (2002/1971), p. 648.

• Jump up ^ The Textual Problem in 1 John
  5:7-8

• Jump up ^ A calm inquiry into the
  Scripture doctrine concerning the person of Christ, p.
  333, 1817.

• Jump up ^ Israel Worsley, An enquiry into
  the origin of Christmas-Day, 1820, p.66. The British
  Review reviewed the controversy and spoke of such phrases as
  "tokens of intellectual weakness … culpable imbecility of
  mind". The Unitarian Controversy, 1821, p.
  165.

• Jump up ^ Robert Taylor: "admitted on all
  hands to be forgeries … Acts xx. 28.—1 Timothy iii.
  10.—1 John v. 7.—These are admitted to be of the
  utmost importance, bearing on the most essential doctrines,
  yet are wilful and wicked interpolations.." The diegesis:
  being a discovery of the origin, evidences, and early history
  of Christianity, p.421, 1829. See also Syntagma of
  the Evidences, p.44, 1828

• Jump up ^ Everard Bierrer, The Evolution
  of Religions, p. 290, 1906.

• Jump up ^ Philip Schaff. History of the
  Christian Church. A.D. 1-311., 1888, p. 412.

• Jump up ^ Charles Taze Russell The Fact and
  Philophy of the Atonement, 1899, p. 61.

• Jump up ^ F C. Conybeare, History of New
  Testament Criticism, 1910, pp. 91-98. (title in Table of
  Contents). The section on the heavenly witnesses was followed
  by his accusation that "in the name of the Father, and of the
  Son, and of the Holy Spirit" in Matthew 28:19 had similarly
  been "revised and interpolated by orthodox copyists" and that
  "we can trace their perversions of the text…expose the
  fraud." Conybeare also took textual positions that were
  related to his unusual position on the virgin
  birth.

• Jump up ^ Preserved Smith, The age of the
  reformation, 1920, p.564

• Jump up ^ Gordon Campbell and Thomas N.
  Corns, John Milton: Life, Work, and Thought, 2008,
  p. 378. Similar in God: A Literary and Pictorial
  History, 2003.

• Jump up ^ Bart Ehrman, The Orthodox
  Corruption of Scripture, 1996, p. 45.

• Jump up ^ Vindiciiœ
  Priestleianœ, p. 227, 1788.

• Jump up ^ Nathaniel Ellsworth Cornwall,
  American Church Review, Vol 29 pp. 509-528 The
  genuineness of I. John, v. 7 proved by neglected witnesses,
  1877, from pp.511, 523.

• Jump up ^ "Fragments of Clemens Alexandrius",
  translated by Rev. William Wilson, section 3.

• Jump up ^ Eclogae propheticae
  13.1Ben David, Monthly Review, 1826 p. 277)

• Jump up ^ Bengel, John Gill, Ben David and
  Thomas Burgess

• Jump up ^ Systematic Theology: Roman
  Catholic Perspectives,, Francis Schüssler Fiorenza,
  John P. Galvin, 2011, p. 159, the Latin is "Ita connexus
  Patris in Filio, et Filii in Paracleto, tres efficit
  cohaerentes alterum ex altero: qui tres unum sunt, non unus
  quomodo dictum est, Ego et Pater unum sumus"

• Jump up ^ Arthur Cleveland Coxe, Latin
  Christianity: Its Founder, Tertullian 1903, p.631
  English on p. 621, left column, bottom.

• Jump up ^ John Kaye, The Ecclesiastical
  History of the Second and Third Centuries, Illustrated from
  the Writings of Tertullian 1826. p. 550.

• Jump up ^ Nolan, Inquiry, p. 297 Although
  Nolan does study the Praxeas citation in some depth
  independently.

• Jump up ^ Daniel McCarthy, Epistles and
  Gospels of the Sunday, 1866, p.514.

• ^ Jump up to: a b c d Georg
  Strecker, The Johannine Letters (Hermeneia);
  Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1996. "Excursus: The Textual
  Tradition of the "Comma Johanneum"".

• Jump up ^ August Neander, The History of
  the Christian Religion and the Church During the Three First
  Centuries, Volume 2, 1841, p. 184. Latin, Item de pudic.
  21. Et ecclesia proprie et principaliter ipse est spiritus,
  in quo est trinitas unius divinitatis Pater et Filius et
  Spiritus Sanctus. Tischendorf apparatus

• Jump up ^ Documents in Early Christian
  Thought, editors Maurice Wiles and Mark Santer, 1977,
  p.178, Latin Bibliotheca Patrum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum
  Selecta 1839.

• Jump up ^ Burgess, Tracts on the Divinity
  of Christ, 1820, pp.333-334. Irish Ecclesiastical
  Review, Traces of the Text of the Three Heavenly
  Witnesses, 1869 p. 274]

• Jump up ^ Westcott and Hort, The New
  Testament in the Original Greek Note on Selected
  Readings, 1 John v 7,8, 1882, p104.

• ^ Jump up to: a b c d e Catholic
  Encyclopedia Vol 8 of 15, Epistles of St John,
  Walter Drum, 1910 pp. 435-438, Chief Editor Charles George
  Herbermann. Online HTML for this section of the Catholic
  Encyclopedia at newadvent.org. "Published 1910. New York:
  Robert Appleton Company. Nihil Obstat, October 1, 1910. Remy
  Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley,
  Archbishop of New York".

• Jump up ^ Horne, critical study 1933, p.
  451

• Jump up ^ Jerome, Lives of Illustrious
  Men, translated by Ernest Cushing Richardson, footnote:
  "Bishop 353, died about 392".

• Jump up ^ William Hales, Inspector,
  Antijacobin Review, Sabellian Controversy, Letter
  XII 1816, p. 590. Latin " Denique Dominus: Petam, inquit, a
  Patre meo et alium advocatum dabit vobis (Ibid., 16). Sic
  alius a Filio Spiritus, sicut a Patre Filius. Sic tertia in
  Spiritu, ut in Filio secunda persona: unus tamen Deus omnia,
  tres unum sunt. Phoebadius, Liber Contra Arianos

• Jump up ^ Griesbach, Diatribe, p.
  700,

• Jump up ^ Introduction historique et
  critique aux libres de Nouveau Testament 1861,
  p.564.

• Jump up ^ Catholic Encyclopedia: "The silence
  of the great and voluminous Augustine and the variation in
  form of the text in the African Church are admitted facts
  that militate against the canonicity of the three
  witnesses."

• Jump up ^ The City of God, Volume 1,
  trans. by Marcus Dods 1888 p. 197, Latin: Deus itaque summus
  et verum cum Verbo suo et Spiritu sancto, quae tria unum
  sunt, Deus unus omnipotens

• Jump up ^ e.g. Franz Anton Knittel, Thomas
  Burgess, Arthur-Marie Le Hir, Francis Patrick Kenrick,
  Charles Forster and Pierre Rambouillet

• Jump up ^ Homilies, 1849, p. 1224.
  Latin: et quid est: finis christus? quia christus deus, et
  finis praecepti caritas, et deus caritas quia et pater et
  filius et spiritus sanctus unum sunt.

• Jump up ^ Principles of Textual
  Criticism, p. 506, 1820.

• Jump up ^ Thomas Joseph Lamy The Decision
  of the Holy Office on the "Comma Joanneum" pp.449-483
  American ecclesiastical review, 1897.

• Jump up ^ Thomas Burgess, A vindication
  of I John, V. 7, p.46, 1821.

• Jump up ^ The Acts of the Council of
  Chalcedon, Vol 3, The Second Session, pp. 22-23, 2005,
  Richard Price, editor

• Jump up ^ Edward Rochie Hardy Christology
  of the Later Fathers 1954, p. 368

• Jump up ^ Richard Porson, Letters to
  Archdeacon Travis 1790 p.378

• Jump up ^ ibid p. 401

• Jump up ^ Thomas Burgess, An introduction to
  the controversy on the disputed verse of st. John, 1835, p.
  xxvi

• Jump up ^ ibid p.xxxi

• Jump up ^ Robert Ernest Wallis, translator,
  The writings of Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, Volume
  1 1868, p.382

• Jump up ^ Daniel B. Wallace, "The Comma
  Johanneum and Cyprian".

Partes: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6