‘A Religious Attention to Minutiae’: César de Missy (1703–1775) Studies the New Testament

2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 151-202
Author(s):  
Anthony Ossa-Richardson

“This article offers a portrait of the milieu and scholarly activity of César de Missy, an assiduous and richly connected but hitherto unknown member of the Republic of Letters in eighteenth-century London. De Missy preached at Huguenot churches and collected books, especially bibles: he published little, but left a great deal of scholarship in manuscript, mostly concerned with the readings and codicology of the Greek New Testament. Perhaps his most peculiar and revealing pursuit was the minute study of scribal error in the production of manuscripts, an activity that absorbed his attention far more than its profit might seem to warrant. I argue that De Missy's fixation on the multiple histories of the scriptural text represents a private reaction to loss, turning away from the more conventional public scholarship of the Huguenot diaspora.”

2017 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 396-430
Author(s):  
Asaph Ben-Tov

August Tittel, a Lutheran pastor, translator, ‘minor author’, and fugitive, was best known to contemporaries for his German translation of Humphrey Prideaux’s The Old and New Testament Connected and for his turbulent life. Together with his printed oeuvre, Tittel’s extant correspondence, especially with his patron Ernst Salomon Cyprian, allow us a close scrutiny of the life and work of a minor and troublesome member of the Republic of Letters. Despite its peculiarities, there is much in his career which is indicative of broader trends in early eighteenth-century scholarship, e.g. networks of patronage and a German interest in Jansenist and English biblical scholarship, theology, and confessional polemics. This view of the Republic of Letters ‘from below’ sheds light on a class of minor scholars, which often evades the radar of modern scholarship, but was an essential part of the early modern Republic of Letters.


1999 ◽  
Vol 55 (2/3) ◽  
Author(s):  
J. A. Loader

On the basis of the evidence of publications daing from the eighteenth century, this paper argues that the orthodox doctrine of the verbal inspiration the Bible caused extreme views on the language of the Old Testament which could maybe transferred to the "heathen" language of the New Testament. The resulting void was filled by focussing on the Jewish (read "Hebrew", thought of the New Testament. The work of Chistian Schoettgen, available the author in Vienna, is used in conjunction with the Critica sacra by Johan Gottlob Carpzov to develop the argument for the thesis. Some conclusions ardrawn.


2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 82-116
Author(s):  
Floris Solleveld

Abstract What happened to the Republic of Letters? Its history seems to stop at the end of the eighteenth century. And yet, in the nineteenth century, there still existed a community gathered in scholarly societies, maintaining a transnational correspondence network and filling learned journals. The term indeed becomes less frequent, but does not go entirely out of use. This article traces the afterlives of the Republic of Letters in the early nineteenth century. Specifically, it investigates texts that attempt to (re)define the Republic of Letters or a cognate, the wider diffusion of the term, and the changing role of learned journals in that period. While most attempts to reinvent the Republic of Letters failed miserably, they indicate a diagnosis of the state of learning and the position of scholars in a period of transition, and in doing so they contradict an ‘unpolitical’ conception of the Republic of Letters.


Open Theology ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Garrick V. Allen

Abstract This article critically examines the functionalities and significance of three prominent digital tools that have become central to the study of Greek New Testament manuscripts. The design, functionalities, and significance of the New Testament Virtual Manuscript Room (NTVMR), the Center for the Study of New Testament Manuscripts (CSNTM) digital library, and the Pinakes database have a hand in shaping the research questions of the field. As such, it is important to understand what these tools do, how they function, and how they might develop further to address the needs of the field. The analysis of these tools leads to fundamental questions about using digital representations as proxies for primary sources, challenges for managing the materiality of artefactual and digital objects, the collaborative nature of digital scholarship, and the implicit interpretations of the Greek New Testament tradition inherent in digital workspaces.


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