About a year ago, I found myself in the library at Regent College in Vancouver B.C. While there, I happened across Arthur Vööbus' Early Versions of the New Testament: Manuscript Studies. I paged through it and knew that someday I'd like to have a copy of it.

So, I've been searching for it off and on. A few weeks back, I finally saw a copy listed by a used book seller in the states. I snapped up the copy. It arrived today.

This is, quite simply, a cool book. I'm looking forward to (slowly) working through it. And the book has a story: Vööbus fled Estonia after the Soviets took over the country. In the Preface, he writes:

In my refugee's bag I have carried this present work. In that moment when I could give one last look at my study and had to make the difficult decision of putting what I could into my bag and seeing what I had to leave, there was no question about this work. It had taken too much of my life and work.

But it was not in a complete form, and I could take nothing from the materials which were in the process of incorporation. It was very difficult to go on with this study when I had no access to my own library and collected materials. And so the work appears later than it was planned. Regardless of what theperiod of delay has meant to the author, this delay has been a gain for the study, for it has grown constantly in perspective.

As I send if forth from my hands, I think with deep gratitude of my teachers and colleagues and of all the rich spiritual atmosphere at the University of Tartu, to which I owe so much. That amosphere gave me the courage to lay plans for a long-range work and to tackle difficult tasks, including all the prepatory work and equipment required for the investigation of areas which seldom attract scholars. This inspiration has been so strong that this has remained with me in all kinds of experiences. All this I could receive before the destruction of the spiritual life in Estonia by the Soviets — for this spiritual floration is now replaced by idiocy, all cultural values trampled underfoot by the Russian boot, and a great number of the bearers of this spiritual atmosphere have perished along with a great part of the nation drowned in an ocean of blood. (Vööbus, p. vii).

Wow. Note also that this book, published in 1954 in Stockholm, is volume 6 in the series: Papers of the Estonian Theological Society in Exile.

Also, if anyone can inform me how to phonetically pronounce "Vööbus", I'd appreciate it. Send me an email; I'll post here so others can know too.

Update (2005-07-07): Thanks to Stephen C. Carlson (Hypotyposeis) for his note regarding the pronunciation of 'Vööbus'.