It's true. You can catch me in one o' them new-fangled movin' pictures over on Bob Pritchett's blog. Bob's Video Tour of Logos covers Logos Bible Software's Design & Editorial department. That's the department I'm in. It's where all of the cool people hang out, playing around with new data sets and figuring out how to implement them in the Libronix Digital Library System.

Update: My D&E colleague Eli chimes in on Bob's video.

I'd planned to blog about a Stephanus version prior to Beza's edition, but then I realized that my edition of Stephanus' 1550 is actually Scrivener's edition of Stephanus, and since I'm primarily interested in format and typography of the originals, this wouldn't do (yet ... wait 'till I work my way into the 1800's!).

So, I'm hopping to Beza. I'll come back to the 1550 (and 1546) Stephanus versions after I download 'em from Bibles.org.uk.

On to Beza. First, check out the device on the title page. An anchor, water, a snake, and some arms. Complete with date in roman numerals. Typical for the period. Again, all of these images are clickable.

The facsimile I downloaded is pretty gritty, so the detail isn't the best. It's a shame, I'd really love to see how the start of each book looks in its full glory. Here you can see the beginning of the epistle to Titus. Once again, Beza's edition isn't simply a reproduction of the Greek text, it is his Greek text, his Latin translation, and the "Vetus" Latin, which I'd guess would be Jerome's Vulgate (but that's purely unconfirmed speculation). There are also marginal notes and scads of translation notes (in Latin, of course) that you can't see on this shot.

Of interest, we see the text is actually versified. I'm guessing that Beza is following Stephanus' innovation here — I think I recall that Stephanus was one of the first to present the text versified in a manner like we're familiar with today, though I could be wrong. So the verses line up. The first block is what we'd call Titus 1.1, and you can see the verse number in the gutter between columns. Same for verse 2, and so on.

On a purely cosmetic note, the marginal note throws the page out of balance. It looks lopsided due to the massiveness of the title device. It's tough for me to look at. It's not nearly as bad on other pages. Also interesting is the use of a smaller italic font for the "Vetus" Latin. He's obviously de-emphasized the older Latin in favor of his own translation.

So, what about Beza's version of 1Ti 2.3-6? Here it is. Beza has so many notes, these four verses span two pages of his edition:

In the above (though you probably can't read it) Beza cites the reading of the Complutensian Polyglot. Anyway, here's the actual content of the verses; you might even be able to read it:

Once again, we see some serious typography going on. Can you imagine hand-setting the type for these plates? That, and this is the third edition of a 1500's-era Greek New Testament we've seen, and they all have a "modern" translation (that is, the Latin) along with them. Yet today, most of those who study Greek seriously would rather not see any modern language translation at all in the version. It makes me wonder how come these early editions viewed such an addition as almost natural?

Of course, Stephanus' 1550 edition doesn't (as I recall, at least it doesn't on the front page of Mark that we have here at the Logos offices) have a Latin translation. So maybe Erasmus, Beza and the Complutensian are the outliers.

Next time: Stephanus' 1550 (and 1546) editions, assuming I download them successfully.

My good friend Bob Pritchett* is back to blogging on a more regular basis. Bob doesn't necessarily blog about Logos Bible Software, but he does occassionally.

Of interest today: He's posted portions of a video tour of Logos. Check it out if you are curious about where the company is located, or what the building looks like on the inside. I think Bob plans to post other portions of the video tour in the future. Who knows ... you might even see some moving pictures of me there sometime!**

* President and CEO of Logos Bible Software; he's also my boss and a ricoblog reader so I have to say nice things about him. But that's easy to do as Bob is a great guy and a good friend. And his teriyaki grilled salmon is most excellent.

** I promise, no more pictures of my toe, and especially no moving pictures of the toe!

Some typophiles may know of Ari Davidow's Hebrew Typography Blog. Anyway, he had a flurry of posts over the weekend after about six weeks of silence. I'd recommend posts on:

• Anti-reader Hebrew-English typography
• Updated Passover Haggadah Toolkit (as an example of Hebrew / English / transliterated typography)

Thanks, folks, to those of you who have asked about the foot.

All is well. No pain (at least, not yet). And I'm not limping or anything.

That said, apologies to all who were unsettled by my podiatrical perambulations; Less picturesque postings will return post-haste.

On Saturday (April 16) I was in bathroom-cleaning mode. [Here's my Bathroom-Cleaning Rhapsody Playlist, if you're interested]. As I was starting the dreaded task, I accidentally slammed my left foot, toes-first, into a doorway. It hurt. I jumped up and down on my right foot, holding my left foot. But it wasn't unbearable, so I cleaned the bathroom. We're talkin' full-scale cleaning, top-to-bottom, including a long-overdue tub/shower scouring. The toe right next to my left pinkie-toe hurt a little, but not incessantly. So, I forgot about it.

Then, since my folks are back from Arizona, I went to Oak Harbor for the afternoon/evening. When I got back home to Bellingham at around 9:30 PM or so I took off my shoes and socks. This is what greeted me:

Actually, it was worse than that. The purple color was deeper. It looked like my toe had died and was getting ready to fall off. "Crud", I thought. "Guess I broke it." So I grabbed the frozen corn from the freezer and started to ice it a bit. After about 20 minutes, I figured I'd better go to the hospital to make sure everything was OK. So I grabbed a book (Van Neste's Cohesion and Structure in the Pastoral Epistles, which turned a few eyes at the hospital), hopped in the car and drove to the ER.

I should stop right now and say that I hate the hospital. I mean, I hate it. "Hate" is a strong word, but I think it is accurate in this case. I've said before that for me to go to the doctor, I either have to be unable to stop the bleeding or unable to bear the pain. Neither of those was true in this case, but I went. The sheer freakishness of the color of my toe convinced me it would be a good thing to go.

So, I went to the ER at St. Joseph's in Bellingham. Talked to the guy behind the front desk a bit, who turns out to be a Music major from WWU with minors in Ancient Greek and Computer Science ... strange the folks you run into. I told him he should apply for a job at Logos. He told me to take a seat, the nurse would check me out. The first nurse took my temperature, blood pressure and pulse. I warned her, "My blood pressure is going to be really high". I could feel my heart racing just from being in the hospital. After she took it, she said, "That's not too bad, after all you're in the ER." Phew. First hurdle down.

Next there was a really helpful lady who took down my information and got it into their computer. One thing I didn't know: There are apparently three other folks in Bellingham who share my name. That's helpful news, I guess. Then I waited some more.

They called my name after probably 90 minutes. I followed some dude down a maze of corridors into another room where I waited. Another nurse then checked out my ugly toe. "Probably broken, the doctor will probably just tell you to keep it taped to the toe next to it." Yep, just what I figured. Another 10 minutes (by this time, I'm into Van Neste discussing the cohesiveness of 1Ti 2.8-15) and the doc looks at it. "Looks like it's broken." He seemed concerned that I was in pain, but I ensured him that wasn't the case. Then some other dude came in and wheeled me in the hospital bed to radiology, where they did an x-ray of my left foot. I told him I would walk no problem, but he insisted on wheeling me. It was a fun ride, we chatted the whole way. Then the radiology dude took my picture:

You'll need to click on it to see a larger picture. Then you'll see this small arrow pointing to where my toe fracture is. You can see a little bone piece sticking out on the right side of the bone, just above the joint, in the toe closest to the "L".

Pretty cool, huh?

On the way out I showed my pictures to the people who helped me in the ER. They were nice folks, generally. All in all not a bad experience. It doesn't change my philosophy about hospitals, though. I still want to avoid them.

I'll probably fill the pain perscription just in case, but I don't know that I'll actually have to use it. If the "pain" persists for a week I'm supposed to go back, but here's hoping that the Dutch blood coursing through my veins imparts its mystical healing powers to my next-to-the-pinkie-toe fracture.

The "open access journal" meme has trotted about the biblioblogosphere recently (sorry, no links handy, but you know it has). In reading an economics blog (Truck & Barter), I came across a post linking to the Directory of Open Access Journals or DOAJ.

The listing of religion journals (26 of 'em) is available: DOAJ Religion Journal Listing. 

There is also a listing of Languages and Literatures Journals.

FWIW, the post and lone comment on the Truck & Barter site about sum up my thoughts from an economic point of view. But have fun with the journals -- there are a few in there that look like they may be worth checking out.

I'm like a boy with new toys. What are those new toys? They're PDF versions of way-old editions the Greek New Testament, of course (editions available here; watch out, the downloads are sizeable).

In light of my previous post on the coolness of the Complutensian Polyglot, it makes sense to me to check out the competition: Erasmus' 1516 edition. So here we go.

First, look at this awesome frontispiece from the Gospel of Matthew. It's a little much for my tastes, but it's typical for the style of the day (from the little reading I've done on typesetting from this period). Note that you can click on any of these images to see them in a seperate window, some of them will be larger than they are inline below.

The drop-caps are the coolest part. The artistic stuff around the edges, while interesting, just doesn't do it for me. Another nice aspect of this edition are the introductions to the books. However ... they're in Greek; Erasmus didn't provide the Latin translation. (note: His 1522 edition does have parallel Greek and Latin of this content).

But what about the Bible text proper? Here's the beginning of First Timothy. Again, the drop-caps are prominent. Also interesting (to me, anyway) is the all-cap presentation of the name of Christ in the Greek, but not in the Latin.

But how does this compare to the Complutensian? Well, here's 1Ti 2.3-6, which I also provided for the Complutensian? (image here). 

I see a few differences immediately. First, the Complutensian is much more readable, at least for my minuscule-challenged eyes. If I know the text (as I do in this case) I can figure out that the first two blobs really do represent τουτο γαρ, but I couldn't prove it to you. Second, remember that the Complutensian is aligned at the word level through the use of superscript letters previous to lexical units. No such innovation in the Erasmian text. But Erasmus does have the name of Christ in all-caps, which is an interesting practice, especially in light of the manner in which the tetragrammaton is treated in Hebrew texts.

I do like Erasmus' Latin font better than the font used in the Complutensian. But that's not enough to sway me to Erasmus. My vote is still for the Complutensian. Now that's typesetting.

Lastly, there is the famous historical matter to check into. What did Erasmus really do with 1Jn 5.7-8? (NKJV: For there are three that bear witness in heaven: the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one. And there are three that bear witness on earth: the Spirit, the water, and the blood; and these three agree as one.) You know what I'm talking about. The legend as I've heard it is that Erasmus didn't put this text into his first edition, but he was beat up by the Vulgate readers such that he made his famous promise: "If you can find a Greek manuscript with that content, I'll publish it". Well, what does Erasmus have in his first edition?

No sign of the explicit mention of the members of the Godhead in Trinity there. So the first part of the legend has merit. What about the second part? I haven't downloaded Erasmus' 1518 edition yet (though it is available, it is 200+ megs) but I did grab his 1522 edition. Check it out:

Do you see that? Yep, it's longer. Through the magic of modern technology, let's get a better look at what's going on in there:

Sure enough. The text is added. And it's been in pretty much every Textus Receptus-based edition since. The Greek MSS with this reading, by the way, are 61 (16th century), 629 (14th century) and 918 (16th century). There are others that have the above as a varia lectio, but who knows when those readings were added to the original MS, or where they came from (most likely a retroversion from Latin back into the Greek, I'd think). I'd guess 629 might be the actual MS that prompted Erasmus to make the change, though that is pure speculation by someone (that's me) with no right to speculate on such text-critical issues.