The Text of the Pauline Corpus

AbstractThe relationship between the text and form of a Pauline letter as sent to its recipients (a single letter hand-written on a scroll or in a notebook) and as read today (edited, printed, and part of a defined corpus with a fixed sequence) is complex and only partially understood. This chapter surveys the witnesses to the text of the Pauline letters, discusses the classification and characterization of the letters’ textual tradition, and notes the methodological implications of the tradition’s textual characteristics. It also discusses the formation of various collections of those letters, because the textual history of the letters is inseparable from the history of their collection, a subject which in turn must be linked to theories regarding their origins and transmission, inasmuch as there is a synergistic relationship between ideas about the creation, transmission, collection, and text of the Pauline letters.