Some Notes on the Ge’ez/Ethiopic Manuscripts of 1 and 2 Timothy

Abstract The past fifty years of academic study conducted by scholars working the text of Ethiopic Bible demonstrate efforts focused on developing a reliable edition of the earliest retrievable text. Through these efforts several critical editions of both Old and New Testament books have been made available. In this line, the short paper I will present is an extract from my PhD thesis, entitled ‘Critical Edition of Pastoral Epistles with their Andemta tradition.’ My overall task in this project was to make a modest contribution to the growing field of the textual history of Ethiopic Biblical material by addressing neglected books and thus filling an existing gap. This paper will focus primarily on describing some features of 18 selected Ge’ez Manuscripts of 1 and 2 Timothy along with their textual history. The research findings are presented and discussed in interaction with the conclusions reached by other scholar’s of the Ethiopic New Testament, particularly as it relates to the Pauline Epistles. I will also look at issues pertaining to the earliest attainable text and its vorlage, text types to a limited extent.