Browse the Gothic Bible
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Gospels
The text is presented verse by verse, with selected interlinear translations. Every word is linked to provisional lexical and morphological analyses. Visit the download page if you prefer static documents for offline reading or processing.
Where are the missing parts?
Wulfila is said to have translated the whole Bible except the Books of Kings, but only parts of the translation have been preserved, and none of the surviving manuscripts is complete.1 Slightly more than half of the New Testament is extant. With the exception of the second epistle to the Corinthians, every book has gaps, ranging from a few verses to several chapters. As for the Old Testament, only a part of Nehemiah has survived.
All extant biblical texts can be accessed from the menu above, minus some minor fragments (e.g. Codex Gissensis, containing parts of Luke 23 and 24) and recent discoveries – notably the Bologna fragment, uncovered around 2010 (also available here in another edition).
Manuscripts
The sources of the Gothic Bible and minor fragments are described on a separate page. Sigla used in the database:
- CA = Codex Argenteus
- A = Codex Ambrosianus A
- B = Codex Ambrosianus B
- C = Codex Ambrosianus C
- D = Codex Ambrosianus D
- E = Codex Ambrosianus E
- Car = Codex Carolinus
- Giss = Codex Gissensis
- Taur = Codex Taurinensis
- Lat5750 = Codex Vaticanus
- Naples = Naples deed
- Arezzo = Arezzo deed
For Codex Argenteus, the start of each manuscript page (recto or verso) is marked in the text with a double bar (||). These markers are not present in Streitberg's edition, but based on Uppström 1854 and inspection of the 1927 facsimile.
Hover over a double bar to see the folio number, or click on a word to go to the analysis page. There, you will find a link to a reproduction of the 1927 facsimile on an external website. Page markers are also included in the TEI edition and will be added for other manuscripts in the coming months.
Minor fragments
For technical reasons, non-biblical fragments in the database have been fitted somewhat artificially into the Bible's reference system, i.e. <chapter>:<verse> becomes <leaf>:<sentence> in the Skeireins and <month>:<day> in the Calendar.
If you are interested in the minor fragments, consult Christian Petersen's digital editions; they are generally based on Snædal. Streitberg's version with notes and apparatus (Streitberg 1919, Anhang):
Editorial interventions by Streitberg
Angular brackets < > indicate additions to the text; square brackets [ ] indicate deletions; italics indicate problematic or uncertain readings. These conventions have been retained in the online text. Additionally, variations between parallel versions of the same verse (e.g. Codex Ambrosianus A and B) are displayed in orange. When you select Gothic alphabet in the display options, uncertain readings are rendered in grey rather than italic text.
Streitberg also made numerous corrections that are not marked in the text, but mentioned in the apparatus at the bottom of the page, typically in the form qiþiþ] qiþiþiþ CA. Conversely, phonologically relevant ‘orthographical errors’ were left untouched in the text, but corrected in the apparatus, e.g. greitiþ] CA für gretiþ:
Orthographische Fehler sind nur dann im Text verbessert, wenn sie für die Erkenntnis der Aussprache bedeutungslos sind (Streitberg 1919, Erläuterungen, p. LI).
The critical apparatus has not yet been digitized. We plan to integrate it into the TEI edition later on, with references to recent emendations (Snædal 1998/2013). In the meantime, readers should note that the electronic edition offers a partially normalized text with many unmarked emendations to the manuscript. It should be used in conjunction with the apparatus in the printed version or facsimile editions of the manuscripts. Codex Argenteus can be browsed at Uppsala University or in the facsimile from 1927.
The Greek text
There is no doubt that the Gothic Bible was translated from Greek: daß Wulfila die gotische Bibel aus dem Griechischen übersetzt hat, lehrt fast ein jeder Vers seiner Übertragung, es bedarf daher nicht des ausdrücklichen Zeugnisses der Acta S. Nicetæ
(Streitberg 1919, p. XXXI). It is, however, not easy to determine the precise source text used by Wulfila. Streitberg's attempt to reconstruct the unknown ‘Vorlage’, printed on the left-hand pages of his edition, is generally criticised for being too dependent on the theories of Hermann von Soden. See e.g. James Marchand at WEMSK (who labels the reconstruction seriously flawed
) or Elfriede Stutz:
Wenn eine gotische Bibelausgabe einen griechischen Text enthält, beruht dieser auf Kombinationen des Herausgebers. So hatte Bernhardt […] einen griech[ischen] Text durch freie Auswahl aus der Gesamtüberlieferung unter Bevorzugung des Codex Alexandrinus (A) zusammengestellt, während Streitbergs griechische Vorlage […] ein Koine-text ist, rekonstruiert in Anlehnung an die textgeschichtliche Theorie Hermann von Sodens, die keine bleibende Anerkennung gefunden hat. Ein Germanist muß sich in diesen schwierigen Fragen auf den Spuren der theologischen Forschung bewegen, und dabei kann es vorkommen, daß er — wie Streitberg — in eine unglückliche Abhängigkeit gerät. (Stutz 1966, p. 31; my emphasis)
For this reason – and the amount of time such a transcription would take – the Greek text presented on this website is not Streitberg's reconstruction of the original Greek source, but an electronic version of Nestle-Aland's Novum Testamentum Graece (26th/27th edition). Like the other interlinear translations on the site, it is provided for illustrative purposes only. It is not suitable for studying Wulfila's translation technique.2
Notes
(1) Several sources mention Wulfila as the author of a translation of the Bible. Cf. Streitberg 1920, §10: Philostorgios, Sokrates und Sozomenos erzählen übereinstimmend, daß Wulfila die gotischen Buchstaben erfunden und die h. Schriften übersetzt habe; Philostorgios mit der Einschränkung, Wulfila habe die Bücher der Könige unübersetzt gelassen, um den kriegerischen Sinn seines Volkes durch sie nicht noch stärker zu entflammen.
(read more) Some testimonies from church historians, cited from Streitberg 1919, pp. XIX-XXIII:
Sokrates: «τότε δὲ καὶ Οὐλφίλας ὁ τῶν Γότθων ἐπίσκοπος γράμματα ἐφεῦρε Γοτθικά· καὶ τὰς θείας γραφὰς εἰς τὴν Γότθων μεταβαλὼν, [...]»;
Sozomenos: «πρῶτος δὲ γραμμάτων εὑρετὴς αὐτοῖς ἐγένετο καὶ εἰς τὴν οἰκείαν φωνὴν μετέφρασε τὰς ἱερὰς βίβλους»;
Philostorgios: «μετέφρασεν εἰς τὴν αὐτῶν φωνὴν τὰς γραφὰς ἁπάσας, πλήν γε δὴ τῶν βασιλειῶν [...]»
Despite these claims, the real extent of the original Gothic Bible cannot be determined with certainty. There was definitely a translation of the Gospels and Pauline Epistles, but some scholars doubt the reliability of Philostorgios' remark regarding the Books of Kings and the authorship of the Nehemiah-fragment (cf. Stutz 1966, p. 29). Whether or not Wulfila personally translated the Bible is also disputed; there may have been different translators (Miller 2019, pp. 8 & 15).
(2) In general, the Gothic translation closely mirrors the Greek original. That makes any differences all the more interesting, cf. Streitberg/Stopp 1981, §234:
[Es] ist stets von der griechischen Vorlage bei Beurteilung der gotischen Verhältnisse auszugehn. [...] Von besonderer Bedeutung [...] sind jene Fälle, wo die gotische Konstruktion in irgendeinem Punkte von der griechischen abweicht. Denn allein diese Abweichungen geben uns den Schlüssel zum Verständnis der wahren gotischen Syntax. (Streitberg/Stopp 1981, §234)
Naturally, the lack of a reliable ‘Vorlage’ makes it harder to determine whether an unexpected construction tells something about syntax or style, or simply reflects an alternative reading in the unknown base text.