Today we’re talking with Bryan Williams about a Hebrew version of the New Testament preserved at Cambridge University Library. The manuscript was acquired in 1806 by Rev. Claudius Buchanan, who said he received it from one of the synagogues of the Cochin Jews in India. Cambridge and evidence reveal that it was made for polemical purposes, meaning used in Jewish-Christian debate, and to disprove New Testament claims. 

Bryan and his partner Janice Baca claim that no matter its purpose in the 18th-century, it is a copy of a first-century original. As evidence, they claim it has Second Temple–period features and Aramaisms that place it in the first century. We will discuss where it came from, why it matters, and what a Hebrew rendering of the New Testament might reveal to readers today. 

Cambridge's argument for it being a polemic when created, is backed up by notes in the manuscript itself. From Cambridge: 

"A note at the end of the Gospel of John (f. 70v) reads וסהדי במרומים שלא העתקתי זה ח׳׳ו להאמין אילה להבין ולידע מה להשיב לאפיקורוסים ימחו מין העולם אכי׳׳ר ויבא משיח צדקינו האמיתי אמן ('And my witness is on high that I did not copy this, God forbid [חס ושלום], except [reading אלא for אילה] to understand and know what to reply to the heretics - may they be wiped out from the world, amen, may it be so [אמן כן יהי רצון], and may the true Messiah of our Righteousness come, amen'). Schiller-Szinessy questions whether העתקתי refers to the act of copying alone, or to the translation itself: the verb can mean both.

Although the character of the translation is not uniform (Schiller-Szinessy, Delitzsch), its originally polemical intent is evident in the epithets given to Jesus (הטמא, 'the Unclean One'), and other figures, e.g., the superscription at the beginning of Acts reads זה כתב אחר מאנגיליון שבדא מדעתו הרעה והקלושה ורעועה הארור הטמא ומחורם לוקוס יש׳ ושם ישו עימו מן העולם ('This is another book of the gospel that was devised from his evil, thin and impaired mind by the accursed, unclean and excommunicated Luke - may his name be blotted out [ימח שמו], and the name of Jesus with him, from the world', f. 71r). The frequent short marginal glosses serve a polemical purpose too. Style and orthography are not consistent across the manuscript, e.g., John is both יוחנן and יואן (Sefardi influence, 'Juan'), and Schiller-Szinessy and Delitzsch see a clear change in attitude towards Christianity (a lack of overtly polemical language) from f. 131 onwards, when the hand of David Cohen takes over."

The manuscript in full at Cambridge Digital Library: 
https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-OO-00001-00032/265

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