115 Burn or Boast? A Text Critical Analysis of 1 Cor 13:3 seem to be results of attempts to improve the text on the part of the copyists. Some would have thought that καυθ and καυθ σεται would be better substitutes for καυθ σωμαι and opted for one or the other7. The third variant καυθ is possibly a result of a scribal correction meant to propose a more natural expression referring to the “body” (“that it might be burnt”) in comparison with the rather cumbersome τ σ μ μου να καυθ σομαι (“I give up my body that I may be burnt”), and making it an aorist subjunctive. So, it needs to be eliminated. The two above variants have no outstanding external witnesses except for a few minuscules. Besides, we have been able to explain their provenance in terms of transcriptional probability. The fourth variant καυθ σεται is another scribal attempt to provide a more smooth reading with a third person singular in place of the first person singular future indicative (καυθ σομαι). There the intention has been to be faithful to the future indicative in his Vorlage. So, the variant καυθ σεται also needs to be eliminated. Having eliminated both the third and fourth variants namely, καυθ and καυθ σεται, now let us turn our attention to the first and the second variants viz. καυθ σωμαι and καυθ σομαι. Metzger calls the first variant καυθ σωμαι “a grammatical mon- strosity that cannot be attributed to Paul,” though the use of the future subjunctive is evidenced in Byzantine times when such erratic usage had gained acceptance8. A scribe who felt uneasy in the presence of the gram- matical anomaly of a “possible original” καυθ σομαι would have turned it to the subjunctive καυθ σωμαι9. The variant καυθ σωμαι may be also a result of an intentional [or even unintentional] change of χ into θ in an original καυχ σωμαι. In LXX 2 Sam 23:7 there is a variant reading for the MT Up:rf>Iy VOrf> which records a similar instance of a change from θ to χ10. On the other hand, it could also be a possible scribal correction of καυθ σομαι11. Lenski opines that both καυθ σωμαι and καυθ σομαι 7 C. Focant, “1 Corinthiens 13: Analyse Rhtéorique et Analyse des Structures”, in R. Bieringer (ed.), The Corinthian Correspondence, Colloquium Biblicum Lovaniense 43, Leuven, August 8-10, 1994 (BETL 125; Leuven 1996) 199-245, 22-23. 8 B.M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (Stuttgart 21994) 564; cf. also J.H. Moulten & W.F. Howard, A Grammar of New Testament Greek (Edin- burgh 1929) 219. Blass-Debrunner rejects the concept of this Byzantine future subjunctive. cf. F. Blass, A. Debrunner & R.W. Funk, A Greek Grammar of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (London / Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961) § 28, 15. 9 J.K. Elliot, “In Favour of Kauthēsomai at 1 Corinthians 133”, ZNW 62 (1971) 297-98, 298. 10 Cf. Moffatt, First Corinthians, 193. 11 W.F. Orr & J.A. Walther, 1 Corinthians: A New Translation: Introduction with a Study of the Life of Paul, Notes, and Commentary (The Anchor Bible 32; Garden City, NY 1976) 291.