Luther’s Textual Study of the Greek New Testament 51 The Wittenberg Reformer drew his knowledge of textual issues from the commentaries available to him which occasionally reported textual variances between Greek evidences or between the Greek original and the Vulgate. To us it is difficult, if not impossible, to identify to which manuscript a commentator referred13. The church fathers equipped Luther with relevant grammatical and textual insights albeit they seldom used a precise grammatical terminology and except Origen, whose writings are partially lost, they had no expertise in textual studies. Since the Wittenberg Reformer left no theoretical statements about the study of the text, his approach must be reconstructed from particular examples (cf. Galatians 1,6; 2,5 and 1 John 5,7-8). Galatians 1,6 Concerning Galatians 1,6 Luther remarked that the Greek text reads ἐν χάριτι θεοῦ in place of “in gratia[m] Christi” (corresponding to ἐν χάριτι χριστοῦ) advocated by the Vulgate14. His comment was based on Erasmus’ Greek New Testament which followed the variant θεοῦ attested by the miniscule no. 327 from the 13th century. On the contrary, the reading χριστοῦ from the Polyglot is found in the vast majority of evidences including the Byzantine text. In the later editions of the Greek New Testament Erasmus incorporated χριστοῦ into the master text (textus receptus) and admarginated θεοῦ15. Moreover, in his annotations he admitted that only some evidences support θεοῦ16. Galatians 2,5 Lecturing on Galatians 2,5 Luther deliberated upon the negative conjunction οὐδὲ17 which is attested by all Greek evidences (except D*), 13 For instance, Erasmus mentioned an unidentified Latin Codex Constantiensis. Erasmus Roterodamus, In Novum Testamentum annotationes (Basel: Froben, 1540), 486 [1 Corinthians 10,17]. Ibidem, 524 [2 Corinthians 1,11]. Ibidem, 565 [Galatians 1,1]. Ibidem, 576 [Galatians 3,1]. Ibidem, 579 [Galatians 3,19]. Ibidem, 668 [1 Timothy 2,6]. Ibidem, 716 [Hebrews 4,2]. 14 Martin Luther, Commentarium in Epistolam S. Pauli ad Galatas, vol. 3, ed. Johann Konrad Irmischer (Erlangen: Sumtibus Caroli Heyderi, 1844), 159-160 [Galatians 1,6]. 15 Erasmus Roterodamus, “Novum Testamentum cum annotationibus,” in Opera, vol. 6 (Basel: Froben, 1541), 306 [Galatians 1,6-7]. 16 Erasmus Roterodamus, In Novum Testamentum annotationes (Basel: Froben, 1527), 505 [Galatians 1,6-7]. 17 Martin Luther, Commentarium in Epistolam S. Pauli ad Galatas, vol. 3, ed. Johann Konrad Irmischer (Erlangen: Sumtibus Caroli Heyderi, 1844), 193-195 [Galatians 2,3-5].