Untitled Document
1864 Emphatic Diaglott
by Benjamin Wilson
This volume is an actual scan of the rare 1864 printing of the Emphatic Diaglott by Benjamin Wilson. This reprint is an historic effort and is needed for several reasons. The Emphatic Diaglott has been in the Public Domain since 1952. After the death of author Benjamin Wilson, Charles Taze Russell of the Watchtower Society purchased the copyright and the original plates from Wilson's heirs, and published a version of the Diaglott in 1902. The same society republished the work in 1927 and 1942, after re-setting the type for its own presses. Whether the Society then or at any other time altered any part of the original work of Benjamin Wilson is unknown. This publisher makes no claim on the question one way or the other. The Watchtower Society continues to print and make available editions of the work under the same name, and reader may compare this scan to those editions and make his own judgement.
For this reason, it is important that a scan of the original work be published, "as is." Though resetting the type would improve the quality, the ability to test current versions to the accuracy of the original would be compromised.
The Emphatic Diaglott is also important in that it comes from a stream of work independent of both the Texus Receptus of Erasmus, on which the King James Bible is based, and the Wescott and Hort compilations, upon which most other modern Bible versions are based. The Emphatic Diaglott provides and important, "third witness" to help the student of the Bible determine the original intent of the New Testament writers in the available Greek manuscripts.
The Greek Text used by the Emphatic Diaglott is the Griesbach Recension, a collation which was completed and published in 1774 - 1775. It is significant that this is a full century prior to the Wescott and Hort compilation in 1881, but after the Erasmus compilations of the 16th century. Though Dr. J.J. Griesbach was familiar with Erasmus work, he designed to create a collation independent of it, based on his own review and judgment of original manuscript sources. Benjamin Wilson chose this work from which to make an interlinear Greek/English Bible, believing its source material was superior to the Texus Receptus of Erasmus. The truth or falsehood of this assumption the reader must decide.
Apologies are made here for any artifacts and difficult to read portions in the scan, for the original book is very old, and pristine copies difficult to obtain. If at some time a better book is found and made available for scanning, we may improve this reprint in future editions.
Volume I: Matthew - Acts, 479 pages. Paperback
Volume II: Romans - Revelation, 394 pages. Paperback
