Matthew 8:21

Matthew 8:21 tw/n maqhtw/n @auvtou/# {C}

Although the support of a B 33 it^a cop^sa for the omission of auvtou/ would usually be regarded as exceptionally strong evidence, in this case a majority of the Committee was impressed by the possibility that auvtou/ may have been deleted in order to prevent the reader from inferring that the grammateu,j of ver. Matthew 8:19 was one of Jesus’ disciples. On the other hand, it can be argued that it is because of the word e[teroj, not auvtou/, that a reader might infer that grammateu,j of ver. Matthew 8:19 was a disciple of Jesus. Actually the absence of auvtou/ does not improve the sense, but rather makes the text more ambiguous. In order to represent these two opposing arguments the Committee decided to retain auvtou/ enclosed within square brackets.