Romans 5:6

Romans 5:6 e;ti ga.r … e;ti {C}

Although it must be acknowledged that the reading ei; ge … e;ti (B cop^sa) possesses a certain inherent fitness which, despite its very slender external support, makes it most attractive, a majority of the Committee could find no adequate reason why, if this reading were original, the others would have arisen. On the other hand, not only is the external evidence for e;ti ga.r … e;ti quite overwhelming in weight and variety, but also all witnesses that omit one or the other instance of e;ti may be held to have originated as scribal improvements to avoid the awkward repetition of the word. Thus, the reading adopted as text seems to be the earliest attainable reading preserved in the manuscripts; whether it originated as a primitive error in the exemplar of the first collection of the Pauline Letters, or whether it arose when, as one may assume, Paul repeated e;ti, perhaps for the sake of emphasis, while dictating to Tertius ( Romans 16:22), it is impossible to say.