What is the difference between “textual criticism” and “source criticism”?
I’m not necessarily referring to the bible, but that is the most obvious area where these issues occur. I understand “textual criticism” to be ascertaining the original text of a document. “Source criticism” kind of confuses me. Is it determining the person who wrote something such as a book in the bible, or is it determining that person’s source for what he/she wrote? For instance, many scholars claim that the flood story involving Noah was derived from the Epic of Gilgamesh. The stories are in fact very similar with the latter having been published prior to the Noah’s Ark story. Now, when it comes to “source criticism” as it regards the Noah’s Ark story, is the issue the source such as the Epic of Gilgamesh, or is the issue who actually wrote the Noah’s Ark story? I hope this is all clear. Pretty much it ties back to the difference between “textual criticism” and “source criticism.” I’m mainly interested in the definition of “source criticism.”
Textual criticism looks at the text itself and tries to spearate the original reading from later edits. One manuscript, for example, might read “Jesus said to him…,” while another reads, “He said to him…” The textual critic will conclude that the second reading is probably original. No scribe would drop the name of Jesus, but many scribes would feel justified adding it in for clarification.
Source criticism tries to identify the source material for a given work. Matthew and Luke, for example, each have material in common. And each has material in common with Mark. But Matthew has things from Mark that Luke does not, and vice versa. Source criticism tries to explain how this happened. Obviously it couldn’t have gone Mark => Matthew => Luke, because then Luke wouldn’t have used source material from Mark that isn’t found in Matthew. You get the idea.
In your Noah example, source criticism would evaluate the Epic of Gilgamesh to determine if it was a source used by the author of Genesis. It is not concerned with the personal identity of the author, but the source material that he employed.
