文本批评（英语：Textual criticism），又称文本批判、低等批评，是文学批评的一种，是对文稿文本错误的确定和勘误，古代文献采用手抄形式导致在传抄过程中会出现错误。在已有传抄本的情况下，文本批判试图尽可能重建原始文本的原貌。文本批判的最终目的是产生出尽可能接近原文的“批判版本”。

自由主义神学的文学研究员认为，约拿书既不被犹太人编为历史书，书中所记，例如：约拿先知于鱼肚中的故事，应一如其他民族的著作（如中国的西游记）般看待；不应一昧相信这些事情是铁一般的历史故事。

Textual criticism is a branch of textual scholarship, philology, and literary criticism that is concerned with the identification of textual variants in either manuscripts or printed books. Ancient scribes made alterations when copying manuscripts by hand. Given a manuscript copy, several or many copies, but not the original document, the textual critic might seek to reconstruct the original text (the archetype or autograph) as closely as possible. The same processes can be used to attempt to reconstruct intermediate versions, or recensions, of a document's transcription history. The ultimate objective of the textual critic's work is the production of a "critical edition" containing a scholarly curated text.