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British Library Puts Oldest Surviving Bible Online
Peace Corps Library writes "BBC reports that about 800 pages of the earliest surviving Christian Bible, the 1,600-year-old Codex Sinaiticus manuscript, have been recovered and put on the Internet. 'The Codex Sinaiticus is one of the world's greatest written treasures,' says Dr. Scot McKendrick, head of Western manuscripts at the British Library. 'This 1,600-year-old manuscript offers a window into the development of early Christianity and first-hand evidence of how the text of the Bible was transmitted from generation to generation.' The New Testament of the Codex Sinaiticus appears in Koine Greek, the original vernacular language, and the Old Testament in the version, known as the Septuagint, that was adopted by early Greek-speaking Christians. For 1,500 years, the Codex Sinaiticus lay undisturbed in a Sinai monastery until it was found in 1844 and split between Egypt, Russia, Germany, and Britain. It is thought to have survived because the desert air was ideal for preservation and because the monastery, on a Christian island in a Muslim sea, remained untouched, its walls unconquered. The British Library is marking the online launch of the manuscript with an exhibition which includes a range of historic items and artifacts linked to the document. 'The availability of the virtual manuscript for study by scholars around the world creates opportunities for collaborative research that would not have been possible just a few years ago.'"
If there's a substantial OT manuscript dating to the 4th cent. BCE on consensus then I'd love to see it.
The reason why Sinaiticus is so important is because it substantially a transcript of what is agreed to be the most accurate record of the original text of the New Testament. It's called the "Alexandrian text-type." Almost all of the tiny fragments that predate the fourth century (and they are very scanty indeed) agree with the text of Sinaiticus extensively. As a result, Bible scholars believe that the alterations we find in later manuscripts are untrustworthy corruptions rather than viable alternate readings.
As to the textual corruption that took place in the late first and second centuries AD we have very little evidence and therefore no remedy. Christians believe that God would not have permitted His word to be corrupted beyond our ability to understand it. I am an atheist and work extensively on ancient Greek textual criticism so you can imagine I do not have much patience for this point of view, but the fact is that the New Testament is the most well-attested ancient Greek or Latin text still in existence. Even Vergil's Aeneid, for which we have three manuscripts predating the fifth century CE, is not supported so well, and in the cases like the tragedies of Sophocles we are on much shakier footing.
I know you are joking, but the Bible says nothing about priests or celibacy. That was invented by the catholic church in the 12th century so the church could get around paying for the children of priests.
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Why would Paul write so strongly about the resurrection even in prison?
What makes you think that Paul wrote that gospel? The Bible was assembled by committee and included the the works submitted and voted in. Is it based on faith alone that you assume that the gospels were not embellished before publication?
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
Mod parent down. That's not correct at all.
1. Codex Sinaiticus mentions the resurrection many times. What is omitted is the description of the Gospel of Mark. The description in the Gospel of Luke, however, is NOT missing from that text. At best Codex S. supports the theory that the ending of Mark was added later---a theory that a fair number of biblical scholars hold, mind you.
2. Codex Sinaiticus was either written in the last few years of Constantine or after his death. This proves nothing about Constantine's effect on the early church. You'd need something at least a hundred years older.
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More than paying for the children... it was about title to the lands.
When a wealthy lord had too many sons, he would have the extras sent either to serve in the military (which cost money, but it was part of the dues to the liege), or to the church. This conveniently got the extra sons out of the way so that his lands could be passed in entirety to his first son.
The son(s) shipped to the church would get a nice title, if the lord donated enough cash (or preferably, land) to the church when he sent his son to them.
The problem is that when some of these sons had sons of their own, they wanted to pass those lands to their sons... and the Church wanted to keep those lands. This caused schisms between the Church and the lords who supported the Church. So the solution was to require celibacy. Then those lordlings could not have sons inherit those lands. If they recognized an heir, then they were guilty of celibacy and the lands were forfeit to the Church (and the lordling would lose their title).
I'm not sure I explained it as well as others could... but the point is that it wasn't just about paying for the children of priests, it was about holding onto the bequests that came in exchange for appointing the sons of Lords to high office.
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C'mon. Why is it that people who are otherwise intelligent, rational thinkers suddenly turn that part of their brains off when it is time to attack Christianity?
Jesus' resurrection is also recounted in the gospels of Matthew (28:1-10) and Luke (24:1-35), passages which are present in the Codex.
Actually, the "corruptions" appear in every new Bible. They are listed in the footnotes. The King James text actually contains all of them in the text itself. This dynamic is well understood and nobody is freaking out over it.
Well, nobody who practices Christianity. It's an example of deliberate blindness to textual defects that would cause infinitely more doubt and discussion if their context was not as emotionally felt as one's relationship with one's God. These variants were never problems in the early church and they are not not in Catholicism and the Orthodox churches because there is a very long tradition among them that church fathers, even today, can transmit to their followers the ultimate meaning of God's message and effectively channel God's will through themselves. Protestants are long since severed from that tradition, and their dependence on the determinacy of the text destroys the power of their message. I'm convinced that you cannot have a good knowledge of the history of the textual transmission of the Bible and be a Protestant.
Papyrus fragments predating Siniaticus contain most of the New Testament if you look at all of them as a whole.
That's possibly true but totally irrelevant. The intrinsic reliability of a papyrus fragment is not determined by its age, and if you try to piece together a text based on nothing but papyri of completely different provenances and values you're going to get a Frankentext that looks far worse than even a comparatively late but integral and complete exemplar. I am extremely well-trained in textual criticism and I don't appreciate your snarky comments. If you want to whip out your degrees I'd be happy to compare, but don't think that passive-aggressive appeals to what you think is my lack of understanding will help you.
Paul's writings predate the gospels. They are generally accepted to be the earliest in the New Testament.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_the_Apostle#Writings
And anyway, atheism is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby. It's not like we have secret handshakes or anything.
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