From Scroll to Codex: The earliest Hebrew scriptures
Until the fourth century, the standard form of a book for people was not a book at all. Rather, it was a roll—also called a scroll or bookroll—made of papyrus or animal skin on which a text was inscribed by hand. The earliest books of the Hebrew Bible survive today in scroll form. Known as the Dead Sea Scrolls, they were discovered in the Judaean Desert in the 1940s and include the Second Isaiah Scroll.
The Hebrew Bible—the thirty-nine books of the Torah, Nevi'im (Prophets), and Ketuvim (Writings)—was formed over a number of centuries. Between 500 and 900 C.E. scribes called the Masoretes established the pronunciation of words and the division of paragraphs and verses.
But the Hebrew Bible was not the only version in circulation. Many Jews and early Christians used a Greek translation, probably begun during the third century B.C.E. It was called the Septuaginta (Latin for "seventy") because according to legend, it was produced by seventy-two Jewish scholars. It included fifteen texts omitted from the Hebrew Bible and was the basis for many of the manuscripts in this exhibition.
In the first century, a new kind of publication appeared: the codex or leaf-book, a series of pages bound together at one edge and protected by covers. Its increasing popularity was directly connected to the formation of the Christian Bible. Codices made cross-referencing between biblical books much easier and were more readily portable than scrolls. These benefits appealed to Christian audiences, particularly during times of persecution.
Because Christianity emerged as a sectarian type of Judaism rather than an independent religion, the Bible of the earliest Christians was the Bible of Judaism. Two codices on display in this exhibition, the Aleppo Codex and the St. Petersburg Pentateuch, formed the basis for what became the standard text of the Hebrew Bible.
As Christianity spread throughout the Roman Empire, the codex gradually displaced the scroll as the medium for non-Christian texts as well. By the time Christianity was established as the empire's official religion in the fourth century, the codex had become standard. This was a monumental change in the history of the book, comparable to the invention of movable type in the fifteenth century or the electronic text of the modern era.
The Earliest Christian Scriptures
The Hebrew Bible—the thirty-nine books of the Torah, Nevi'im (Prophets), and Ketuvim (Writings)—was formed over a number of centuries. Between 500 and 900 C.E. scribes called the Masoretes established the pronunciation of words and the division of paragraphs and verses.
But the Hebrew Bible was not the only version in circulation. Many Jews and early Christians used a Greek translation, probably begun during the third century B.C.E. It was called the Septuaginta (Latin for "seventy") because according to legend, it was produced by seventy-two Jewish scholars. It included fifteen texts omitted from the Hebrew Bible and was the basis for many of the manuscripts in this exhibition.
In the first century, a new kind of publication appeared: the codex or leaf-book, a series of pages bound together at one edge and protected by covers. Its increasing popularity was directly connected to the formation of the Christian Bible. Codices made cross-referencing between biblical books much easier and were more readily portable than scrolls. These benefits appealed to Christian audiences, particularly during times of persecution.
Because Christianity emerged as a sectarian type of Judaism rather than an independent religion, the Bible of the earliest Christians was the Bible of Judaism. Two codices on display in this exhibition, the Aleppo Codex and the St. Petersburg Pentateuch, formed the basis for what became the standard text of the Hebrew Bible.
As Christianity spread throughout the Roman Empire, the codex gradually displaced the scroll as the medium for non-Christian texts as well. By the time Christianity was established as the empire's official religion in the fourth century, the codex had become standard. This was a monumental change in the history of the book, comparable to the invention of movable type in the fifteenth century or the electronic text of the modern era.
The Earliest Christian Scriptures
Composed in Greek, early Christian texts were not intended as "biblical" books as such but were written in response to the needs of local Christian communities. Ultimately many of these writings came to form the New Testament, including the canonical gospels attributed to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. But that was the result of a long process not imagined by their authors.
Perhaps because they relied on the scriptures of Judaism, early Christians were slow to produce writings of their own. The earliest to survive are the letters of Saint Paul (50–60 C.E.) and the Gospel according to Mark (65–70 C.E.). These were followed around 80–90 C.E. by the longer Gospels of Matthew and Luke (the latter accompanied by the Acts of the Apostles), along with a lost source that scholars call "Q," which contained sayings and parables of Jesus and some episodes from his life. Saint John's Gospel appeared around 85–95 C.E., as did the letters of James, Peter, and John; Paul's letter to the Hebrews; and the Revelation of Saint John (the Apocalypse).
Christian writings then proliferated, with more letters and revelations/apocalypses as well as a variety of gospels eventually omitted from the Christian Bible. These include the Unknown or Egerton Gospel and the Gospel of Thomas, both on display in this exhibition. Other writings have been attributed to Christians and Gnostics, a sect that sought mystical enlightenment as a means to salvation.
The Dead Sea Scrolls: Isaiah Scroll, Manuscript B
Jerusalem, The Shrine of the Book, 95.57/26B
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (owner)
MS. B (1QIsab [1Q8])
Ink on leather; 1 leaf (part of a scroll); 220 x 430mm
Bible (fragment); Hebrew
Judaean Desert, Israel; before 73 C.E.
The Second Isaiah Scroll is part of an original repository of seven found by Bedouin of the Ta'amra tribe in a cave near Khirbet Qumran, on the northwestern shore of the Dead Sea, between late 1946 and mid-1947. This scroll was one of three subsequently purchased by a Bethlehem antiquities dealer, Faidi Salahi, who in turn sold them at the end of 1947 to Prof. Eliezer Lipa Sukenik of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The first publication of the scroll in English, by Sukenik in 1955, included a short introduction, a transcription of the text, and photographs.
Additional fragments of the scroll were found scattered in the same cave (now called Cave 1) in the excavations conducted in 1949 by the Dominican scholar, Fr. Roland de Vaux, of the École Biblique et Archéologique Française, under the auspices of the Jordanian Department of Antiquities. The fragments were published in 1955 by Barthélemy and Milik.
This scroll reached us in very poor condition. Regrettably, all that survived was the upper portion of the last third of the biblical book of Isaiah, and a few fragments of the early and middle sections. Written in a Herodian (that is, the period of Jewish history from 30 B.C.E. to 70 C.E.) Hebrew script and dated to the first century C.E., the section of the scroll illustrated here contains four columns (8—11) with an average of thirty-four lines each; an estimated fourteen lines at the bottom of the scroll have been lost. It contains Isaiah 52:7—8 to 61:2; it is the best preserved of the four sheets found. The text of this Isaiah scroll is close to the fixed Masoretic text of medieval codices, but not as close as appeared at first. Some differences are minor—column 9, line 18 reads hanilvah al, while the traditional text has hanilvah el, "has joined himself to" (56:3)—while others are more significant. The word or, "light," which appears in column 8, line 22 of this scroll, for example, is missing from the Masoretic text (53:3). Conversely, the Masoretic text includes the phrase tze'u mitocha, "go out of the midst of her" (52:11) while this scroll does not. On the other hand, there are passages in the scroll that are different to the Masoretic text, but identical to the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible in circulation at the time the scroll was written: roshcha, "your head" (column 10, line 12) rather than rosho, "his head" (58:5), for example. In addition, the scroll uses the mixed "plene" or full spelling (ktiv malei) and "defective" Hebrew spelling (ktiv haser), as in the Masoretic text, rather than the plene form usually found in the other scrolls, biblical and sectarian alike, discovered in the Qumran caves between 1947 and 1956.
Apart from this scroll, parts of twenty separate copies of the book of Isaiah were found in the Qumran caves—one complete (1QIsaa) and all the others fragmentary (4Qa-r, 5QIsa)—and another manuscript in Wadi Muraba'at (MurIsa). Isaiah appears to have been the most popular biblical book of the Qumran community, after Psalms (thirty-six copies) and Deuteronomy (thirty copies). Six pesharim (sectarian commentaries) are devoted to it, and it is the most widely quoted in other scrolls. Most scholars recognize the Qumran community as a sect of Jewish separatists, perhaps a radical group of Essenes mentioned in the ancient writings of Flavius Josephus, Philo of Alexandria, and Pliny the Elder. The evident special status they accorded Isaiah—the eighth-century B.C.E. Judaean prophet who predicted the end-times—is consistent with their messianic and eschatological world-view.
The Chester Beatty Numbers and Deuteronomy Codex
Dublin, Chester Beatty Library
MS. Biblical Papyri VI (Rahlfs 963), ff. 63v, 64v
Papyrus; ff. 50; 280 x 180mm (original size 330 x 190mm)
Numbers and Deuteronomy; Greek
Fayyum or Aphroditopolis (modern Atfih)
Egypt; ca. 150 C.E.
Before the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the late 1940s, the earliest extant biblical manuscripts came from the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible known as the Septuagint, and the pages exhibited here from the Chester Beatty Numbers and Deuteronomy Codex was regarded as the oldest extant manuscript of any bible. That accolade has now passed to other manuscripts but this codex, dating from the middle of the second century C.E. (or at the very latest the beginning of the third century), is still the most extensive second-century Christian codex. It is of great interest for providing evidence of the transition from roll to codex and is among the earliest examples in the world of the codex form of book production. It is possibly the earliest book to have page numbers, which are clearly visible written in Greek letters on the folios shown.
The portion of the text shown here is Deuteronomy 4:6-23. Analysis suggests that the scribe copied the biblical text from two different rolls, as the textual characteristics of Numbers are quite different from those of Deuteronomy. The exemplars were probably of varying dates and originated from different scribal centers. The text for Numbers largely corresponds to Codex Vaticanus but the Deuteronomy text does not; it largely agrees with the much later fifth-century Freer manuscript of Deuteronomy.
The codex originally consisted of 216 pages, of which about 100 survive. It is in a very fine hand, written by an accomplished scribe, on good-quality papyrus that has been carefully prepared so that the direction of the papyrus fibers aligns correctly on each facing page. Just as medieval scribes ensured that the hair side and flesh side of vellum manuscripts matched on each opening, so this earlier scribe has ensured that the direction of the papyrus fibers match. The elegance of the script and the generous margins mark it as a superior specimen of book production demonstrating that, even before Constantine's Edict of Toleration, a Christian community in Roman Egypt could occasionally command the services of skilled professional scribes. Several other characteristics of the manuscript point to its Christian origin, particularly the abbreviations used for the "nomina sacra" or holy names, where the abbreviation for Joshua is the same as that for Jesus
The Sayings of Jesus (Logia Jesou)
Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS. Gr. th. e. 7 (P), recto and verso
Ink on papyrus; f. 1; 140-48 x 90-95mm
Gospel of Thomas (fragment); Greek
Oxyrhynchus, Egypt; third century C.E.
Jesus says "...Raise the stone and there you shall find me, split the wood and there I am." (Logion 5)
Every Christian must feel a shiver of excitement at the new vistas suggested by these words. They are a translation of one of the eight Greek sayings (logia) of Jesus surviving on the two sides of this papyrus. Each begins "Jesus says...," and though most of the material is duplicated in the canonical gospels, some is new or shows an unexpected turn of phrase:
Jesus says, "A prophet is not acceptable in his own country, nor does a physician work cures on those who know him." (Logion 6)
The papyrus derives from the Greco-Roman culture of Egypt, and was excavated in 1896–97 at Oxyrhynchus, a town about 190 kilometers south of Cairo. There, the ancient rubbish-tips have yielded the largest surviving group of papyri containing documents and literary texts from the period of the Roman Empire. Nearly five thousand Oxyrhynchus papyri have been published so far, but this has the distinction of being the first: P.Oxy.I 1. Its discoverers, the Oxford scholars B. P. Grenfell and A. S. Hunt, dated it from its script "not much later than the year 200," and rushed it into print in 1897 under the title Sayings of Our Lord. The original was given to the Bodleian Library in 1900 by the Egypt Exploration Fund, which had financed the excavation.
The nature of the text was established more fully through the discovery in 1945 at Nag Hammadi in Upper Egypt of a papyrus codex of the later fourth century which includes, among various Gnostic texts in Coptic, a complete version in Coptic of the Gospel of Thomas (Cairo, Coptic Museum, Nag Hammadi Codex II). Textual parallels reveal that the Oxyrhynchus papyrus and other fragments in fact belong to the Greek version (close, but not identical) of the apocryphal text attributed in the Coptic to "Didymos Judas Thomas": it consists entirely of sayings attributed to Jesus, without narrative. Nevertheless, the Bodleian's papyrus remains of the highest value as the major witness to the original Greek version, first composed perhaps in the mid-second century—or earlier?
Like the Coptic find, this copy of the Greek Gospel of Thomas had been written in a papyrus codex. The format is immediately evident from the continuity of text and script on both sides: it is clearly one whole leaf, relatively little damaged, which had been numbered as the eleventh folio (equivalent to pages 21-22) of its book. By contrast, an ancient roll would have been written on one side only, with the other side either blank or perhaps reused for a different text and script. The fact that this early Christian text was here written in codex form is especially significant. Unlike the roll, the codex allows immediate access to any part of the text: the reader need no longer read a text continuously, but can leaf through it quickly, maybe to find a favorite Saying in a book like this. The adoption of the new format by the early Christians may have been the decisive factor in the development of the Western form of book.
Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS. Gr. th. e. 7 (P), recto and verso
Ink on papyrus; f. 1; 140-48 x 90-95mm
Gospel of Thomas (fragment); Greek
Oxyrhynchus, Egypt; third century C.E.
Jesus says "...Raise the stone and there you shall find me, split the wood and there I am." (Logion 5)
Every Christian must feel a shiver of excitement at the new vistas suggested by these words. They are a translation of one of the eight Greek sayings (logia) of Jesus surviving on the two sides of this papyrus. Each begins "Jesus says...," and though most of the material is duplicated in the canonical gospels, some is new or shows an unexpected turn of phrase:
Jesus says, "A prophet is not acceptable in his own country, nor does a physician work cures on those who know him." (Logion 6)
The papyrus derives from the Greco-Roman culture of Egypt, and was excavated in 1896–97 at Oxyrhynchus, a town about 190 kilometers south of Cairo. There, the ancient rubbish-tips have yielded the largest surviving group of papyri containing documents and literary texts from the period of the Roman Empire. Nearly five thousand Oxyrhynchus papyri have been published so far, but this has the distinction of being the first: P.Oxy.I 1. Its discoverers, the Oxford scholars B. P. Grenfell and A. S. Hunt, dated it from its script "not much later than the year 200," and rushed it into print in 1897 under the title Sayings of Our Lord. The original was given to the Bodleian Library in 1900 by the Egypt Exploration Fund, which had financed the excavation.
The nature of the text was established more fully through the discovery in 1945 at Nag Hammadi in Upper Egypt of a papyrus codex of the later fourth century which includes, among various Gnostic texts in Coptic, a complete version in Coptic of the Gospel of Thomas (Cairo, Coptic Museum, Nag Hammadi Codex II). Textual parallels reveal that the Oxyrhynchus papyrus and other fragments in fact belong to the Greek version (close, but not identical) of the apocryphal text attributed in the Coptic to "Didymos Judas Thomas": it consists entirely of sayings attributed to Jesus, without narrative. Nevertheless, the Bodleian's papyrus remains of the highest value as the major witness to the original Greek version, first composed perhaps in the mid-second century—or earlier?
Like the Coptic find, this copy of the Greek Gospel of Thomas had been written in a papyrus codex. The format is immediately evident from the continuity of text and script on both sides: it is clearly one whole leaf, relatively little damaged, which had been numbered as the eleventh folio (equivalent to pages 21-22) of its book. By contrast, an ancient roll would have been written on one side only, with the other side either blank or perhaps reused for a different text and script. The fact that this early Christian text was here written in codex form is especially significant. Unlike the roll, the codex allows immediate access to any part of the text: the reader need no longer read a text continuously, but can leaf through it quickly, maybe to find a favorite Saying in a book like this. The adoption of the new format by the early Christians may have been the decisive factor in the development of the Western form of book.
The Washington Codex of the Minor Prophets
Washington, D.C., Freer Gallery of Art, F1916.768 (MS V), p. 37
Ink on papyrus; ff. 34 + fragments; 295 x 140mm
Minor Prophets; Greek with Coptic glosses
Egypt, Fayyum(?); third century, second half
This papyrus codex contains what is almost the oldest complete Christian copy of the Greek text of the twelve Minor Prophets (compare the more fragmentary first-century B.C.E. leather scroll from Nahal Hever). Only fragments of the first book (Hosea) are preserved, but part or whole of every page of the eleven other Minor Prophets survives. The codex was produced on papyrus of fine quality, and the scribe's work was corrected by another person against the parent manuscript with meticulous care.
Thirty-four leaves of the codex survive in some form. Based on how much of Hosea is lost at the beginning, the codex was almost certainly originally formed from twenty-four sheets of papyrus, folded and bound as a single quire (gathering) to make a ninety-six-page codex. After the end of Malachi, a fragmentary colophon of sorts in a different, later hand names the work ("Prophets and...[?]") and notes "(it is) complete." This may serve to set the Minor Prophets off from the work that follows on the last preserved page of the codex. This text survives only in fragments, and more may have originally stood at the end of the manuscript. It was written, perhaps in the early fourth century, by a scribe different from the one who wrote the Minor Prophets (whose hand is, however, similar to that of some of the marginal notations). This text contains verbatim quotes from the books of Isaiah and Ezekiel (the latter in the version of Symmachus) surrounded (where the writer's sense can be followed) by development of the theme of the "new Jerusalem" of Revelation 21.
Indications both within the text and in one set of marginal notations of independence from the known Greek translations of the Hebrew scriptures suggest that the direct influence of the Hebrew is likely in some cases. A more certain linguistic influence is provided by the Coptic glosses that line many of the left, right, and bottom margins of fourteen pages (and probably originally many more, as one or more margins are lost entirely on a large number of pages).
The codex's ancient home is not known. Judging by the Sahidic (Upper Egyptian) dialect of the Coptic glosses, it may not have been the Fayyum, despite the fact it was acquired there. Wherever it was kept, a succession of people with close knowledge of the biblical books concerned had access to it and helped shape its text. Whether these were individual owners or members of a community in whose library the book was kept cannot be known. In its passage from a purely Greek production to a work adapted for use for preaching in Egyptian (one explanation for the Coptic glosses) the codex is a contemporary witness to the spread of Christianity in third- and fourth-century Egypt, from the Hellenized cultural centers in the Nile Delta and Valley into the native-speaking population.
The codex of the Minor Prophets was acquired in Egypt's Fayyum region by David Askren, a resident American missionary, and formed part of a large consignment of papyri that he sold through the Cairo antiquities dealer Maurice Nahman. These were purchased in 1916 by Charles Lang Freer in partnership with J. P. Morgan Jr., who (per agreement) took all the Coptic texts to the library founded by his father in New York. Freer received the lone Greek item, the Minor Prophets
Washington, D.C., Freer Gallery of Art, F1916.768 (MS V), p. 37
Ink on papyrus; ff. 34 + fragments; 295 x 140mm
Minor Prophets; Greek with Coptic glosses
Egypt, Fayyum(?); third century, second half
This papyrus codex contains what is almost the oldest complete Christian copy of the Greek text of the twelve Minor Prophets (compare the more fragmentary first-century B.C.E. leather scroll from Nahal Hever). Only fragments of the first book (Hosea) are preserved, but part or whole of every page of the eleven other Minor Prophets survives. The codex was produced on papyrus of fine quality, and the scribe's work was corrected by another person against the parent manuscript with meticulous care.
Thirty-four leaves of the codex survive in some form. Based on how much of Hosea is lost at the beginning, the codex was almost certainly originally formed from twenty-four sheets of papyrus, folded and bound as a single quire (gathering) to make a ninety-six-page codex. After the end of Malachi, a fragmentary colophon of sorts in a different, later hand names the work ("Prophets and...[?]") and notes "(it is) complete." This may serve to set the Minor Prophets off from the work that follows on the last preserved page of the codex. This text survives only in fragments, and more may have originally stood at the end of the manuscript. It was written, perhaps in the early fourth century, by a scribe different from the one who wrote the Minor Prophets (whose hand is, however, similar to that of some of the marginal notations). This text contains verbatim quotes from the books of Isaiah and Ezekiel (the latter in the version of Symmachus) surrounded (where the writer's sense can be followed) by development of the theme of the "new Jerusalem" of Revelation 21.
Indications both within the text and in one set of marginal notations of independence from the known Greek translations of the Hebrew scriptures suggest that the direct influence of the Hebrew is likely in some cases. A more certain linguistic influence is provided by the Coptic glosses that line many of the left, right, and bottom margins of fourteen pages (and probably originally many more, as one or more margins are lost entirely on a large number of pages).
The codex's ancient home is not known. Judging by the Sahidic (Upper Egyptian) dialect of the Coptic glosses, it may not have been the Fayyum, despite the fact it was acquired there. Wherever it was kept, a succession of people with close knowledge of the biblical books concerned had access to it and helped shape its text. Whether these were individual owners or members of a community in whose library the book was kept cannot be known. In its passage from a purely Greek production to a work adapted for use for preaching in Egyptian (one explanation for the Coptic glosses) the codex is a contemporary witness to the spread of Christianity in third- and fourth-century Egypt, from the Hellenized cultural centers in the Nile Delta and Valley into the native-speaking population.
The codex of the Minor Prophets was acquired in Egypt's Fayyum region by David Askren, a resident American missionary, and formed part of a large consignment of papyri that he sold through the Cairo antiquities dealer Maurice Nahman. These were purchased in 1916 by Charles Lang Freer in partnership with J. P. Morgan Jr., who (per agreement) took all the Coptic texts to the library founded by his father in New York. Freer received the lone Greek item, the Minor Prophets