The Oxyrhynchus Gospels are two fragmentary

manuscript A manuscript (abbreviated MS for singular and MSS for plural) was, traditionally, any document written by hand – or, once practical typewriters became available, typewritten – as opposed to mechanically printed or reproduced in ...

s discovered among the rich finds of discarded papyri at Oxyrhynchus in Egypt. They throw light on early

non-canonical The adjective canonical is applied in many contexts to mean "according to the canon" the standard, rule or primary source that is accepted as authoritative for the body of knowledge or literature in that context. In mathematics, "canonical example ...

Gospel Gospel originally meant the Christian message (" the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words a ...

traditions.

Oxyrhynchus 840

Oxyrhynchus 840 (P. Oxy. V 840), found in 1905, is a single small

vellum parchment Vellum is prepared animal skin or membrane, typically used as writing material. Parchment is another term for this material, from which vellum is sometimes distinguished, when it is made from calfskin, as opposed to that made from other animal ...

leaf with 45 lines of text written on both sides in a tiny neat hand that dates it to the 4th century, almost square, less than 10 cm across. It is kept at the Bodleian Library, MS. Gr. th. g. 11 (P). The text probably predates 200, but no more is determinable from this evidence. In his introduction in ''The Complete Gospels'', Philip Sellew notes that this fragment was likely a

talisman A talisman is any object ascribed with religious or magical powers intended to protect, heal, or harm individuals for whom they are made. Talismans are often portable objects carried on someone in a variety of ways, but can also be installed perm ...

text, kept as an amulet, perhaps worn around the neck. Michael J. Kruger who did his PhD dissertation on this fragment concludes that this could not be an amulet but rather a miniature codex. The text itself has been dated to the first half of the second century. Sellew calls it "similar to the New Testament gospels in its style and tone." The fragment begins with the end of a warning to an evildoer who plans ahead, yet fails to take the next life into account. There follows sections of a narrative unparalleled in any other known gospel tradition, about Jesus' encounter with "a Pharisee, a leading priest" who tries to order Jesus and the disciples out of the Temple as ritually unclean. Jesus responds by contrasting ritual cleanliness, gotten by bathing with water used by dogs and pigs, like a harlot, against the life-giving water that comes down from heaven in baptism. Jesus is called "

Savior Savior or Saviour may refer to: *A person who helps people achieve salvation, or saves them from something Religion * Mahdi, the prophesied redeemer of Islam who will rule for seven, nine or nineteen years * Maitreya * Messiah, a saviour or l ...

" ( el, Σωτήρ), which is rare in the New Testament, but not unparalleled. The author of the fragment also believes that laymen have to change their clothes to enter the temple, for which there is no other evidence. The author is distinctly hostile to Judaism, but as he knows little about it, the text is presumably not from Judea; the author's vague grasp of details of

Temple A temple (from the Latin ) is a building reserved for spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. Religions which erect temples include Christianity (whose temples are typically called churches), Hinduism (whose temples ...

rituals have suggested a

Johannine Johannine literature is the collection of New Testament works that are traditionally attributed to John the Apostle, John the Evangelist, or to the Johannine community. They are usually dated to the period , with a minority of scholars such as Jo ...

circle, perhaps in Syria.

Oxyrhynchus 1224

Oxyrhynchus 1224 (P. Oxy. X 1224), now at the Bodleian Library, MS. Gr. th. e. 8 (P), consists of two small

papyrus Papyrus ( ) is a material similar to thick paper that was used in ancient times as a writing surface. It was made from the pith of the papyrus plant, '' Cyperus papyrus'', a wetland sedge. ''Papyrus'' (plural: ''papyri'') can also refer to a ...

fragments from the late 3rd or early 4th century. It contains six passages, each about a sentence. Two of the longer ones are parallel to Mark 2:17 and Luke 9:50, but the differences in phrasing show they are textually independent of the Gospels. A precise date for composition is unknown; 50 is possible, though a date of around 150 AD. is more widely accepted by scholars.Craig A. Evans, Ph.D., Fabricating Jesus: How Modern Scholars Distort the Gospels, p. 61

John Dominic Crossan John Dominic Crossan (born 17 February 1934) is an Irish-American New Testament scholar, historian of early Christianity, former Catholic priest who was a prominent member of the Jesus Seminar, and emeritus professor at DePaul University. His res ...

notes the mutilated condition in his introduction to the fragmentary text in ''The Complete Gospels'' resulting in highly conjectural reconstructions of the text, which, however, "does not seem to be dependent on the New Testament gospels.... As an independent gospel, it belongs, insofar as its fragmentary state allows us to see, not with discourse gospels involving the risen Jesus (e.g., the '' Secret Book of James'' and the ''

Gospel of Mary The Gospel of Mary is a non-canonical text discovered in 1896 in a 5th-century papyrus codex written in Sahidic Coptic. This Berlin Codex was purchased in Cairo by German diplomat Carl Reinhardt. Although the work is popularly known as the Go ...

''), but with sayings gospels involving the earthly Jesus (e.g.,

Q document The Q source (also called Q document(s), Q Gospel, or Q; from german: Quelle, meaning "source") is a hypothetical written collection of primarily Jesus' sayings (λόγια : ). Q is part of the common material found in the Gospels of Matthew ...

and the ''

Gospel of Thomas The Gospel of Thomas (also known as the Coptic Gospel of Thomas) is an extra-canonical sayings gospel. It was discovered near Nag Hammadi, Egypt, in December 1945 among a group of books known as the Nag Hammadi library. Scholars speculate ...

''). Crossan suggests that the document might have been written as early as the mid-first century.

References

External links

Early Christian Writings:
Oxyrhynchus 840

translation by Henry Sweet Barclay ''(Internet Archive)''

Oxyrhynchus 1224

translation ''(Internet Archive)'' 2nd-century Christian texts Agrapha of Jesus and apocryphal fragments Gospels Biblical manuscripts 3rd-century biblical manuscripts 4th-century biblical manuscripts Bodleian Library collection Texts in Koine Greek

Oxyrhynchus 840

Oxyrhynchus 1224

See also

References

Further reading

External links