A New Testament papyrus is a copy of a portion of the

New Testament The New Testament (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus, as well as events relating to Christianity in the 1st century, first-century Christianit ...

made on

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'' or ''papyruses'') can a ...

. To date, over 140 such papyri are known. In general, they are considered the earliest witnesses to the original text of the New Testament. This elite status among New Testament manuscripts only began in the 20th century. The grouping was first introduced by Caspar René Gregory, who assigned papyri texts the

Blackletter Blackletter (sometimes black letter or black-letter), also known as Gothic script, Gothic minuscule or Gothic type, was a script used throughout Western Europe from approximately 1150 until the 17th century. It continued to be commonly used for ...

character 𝔓 followed by a superscript number. This number refers not to the age of the papyrus, but to the order in which it was registered.Law 2012, p. 95 Before 1900, only 9 papyri manuscripts were known, and only one had been cited in a

critical apparatus A critical apparatus () in textual criticism of primary source material, is an organized system of notations to represent, in a single text, the complex history of that text in a concise form useful to diligent readers and scholars. The apparatu ...

( by

Constantin von Tischendorf Constantin is an Aromanian language, Aromanian, Megleno-Romanian language, Megleno-Romanian and Romanian language, Romanian male given name. It can also be a surname. For a list of notable people called Constantin, see Constantine (name). See ...

). These 9 papyri were just single fragments, except for , which consisted of a single whole leaf. The discoveries of the twentieth century brought about the earliest known New Testament manuscript fragments. Kenyon in 1912 knew 14 papyri, Aland in his first edition of ''Kurzgefasste...'' in 1963 enumerated 76 papyri, in 1989 there were 96 known papyri, and in 2008 124 papyri. As of 2021, a total of 141 papyri are known, although some of the numbers issued were later deemed to be fragments of the same original manuscript. Among the most important are the Chester Beatty Papyri: , which contains the Gospels and Acts; , which contains the Pauline epistles; and , which contains the Book of Revelation. All of these are thought to date from sometime in the third century. Also significant are the Bodmer Papyri: , which contains the Gospel of John; and , which contains the Gospels of Luke and John. These early manuscripts are more complete, allowing scholars to better examine their textual character. Not all of the manuscripts are simply New Testament texts: , , , are texts with commentaries; , , and are lectionaries; , , and are talismans; and , , , , , , and belong to other miscellaneous texts, such as writing scraps, glossaries, or songs.Nestle-Aland 1996, p. 85 Every papyrus is cited in Nestle-Aland Novum Testamentum Graece.

List of all registered New Testament papyri

* The P-numbers are the standard system of Gregory-Aland. * Dates are estimated to the year range shown. * Content is given to the nearest chapter; verses are sometimes listed. Thus, many of the papyri are small fragments, not whole chapters. For instance, contains 5 verses out of the 40 verses in John chapter 18. * Digital images are referenced with direct links to the hosting web pages. The quality and accessibility of the images is as follows:

Papyrus 1–50

Papyrus 51–100

Papyrus 101–

Distribution based on content

Note: "Early" manuscripts are manuscripts dated firmly from the fourth century or earlier. Roughly half of the papyri are "early". Some manuscripts contain content from more than one New Testament book, so the numbers above do not directly correspond to the total number of manuscripts.

Notes

References

* * Nestle-Aland, '' Novum Testamentum Graece''. 27th ed. Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 1996 * K. Aland, M. Welte, B. Köster, K. Junack, ''Kurzgefasste Liste der griechischen Handschriften des Neues Testaments'', (Berlin, New York:

Walter de Gruyter Walter de Gruyter GmbH, known as De Gruyter (), is a German scholarly publishing house specializing in academic literature. History The roots of the company go back to 1749 when Frederick the Great granted the Königliche Realschule in Be ...

, 1994), p. 3-17.
"Continuation of the Manuscript List"
'' INTF'', University of Münster. Retrieved February 4, 2010 * Nestle-Aland. '' Novum Testamentum Graece''. 27th ed. '' Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft'', Druck: 1996, p. 57-63, 684-689 * Law, David R. ''The Historical-Critical Method: A Guide for the Perplexed'', Bloomsbury Publishing, 2012.

External links

* Dr. J. Lyle Story, professor of Biblical Languages
NT Source Documents & History - Papyri
Retrieved February 27, 2020 *Seid, Timothy

''Interpreting Ancient Manuscripts.'' Retrieved June 22, 2007. * Peter M. Head

* Waltz, Robert

''A Site Inspired By: The Encyclopedia of New Testament Textual Criticism.'' Retrieved on June 22, 2007. * Willker, Wieland

Last Update: 17 April 2008. Retrieved 23 January 2008.
New Testament Transcripts Prototype
* Wieland Willker
''A Textual Commentary on the Greek Gospels: Fragmentary papyri''

Images of manuscripts

Institut für Altertumskunde
{{DEFAULTSORT:New Testament Papyri

papyri 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'' or ''papyruses'') can ...

Greek New Testament manuscripts Greek-language papyri