Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 1 (P. Oxy. 1) is a

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 ...

fragment of the

logia The term ''logia'' ( el, λόγια), plural of ''logion'' ( el, λόγιον), is used variously in ancient writings and modern scholarship in reference to communications of divine origin. In pagan contexts, the principal meaning was "oracles", ...

of Jesus written in Greek (''Logia Iesou''). It was among the first of the

Oxyrhynchus Papyri The Oxyrhynchus Papyri are a group of manuscripts discovered during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries by papyrologists Bernard Pyne Grenfell and Arthur Surridge Hunt at an ancient rubbish dump near Oxyrhynchus in Egypt (, mo ...

discovered by Grenfell and

Hunt Hunting is the human practice of seeking, pursuing, capturing, or killing wildlife or feral animals. The most common reasons for humans to hunt are to harvest food (i.e. meat) and useful animal products (fur/ hide, bone/tusks, horn/antler, e ...

. It was discovered on the second day of excavation, 12 January 1897, in the garbage mounds in the Egyptian town of

Oxyrhynchus Oxyrhynchus (; grc-gre, Ὀξύρρυγχος, Oxýrrhynchos, sharp-nosed; ancient Egyptian ''Pr-Medjed''; cop, or , ''Pemdje''; ar, البهنسا, ''Al-Bahnasa'') is a city in Middle Egypt located about 160 km south-southwest of Cairo ...

. The fragment is dated to the early half of the 3rd century. Grenfell and Hunt originally dated the fragment between 150 and 300, but "probably not written much later than the year 200." It was later discovered to be the oldest manuscript of the

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

. __NOTOC__

Description

The manuscript was written on papyrus in codex form. The measurements of the original leaf were . The text is written in

uncial Uncial is a majuscule Glaister, Geoffrey Ashall. (1996) ''Encyclopedia of the Book''. 2nd edn. New Castle, DE, and London: Oak Knoll Press & The British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one ...

letters, with one column per page and 21 lines per page, in a reformed documentary hand.

Larry Hurtado Larry Weir Hurtado, (December 29, 1943 – November 25, 2019), was an American New Testament scholar, historian of early Christianity, and Emeritus Professor of New Testament Language, Literature, and Theology at the University of Edinburgh ( ...

, ''The Earliest Christian Artifacts'' (Wm. Eerdmans 2006), p. 228. The last line is fragmented. There is a pagination at the upper right corner (number ΙΑ = 11 on the verso). The

nomina sacra In Christian scribal practice, nomina sacra (singular: ''nomen sacrum'' from Latin ''sacred name'') is the abbreviation of several frequently occurring divine names or titles, especially in Greek manuscripts of the Bible. A nomen sacrum consists ...

are written in an abbreviated way (ΙΣ, ΘΥ, ΠΡΑ, ΑΝΩΝ).

, ''The Earliest Christian Artifacts'' (Wm. Eerdmans 2006), p. 239. According to Grenfell and Hunt, who identified this fragment only as ''Logia Iesu'' ("Sayings of Jesus"), the original manuscript contained a collection of Jesus's sayings, which were independent of the four

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 an ...

s in their present form. They classified it as non-heretical and placed the origin of its sayings as earlier than 140 A.D. They observed some parallels with the works of

Clement of Alexandria Titus Flavius Clemens, also known as Clement of Alexandria ( grc , Κλήμης ὁ Ἀλεξανδρεύς; – ), was a Christian theologian and philosopher who taught at the Catechetical School of Alexandria. Among his pupils were Origen and ...

History

Grenfell and Hunt did not realize they had discovered part of the

, as at the time there was no reference text. The only complete copy of the Gospel of Thomas was found in 1945 when a Coptic version was discovered at

Nag Hammadi Nag Hammadi ( ; ar, نجع حمادى ) is a city in Upper Egypt. It is located on the west bank of the Nile in the Qena Governorate, about north-west of Luxor. It had a population of close to 43,000 . History The town of Nag Hammadi is name ...

with a collection of early Christian

Gnostic texts Gnosticism used a number of religious texts that are preserved, in part or whole, in ancient manuscripts, or lost but mentioned critically in Patristic writings. Gnostic texts Gnostic texts preserved before 1945 Prior to the discovery at Nag H ...

, and it was only after that discovery that the text of Oxyrhynchus Papyri I was able to be attributed. The fragment contains logia (sayings) 26–28 of the Gospel of Thomas on the recto, and logia 29–33 on the verso of the leaf. with what appears as the last two sentences of logion 77 in the Nag Hammadi Coptic version included at the end of logion 30. Grenfell and Hunt also discovered another two fragments of this apocryphal Gospel: P. Oxy. 654 and P. Oxy. 655. It was discovered by Hunt on the second day of the excavations. In November 1900, P. Oxy. 1 was given to the

Bodleian Library The Bodleian Library () is the main research library of the University of Oxford, and is one of the oldest libraries in Europe. It derives its name from its founder, Sir Thomas Bodley. With over 13 million printed items, it is the second- ...

by the

Egypt Exploration Fund The Egypt Exploration Society (EES) is a British non-profit organization. The society was founded in 1882 by Amelia Edwards and Reginald Stuart Poole in order to examine and excavate in the areas of Egypt and Sudan. The intent was to study and an ...

.Bodleian Library MS.Gr.th.e.7(P)
– GPBC The fragment is housed at the Bodleian Library (Ms. Gr. th. e 7 (P)).

References

External links

P. Oxy. 1
at the Oxyrhynchus Online
Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 1
agraphos.com

P. Oxy. 1

LDAB The Leuven Database of Ancient Books (LDAB) is a resource for all ancient written literary manuscripts, from 500 BC to AD 800. It currently lists more than 16.000 Greek, Latin, Coptic, Syriac and Demotic literary texts. It is said that it "attempts ...

{{Oxyrhynchus Papyri 001 Gnostic Gospels 3rd-century manuscripts

Description

History

See also

References

Further reading

External links