Codex Sinaiticus: Old Testament (Facsimile)

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but practiced in separate writing rooms scriptoria: rooms in monasteries or libraries dedicated to copying manuscripts; (2) it may be that the headings original: superscriptions in Codex Vaticanus¹ were added after it had passed outside the original writing room to some other place. These are real possibilities, and regarding the latter, attention may be directed to Dr. Karl Dziatzko's Investigations into Selected Chapters of Ancient Bookmaking original: Untersuchungen über ausgewählte Kapitel des antiken Buchwesens, especially to his seventh chapter, "The Influence of the Scroll Form on the Codex Form" original: Die Einwirkung der Rollenform auf die Codexform. In this, he adopts the view that the custom of adding page headings original: Seitenüberschriften did not exist before the end of the fourth century. He points out that the Codex Vaticanus represents a transitional period in which the addition was not made by the original scribe. His theory seems to be supported by the evidence of the headings in the Codex Sinaiticus (see p. xxi).

It will, however, probably not be denied that there is, despite all other possibilities, a probability that the Codex Sinaiticus and the Codex Vaticanus belonged to the same writing room. Where, then, should we look for it? It was suggested above that the fact that the Egyptian Papyrus Rylands 28 agrees with the two codices in practically the only handwriting original: palaeographical peculiarities which they present must be seen as pointing to Egypt until contradictory evidence is discovered. So far, however, from refuting this suggestion, Dr. Rahlfs—who investigated the historical and critical evidence for the origin original: provenance and date of the Codex Vaticanus in the Reports of the Royal Society of Sciences in Göttingen original: Nachrichten der königlichen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen²—has strongly confirmed it.

He has pointed out that the Codex Vaticanus agrees in a remarkable way with the list of scriptural books given by Athanasius Athanasius was the Bishop of Alexandria in the 4th century in the Easter letter for the year 367. The points of agreement against other authorities are these: (1) In the Old Testament, the book of Esther is not reckoned? among the books which are canonical original: κανονιζόμενα, but only among those? which are to be read original: ἀναγινωσκόμενα. (2) In the New Testament, in Codex Vaticanus, the book of Hebrews is placed between the "Epistles of the Captivity" the letters Paul wrote while in prison: Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and Philemon and the "Pastoral Epistles" 1 and 2 Timothy, and Titus. This agrees with the Greek and Syriac text of the Easter letter; but the Sahidic version an early Egyptian Coptic translation, agreeing with the usual Sahidic biblical text, places it between

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Corinthians and Galatians. It is argued that this represents a return to an old local use in Egypt within a Sahidic text. Curiously enough, Codex Vaticanus has a continuous numbering for the sections in the epistles letters, which is currently out of order in a way that shows it was copied from a manuscript which placed Hebrews after Galatians. This is not quite the same as the Sahidic, but Dr. Rahlfs thinks it is near enough to justify the view that the Codex Vaticanus is an attempt to carry out Athanasius's view regarding the order of the books, and that the text of the original model original: archetype, which was being modified, belonged to the old Egyptian type represented by the Sahidic version. He therefore argues that the Codex Vaticanus comes from Alexandria and dates to at least as late as 367.

It is, of course, plain that this is not a decisive argument: the parallel between the Sahidic text of Athanasius and that implied by the numbering in Codex Vaticanus is not quite perfect; and the textual facts regarding Athanasius are by no means clear. Nevertheless, when all these points have been weighed, it will probably be agreed that enough remains to justify the statement that, as our knowledge stands today, there is a presumption in favor of Egypt as the original home of the Codex Vaticanus. One may also, without venturing too far into the field of textual criticism, draw attention to a further point. The Psalms quoted in the Coptic text of the Pistis Sophia a 3rd or 4th-century Gnostic text have an extraordinary resemblance to the text of the Codex Sinaiticus. In Professor Harnack's phrase,¹ "This text stands as close to Codex Sinaiticus original: Cod. Sinait. as a twin brother" original: Dieser Text steht dem Cod. Sinait. wie ein Zwillingsbruder nahe. This fact may be allowed to weigh in favor of an Egyptian origin. Formerly, one would have regarded Egypt, in this context, as synonymous with Alexandria. However, in view of the wealth of Greek papyri found at Oxyrhynchus and other places far from Alexandria, it is necessary to hesitate; though it probably remains true that splendid volumes, such as the Codex Sinaiticus and the Codex Vaticanus, are more likely to have been produced in Alexandria than in the country higher up the Nile.

It remains to consider the connection between the two codices and "Euthalius" an ancient scholar credited with dividing the New Testament into sections. The simplest way of dealing with...

Footnotes

¹ It is not necessary here to discuss the difficult question of whether all the headings original: superscriptions in Codex Vaticanus are by the same hand, or if the scribe who wrote Acts original: πράξεις should be distinguished from the rest.
² "Philological-Historical Class," 1899, pp. 72-9.
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¹ See his A Jewish-Christian Psalter (Texts and Investigations original: Ein jüdisch-christliches Psalmbuch (Texte und Untersuchungen, xxxv. 4), p. 13. He gives a further reference to Rahlfs, The Berlin Manuscript of the Sahidic Psalter original: Die Berliner Handschrift des sahidischen Psalters; but the textual relations between Codex Sinaiticus original: ℵ and the Sahidic version form too complicated a question to be used as the basis for any argument regarding the origin of the Codex Sinaiticus.