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World's oldest Bible to be available online

sparkchaser

sparkchaser

Administrator and Stuntman
Staff member
Saw this on Slashdot.

The British Museum is putting online the remaining fragments of the world's oldest Bible. The Codex Sinaiticus dates to the fourth century CE and was discovered in the 19th century. Very few people have seen it due to its fragile state — that and the fact that parts of it are in collections scattered across the globe. It'll give scholars and those interested their first chance to take a look. However, I've got a feeling that some people won't be happy to see it online, since it makes no mention of the resurrection, which is a central part of Christian belief.

On Thursday the Book of Psalms and the Gospel According to Mark will go live at the Codex Sinaiticus site. The plan is to have all the material up, with translations and commentaries, a year from now.
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I look forward to see what other ancient documents make it to the interwebs.
 
I love looking at old documents like this. I took a class on the witch hunts of Salem, MA during undergrad and we had access to a website with primary documents from the initial witch trials. It was very cool to look at, even online.
 
". . . some people won't be happy . . ." éh?

That's a safe bet, Resurrection or no Resurrection! :lol:
 
impalpable said:
I love looking at old documents like this. I took a class on the witch hunts of Salem, MA during undergrad and we had access to a website with primary documents from the initial witch trials. It was very cool to look at, even online.
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I think it's great that so many old documents are being made available online.
 
Peder said:
". . . some people won't be happy . . ." éh?

That's a safe bet, Resurrection or no Resurrection! :lol:
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True:lol:

But that statement bothers me just the same. Why would people be unhappy that a fragment of this Bible didn't mention the Resurrection? Hello, it OLD and it's a fragment...I'd be happy any of it survived at all, not angry it didn't contain a certain part of Scripture. Seems to me whoever said that was just stirring the waters...
 
abecedarian said:
True:lol:

But that statement bothers me just the same. Why would people be unhappy that a fragment of this Bible didn't mention the Resurrection? Hello, it OLD and it's a fragment...I'd be happy any of it survived at all, not angry it didn't contain a certain part of Scripture. Seems to me whoever said that was just stirring the waters...
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I agree. Unless the resurrection stuff mentioned should be on a page but isn't.
 
sparkchaser said:
I agree. Unless the resurrection stuff mentioned should be on a page but isn't.
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That's another thing.. this thing about chapter and verse didn't come about for a long time.. I'd have to check but I'm thinking it wasn't until sometime during the Reformation. I'd need to know which book the fragment is from and what else in on the page to know whether to get upset.
 
abecedarian said:
That's another thing.. this thing about chapter and verse didn't come about for a long time.. I'd have to check but I'm thinking it wasn't until sometime during the Reformation. I'd need to know which book the fragment is from and what else in on the page to know whether to get upset.
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Doesn't changing the order of the sentences/paragraphs change the meaning?
 
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. I think that the pages that contain resurrection passages aren't there because they didn't survive.

At any rate, it will be interesting to see how much the Bible has changed over the past 1600 years. Well, the New Testament.
 
The one thing we can all be assured of is the fact that meanings will be twisted, and moaning will be heard from all sides as to what is or is not included. And since there is no way of knowing what was lost, or deliberately included or deliberately excluded we can take no meaning from said inclusion or exclusion.
 
pontalba said:
The one thing we can all be assured of is the fact that meanings will be twisted, and moaning will be heard from all sides as to what is or is not included. And since there is no way of knowing what was lost, or deliberately included or deliberately excluded we can take no meaning from said inclusion or exclusion.
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Sure but can't this version, since it is closer to the original chronologically speaking, be considered more valid than our modern versions?
 
sparkchaser said:
Sure but can't this version, since it is closer to the original chronologically speaking, be considered more valid than our modern versions?
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It depends, logically speaking one would assume so, however there were divisive elements in Christianity at the time and the found versions could or might not be of a sect or group that was deliberately withholding original scripture.
We just don't have any way of knowing that.
 
pontalba said:
It depends, logically speaking one would assume so, however there were divisive elements in Christianity at the time and the found versions could or might not be of a sect or group that was deliberately withholding original scripture.
We just don't have any way of knowing that.
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True but we don't know if our versions are any "truer".
 
pontalba said:
The modern versions jive with the portions of The Dead Sea Scrolls that were found in 1947.

Other than that God states that He would never allow His Word to die. Of course that is a matter of faith. Either you have faith or you don't.
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Sure but that's the Old Testament. The one I'm talking about has New Testament material.
 
sparkchaser said:
Sure but that's the Old Testament. The one I'm talking about has New Testament material.
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The Psalms overlap.

And my previous post regarding the 4th Century.....
...however there were divisive elements in Christianity at the time and the found versions could or might not be of a sect or group that was deliberately withholding original scripture.
We just don't have any way of knowing that.
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still holds true.
 
The Psalms aren't one of the books of the New Testament. Unless you're using a different Bible than everyone else.
 
sparkchaser said:
The Psalms aren't one of the books of the New Testament. Unless you're using a different Bible than everyone else.
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/patiently/
If you read the link I provided however Psalms is included in the list of found bits at the site by the Dead Sea. That is what I was referring to in my post.

EDIT: Sparky, note Psalms mentioned in your article link and mine....that is the connection.
 
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