Tuesday, March 21, 2017

Sinaiticus Is Not a Forgery - Setting the Stage

          Codex Sinaiticus, one of the most important early manuscripts of the New Testament, is over-rated.  Even though it is often heralded as The World’s Oldest Bible,” having been produced in the mid-300’s, its text is so riddled with scribal errors that many much younger manuscripts can be shown to be more accurate – whether one uses the Byzantine Text, or the primarily Alexandrian Nestle-Aland compilation, as the basis of comparison.  It does not really deserve the description that so often appears in Bible footnotes that cite “The most reliable manuscripts” when referring to its readings.  Its text-critical importance lies in that it constitutes early confirmation of readings found in Codex Vaticanus, which, besides being slightly earlier, was written much more carefully. 
          In the past few years, a conspiracy theory has developed about Codex Sinaiticus, consisting of the claim that the manuscript is not from the 300’s but is instead from the 1800’s – specifically, that it was made by Constantine Simonides, who was both a scholar and a notorious forger.  Before introducing his claims and the evidence against them, let’s review today the basic history of how Codex Sinaiticus was brought to the attention of European researchers.

Saint Catherine's Monastery
(Photo:  Joonas Plaan)
          In May of 1844, the textual critic Constantine Tischendorf visited Saint Catherine’s Monastery on Mount Sinai, and there, “in the middle of the great hall,” he saw “a large and wide basket full of old parchments.”  According to Tischendorf, the librarian informed him that the monks had “already committed to the flames” two heaps of papers like these.  Tischendorf examined the contents of the basket, and found there “a considerable number of sheets of a copy of the Old Testament in Greek,” and he was then allowed to take “a third of these parchments, or about forty-three sheets,” which, if it had not been for his intervention, “were destined for the fire.” 
          Those 43 sheets [more accurately, leaves] containing text from the Greek Old Testament were published in 1846 by Tischendorf as “Codex Frederico-Augustanus,” so-named after Frederick, king of Saxony, who financed his travels.  The pages themselves were entrusted to the library at the University of Leipzig, where they remain to this day.

          That, at least, is the way Tischendorf tells the tale, in a special chapter of his little book When Were Our Gospels Written?.  The monks of the monastery later insisted that Tischendorf’s account was wrong, that the basket was simply a basket used for carrying detached manuscript-pages, and that they were not disposing of the ancient contents of their valuable and extensive library by tossing legible parchments into any fire.  Indeed, J. Rendel Harris, who visited the monastery later in the 1800’s, claimed to have seen the basket to which Tischendorf referred, and after investigating the matter, he considered the monks’ protests to be entirely justified, and regarded Tischendorf’s version of events as an amusing myth.   (Tischendorf’s view of the monks at Saint Catherine’s Monastery may be deduced from a comment that he wrote in a letter in 1844, when he was at the monastery:  “I have now been in the St. Catherine Monastery eight days.  But oh, these monks!  If I had the military strength and power I should be doing a good deed if I threw this rabble over the walls.”) 
          Tischendorf might have lied so as to depict himself as a sort of hero, rescuing the manuscript in the nick of time.  Or he might have misunderstood what he had been told, and misunderstood why the pages were in the basket – like someone who sees a library’s book-return box for the first time and assumes that people are throwing away their books in a small dumpster.  In any event, he returned to the monastery in 1853, and found no more intact pages of the manuscript – only a fragment from the book of Genesis. 
          In 1859, Tischendorf again visited Saint Catherine’s monastery, hoping to find the rest of the manuscript of which he had acquired 43 sheets in 1844.  (Although he had published the contents of those pages, he had not revealed where they had been acquired.)  According to Tischendorf’s account, on February 7 of 1859, “the steward of the convent” showed Tischendorf “a bulky kind of volume wrapped up in a red cloth,” and when it was opened, Tischendorf recognized that its pages included some of the pages that he had seen, but not obtained, in the basket in 1844:  
          “I unrolled the cover, and discovered, to my great surprise, not only those very fragments which, fifteen years before, I had taken out of the basket, but also other parts of the Old Testament, the New Testament complete, and, in addition, the Epistle of Barnabas and a part of the Pastor of Hermas.” (These last mentioned books are compositions from the early 100’s.)  Inwardly Tischendorf was “full of joy,” but he strategically asked in a casual way if he could borrow the manuscript to look at it more closely.  His request was granted, and once he was alone with the manuscript, “though my lamp was dim and the night cold,” he writes, “I sat down at once to transcribe the Epistle of Barnabas.” 
          Not long after this, the manuscript was transferred to Cairo, and it was eventually deposited in the Russian library at Saint Petersburg, where it was regarded as a gift to Czar Alexander II.  Tischendorf studied the manuscript there.  A sample of its script was released in 1860, and the full contents were published in 1862, in a special Greek font that resembled the uncial handwriting of the copyists.  Once again, Tischendorf’s account of how this happened contradicts the claims of the monastery’s monks, for some of them insisted that Tischendorf had promised to return the manuscript upon request. 
          A note to this effect, with Tischendorf’s signature, is still extant at the monastery; in it, Tischendorf states that there has been delivered to him “as a loan an ancient manuscript of both Testaments, being the property of the aforesaid monastery,” and “This manuscript I promise to return, undamaged and in a good state of preservation, to the Holy Confraternity of Mount Sinai at its earliest request.”  Eventually, instead of the manuscript, the monks of the monastery received a donation and a collection of medallion-awards. 

          This brings us up to the time when Constantine Simonides enters the picture.  In a letter that was published in The Guardian newspaper on September 3, 1862, Simonides claimed that he had produced Codex Sinaiticus in 1839, while he had resided at Mount Athos (an important monastery-center in Greece which has a vast manuscript-library), using, as its basis, the contents of a printed copy of the text of Codex Alexandrinus, three manuscripts from Mount Athos, and a printed Greek Bible published by Zosima, based in Moscow.  He claimed to have obtained the required amount of parchment from an ancient codex at Mount Athos that consisted almost entirely of blank pages.  
          Simonides claimed that after finishing this large project, he donated it to a retired church-leader, Constantius, whose home was on the Greek island of Antigonus.  Constantius, in turn (again – it is claimed by Simonides), after sending a contribution to Simonides, donated the codex to Saint Catherine’s monastery, and that, according to Simonides, is how its pages turned up there in 1844, when its pages were first encountered by Tischendorf.  Simonides also claimed that he himself had visited Saint Catherine’s monastery in 1844 and 1852, and had seen the codex there.

          With all this in the background, we shall test Simonides’ claims.  But first, it should be pointed out that some well-distributed versions of the history of how Tischendorf encountered Codex Sinaiticus are far from accurate.  Let us remove these boulders from the field today, or at least one of them.  Specifically, James White, in his book The King James Only Controversy, on pages 56-57 of the 2009 edition, describes Tischendorf’s 1844 visit to Saint Catherine’s monastery very differently.  White claims that Tischendorf “noticed some parchment scraps in a basket that was to be used to stoke the fires in the monastery’s oven.”  And in a footnote, White says, “If you’re wondering why these scraps would be in a trash can, the answer is that ancient books, be they made of papyri or vellum, decay over time.  Bits of pages, the final or initial pages in a codex, were very subject to loss; they would, over time, find their way to the floor and need to be picked up or pose a real fire hazard.”
          In some online comments,  White categorically denies that Codex Sinaiticus was found in a trash can.  Yet, with equal confidence, he describes Tischendorf’s 1844 visit to Saint Catherine’s monastery as follows:  

          “So, they have someone from the outside world there amongst them; that makes them a little bit nervous, and so there’s this monk, and he’s just, you know, carrying a basket with him with some old scraps of stuff that they don’t need anymore, and von Tischendorf looks in there and realizes, ‘That’s a page from the Septuagint.’  And he stops him, and he goes, you know, ‘This freakish guy from Europe is grabbing my trash can, and he’s all excited about the trash in my trash can, and he’s telling me, “Don’t burn this!  Don’t burn this!”’” 
          White continues, moving on to describe the 1859 visit:  “On the final night of his visit, in 1859, he decided to be a nice guy.  And he had published a version of the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament.  So he had an extra copy with him. And he decided to be nice to his steward, who had been taking care of him, and he said, ‘I’d like to give this to you as a present.  And the monk looked at it, and said, ‘Oh, I have one of these.  Let me show it to you.  So the monk takes him into his room, and in what we would call a closet, he reaches up, and he pulls something down that is wrapped in a red cloth.  Now, monks do not wrap garbage in red cloths.  They don’t keep garbage wrapped in red cloths in their closets.  And so he pulls this thing out, and he unwraps the red cloth, and there von Tischendorf is staring at Codex Sinaiticus.”    

          In the same lecture, White says about Codex Sinaiticus:  “It was not found in a trash can, despite how many times D. A. Waite or Dave Hunt or anybody else says that it was.  It was not.”
          It is no credit to D. A. Carson, John MacArthur, Mike Baird, Norman Geisler, and the others who have recommended White’s book, that this twisted version of events not only made it through the initial editing of The King James Only Controversy in 1995, but also survived to be reprinted in the second edition.  For in real life, what White refers to as “scraps” were the 43 parchment sheets that Tischendorf published as Codex Frederico-Augustanus.  That is, they were (and still are) pages from the Old Testament portion of Codex Sinaiticus.   

The stamp of Leipzig University Library
is still on the pages of Codex Sinaiticus
that Tischendorf took in 1844
.
           White, in a 2006 online article, says, “Any “scholar” who can’t even get this story straight is not really worth reading, to be honest.”  Okay, if you say so, professor.  It is White who needs to get the story straight:  he repeatedly affirms that Tischendorf found “scraps” in a “trash can” and then says that Codex Sinaiticus was not found in a trash can.  He does not realize that the pages which Tischendorf saw in a basket were pages from Codex Sinaiticus!  One can say that Tischendorf did not find Codex Sinaiticus in a trash can (because it was a basket, not a trash can), but one cannot say that Tischendorf found pages of the Septuagint in a trash can, and then say that he did not find pages from Codex Sinaiticus in a trash can, because those pages from the Septuagint that Tischendorf obtained in 1844 are pages of Codex Sinaiticus.
          This error has been spread by James White and Alpha & Omega Ministries for over 20 years!  He should openly acknowledge his mistake, and withdraw his error from future circulation, and give a public apology to Douglas Stauffer, who White mentions in the following statement:  “Sinaiticus was not found in a trash can. It was clearly prized by its owner, and well cared for.  The only reason Stauffer and those like him continue to repeat the story is for its impact upon those ignorant of history and unlikely to actually look into it for themselves.  But for anyone serious about the subject, such dishonesty destroys one’s credibility.”
          Considering that it is James White who is mixed up, such a confidently worded statement destroys his credibility and makes him a laughingstock.  But he should not bear the blame alone, for his colleagues and co-workers have allowed his error to circulate for over 20 years, either because they, too, are ignorant about the history of how Tischendorf first encountered pages from Codex Sinaiticus, or because they find such a combination of bravado and ignorance highly entertaining. 
           With all that in the background, we shall focus on the claims of Constantine Simonides, and the evidence against them, in the next post.



19 comments:

  1. Hi James,

    The James White "any scholar" section is well done.

    ============

    It is ironic that you can disassemble the fabrications of 1844 (to a degree, he actually stole the 43 leaves from an intact volume), recognizing the Tischendorf conspiracy theory, yet still accept Tischendorf fabrications about the later visits in the 1850s.

    ===========

    "according to Simonides, is how its pages turned up there in a basket in 1844"

    - the basket story was a total fabrication. We know from Uspensky that the ms was whole. And the basket was not referenced by Simonides (which is what your quote says). It was created by Tischendorf in 1859, 15 years after the first theft.

    ==========

    "the contents of a printed copy of the text of Codex Alexandrinus..."

    - this was written by William Kelly in 1870 in the Bible Treasury article. Afaik that is the only place Alexandrinus is mentioned.

    "withdrawn his error" - withdraw

    ==========

    Steven Avery
    Asheville, NC

    ReplyDelete
  2. James,
    You never cease to amaze me! In a fascinating manner you describe how the manuscript was found, both from Tischendorf's account and from the monks perspective. You continue with the account of the forger, I am on the edge of my seat! Then for whatever reason, I would guess, a personal dislike for James White and your opposition to anyone who favors an Alexandrian text, you launch an attack on White and others, that has no bearing on the forgery issue at all.
    I often find your knowledge on textual criticism and especially the versions and early fathers enlightening! Yet, I struggle with reading your blog because I know that somehow you will randomly attack the Alexandrian text or its supporters in almost every article, regardless of the content.

    Tim

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  3. So long as a discussion focuses on and attempts to correct erroneous information, there should be no problem in pointing out the source of the error and calling for correction. The same would apply to issues regarding methodological or theological presuppositions that may have influenced one's particular manner or form of presentation.

    Discussions from either side need to avoid ad hominem comments that attack the person rather than his or her methodology, presuppositions, or statements of plain and clear factual error.

    ReplyDelete
  4. And Timothy Joseph, first I want to acknowledge that there are times that James Snapp uses the "liar" description too easily. For what might be perceived as repeated, avoidable and flagrant errors, a type of reckless disregard for the textual truth. Larry Hurtado called him out on using the liar tab on his blog a year ago, and I agree with Hurtado, and have shared my concern over too easy "liar" usage with James Snapp. And I think he may be slower to use the word today.

    There are other times that what is involved is, as Maurice Robinson says, is "plain and clear factual error".

    And I don't believe James Snapp has any special animus involving James Whites. None whatsoever.

    What has occurred for 30 years involving James White and the Sinaiticus trash-can is truly an exceptional case of scholastic dishonesty and false accusation. The boomerang attack.

    Understand this statement used as part of a sustained and pubilc attack on the integrity and honesty of others:

    > James White
    . “Any “scholar” who can’t even get this story straight is not really worth reading, to be honest.

    When in fact, James White has not got this story straight for over 30+ years! Through two editions of his book. And from his own blunder White has attacked the honesty and integrity of David Hunt (now passed away,thus the needed apology would be very late), Douglass Stauffer and Jack Moorman and likely others. And James White and his AOMIN staff have simply censored and ignored the many attempts to request a simple correction, whether made in private or public.

    This is why James Snapp took the time to review this above. At this point it has become a remarkable and exceptional case of dishonesty and railing accusation and strikes at the heart of real discourse. Note that it just incidentally has to do with Sinaiticus.

    And I heartily applaud the review by James Snapp above.

    Steven Avery
    SART - Sinaiticus Authenticity Research Team

    ReplyDelete
  5. The title of the post has a major error. Simonides never claimed this manuscript was a "forgery". It was a replica designed as a gift to the czar, in hope or expectation of receiving a printing press, in view of the cache of unpublished mss at Mt. Athos. The evidence supports this assertion, although, to be fair, it is remotely possible that the goal was deception.

    "Forgery is the process of making, adapting, or imitating objects, statistics, or documents with the intent to deceive for the sake of altering the public perception, or to earn profit by selling the forged item. Copies, studio replicas, and reproductions are not considered forgeries, though they may later become forgeries through knowing and willful misrepresentations."

    A replica is not a forgery.

    When Simonides published the first Greek Barnabas edition in 1843 (when you hear that Sinaiticus was the first Greek Barnabas, a chuckle is appropriate.) it was published in Smyrna. Afaik, no printing press at Mt. Athos.

    So the fundamental claim from James is way off base.

    Steven

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  6. To be fair, we could say that Tischendorf turned the replica into a forgery. He tested out the 43 leaves of 1844 and saw that pristine white parchment, supple and easy turning like a Life magazine, in "phenomenally good condition" (Helen Shenton of the British Library) could be pawned off to a gullible textual establishment as a manuscript that was 1500 years. And, when the full Tischendorf story was unraveled, even have suffered from heavy use century after century. Oh, and not a word missing from the New Testament!

    Amazing. Bridge for sale. Conspiracy theory.

    Even before the Before and After colouring. Even before the coincidence of Simonides publishing Hermas and Barnabas. Even before the Claromontanus-->Sinaiticus homoeoteleutons. And the mountain of "coincidences".

    So in a very difficult sense, you could say that Tischendorf morphed the replica into a forgery.

    A better question, less charged, would be whether Sinaiticus is an authentic antiquity (c. 350 AD.) manuscript.

    Ok, looking forward to the next installment.

    Steven Avery

    Steven

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  7. Timothy Joseph,

    The correction of White's pretzelated version of events is relevant, because I intend to refer later to the portion of Codex Sinaiticus acquired by Tischendorf in 1844, and to the portion he acquired later; to those readers who believe (thanks to White) that Tischendorf only saw some "scraps" in the basket, that won't make any sense, unless they are freed of the burden of White's misinformation. So it definitely has a bearing.

    Yours in Christ,

    James Snapp, Jr.

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  8. Steven Avery,

    I appreciate your sharp eye for typo's; thanks.

    SA: "The title of the post has a major error."

    No; it does not -- but if clarification is needed, I affirm that Codex Sinaiticus is neither a forgery nor a replica from the 1800's.

    James Snapp, Jr.

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  9. Let's make one more point clear from this first post by James.

    There should not be any ambiguity about the 1844 heist of 43 leaves to Leipzig. Tischdorf took the leaves from an intact manuscript, which is consistent with what was seen by Uspensky in 1845. His phantasamogorical saved-from-burn-basket claim was a very successful lie, it was not a misunderstanding.

    Here are more reasons why:

    In 1844, Tischendorf wrote to his wife only that the leaves had come into his possession (a type of thieve's description). Without a hint of baskets or saving from fire or even any involvement of the monks. -- "ich bin in den besitzgelangt von"

    The basket and fire story did not exist anywhere until 1859, when he needed political cover for his second, more sensitive, heist.

    Tischendorf even hid the connection of the 1844 Codex Friderico-Augustanus with Sinaiticus for years after 1859. Although the scholars were able to put 2+2 together in the early 1860s.

    His supposedly loose, somewhat random, fragments were precisely five full quires. And three more folia. And, incidentally, these white parchment leafs had on them written, or were used for, the critical colophons. The colophons were needed for the aggressive early dating push. With the very last of the 43 leaves being the Esther colophon. Coincidences abound.

    Bottom line: Every element of the story of Tischendorf accidentally finding 43 leaves should be discarded. The evidence is super-clear. It was all one big fabricated story. To disguise a theft of leaves taken out of the full manuscript and to gain sympathy for his larger 1859 heist.

    And if you doubt that Tischendorf would do such a thing, read about the Archimedes Palimpsest, along with other manglings and thefts.

    Steven Avery
    Asheville, NC

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  10. Greetings!

    Readers can see my response to the three James Snapp Sinaiticus authenticity blog posts here:

    PureBibleForum
    James Snapp attempts to defend authenticity of Sinaiticu
    James Snapp #1 - Setting the Stage
    http://www.purebibleforum.com/showthread.php?468-James-Snapp-attempts-to-defend-authenticity-of-Sinaiticus&p=940#post940

    Three posts.

    While this is still a WIP, most all the points are easily handled. And a good number of the points raised, looked at carefully, actually end up favoring non-authenticity.

    ============================

    See also the new book, and ebook, just released:

    Is the 'World's Oldest Bible' A Fake?
    David W. Daniels
    http://www.chick.com/catalog/books/1442.asp
    https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10155083519476080&set=a.260636646079.149319.561561079&type=3

    Hopefully, James Snapp will grace us with a review :). James gets credit for at least making an effort to look at some of the early debate and to share various points that have been given in the effort to shore up the Tischendorf 4th century and authenticity claims.

    ============================

    Thanks!

    Steven Avery
    Dutchess County, NY
    https://www.facebook.com/groups/purebible/

    ReplyDelete
  11. James,
    There are not 176 pages in the Tischendorf theft that was brought to Leipzig in 1844, the Codex Frederico-Augustanus. There are 86 pages.

    The problem above is that you were quoting Tischendorf, instead of doing your own checking. Tischendorf wanted to obscure the fact that he had stolen five intact quires from the manuscript. Five intact quires is 80 pags, and he took 6 more, in order to get to the colophon spot in Esther.(Note that Uspensky saw an intact codex in 1845, although of course without those quires that Tischendorf had stolen in 1844.)

    More details are explained here:

    Quires - Sheets - Folia - Pages (recto and versa)
    http://www.purebibleforum.com/showthread.php?499-Quires-Sheets-Folia-Pages-(recto-and-versa)&p=995#post995

    Steven Avery
    Dutchess County, NY

    ReplyDelete
  12. Errata above: James has it as 172,not 176.
    Thannks!

    ReplyDelete
  13. James, your"correction" of "172 pages" to "43 sheets" is still the same error. 43 sheets = 172 pages.

    What you want is 86 pages, or 43 folia, or 43 leaves.

    In Feb, above, I had left you the url that would help you get this right.

    Quires - Sheets - Folia - Pages (recto and versa)
    http://www.purebibleforum.com/showthread.php?499-Quires-Sheets-Folia-Pages-(recto-and-versa)&p=995#post995

    ReplyDelete
  14. Steven,
    I see what you mean. I'll try to correct the error; Tischendorf's comment was probably mistranslated and was meant to refer to leaves rather than sheets.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Yep, mistranslation is often the source, e.g. one Russian site, the National Library has the error as well. Stanley Porter also, in his book.

    Academia.edu also needs correction:
    Sinaiticus and Simonides
    https://www.academia.edu/32044905/Sinaiticus_and_Simonides

    Now, if you can only move a bit out of the textual criticism mentality to really look at the fullness of historical and material evidences, then you can consider more real issues, rather than emphasizing pseudo-issues.

    Steven Avery
    http://www.purebibleforum.com/forumdisplay.php?65-Sinaiticus-authentic-antiquity-or-modern
    http://www.sinaiticus.net/

    ReplyDelete
  16. The Holy Spirit is said to reveal all truth
    The scriptures it is said by the Lord have been preserved for all generations.
    Thus we can know that with this truth and the Holy Spirit we can rest assured as we read scripture which is truth and that which is not

    ReplyDelete
  17. With all due respect: When are people going to realize ad hominem is not a valid way of refuting the accusations of whether Sinaiticus is a forgery? The "trashcan story" is irrelevent to the evidence that has been put forth by individuals such as Bill Cooper certainly raise suspicion that the document was "doctored". The evidence itself needs to be refuted: Scribings around worm holes, worm holes without entrance and exit egresses in the codex, 16-18th century greek language that should not be found in a 4th century document... Refute these accusations and in fact sincerely investigate these charges we due diligence and perhaps then we can have a real "conversation" regarding the rumors circulating that it is a forgery. RF

    ReplyDelete
  18. Thank you, Straysky.

    Thanks, Straysky.

    The language arguments of James Donaldson in regard to Hermas and Barnabas do show the impossibility of the early Sinaiticus date. Donaldson even has a fascinating note about how recent scholarship conjectural emendations showed up in the text of Barnabas.

    "16-18th century greek language" - anyway, much later than the proposed ancient date.

    Bill Cooper (d. 2021) did a good job on that section. Although his Sinaiticus book has to be used cautiously, he has a couple of doozies.

    Updated urls

    Sinaiticus - authentic antiquity or modern?
    https://www.purebibleforum.com/index.php?forums/sinaiticus-authentic-antiquity-or-modern.65/

    Response to James Snapp - Ten Reasons Why Sinaiticus Was Not Made By Simonides
    https://www.purebibleforum.com/index.php?threads/james-snapp-attempts-to-defend-authenticity-of-sinaiticus-multiplication-of-nothings.468/#post-940

    Posts 4-5-6.

    And I should look again at the worm hole issues.

    Steven Avery
    Dutchess County, NY USA

    ReplyDelete