Please Support the Bible Translation Work of the Updated American Standard Version (UASV)
$5.00
Uncial 04
Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus, at the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, Département des manuscrits, Grec 9, fol. 60r (rotated)
Name
Ephraemi rescriptus
Sign
C
Text
Old and New Testament
Date
5th century CE
Script
Greek
Now at
Bibliothèque nationale de France
Size
33 × 27 cm (13.0 × 10.6 in)
Type
mixture types of text
Category
II
Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus (Paris, National Library of France, Greek 9; Gregory-Aland[1] no. C or 04, von Soden δ 3) is a fifth-century Greek manuscript of the Bible,[2] sometimes referred to as one of the four great uncials[3] (see Codices Sinaiticus,[4]Alexandrinus[5] and Vaticanus).[6] The manuscript is not intact: in its current condition, Codex C contains material from every New Testament book except 2 Thessalonians and 2 John; however, only six books of the Greek Old Testament are represented. It is not known whether 2 Thessalonians and 2 John were excluded on purpose, or whether no fragment of either epistle happened to survive.[7]
The manuscript is called Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus because (a) it is a codex,[8] i.e., a handmade book; (b) its parchment has been recycled; originally inscribed with scriptural texts, the pages were washed (removing most of the ink) and reused for another text, and (c) the text that was written on the recycled pages, in the 12th century, consisted of Greek translations of 38 treatises composed by Ephrem the Syrian,[9] a prominent theologian of the mid-4th century. Manuscripts of this sort, consisting of recycled pages, are known as palimpsests.[10] The later, “upper”, text was written in the 12th century.
The lower text of the palimpsest was deciphered by biblical scholar and palaeographer Constantin von Tischendorf[11] in 1840–1843 and was edited by him in 1843–1845. Currently it is housed in the Bibliothèque nationale de France (Grec 9) in Paris.[12]
Description
209 leaves of the codex are extant; 145 belong to the New Testament and 64 to the Old Testament. The codex measures 12¼ in/31.4-32.5 cm by 9 in/25.6-26.4 cm. The text is written in a single column per page, 40–46 lines per page, on parchment leaves. The letters are medium-sized uncials.[13]
The uncial writing is continuous, with the punctuation consisting only of a single point, as in codices Alexandrinus and Vaticanus. The capitals at the beginning sections stand out in the margin as in codices Codex Alexandrinus and Codex Basilensis.[14] Iota and upsilon, which in Alexandrinus and many other manuscripts have two dots over them (diaeresis) when they commence a syllable – sometimes only one dot – have in the Codex Ephraemi a small straight line in their place.[15] The breathings and accents were added by a later hand.[16] The nomina sacra[17] tend to be contracted into three-letter forms rather than the more common two-letter forms.[18]
Before the Gospel of Luke and the Gospel of John, a list of κεφαλαια (chapters) is preserved (and one may deduce that the manuscript contained such lists for Matthew and Mark when it was in pristine condition), but their τιτλοι (titles of chapters) were apparently not placed in the upper margin of the page as in Codex Alexandrinus. It is possible, however, that the upper margins once contained τιτλοι in red ink which has completely faded away; another possibility is that the upper portions of the pages have been over trimmed. The text of the Gospels is accompanied by marginal notations indicating the Ammonian Sections. Probably when the codex was pristine, numerals representing the Eusebian Canons were also present in red ink, which has completely vanished. There are no systematic divisions in the other books.
The Pericope Adulterae (John 7:53–8:11) was almost certainly not included in Codex C when it was in pristine condition. The two leaves which contained John 7:3–8:34 are not extant. By counting the lines and calculating how much space would be required to include John 7:53-8:11, it can be demonstrated that, barring a large omission elsewhere in the text on the missing leaves, they did not contain sufficient space to include the passage.[19] The text of Mark 16:9–20 is included in Codex C on folio 148r.
It is difficult to determine whether Luke 22:43–44 Christ’s agony at Gethsemane was originally in the text of Codex C; the leaves that contained the surrounding verses are not extant.[20] Mark 15:28 is not included.
Acts of the Apostles: 1:1–2; 4:3–5:34; 6:8; 10:43–13:1; 16:37–20:10; 21:31–22:20; 23:18–24:15; 26:19–27:16; 28:5-fin.;
Epistle to the Romans: 1:1–3; 2:5–3:21; 9:6–10:15; 11:31–13:10;
First Epistle to the Corinthians: 1:1–2; 7:18–9:6; 13:8–15:40;
Second Epistle to the Corinthians: 1:1–2; 10:8-fin.
Epistle to the Galatians: 1:1–20
Epistle to the Ephesians: 1:1–2:18; 4:17-fin.
Epistle to the Philippians: 1:1–22; 3:5-fin.
Epistle to the Colossians: 1:1–2;
First Epistle to the Thessalonians: 1:1; 2:9-fin.;
Second Epistle to the Thessalonians entirely
First Epistle to Timothy: 1:1–3:9; 5:20-fin.;
Second Epistle to Timothy: 1:1–2;
Epistle to Titus: 1:1–2
Epistle to Philemon: 1–2
Epistle to the Hebrews: 1:1–2:4; 7:26–9:15; 10:24–12:15;
Epistle of James: 1:1–2; 4:2-fin.
First Epistle of Peter: 1:1–2; 4:5-fin.;
Second Epistle of Peter: 1:1;
First Epistle of John: 1:1–2; 4:3-fin.
Second Epistle of John entirely;
Third Epistle of John: 1–2;
Epistle of Jude: 1–2;
Book of Revelation: 1:1–2; 3:20–5:14; 7:14–17; 8:5–9:16; 10:10–11:3; 16:13–18:2; 19:5-fin.
Text-type
The New Testament text of Codex C is primarily Alexandrian, although the strength and character of its testimony varies from book to book. It is a weak Byzantine witness in Matthew, a weak Alexandrian witness in Mark, and a strong Alexandrian witness in John. In Luke, its textual character is unclear.[21] Westcott-Hort classified it as mixed;[22] Hermann von Soden classified it as in the Alexandrian text-type.[23]
According to Kurt Aland it agrees with the Byzantine text-type 87 times in the Gospels, 13 times in the Acts, 29 times in Paul, and 16 times in the Catholic epistles. It agrees with the Nestle-Aland text 66 times (Gospels), 38 (Acts), 104 (Paul), and 41 (Cath.). It has 50 independent or distinctive readings in the Gospels, 11 in Acts, 17 in Paul, and 14 in the Catholic epistles. Aland placed the text of the codex in Category II. According to the Claremont Profile Method its text is mixed in Luke 1, Luke 10, and Luke 20.
In the Apocalypse, Codex Ephraemi is a witness of the same form of the text as Alexandrinus.
Unusual Interpolations
In Matthew 8:13 there is additional text (see Luke 7:10): και υποστρεψας ο εκατονταρχος εις τον οικον αυτου εν αυτη τη ωρα ευρεν τον παιδα υγιαινοντα (and when the centurion returned to the house in that hour, he found the slave well) – a reading also found in codices (Sinaiticus, N), Θ, f1, 545, g1, syrh.
In Matthew 27:49, Codex C contains added text: ἄλλος δὲ λαβὼν λόγχην ἒνυξεν αὐτοῦ τὴν πλευράν, καὶ ἐξῆλθεν ὖδορ καὶ αἳμα (the other took a spear and pierced His side, and immediately came out water and blood). This reading was derived from John 19:34 and occurs in other manuscripts of the Alexandrian text-type (א, B, L, Γ, 1010, 1293, pc, vgmss).
In Acts 14:19 there is additional text: και διαλεγομενων αυτων παρρησια επεισαν τους οχλους αποστηναι απ’ αυτων λεγοντες, οτι ουδεν αληθες λεγουσιν αλλα παντα ψευδονται for και πεισαντης τους οχλους. Similar readings appear in codices 6, 36, 81, 104, 326, 452, 945, 1175, 1739.
Some Corrections
In Matthew 11:2 its original text has the reading δια (by) as well as codices א, B, D, P, W, Z, Δ, Θ, 0233, f13, 33, but the third corrector C3 changed it into δυο (two) — as in codices L, f1, Byz
In Acts 20:28 it reads του κυριου (of the Lord) along with the manuscripts P74 D E Ψ 33 36 453 945 1739 1891, but the corrector added και του Θεου (and God) as have P 049 326 1241 2492 and the Byzantine manuscripts.
In 1 Corinthians 12:9 the original scribe omits the phrase εν τω αυτω πνευματι (in His spirit), but it was added by the third corrector (C3).
In 1 Timothy 3:16 it reads ὅς ἐφανερώθη (He was manifested), but the second corrector (C2) changed it into θεός ἐφανερώθη (God was manifested);
In James 1:22 it reads λογου (of the word) as the majority of manuscripts, but the second corrector (C2) corrected into νομου (of the law), which is read by manuscripts such as 88, 621, 1067, 1852.
Scrivener’s facsimile with text of 1 Tim 3:15–16
Other Textual Variants
Acts 15:23 Codex C has the unique reading γραψαντης δια χειρος αυτων επιστολην περιεχουσαν ταδε (they wrote by their hands the letter containing this), which is not supported by any other Greek manuscripts, though it is supported by versions: ar, c, gig, w, geo. The majority of the Greek manuscripts read γραψαντης δια χειρος αυτων ταδε (they wrote this by their hands), the Alexandrian manuscripts read γραψαντης δια χειρος αυτων (wrote by their hands).
Romans 16:24
Verse is omitted along with Codex Sinaiticus A B 5 81 263 623 1739 1838 1962 2127 itz vgww copsa,bo ethro Origenlat)
Matthew 22:10 – γαμος ] αγαμος; some manuscripts read νυμφων (codices א, B, L, 0138, 892, 1010);
Mark 10:35 – οι υιοι Ζεβεδαιου (the sons of Zebedee) ] οι δυο υιοι Ζεβεδαιου (the two sons of Zebedee); the reading is supported by Codex Vaticanus and the Coptic version;
Romans 16:15 – Ιουλιαν, Νηρεα ] Ιουνιαν, Νηρεα; the reading is supported only by Codex Boernerianus (Greek text).
1 Corinthians 2:1 – μαρτυριον (testimony) ] μυστηριον (secret); the reading is supported by P46, א, Α, 88, 436, ita,r, syrp, copbo; other manuscripts read σωτηριον (savior).
1 Corinthians 7:5 – τη νηστεια και τη προσευχη (fasting and prayer) ] τη προσευχη (prayer); the reading is supported by 11, 46, א*, A, B, C, D, G, P, Ψ, 33, 81, 104, 181, 629, 630, 1739, 1877, 1881, 1962, it vg, cop, arm, eth. Other manuscripts read τη προσευχη και νηστεια (prayer and fasting).
James 1:12 – ο κυριος (the Lord) ] κυριος (Lord); some manuscripts have ο θεος (God) (4, 33, 2816vid, 323, 945, 1739, vg, syrp), others omit this word (א, A, B, Ψ, 81, ff, co).
2 Timothy 4:10 – Γαλατιαν ] Γαλλιαν – the reading is supported by Sinaiticus, 81, 104, 326, 436.
Revelation 1:5 – λουσαντι ημας εκ (washed us from) ] λυσαντι ημας εκ (freed us from) — as have manuscripts: P18, אc, A, 2814, 2020, 2081.
History
The place where Codex C was written sometime in the 400’s is unknown; Tischendorf tentatively suggested Egypt. Tischendorf also proposed that two scribes produced the manuscript—one for the Old Testament and one for the New Testament. Subsequent research has indicated that a third scribe may have been involved. The text has been corrected by three correctors, designated by C1, C2, and C3 (Tischendorf designated them by C*, C**, and C***). Sometimes they are designated by Ca, Cb, and Cc. The first corrector (C1) worked in a scriptorium,[24] probably in the 500’s, but the exact location where any of the correctors worked is unknown. The latter’s corrections are not numerous, except in the Book of Sirach.[25]
The third and last corrector (C3) wrote in the 800’s, possibly in Constantinople. He conformed readings of the codex to ecclesiastical use, inserting many accents, breathings, and vocal notes. He also added liturgical directions in the margin, and worked extensively on the codex. The codex was recycled in the twelfth century.
After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, the codex was brought to Florence by an émigré scholar. It belonged to Niccolo Ridolpho († 1550) Cardinal of Florence. After his death it was probably bought by Piero Strozzi, an Italian military leader, for Catherine de’ Medici. Catherine brought it to France as part of her dowry, and from the Bourbon royal library it came to rest in the Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris. The manuscript was bound in 1602.
The older writing was first noticed by Pierre Allix, a Protestant pastor. Jean Boivin, supervisor of the Royal Library, made the first extracts of various readings of the codex (under the notation of Paris 9) to Ludolph Küster, who published Mill’s New Testament in 1710. In 1834–1835 potassium ferricyanide was used to bring out faded or eradicated ink, which had the effect of defacing the vellum from green and blue to black and brown.
The first collation of the New Testament was made in 1716 by Johann Jakob Wettstein for Richard Bentley, who intended to prepare a new edition of the Novum Testamentum Graece. According to Bentley’s correspondence, it took two hours to read one page, and Bentley paid Wettstein £50. This collation was used by Wettstein in his own Greek New Testament of 1751–1752. Wettstein also made the first description of the codex. Wettstein only occasionally examined the text of the Old Testament, but he did not publish them. Various editors made occasional extracts from the manuscript, but Tischendorf was the first who read it completely (Old and New Testament). Tischendorf gained an international reputation when he published the Greek New Testament text in 1843 and the Old Testament in 1845. Although Tischendorf worked by eye alone, his deciphering of the palimpsest’s text was remarkably accurate. The torn condition of many folios, and the ghostly traces of the text overlaid by the later one, made the decipherment extremely difficult. Even with modern aids like ultraviolet photography, not all the text is securely legible. Robert W. Lyon published a list of corrections of Tischendorf’s edition in 1959. This was also an imperfect work.
According to Edward Miller (1886), Codex C was produced “in the light of the most intellectual period of the early Church.”
According to Frederic Kenyon “the original manuscript contained the whole Greek Bible, but only scattered leaves of it were used by the scribe of St. Ephraem’s works, and the rest was probably destroyed.”
Swete examined only the text of the Old Testament. According to him the original order of the Old Testament cannot be reconstructed; the scribe who converted the manuscript into a palimpsest used the leaves for his new text without regard to their original arrangement. The original manuscript was not a single volume.
The manuscript is cited in all critical editions of the Greek New Testament (UBS3, UBS4, NA26, NA27). In NA27 it belongs to the witnesses consistently cited of the first order. Even readings of correctors (C1, C2, and C3) are regularly cited in critical editions (as in Sinaiticus, Vaticanus, Bezae, and Claromontanus).
SCROLL THROUGH DIFFERENT CATEGORIES BELOW
BIBLE TRANSLATION AND TEXTUAL CRITICISM
BIBLICAL STUDIES / INTERPRETATION
EARLY CHRISTIANITY
CHRISTIAN APOLOGETIC EVANGELISM
TECHNOLOGY
CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY
CHILDREN’S BOOKS
PRAYER
TEENS-YOUTH-ADOLESCENCE-JUVENILE
CHRISTIAN LIVING
CHRISTIAN COMMENTARIES
CHRISTIAN DEVOTIONALS
CHURCH HEALTH, GROWTH, AND HISTORY
Apocalyptic-Eschatology [End Times]
CHRISTIAN FICTION
[1] A biblical manuscript is any handwritten copy of a portion of the text of the Bible. Biblical manuscripts vary in size from tiny scrolls containing individual verses of the Jewish scriptures (see Tefillin) to huge polyglot codices (multi-lingual books) containing both the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) and the New Testament, as well as extracanonical works.
[2] Aland, Kurt; Aland, Barbara (1995). The Text of the New Testament: An Introduction to the Critical Editions and to the Theory and Practice of Modern Textual Criticism. Erroll F. Rhodes (trans.). Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. p. 109.
[3] The great uncial codices or four great uncials are the only remaining uncial codices that contain (or originally contained) the entire text of the Bible (Old and New Testament) in Greek.
[4] The Codex Sinaiticus (Shelfmarks and references: London, British Library, Add MS 43725; Gregory-Aland nº א [Aleph] or 01, [Soden δ 2]), or “Sinai Bible”, is one of the four great uncial codices, ancient, handwritten copies of a Christian Bible in Greek. The codex is a historical treasure.The codex is an Alexandrian text-type manuscript written in uncial letters on parchment and dated paleographically to the mid-4th century.
[5] The Codex Alexandrinus (London, British Library, Royal MS 1. D. V-VIII; Gregory-Aland no.
[6] The Codex Vaticanus (The Vatican, Bibl. Vat., Vat. gr. 1209; no. B or 03 Gregory-Aland, δ 1 von Soden) is one of the oldest copies of the Bible, one of the four great uncial codices. The Codex is named after its place of conservation in the Vatican Library, where it has been kept since at least the 15th century. It is written on 759 leaves of vellum in uncial letters and has been dated palaeographically to the 4th century [300-325 C.E.].
[7] McDonald, Lee Martin (2017). The Formation of the Biblical Canon: Volume 2: The New Testament: Its Authority and Canonicity. London: Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 244.
[8] The codex (plural codices ) was the historical ancestor of the modern book. Instead of being composed of sheets of paper, it used sheets of vellum, papyrus, or other materials.
[9] Ephrem the Syrian (Classical Syriac: ܡܪܝ ܐܦܪܝܡ ܣܘܪܝܝܐ, romanized: Mār ʾAp̄rêm Sūryāyā, Classical Syriac pronunciation: [mɑr ʔafˈrem surˈjɑjɑ]; Koinē Greek: Ἐφραὶμ ὁ Σῦρος, romanized: Efrém o Sýros; Latin: Ephraem Syrus; c. 306 – 373), also known as Saint Ephrem, Ephrem of Edessa or Aprem of Nisibis, was a prominent Christian theologian and writer, who is revered as one of the most notable hymnographers of Eastern Christianity. He was born in Nisibis, served as a deacon and later lived in Edessa. Ephrem is venerated as a saint by all traditional Churches.
[10] In textual studies, a palimpsest () is a manuscript page, either from a scroll or a book, from which the text has been scraped or washed off so that the page can be reused for another document. Parchment was made of lamb, calf, or goat kid skin and was expensive and not readily available, so in the interest of economy a page was often re-used by scraping off the previous writing.
[11] Lobegott Friedrich Constantin (von) Tischendorf (18 January 1815 – 7 December 1874) was a German biblical scholar. In 1844, he discovered the world’s oldest and most complete Bible dated to around the mid-4th century and called Codex Sinaiticus after the St.
Uncial is a majuscule script (written entirely in capital letters) commonly used from the 4th to 8th centuries AD by Latin and Greek scribes. Uncial letters were used to write Greek and Latin, as well as Gothic and Coptic.
[14] Codex Basilensis, designated by Ee, 07 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering) or ε 55 (von Soden), is a Greek uncial manuscript of the four Gospels, dated paleographically to the 8th century. The codex is located, as its name indicates, in Basel University Library.
[15] Scrivener, Frederick Henry Ambrose; Edward Miller (1894). A Plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament. Vol. 1 (4 ed.). London: George Bell & Sons. p. 123.
[16] Gregory, Caspar René (1900). Textkritik des Neuen Testaments. Vol. 1. Leipzig: J.C. Hinrichs’sche Buchhandlung. p. 41.
[17] 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 Holy Scripture. A nomen sacrum consists of two or more letters from the original word spanned by an overline.
[18] Gregory, Caspar René (1900). Textkritik des Neuen Testaments. Vol. 1. Leipzig: J.C. Hinrichs’sche Buchhandlung. p. 43.
Πατήρ usually was abbreviated to ΠΗΡ, Σταυρωθῇ to ΣΤΘΗ. See Larry W. Hurtado, The Earliest Christian Artifacts, Wm. Eerdmans, 2006, p. 134.
[19] Bruce M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft: Stuttgart 2001), p. 187.
[20] The Greek New Testament, ed. K. Aland, A. Black, C. M. Martini, B. M. Metzger, and A. Wikgren, in cooperation with INTF, United Bible Societies, 3rd edition, (Stuttgart 1983), p. 305. [UBS3]
[22] Brooke Foss Westcott and Fenton John Anthony Hort, The New Testament in the Original Greek. Introduction; Appendix (Cambridge: Macmillan, 1881), p. 152
[23] Wisse, Frederik (1982). The profile method for the classification and evaluation of manuscript evidence, as Applied to the Continuous Greek Text of the Gospel of Luke. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. p. 52.
[24] Scriptorium ( (listen)), literally “a place for writing”, is commonly used to refer to a room in medieval European monasteries devoted to the writing, copying and illuminating of manuscripts commonly handled by monastic scribes. However, lay scribes and illuminators from outside the monastery also assisted the clerical scribes.
[25] The The Wisdom of Jesus the Son of Sirach, also called the Wisdom of Sirach, Book of Sirach, Ben Sira, or simply Sirach (), and also known as the Book of Ecclesiasticus (; abbreviated Ecclus.), is a Jewish work, originally in Hebrew, of ethical teachings, from approximately 200 to 175 BC, written by the Jewish scribe Ben Sira of Jerusalem, on the inspiration of his father Joshua son of Sirach, sometimes called Jesus son of Sirach or Yeshua ben Eliezer ben Sira. In Egypt, it was translated into Greek by the author’s unnamed grandson, who added a prologue.
209 leaves of the codex are extant; 145 belong to the New Testament and 64 to the Old Testament. The codex measures 12¼ in/31.4-32.5 cm by 9 in/25.6-26.4 cm. The text is written in a single column per page, 40–46 lines per page, on parchment leaves. The letters are medium-sized uncials.[13]
but their τιτλοι (titles of chapters) were apparently not placed in the upper margin of the page as in Codex Alexandrinus. It is possible, however, that the upper margins once contained τιτλοι in red ink which has completely faded away; another possibility is that the upper portions of the pages have been over trimmed. The text of the Gospels is accompanied by marginal notations indicating the Ammonian Sections. Probably when the codex was pristine, numerals representing the Eusebian Canons were also present in red ink, which has completely vanished. There are no systematic divisions in the other books.
