nukular

Probably not. But the library is a good place to start, if not try interlibrary loan. Nonetheless, it should be noted that Ehrman's book is not leisure reading.

worldling

Would you happen to know what these materials are, Vinnie? TIA.

Legion

Unfortunately no. You might be able to find an on-line site that attempts to cover some of the same material (I haven't found one yet, but I'd be interested if anyone knows of any off the top of their head), but it still won't be anywhere near the quality of what Ehrman has done. As nukular suggested, I recommend the inter-library loan route (unless your library has a copy) and just skim the parts you find interesting; it's organized well enough that you should be able to do that without much trouble.

Vinnie

Several ancient originals have already been mentioned.

The page in Crossan on HJ is 20. I believe the letter found may be an autograph. Not sure why anyone would make a copy of such a letter so...

DougP

I dont know, how about The Commentaries on teh Gallic Wars or the Commentaries on the Punic Wars, they were written before christianity came about and they are still in their entire forms. Thanks Julius :-D

Malachi151

You fail to see the real irony in this statement.

Do you know WHY so many other books are less wel preserved than they could be? Because THE CHRISTIANS BURNED THEM!

Hey, yeah, the Bible is the best preserved text because.... WE BURNED THE LIBRARY OF ALEXANDRIA!



And BTW its not, as has already been said. In fact I think the oldest copy we have of it is from the 1200s.

Any text that becomes a religious icon and which the followers of take as part of their mission to destroy all other stexts, would of course be well preserved in general though.

But seriously though, back to the destruction aspect.

We know FOR A FACT, that the Roman Catholic Church and the Holy Roman Empire took on the position by the 500s CE that all books that contradicted the Holy Bible that they put together, were to be destroyed, this included other non canon gospels.

We can't really say that "Christian texts" are well preserved, just these specific Roman State texts, and make no mistake, that is what the Bible is, a Roman State text.

The offical practice of Christians from the 400s though about the 1700s was to destroy the texts of any culture they encountered. Look at all the texts that were destroyed by the Catholic Church in South America, they completely eliminated all of the texts and knowledge of like 3 or 4 major civilizations.

They destroyed the texts of the pre-Christian British, the texts of the Greeks, the texts of the pagan Romans, the texts of the non-canon Christains, the texts fo every Europena culture they came across.

Of course in that situation we don't have many preserved texts... :banghead:

Vinnie

12th century for a Bible? What about Codex Vaticanus and Sinaiticus? I believe we have some fragments from the second and third centuries as well.

Vinnie

Malachi151

I meant complete in one text.

lpetrich

That's an overstatement, Malachi151. Some pagan stuff did survive over the centuries, but in much smaller amounts than such favorites as the Bible, Church Fathers, hymnbooks, and saint biographies.

Vinnie

How complete? I repeat:

What about Codex Vaticanus and Sinaiticus.

Vinnie