Doug Shaver

I'm not sure, and forgive me if I don't review the entire thread to confirm one way or the other. I vaguely remember somebody (not necessarily in this thread) saying that because of its age, it is possible that the fragment of (apparently) John's gospel called P52 is from the original. To my knowledge, it is in fact not impossible, but it is exceedingly unlikely, and even if it is original, I am aware of no way that this could be confirmed with any certainty.

With that (barely) possible exception, it is certain that no New Testament manuscript is an original -- or, as Roger notes, what is called the autograph.

Of course the time lapse between the oldest extant copies and the autographs depends, obviously, on when the autograph was produced, and that depends in turn on who actually produced it, since whoever it was had to be alive at the time in order to write it.

Further complicating everything is that some documents in their present form are known to be composites of two or more earlier documents, not necessarily by the same writer and not necessarily contemporaneous.

Helpmabob

Hi TomboyMom - Note that in the UK, we get a P45 when we leave a job – it summarises our tax position. Personally in your opening sentence, I thought you might mean Psalm 45 & 46. I remain unaware of the contents of the P45 and P46 to which you refer – have you a link please? The origin, foundation, bedrock and author of the Christian faith (the clue is in the name) happens to be Christ Himself. The Bible tells inter alia about Christ and His purpose, but is not in itself divine. Christians are not followers of the Bible, but followers of Christ. You do not need to be a scholar to come to Him, which is perhaps why the P45 and P46 you mention are not so vital to Christians as to the atheist.Under those circumstances you'd be convinced then?

Hi NZSkep - They don’t contradict each other on all points. For example, the Jews, Muslims and Christians all use the same Old Testament. And they all agree that there is a God, and that Jesus lived a good life. That’s a fair amount of consensus, suggesting perhaps a perfectly solid undercurrent.

Hi Waning Moon Conrad - This perfectly amplifies my point that it is not the condition of the media itself that is important, but the truth that is being reported within. The news has happens and moves on and is subsequently entirely unaffected by the means used to report that news.I think God desires simple trust, not a subjection to harsh economic analysis.

Roger Pearse

P45 and P46 are early papyrus manuscripts of the New Testament. p45 is important since it is a fragment of a single page containing a bit of John 18, and dates to ca. 125 AD (plus or minus 25 years; lots of recent attempts to redate it later, tho). P46 is a manuscript of some 80+ leaves containing Paul's letters, dated to around 200 AD.

These together with many others form part of the manuscript base of the bible (so I am unsure why these are singled out here).

Origen makes a similar point in Contra Celsum book 1 chapter 9.

No such events took place, either at the Council of Nicaea or anywhere else.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

gregor

Roger
Are you meaning P52 for the dating (125 - 175) and John excerpt?

yalla

Presuming Roger did mean P52, his comment that there are recent attempts to date it [considerably] later than the aforementioned c125 reminds me that there was a reference some months ago to an article which examined the time frame for the dating and suggested that the, shall I say "orthodox"?, habit of confidently asserting it to be early 2nd century was optimistic.
There was a link to the article here on IIDB somewhere.
I tried to find it but failed.
Would anybody be able to conjure it up?
Toto usually waves his wand in such matters, I would appreciate it if someone could link to it.
cheers
yalla

Iasion

Greetings,

Some details in Wiki on Schnelle on Schmidt on P52 :

"Udo Schnelle writes on the palaeographic dating: "Cf. A. Schmidt, 'Zwei Ammerkungen zu P. Ryl. III 457,' APF 35 (1989) 11-12, who dates P52 in the period around 170 AD (+/- 25) on the basis of a comparison with P Chester Beatty X, and thus excludes an early dating around ca. 125 for P52! The result for the dating of p52 is that the 125 AD period, usually given with extraordinary certitude, must now be stated with some doubt. One must at least allow a margin of 25 years, that one could think of a dating around 150." (The History and Theology of the New Testament Writings, p. 477 n. 119)"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rylands...ry_Papyrus_P52

It's only Wiki - perhaps someone can confirm APF 35 (1989) 11-12 says this?

Iasion

yalla

I found, sort of, the article re the dating of P52.
It's referred to by S.C Carlson in a thread titled Pushback on P52.
The article is titled "Use and Abuse of P52".
Unfortunately I can't access more than that provided in the thread.
But what I found interesting is this comment from the author [via a circuitous route] Brett Nongbri:
"any serious consideration of the window of possible dates for P52 must include dates in the later second and early third centuries. Thus, P52 cannot be used as evidence to silence other debates about the existence (or non-existence) of the Gospel of John in the first half of the second century."

So caution would be advised when dating the NT texts.

Roger Pearse

Indeed I did. P45 is something else, of course. Incipient dyslexia...

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Roger Pearse

These were indeed the two people that I was thinking of.

Udo Schnelle's comment was referred to in a footnote in Metzger's "Text of the NT"; I presumed it was exceptional.

Nongbri's paper came out a couple of years ago. The argument seemed to my ignorant eyes to consist mainly of attacking all paleographical dates, with this conclusion steadily in mind, so I really didn't care for it. If paleographical dates need to be reassessed (which was his point) then it should start with uncontroversial stuff and work out from there. I don't know how his paper has been generally received.

All the best,

Roger Pearse