P52 papyrus

Description

P52 is the code name of a fragment of papyrus preserved at the John Rylands Library of Manchester. Written in old Greek and of reduced size (9 cm out of 6 cm), it contains on its recto and its back of the extracts of the Gospel of Jean (respectively verses 31 to 33 and 37 to 38 of chapter 18).

History

Discovered in Egypt at the beginning of the 20th century, probably at the time of archaeological excavations on the famous site of Oxyrhynque, it is acquired in 1920 by Bernard P. Grenfell. In 1934, whereas it carries out the sorting of old man Greek papyruses on behalf of the library John Rylands, the professor C.H. Roberts of the university of Oxford (England) falls on this piece of papyrus which it very quickly recognizes as being an extract of the Évangile according to Jean. He will publish his first conclusions in 1936 off under the title “Year Unpublished Fragment the Fourth Gospel in the John Rylands Library”.

Dating and its importance

Roberts, after meticulous analysis of the writing, dates the fragment from first half of the second century of the Christian era. Doubtless in the neighborhoods of the year 125. Although at the present time the polemic on this subject remains, the majority of the specialists confirm from now on the dating of Roberts. P52 thus seems the extract of the the oldest New Testament in our possession any confused language.

He is written in the form of Codex (not roller) which was at the time the most used vehicle of transmission of the writings.

The importance of this fragment is that it proves the existence and the diffusion of the Gospel of Jean as of first half of the second century after Jesus Christ. Taking into account the time necessary between the drafting of the original, that of the copies and their diffusions of the place of origin (doubtless Éphèse in Turkey) until into High Egypt, the researchers estimate that the original earlier has being written 30 to 35 years.

Unfortunately the text of P52 is so short that it does not allow us the comparison with full versions of the same Gospel appeared later on.

External bonds

Site of the Library John Rylands in Manchester
formation of the biblical texts: [[New Testament]. By Michel Quesnel, director of the department of research at the catholic Institute of Paris.]

Random links: