Early Christian Manuscripts

A provocative book from a highly original scholar, challenging much of what we know about early Christian manuscripts In this bold and groundbreaking book, Brent Nongbri provides an up-to-date introduction to the major collections of early Christian manuscripts and demonstrates that much of what we thought we knew about these books and fragments is mistaken. While biblical scholars have expended much effort in their study of the texts contained within our earliest Christian manuscripts, there has been a surprising lack of interest in thinking about these books as material objects with individual, unique histories. We have too often ignored the ways that the antiquities market obscures our knowledge of the origins of these manuscripts. Through painstaking archival research and detailed studies of our most important collections of early Christian manuscripts, Nongbri vividly shows how the earliest Christian books are more than just carriers of texts or samples of handwriting. They are three-dimensional archaeological artifacts with fascinating stories to tell, if we’re willing to listen.

The authors of the nine essays in this collection deal with individual or certain sets of manuscripts in order to demonstrate that approach and method are both crucial and pivotal aspects for a sound investigations. Thus, the essays serve as a variety of approaches destined by their topics, but all of them concerned about acknowledged methods.

Review: "Much attention has been paid to the words of the earliest Christian canonical and extracanonical texts, yet Larry Hurtado points out that an even more telling story is being overlooked - the story of the physical texts themselves. He introduces readers to the staurogram, possibly the first representation of the cross, the nomina sacra, a textual abbreviation system, and the puzzling Christian preference for book-like texts over scrolls." "Drawing on studies by papyrologists and palaeographers as well as New Testament scholars - and including photographic plates of selected manuscripts - The Earliest Christian Artifacts examines the distinctive physical features of early Christian manuscripts, illustrating their relevance for wider inquiry into the complex origins of Christianity." -- book jacket.

The authors of the nine essays in this collection deal with individual or certain sets of manuscripts in order to demonstrate that approach and method are both crucial and pivotal aspects for a sound investigations. Thus, the essays serve as a variety of approaches destined by their topics, but all of them concerned about acknowledged methods.

Other Early Christian Gospels collects all the recently-recovered Greek manuscripts containing parts of long-lost early Christian gospels into a single volume.

In Public Reading in Early Christianity: Lectors, Manuscripts, and Sound in the Oral Delivery of John 1-4 Dan Nässelqvist examines public reading in early Christianity and presents a method of sound analysis for New Testament writings.

This book provides a comprehensive introduction to the history and development of the Latin New Testament and a user?s guide to the resources available for research and further study. The first five chapters offer a new historical synthesis, bringing together evidence from Christian authors and biblical manuscripts from earliest times to the late Middle Ages. Each witness is considered in its chronological and geographical context, to build up the bigger picture of the transmission of the text. There are chapters introducing features of Latin biblical manuscripts and examining how the Latin tradition may serve as a witness for the Greek New Testament. In addition, each book of the New Testament is considered in turn, with details of the principal witnesses and features of particular textual interest. The three main scholarly editions of the Latin New Testament (the Vetus Latina edition, the Stuttgart Vulgate, and the Oxford Vulgate) are described in detail. Information is also given about other editions and resources, enabling researchers to understand the significance of different approaches and become aware of the latest developments. The Catalogue of Manuscripts gives full details of each manuscript used in the major editions, with bibliographical references and links to sets of digital images. The Appendices include concordances for the different ways in which manuscripts are cited in scholarly literature. An extensive reference bibliography of publications on the Latin New Testament is also supplied.

Here in one volume are two of Birger Gerhardsson's much-debated works on the transmission of tradition in Rabbinic Judaism and early Christianity. In Memory and Manuscript (1961), Gerhardsson explores the way in which Jewish rabbis during the first Christian centuries preserved and passed on their sacred tradition, and he shows how early Christianity is better understood in light of how that tradition developed in Rabbinic Judaism. In Tradition and Transmission in Early Christianity (1964), Gerhardsson further clarifies the discussion and answers criticism of his earlier book. This Biblical Resource Series combined edition corrects and expands Gerhardsson's original works and includes a new preface by the author and a lengthy new foreword by Jacob Neusner that summarizes these works' importance and subsequent influence.