RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Papyrus
6. Fragments of Pss. v., cviii., cxviii., cxxxv., cxxxviii.,
cxl., in Amherst papyri 5-6.
7. Fragments of the Psalms in the Rainer collection, in
the Louvre and the National Library in Paris.
8. Job i. 21-22, ii. 3, in Amherst papyrus 4.
9. Cant. i. 6-9, Oxford, Bodleian MS. Gk. g. 1 (P).
10. Isa. xxxviii. 3-5, 13-16, Rainer collection, no. 8024
(guide no. 536).
11. Ezek. v. 12-vi. 3, with the diacritical signs of Origen,
Oxford, Bodleian MS., Gk. d. 4 (P).
12. Zech. iv.-xiv.; Mai. i.-iv., twenty-seven leaves written
on both sides, now in the Heidelberg library (ed. Deissmann in Veroffentlichungen aus der Heidelberger Papyrus-Sammlung, vol. i., Heidelberg, 1904).
13. Gen. i. 1-5, Amherst papyrus 3c.
14. Several fragments having to do with the history of
Egyptian Judaism, in Berlin, Paris, London, Gizeh, and in the Oxyrhyncus Papyri.
15. Fragments of Philo, in the National Library, Paris.
16. Matt. i. 1-9, 12, 14-20, Oxyrhyncus papyrus no. 2. 16a. Matt, i.-ii., idem, no 401.
17. Fragments of Matt, in the National Library, Paris, at
the end of the Philo fragment.
18. Fragments of Matt, in the Rainer collection.
19. Luke v. 30-vi. 4, in the National Library, Paris, at the
end of the Philo fragment.
20. Luke vii. 36-43, x. 38-42, in the Rainer collection, no.
8021 (guide no. 539).
21. John i. 23-32, 33-41, xx. 11-17, 19-25, Oxyrhyncus
papyrus no. 208.
22. Fragments of the Gospels, in the Rainer collection.
23. Rom. i. 1-7, Oxyrhyncus papyrus no. 209.
24. I Cor. i. 17-20, vi. 13-18, vii.! 3, 4, 10-14, in the li-
brary of Bishop Porfiri Uspensky at Kief.
25. I Cor. i. 25-27, ii. 6-8, iii. 8-10, 20, at Sinai.
26. Heb. i. 1, Amherst papyrus 3b. In the Louvre is an
inedited fragment of the Epistle of Jude, and Oxyrhyncus papyri, vol. iv., has a large fragment from Heb. 26a. I John iv. 11-17, Oxyrhyncus papyrus no. 402.
27. An amulet containing passages from the Septuagint of
Ps. xc (xci.), Rom. xii., John ii., in the Rainer collection, no 8032 (guide no. 528).
28. Fragments of an extra-canonical Gospel containing a
part of the denial of Peter, in the Rainer collection.
29. The so-called Logia-Fragment, Oxyrhyncus papyrus
no. 1, published by Grenfell and Hunt (see under Agrapha), and a second fragment published by the same, 1904.
30. Fragment of a Hebrew-Greek Onomasticum sacrum,
in the library of the University of Heidelberg, published by Deissmann, ut sup., vol. i.
31. Shepherd of Hennas, Similitudes, ii. 7-10, iv. 2-5, in
the Berlin Museum.
32. Fragment (from Melito of Sardis?) upon prophecy, con-
tains a citation from the Shepherd of Hermas, Mandates xi. 9-10, Oxyrhyncus papyrus no. 5.
33. Fragment of a Gnostic (Valentinian?) writing, the same,
no. 4 verso. 33a. Irena^us, Hmr., III., ix., the same, no. 405.
34. Fragments of Basil of Caesarea, Epist. v., vi., ccxciii.,
cl., ii., Berlin Museum.
35. Fragments of Gregory of Nyssa, " Life of Moses," the
same.
36. " Lives of the Saints," Paris, Musees nationaux, nos.
7403-05, 7408, and Fond du Faioum, no. 261.
37. Theological fragments, British Museum, papyrus no.
455.
38. The same, no. 113; neither this nor the preceding is
fully made out.
39. Fragment of Cyril of Alexandria, De adoratione, in
Dublin.
40. Fragments of Cyril, in the Rainer collection.
41. Letter of a patriarch of Alexandria to the Egyptian
churches, with citations from Cyril's commentary on the Gospel of John, British Museum, no. 729.
42. Assumption of Isaiah ii. 4-iv. 4, Amherst papyrus
no. 1.
43. Fragments of the Greek Apocalypse of Baruch, Oxyrhyn-
cus papyrus no. 403.
44. An unidentified fragment, the same, no. 406.
Besides these, there are several liturgical and homiletical fragments. Of importance for theology are a number with Coptic writing carrying Biblical, Gnostic, and other early Christian writings, one of them the Acta Pauli, published
by C. Schmidt in Veroffentlichungen aus der Heidelberger Papyrus-Sammlung, vol. ii., Leipsic, 1904.
The non-literary papyri often contain details which have direct bearing upon Biblical and early Christian antiquity. Thus there are pieces which name Jews living in various parts of Egypt and so afford a view of Judaism from the times of the Ptolemies till the time of the Roman empire. Other papyri enable us to settle the date of 5. Their the prefect of Egypt Munatius Felix Utility. and so to date Justin Martyr's Apology. The period of persecution is illumined by the libelli which have been found (see Lapsed). There is a letter from a presbyter in the Great Oasis to another presbyter concerning a banned Christian woman (cf. A. Deissmann, Ein Original-Document aus der diocletianischen Christenverfolgung, Leipsic, 1902; in English, The Epistle of Psenosiris, London, 1902). There are also legal documents of importance and interest for the history of Christianity, not all published, which will advance knowledge materially. Incidentally, light is thrown upon the Monogram of Christ (see Jesus Christ, Monogram op). While the papyri have value for general Greek philology, they are of especial importance for the Septuagint (see Hellenistic Greek). Until the discovery of the papyri there were few contemporary documents which illustrated that phase of the Greek language which lies open in the Septuagint and the New Testament. In those books what is found is the Greek of common intercourse of the times, both in vocabulary and in forms, and often also in syntax — this in distinction from the literary language of rhetoricians. The impression conveyed is that development of the language was still proceeding, and this impression might have been confirmed by reference to the few inscriptions of the period, which often show close affinities with Biblical Greek. But these had received little attention, and the opinion grew up and is even yet prevalent that Biblical Greek was a special type of the language. This theory has had great influence in exegesis, but will have to give way in face of the testimony of the papyri. One of the great gains from the recovery of these documents is that they show the relation of the Biblical texts to contemporary use of the Greek tongue and in a good sense " secularize " the Greek of the Bible. Among special points made clear by the papyri is the fact that the Septuagint is an Egyptian product. This is, of course, not new; but the Greek Bible can now be placed among a multitude of documents which are, so to speak, of its own nationality, and thereby it gains in vividness and in power to present to the imagination the environment in which it arose. Thus when the translators substituted " embalmers " for the " physicians " of the Hebrew text in Gen. 1. 2, they reproduced in their rendering the influence of their surroundings. Again, the papyri make possible a more exact investigation of questions which concern orthography, morphology, and syntax. Thus the repetition of the numeral to express distribution as found in, e.g., Gen. vii. 15 and Mark vi. 7 is illustrated in the Oxyrhynchus papyrus No. 121 of the third Christian century; by this the later
Papyrus
Parables of Jesus Christ