Holy scriptures associated with the name of the Autonomous Sinai Orthodox Church. Exhibition dedicated to the international conference "The Codex Sinaiticus: a manuscript in the modern information space" Famous manuscripts of the Middle Ages Codex Sinaiticus
History of the book: Textbook for universities Govorov Alexander Alekseevich
6.2. FAMOUS MANUSCRIPTS OF THE MIDDLE AGES
In the Middle Ages, in almost all countries, the development of spiritual and material culture took place within the framework of the so-called book religions. Dogmatism, ideology, ritualism of these religions were embodied in sacred, "inspired" texts, canonical books.
For millennia, the Bible has been and remains the book of books (in Greek, la biblia, that is, "books", in the plural). This meeting sacred books, variously sent down to people, according to legend, by God himself. The Bible is revered by the Jewish (Jewish, Jewish) religion, all Christian churches, creeds and sects, although each in its own way and in its composition. Other religions also borrow some provisions from the Bible, referring to it. For several thousand years, the Bible has become the most widely read book.
When transmitting sacred texts, authenticity and accuracy were required. Hence the role that the Bible played in developing the practice of editing, translation, commenting, textual criticism, and book publishing in general.
The Bible as a work is divided into different parts: the Old Testament (in the Slavic translation, the word "old" can mean "old", "former", "ancient"), composed originally in Semitic languages, and New Testament. The Bible contains myths about the Creation of the world, historical narratives, various traditions, legends, elements of folklore. The unified canonical text was called in Hebrew "torah" - the law.
In the III-II centuries BC. e. at the request of King Ptolemy Philadelphus, in the famous Alexandrian Library, a commission of more than seventy scholars and translators, having reviewed the Hebrew and Aramaic manuscripts available there, translated them into Greek, the colloquial dialect - Koine.
This text is called septuagint, that is, a translation of seventy interpreters. It is he who is accepted as the canon of all christian church. It also served as the basis for translations into Slavonic and Russian. Throughout the Middle Ages in various countries, Jewish interpreters - "masoretes", that is, "experts in tradition", scribes, processed the Hebrew and Aramaic texts that had come down to them. Old Testament, and some even translated back from Greek. In addition to the Old Testament, the Bible includes the New Testament, which includes sacred history before the advent of our era. It consists of four Gospels (translated into Russian, the Gospel is "good news"), which are called by the names of the alleged authors or compilers: from Matthew, from Mark, from Luke, from John. Then follow the Acts and Epistles, apostolic and catholic (Apostle), the Apocalypse, or the Revelation of the Apostle John the Theologian. These books took shape in the 1st century AD. e. in the same Greek Koine dialect and are apparently recorded in the land of Canaan.
Christianity, established at the beginning of the 4th century, relied on "inspired" books in its dogmas and rituals. During the period of persecution, until the "Edict of Milan" by Emperor Constantine, every Christian community in different parts of the multilingual empire took care of the distribution of such books.
Due to the lack of mutual connections, the illiteracy of believers and dogmatic differences, they all differed greatly from each other. This question was posed in Nicene Ecumenical Council in 325, where the most important issues of church unity were resolved. Special commissions from among believers and experts, having reviewed many versions of Christian books in circulation, singled out the canon - the only common and correct text in which each letter was considered sacred, and it was impossible to change them. The canon includes the Old Testament ("Septuagint") and the books of the New Testament in the same composition as they are accepted now.
The Council of Nicaea rejected over a hundred versions of the Gospels - they are called apocrypha, that is, rejected. Most of them are known to modern science. The last archaeological find of apocryphal books was made in Egypt in 1945. These are the Gospel of Thomas and the Gospel of Truth, the texts of which are very different from the canonical ones. However, with all the diversity of the life and deeds of Christ, all apocryphal books paint in general the same way.
In the West, the spoken language was Latin, and its vernacular dialect was called the Vulgate. In the 4th century, blessed Jerome translated the Greek Bible into Latin, and he also divided it into parts, books and chapters, accepted today. The Latin translation of Jerome is accepted as canonical for the Roman Catholic Church and is called Vulgate.
Translations soon followed for the Ethiopian (in the Geez language), Coptic (in Egypt), Armenian, Gothic, Georgian (in the Guzuri alphabet), Syrian, Chaldean (in Aramaic) and other Christian churches.
Translation of the Bible into Slavic was made by Cyril and Methodius in 863–881; it was brought to Russia in the era of Baptism and diligently multiplied (corresponded) in whole or in part for the communities and their inhabitants.
The Codex Sinaiticus is considered the most ancient of the complete lists of the Bible that have come down to us. It is transcribed in Greek on parchment in capital letters (mayuskul) without spaces between words. Scholars attribute it to the 6th century. For centuries it was kept in the monastery of St. Catherine in Palestine, in the 19th century it was presented to the Russian emperor, and in 1930 it was sold to London.
Before the discovery of Sinai, the ancient was considered Vatican Code. This is also the Greek version of the Bible, but some parts of it have been lost. It also belongs to the 4th century. Written in majusculum, but with gaps between phrases. It is now kept at the papal court.
In Sweden, the Uppsala University Library has Silver Code - a luxurious manuscript in the Gothic language, translated by Wulfila, made in the 5th century.
Like Christianity, all the religions of the world took care of the creation and dissemination of their religious literature. Jews in the Middle Ages, as they settled in the countries of the Mediterranean, developed unified texts of their traditions and teachings. Learned scribes ("soferim") in the synagogues searched for and collected texts of the Old Testament, compiled a canonical version, and various interpretations and instructions were attached to it. The collection of these works is called Talmud. It was written one and a half thousand years ago in Babylon and represented the foundations of legislation and the source of knowledge and morality of the Jews of the world.
For the Arabic-speaking and Muslim peoples, the same role was played by Koran is the main book of Islam. It was created in the Middle East (Medina, Mecca, Damascus, Baghdad) and has since been translated into most languages of the world, but only the Arabic text is canonical ("Kuran", that is, teaching). Apparently, its suras (chapters), there are only 114 of them, and ayats (verses) were written down by the companions of the prophet Mohammed, but only in 655, by the decree of Caliph Osman, the former secretary of the prophet Zeid and learned theologians combined all the fragments into a common text ("Osmanova edition"), although there were many discrepancies in it, generated by historical, ethnic, linguistic features of the development of Muslim culture. Only in 1923 did the Islamic countries agree on a single edition of the Koran.
In the Middle Ages, there was a constant change in the cultural boundaries of civilizations, the resettlement and migration of peoples. These processes were expressed in the penetration and mutual influence of various book cultures, in the strengthening of spiritual ties between people. Military campaigns, wanderings, travels pushed the boundaries of interpersonal communication, expressed in the exchange of information received.
In addition to clerical writings written in inaccessible "learned" languages - Latin, Sanskrit, Church Slavonic - works are being created that are close to real life reflecting it through the prism of medieval prejudices, delusions and passions.
"Ecumenical Chronicles", biographies of great martyrs, chivalric novels, heroic epics are becoming the habitual reading of people. Thanks to medieval authors, legends and sayings of the sages are recorded. In the Middle Ages and later, interest in the works of Arabic prose writers and poets did not fade away. The most famous monuments are the adventure odyssey "About Sinbad the Sailor", the short story "A Thousand and One Nights", which Arab scribes considered a model of "demos culture", and Europeans perceived with great interest. Books by Chinese and Persian authors were popular. In many cases, medieval books were copied and distributed over many subsequent centuries, and in their plots, the authors of later times drew philosophical ideas, images, thoughts and, processing them creatively, created new works for books of the early Renaissance and later cultural eras.
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The Codex Sinaiticus, one of the two oldest Greek copies of the Old and New Testaments (4th century), has been digitized and posted online. The project to virtually reunite the codex took about four years and involved four libraries: the British, the Russian National, the University of Leipzig and the library of St. Catherine's Monastery in Sinai, reports The Daily Telegraph. According to The Guardian newspaper, the project cost about a million pounds.
Codex sheets are stored in the four libraries mentioned above; due to the exceptional fragility of the manuscript, a very small number of researchers are allowed to work with it. Now the code is available to everyone. So far, the texts are provided only with English translation, but in the future the creators of the Codex Sinaiticus project are going to supplement it with Russian and German.
The electronic edition of the codex includes sheets found in the library of the monastery of St. Catherine in 1975: this is their first publication. Thanks to digitization, scientists also specified the number of scribes who worked on the codex: previously it was believed that there were three of them, now it turned out that there were four of them.
The Codex Sinaiticus, along with the Vatican, reflects the history of the formation of the canon of biblical texts. For example, in the Codex Sinaiticus, the Gospel of Mark is 12 verses shorter than later versions: it does not contain an episode with the appearance of the risen Christ before the apostles.
The Codex Sinaiticus is one of the main sources on the history of the compilation of the biblical canon. It contains a relatively small number of lacunae, an almost complete text of the Old Testament, the entire New Testament and two more early Christian texts of the 2nd century - "The Epistle of Barnabas" and "The Shepherd of Hermas", which are not included in the canon. It is only slightly older than the Vatican Codex and four older papyri. In terms of completeness, the Codex Sinaiticus in the corpus of the earliest biblical texts has no equal.
Sheets of the codex, created between 325 and 360, are scattered over four countries. Some of the fragments are located in Sinai, in the ancient monastery of St. Catherine. There, in fact, in 1844, the codex was discovered by a prominent German biblical scholar Konstantin von Tischendorf. He took several sheets of the manuscript from the monastery to his native Leipzig, keeping the place of the find a secret. In 1845, the monks showed part of the codex to Archimandrite Porfiry (Uspensky), a major Russian researcher of ancient texts. In the late 1850s, von Tischendorf visited Sinai as part of a Russian mission and managed to buy a significant number of pages of the code from the monks. Under the conditions set by the German researcher, most of the codex went to St. Petersburg, a smaller part was sent to Leipzig. A number of pages were found in the monastery at the beginning of the 20th century by Vladimir Beneshevich, an outstanding historian of ecclesiastical law, and his finds also entered the Imperial Public Library in the Russian capital. In the 1930s, the Soviet authorities sold almost the entire volume of the codex to the UK, and in 1975 several more fragments of the codex were found in the monastery of St. Catherine. Such is the history of the "scattering" of the manuscript.
In 2005, researchers from all four interested countries agreed to participate in a joint project to virtually reunite the codex. It was necessary to photograph all the pages in high resolution (and in different light - for greater clarity), parse the text letter by letter, translate it into electronic form, compare it with illustrations, mark blots, errors, notes of different scribes and proofreaders, place translations. As a result, by July 6, 2009, when the second, most of the project was opened (the first has been operating since July 2008), it turned out that not everything is ready yet - translations do not appear everywhere. But, nevertheless, it is already possible to look at the pages of the code (if only the server is currently coping with the load). Reading the codex is facilitated by a convenient option: to the right of the photo of any page there is a full Greek transliteration with a breakdown into verses and notes where amendments were made. Information about the page (sheet number, location, chapter, verse, copyist) is also always in front of your eyes.
The codex is written on parchment, meaning it was an extremely expensive book in the 4th century. According to some estimates, it took at least 350 animal skins to make pages for it. Von Tischendorf suggested that the codex was commissioned by the newly converted emperor Constantine, but modern scholars believe that the codex began to be rewritten somewhat earlier. There is also no consensus on the place where the manuscript was written: perhaps it was written in Rome, in Egypt, or in Caesarea, an important ecclesiastical center in Palestine. It is not difficult to see historical justice in the fact that the ancient book, scattered on separate sheets, was again collected by researchers from different countries and now it can be read from anywhere where there is internet.
The Codex Sinaiticus, along with the ancient papyri, Alexandrian, Vatican and a number of other ancient codes, is one of the most valuable sources that allow textual critics to recreate the original text of the New Testament books.
The codex was written in the 4th century. and until the middle of the XIX century. was on the Sinai Peninsula in the library of the monastery of St. Catherine. Part of the Old Testament manuscript has been lost, but the New Testament text has been preserved in its entirety. In fact, Codex Sinaiticus is the only Greek uncial manuscript with a complete text of the New Testament. In addition to biblical texts, the codex contains two works by early Christian authors of the 2nd century: "The Epistle of Barnabas" and (partially) "The Shepherd" of Hermas. In scientific literature, the Codex Sinaiticus is designated by the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet (alef) or the number 01.
There is speculation that the Codex Sinaiticus is one of fifty manuscripts of the Divine Scriptures commissioned around 331 CE. e. Emperor Constantine Eusebius of Caesarea.
As in the vast majority of ancient manuscripts, the words of the text are written without spaces, only dots at the end of sentences are used as separation. There are no signs of stress and aspiration. Quotations from the text from the Old Testament are not highlighted on the letter. The division of Ammonius and the canons of Eusebius are highlighted in red and may have been added by another scribe. The entire text is written in Greek uncial script.
Scholars believe that three scribes (called A, B, and D) worked on the Codex Sinaiticus. In addition, obviously, in the period from the IV century. by the 12th century about 9 scribes made corrections to the text.
The Codex Sinaiticus was discovered by the German scientist Konstantin von Tischendorf in 1844 quite by accident.
Once, while working in the main library of the monastery, Tischendorf saw a basket full of sheets of an ancient manuscript. The scientist examined the sheets - it was ancient list Septuagint, written in beautiful uncial script. A librarian monk approached and said that two such baskets had already been set on fire and the contents of this basket should also be burned. Tischendorf asked not to do this, citing the value of the ancient manuscript. There were 43 sheets in the basket, and the scientist found 86 more sheets of the same code in the library. In terms of content, these were: the First Book of Kings, the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah, the Book of Ezra and Nehemiah, the Book of the Prophet Isaiah, the first and fourth Maccovean books. In the monastery, Tischendorf was allowed to take 43 sheets, which he then published in Germany.
Archimandrite and educator of the 19th century. Porfiry Uspensky wrote: “The Greek monks, under various pretexts, did not show him (Tischendorf) the precious manuscripts kept in the recesses of their holy cloisters. These monks, long frightened by the firmans of the Porte, authorizing European travelers to enter the sacristies and book depositories Orthodox monasteries, and offended by unfavorable reviews of them in travel descriptions, partly rightly evaded the requests of Tischendorf, who did not and does not have the main attractive force, i.e. confession Orthodox faith».
Nevertheless, after examining the library, the German scientist found another 86 sheets of the codex, which, with the permission of the monks of the monastery, he took to Europe and published under the name "Federico-Augustinian Codex", dedicating it to his patron, the King of Saxony.
In 1859, Tischendorf, already under the auspices of the Russian Tsar Alexander II, returned to Sinai, where he found several more sheets of the Old Testament from the Codex Sinaiticus and discovered the complete New Testament. The scientist managed to persuade the monks to give him all the sheets of the code as an offering to the Russian emperor. Having received the codex, Tischendorf brought it to St. Petersburg, where he published a facsimile edition. The Emperor gave the priceless scroll to the Public Library, where it was kept until 1933.
In 1933, the authorities, considering the Christian relic a burden on an atheistic state, sold the entire codex to the British Museum for £100,000. The sale was carried out on the personal orders of I. V. Stalin. The British raised money for the purchase in one day. Since 1973 the codex has been kept in the library of the British Museum. Thus, at present, the codex is divided between Leipzig (43 sheets acquired by Tischendorf in 1844) and London (the remaining 347 sheets, which he transported to Russia in 1859). Only fragments of three sheets of the codex remained in St. Petersburg.
In 1975, the monks of the monastery of St. Catherine opened a secret room in which, among other manuscripts, they found 12 missing sheets of the codex, as well as 14 fragments. Although at one time Emperor Alexander II sent 9 thousand rubles to Sinai as a token of gratitude, modern monks raised the question of the legality of the alienation of the monument by Tischendorf. In their opinion, the German scientist, being a representative of the “pirate archeology” of the 19th century, misled the abbot of the monastery. In support of their correctness, they refer to the surviving receipt, in which the scientist promises to return the parchments to the monastery immediately after the end of their scientific publication.
In 2005, all four owners of the sheets of the code agreed that high-quality scanning of the code would be carried out in order to post the full text on the Internet. The first digital photos were published on July 24, 2008 and are already available to everyone at: www.codex-sinaiticus.net .
It must be said that in most of the information about the discovery of the Codex Sinaiticus, practically nothing is mentioned about the works of Archimandrite Porfiry (1804–1885). Already in the XIX century. the outstanding Russian liturgist A. A. Dmitrievsky noted: “The honor of discovering this manuscript undoubtedly belongs to our scholar, the late Eminent Porfiry (Uspensky), who was the first to draw the attention of the monks of the Sinai monastery to it, but the honor of promulgation and scientific study of this code was anticipated by K. Tischendorf, at the same time, he also won scientific laurels. Only the unenviable position of Russian scientists, their material groundlessness make what is ours become the property of strangers and we "from distant countries" receive, as a special favor, miserable grains, at a time when we could have a whole loaf in our hands.
result scientific activity Porfiry was published in 1862 the book "Opinion on the Sinai manuscript, containing the Old Testament incompletely and the entire New Testament with the message of the holy Apostle Barnabas and the book of Hermas."
(Materials used: Priest Maxim Fionin. “History of the discovery of the Codex Sinaiticus”, http://www.mitropolia-spb.ru/rus/conf/znambibl03/5fionin.shtml
Materials for the biography of Bishop Porfiry Uspensky. Sat., 1910. Vol. II.
Porfiry (Uspensky), archimandrite. The first trip to the Sinai Monastery in 1845. SPb., 1856.
A. A. Dmitrievsky. Journey through the East and its scientific results. Kyiv, 1890).
Uncial, uncial writing - a calligraphic version of one of the main types of ordinary writing of the 3rd-5th centuries, sometimes called the original minuscule. It is characterized by large, rounded letters, almost not extending beyond the line, without sharp corners and broken lines. Uncial writing was widely used in Christian books, as well as in manuscripts with ancient texts.
Ammonius of Alexandria - Christian philosopher of the III century, the first in history to compose the harmony of the four Gospels. This work is called the Harmony of the Gospels, or the Diatessaron. Ammonius placed in parallel with the Gospel of Matthew similar fragments from the rest of the Gospels (breaking of Ammonius). At the same time, the order of the gospel text was preserved only for Matthew, while the rest of the text was built according to the principle of parallelism to the text of Matthew, and not in the order of presentation of the rest of the evangelists. Moreover, the text of the rest of the Gospels, apparently, was not presented in full, but only to the extent that it found parallels in Matthew.
In the first half of the 4th c. Eusebius of Caesarea compiled a system of references between parallel places in all four Gospels, which was called the canon of Eusebius. They were reproduced in many manuscripts of the Gospels of late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, and subsequently in a number of printed publications. A special style of artistic design of handwritten canon tables arose in the form of arcades framing the columns of numbers of parallel fragments.
Septuagint - the first Greek translation Old Testament, made during the III-II centuries. BC e. The Old Testament in this translation played a huge role for the Christian church. It was used by the apostles, New Testament writers, holy fathers. From it was made the first translation of the Old Testament into Church Slavonic by Cyril and Methodius. The collection of sacred books of the Septuagint was included in the Alexandrian canon.
Friedrich August II (1797-1854) - King of Saxony from 1836. One of the most famous patrons of his time.
SINAI CODE
open orthodox encyclopedia"TREE".
The Codex Sinaiticus, a 4th-century manuscript of the Greek Bible, is one of the oldest complete codes of the Holy Scriptures of the New Testament.
Part of the Old Testament manuscript has been lost, but the New Testament text has been preserved in its entirety. The Codex Sinaiticus is the only Greek uncial manuscript with a complete text of the New Testament. In addition to biblical texts, the codex contains two works by early Christian authors of the 2nd century: "The Epistle of Barnabas" and (partially) "Shepherd" Hermas (before the discovery of the Codex Sinaiticus, the first of these books existed only in Latin translation, the second was known only by name). In scientific literature, the Codex Sinaiticus is designated by the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet א (aleph) or the number 01.
Along with the Vatican Codex, this text forms the basis of modern critical editions of the New Testament, such as the 27th edition of Nestlé Allande and the 4th edition of the United Bible Societies.
In 1844, while traveling in search of ancient manuscripts, the young German scholar Konstantin von Tischendorf arrived at the monastery of St. Catherine on Mount Sinai. Unlike most ancient monasteries, this monastery has never been plundered and therefore contained the most valuable historical materials. In the monastery of St. Catherine's then had three libraries, located in three separate rooms, and, according to Tischendorf, there were about 500 ancient manuscripts. Tischendorf was a tireless searcher for ancient manuscripts in order to restore the original text of the Holy Scriptures of the New Testament.
But, as Porfiry (Uspensky) wrote: “The Greek monks, under various pretexts, did not show him (Tischendorf) the precious manuscripts stored in the recesses of their holy cloisters. These monks, long frightened by the firmans of the Porte, who authorized European travelers to enter the sacristies and book depositories of Orthodox monasteries, and offended by unfavorable reviews about them in the descriptions of travels, partly rightly evaded the requests of Tischendorf, who did not have and does not have the main attractive force, i.e. Confession of the Orthodox Faith".
Once, while working in the main library of the monastery, Tischendorf saw a basket full of sheets of an ancient manuscript. The scientist examined the sheets - it was an ancient copy of the Septuagint, written in a beautiful uncial script. A librarian monk approached and said that two such baskets had already been set on fire and the contents of this basket should also be burned, Tischendorf asked not to do this, citing the value of the ancient manuscript. There were 43 sheets in the basket, and the scientist found 86 more sheets of the same code in the library. According to the content, these were: the 1st book of Kings, the book of the prophet Jeremiah, the book of Ezra and Nehemiah, the book of the prophet Isaiah, the first and fourth Maccovean books. In the monastery, Tischendorf was allowed to take 43 sheets, which he then published in Germany. The codex was named "Frederico-Augustinian" in honor of the king of Saxony, who at that time patronized the scientist.
In April-May 1845, the monastery of St. Catherine arrived archim. Porfiry (Uspensky), where he also found sheets of the Codex Sinaiticus, and not only 86 sheets that Tischendorf was not allowed to take out during his first visit to the monastery, but also the remaining parts of the Old Testament and the entire New Testament. Here is how Archim himself describes it. Porfiry: “The first manuscript containing the incomplete Old Testament and the entire New Testament with the epistle of St. Barnabas and the book of Hermas, written on the finest white parchment. /…/ The letters in it are completely similar to Church Slavonic. Their setting is straight and solid. There are no aspirations and stresses above the words, and speeches are not separated by any spelling marks except for periods. The entire sacred text is written in four and two columns in a verse manner and so seamlessly, as if one long utterance stretches from point to point.
Subsequently, analyzing the text, Archimandrite Porfiry, having dated it to the 5th century, suggested that it was copied from the Alexandrian list, and, possibly, was related to the Alexandrian catechumens school, since it was not used during worship. The text is currently dated to the 4th century. Konstantin Tischendorf was the first to date the text in this way, later Vladyka Porfiry was also ready to revise his dating.
In 1859, Tischendorf, already under the patronage of the Russian Tsar Alexander II, returned to Sinai, where he got acquainted with the finds of Archim. Porfiry. The scientist manages to persuade the monks to give him all the sheets of the code as an offering to the Russian emperor. Having received the code, Tischendorf brought it to St. Petersburg, where its facsimile edition was carried out in 1862 under the title "Codex Bibliorum Sinaiticus Petropolitanus, rescued from obscurity under the auspices of His Imperial Majesty Alexander II, delivered to Europe and published for the greater good and glory of the Christian teachings by the works of Konstantin Tischendorf".
The Emperor gave the priceless scroll to the Public Library, where it was preserved until 1933, when the Soviet government, considering the Christian relic a burden on an atheistic state, sold the entire codex to the British Library for £100,000.
Most of the information about the discovery of the Codex Sinaiticus practically does not mention anything about the works of Archim. Porfiry. Already in the 19th century, the outstanding Russian liturgist A.A. Dmitrievsky noted: “The honor of discovering this manuscript undoubtedly belongs to our scientist, the late Bishop Porfiry (Uspensky), who was the first to draw the attention of the monks of the Sinai monastery to it, but the honor of promulgation and scientific research of this code was anticipated by K. Tischendorf, who at the same time acquired learned laurels . Only the unenviable position of Russian scientists, their material groundlessness make what is ours become the property of strangers and we "from distant countries" receive, as a special favor, pitiful grains, at a time when we could have a whole loaf in our hands.
The result of the scientific activity of archim. Porfiry became the book published in 1862 "Opinion on the Sinai manuscript, containing the Old Testament incompletely and the entire New Testament with the message of the holy Apostle Barnabas and the book of Hermas."
Modern location of the codex
Thus, at present, the codex is divided between Leipzig (43 sheets acquired by Tischendorf in 1844) and London (the remaining 347 sheets, which he transported to Russia in 1859). Only fragments of three sheets of the codex remained in St. Petersburg. In 1975, the monks of the monastery of St. Catherine opened a secret room in which, among other manuscripts, 12 missing sheets of the codex, as well as 14 fragments, were found.
Although at one time Emperor Alexander II sent 9,000 rubles to Sinai as a token of gratitude, modern monks raised the question of the legality of the alienation of the monument by Tischendorf. In their opinion, the German scientist, being a representative of the “pirate archeology” of the 19th century, misled the abbot of the monastery. In support of their correctness, they refer to the surviving receipt, in which the scientist promises to return the parchments to the monastery immediately after the completion of their scientific publication.
In 2005, all four owners of the sheets of the code agreed that it would be scanned in high quality in order to post the full text on the Internet.
Peculiarities
The Codex Sinaiticus is written on thin parchment, 38.1 cm by 33.7-35.6 cm. The text on the sheet is arranged in four columns of 48 lines each. The text color is light brown.
As in the vast majority of ancient manuscripts, the words of the text are written without spaces, only dots at the end of sentences are used as separation. There are no signs of stress and aspiration. Quotations from the text from the Old Testament are not highlighted on the letter. The division of Ammonius and the canons of Eusebius are highlighted in red, and may have been added by another scribe. The entire text is written in Greek uncial script.
Scholars believe that three scribes (called A, B and D) worked on the Codex Sinaiticus. In addition, it is obvious that in the period from the 4th century to the 12th century, about 9 scribes made corrections to the text.
There is an assumption that the Codex Sinaiticus is one of the fifty manuscripts of the Divine Scriptures, commissioned around 331 by Emperor Constantine to Eusebius of Caesarea.
Used materials
Priest Maxim Fionin "The History of the Discovery of the Codex Sinaiticus".
http://www.mitropolia-spb.ru/rus/conf/znambibl03/5fionin.shtml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code Sinaiticus
Materials for the biography of Bishop Porfiry Uspensky. SPb., 1910, vol. II, p. 682.
Porfiry (Uspensky), archimandrite. The first trip to the Sinai Monastery in 1845. SPb., 1856, p. 226.
Dmitrievsky A. A. Journey through the East and its scientific results. Kyiv, 1890, p. 6.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4739369.stm
TREE - open Orthodox encyclopedia: http://drevo.pravbeseda.ru
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2012See also interpretations, synonyms, meanings of the word and what is the SINAI CODE in Russian in dictionaries, encyclopedias and reference books:
- CODE in the Dictionary of Fine Art Terms:
- (from the Latin codex - a trunk, a log, wooden tablets for writing, a book) one of the forms of a book: a notebook from bent in half ... - CODE in the One-volume large legal dictionary:
(lat. codex - a collection of laws) - a consolidated legislative act that combines and systematizes legal norms that regulate similar between ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Financial Terms:
a legislative act that unites and systematizes the rules of law governing a certain area of social relations. CODE most often refers to any ... - CODE
JUSTINIAN - one of constituent parts Codifications of Justinian. Includes 4652 excerpts from imperial decrees (constitutions) issued since the emperor ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
THEODOSIA (Codex Theodosianus) - the first official collection of orders of the Roman emperors from the beginning of the 4th century, compiled in 435 by a commission of ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
CRIMINAL - see CRIMINAL CODE OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
CUSTOMS - see CUSTOMS CODE OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
STANDARD PRACTICE RELATED TO REQUIREMENTS FOR DOCUMENTS RELATED TO THE IMPORT OF GOODS - a document adopted by the member countries of the GATT "1952, bears ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
FAMILY - see FAMILY CODE OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
RSFSR ON ADMINISTRATIVE OFFENSES - the main act regulating the administrative responsibility of individuals. Adopted in 1984 and put into effect from ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
CONDUCT is one of the subsidiary sources of international trade law; an example of non-state regulation of international economic relations. So, the International Chamber of Commerce in ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
NAPOLEON - the current French Civil Code of 1804. Compiled with the active participation of Napoleon Bonaparte. Includes norms of civil, family, procedural, partially ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
TAX - see TAX CODE ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
MU - a code of criminal law of Ancient China of the Zhou era The creation of K. M. is attributed to the semi-legendary king (wang) Mu, whose reign is attributed to ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
LAND - see LAND CODE. ELECTORAL CODE - see ELECTORAL CODE ... - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
LABOR LAWS of the Russian Federation (Labor Code of the Russian Federation) - the main source of labor law in the Russian Federation after the Constitution of the Russian Federation. Introduced from 1… - CODE in the Dictionary of Economic Terms:
CIVIL - see CIVIL CODE ... - CODE in the Big Encyclopedic Dictionary:
(lat. codex) 1) a systematized single legislative act regulating any homogeneous area of social relations (civil code, criminal code, etc.). … - SINAI in the Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Euphron:
I Alexander Lvovich (born 1850) - spiritual writer, son of a priest; educated in Moscow. spiritual academician; is a priest of Novoderevenskaya ... - CODE in the Modern Encyclopedic Dictionary:
(Latin codex), 1) a systematized single legislative act regulating any homogeneous area of public relations (civil code, criminal code, etc.). 2) ... - CODE in the Encyclopedic Dictionary:
[from the Latin codex (codicis) book] a systematized set of laws relating to any area of \u200b\u200blaw (for example, a criminal code, a labor code ... - SINAI
SINAI PENINSULA, in Egypt, between the Gulfs of Suez and Aqaba Red m. Approx. 25 tons km 2. Mountains (high to ... - SINAI in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
SINAI Victus. Al-dr. (1893-1968), sculptor. Worked in Leningrad. Combined etude freshness and immediacy with plastic. clarity and completeness of the image ("Young ... - CODE in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
JUSTINIAN CODEX, part of the Justinian Codification. Includes excerpts from the decrees (constitutions) of emperors (starting from the 2nd century AD), combined into 12 ... - CODE in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
MODEX FEODOSIA, official. collection of decrees of Rome. emperors of the 4th-5th centuries. Compiled at the direction of imp. Theodosius II. Published in … - CODE in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
COMMERCIAL SHIPPING CODE (KTM), legislature. an act regulating relations related to the use of ships for the carriage of goods, passengers, baggage and mail, for ... - CODE in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
CODE ON MARRIAGE AND FAMILY, see the Family Code of the Russian Federation ... - CODE in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
MODEX MU, set of angles. rights dr. China. Compiled approx. in the 10th century before … - CODE in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
MODEX BUSTAMANTE, see Bustamante ... - CODE in the Big Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary:
ЌODEX (lat. codex), systematization. single legislator. the act regulating k.-l. homogeneous area of society. relations (citizen. K., criminals. K., etc.). Most… - SINAI in the Encyclopedia of Brockhaus and Efron:
Alexander Lvovich (born 1850)? spiritual writer, son of a priest; educated in Moscow. spiritual academician; is a priest of the New Village Church. … - CODE in the Popular Explanatory-Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Russian Language:
[de], -a, m. 1) jur. A systematized code of laws relating to a areas of law. Civil Code. Criminal Code. Marriage code... - SINAI in the Complete Spelling Dictionary of the Russian Language:
Sinai (from ... - SINAI in the Spelling Dictionary:
Sin'ai (from ... - CODE in the Dictionary of the Russian Language Ozhegov:
old manuscript bound Spec Parchment Code of Laws Code of Laws Criminal Code of Labor Laws. Air station of the USSR. code... - SINAI
Viktor Alexandrovich (1893-1968), Russian sculptor. He combined the freshness of the impression with the clarity and completeness of the image ("Young Worker", ... - CODE in Modern explanatory dictionary, TSB:
(lat. codex), 1) a systematized single legislative act regulating any homogeneous area of social relations (civil code, criminal code, etc.). … - CODE in the Explanatory Dictionary of the Russian Language Ushakov:
codex, m. (Latin codex). 1. Systematized code of laws (official, law). Labor Code. 2. trans. A general set of rules, habits, ... - CODE in the Big Modern Explanatory Dictionary of the Russian Language:
I m. 1. Code of laws relating to any area of law; civil Code. 2. A set of rules governing relations in any area ... - SINAI, SINAI PENINSULA in bible encyclopedia Nicephorus:
(rocky rocky) - the mountain and desert of Rocky Arabia, where the Israelites came in the third month after their exit from Egypt, and ... - PHOSTIRUS SINAI
Open Orthodox Encyclopedia "TREE". Phostiri of Sinai (VI century), hermit, reverend. Commemorated January 5th. Went up on a high mountain. … - THEODULUS OF SINAI in the Orthodox Encyclopedia Tree:
Open Orthodox Encyclopedia "TREE". Theodulus of Sinai (5th century), venerable. Commemorated January 14th. Son Reverend Nile Postnik, …
The oldest texts of the Bible will soon appear on the Internet
Scientists who are engaged in the digitization of the Codex Sinaiticus said that in the near future a copy of the famous manuscript will appear on the Internet. It is quite possible that after the publication of the ancient text, all religious denominations without exception will have to revise many established dogmas. The fact is that the Codex Sinaiticus contains the full text of the Bible. It includes the world's oldest version of the complete text of the New Testament, as well as the text of the Greek translation of the Old Testament, which is known as the Septuagint, which includes books that are now considered Apocrypha.
Scientists believe that the manuscript, made on parchment, is one of 50 copies scripture ordered by the Roman emperor Constantine after his conversion to Christianity. In the last 20 years, only four researchers have been admitted to the original text. The manuscript is named after the place of storage - the monastery of St. Catherine on the Sinai Peninsula in Egypt. As you know, the monastery is located at the foot of the mountain, where Moses received the Ten Commandments.
The scrolls were in the monastery until the middle of the 19th century, when the German researcher Konstantin von Tischendorf, who visited it, took part of the document to Germany and Russia. The monastery is still convinced that the manuscript was stolen. However, history tells us the following.
Indeed, Konstantin Tischendorf arrived in Egypt with one sole purpose - by all means to get an ancient manuscript, which he learned about while studying at the University of Leipzig. He was driven by the desire to restore the true text of the New Testament, since numerous translations, in his opinion, could lose something important. For several years he visited many cities in Europe, where he studied ancient biblical primary sources.
He first read the Ephraim Codex, also known as the Parisian Codex. To do this, he had to scrape off the later text printed on parchment and read the original ancient Greek text of the Bible. It was assumed that it was written in the 5th century BC. In 1843, the persistent Tischendorf published a palimpsest (a monument of writing in which the original text was erased and replaced by a new one - author's note) of the Ephraim Codex and got the opportunity to study the Alexandrian Codex and sought permission from the Vatican to touch the Vatican Codex.
Following this, the German goes to Egypt. When he reached the monastery of St. Catherine in Sinai, there were only 18 monks left. The monks were not predisposed to communicate with a non-believer, but the latter was not going to give up and found 129 parchments. It was a Greek translation of the Old Testament of the Septuagint ("Translation of 70 interpreters"). The texts of the New Testament could not be found at that time.
In 1853 Tischendorf again went to the monastery of St. Catherine and invites the monks to sell the remaining parts of the code. The monks refused. Then Konstantin decides to seek help from the Russian government, which patronized the monastery of St. Catherine.
Returning to the monastery, Tischendorf met with a more friendly attitude of the monks, and the abbot handed over to the researcher an old manuscript that was kept in his cell. Tischendorf's joy knew no bounds! He received the primary sources containing the entire New Testament, as well as two apocryphal books. Neither the Vatican nor the Alexandrian Codes contained the texts of the New Testament in their entirety. In addition, the found manuscript turned out to be older than the two already known Codices! The find contained most of the books of the Old Testament and the entire New Testament, and, in addition, the Epistle of the Apostle Barnabas and the "Shepherd" of Hermas.
First, this code was transferred to Tischendorf in temporary possession. But then the great explorer meets the no less great Russian Prince Konstantin, and the monks donate the manuscript to Russia. For the anniversary celebrations of the millennium of the Russian state, Konstantin Tischendorf published the Codex Sinaiticus and brought the book to St. Petersburg. In Leipzig, it came out under the heading: "Codex Bibliorum Sinaiticus Petropolitanus, rescued from obscurity under the patronage of His Imperial Majesty Alexander II. European monarchs and the Pope himself congratulated Tischendorf on his success. In Russia, he received hereditary nobility.
But the most important merit of the scientist lies in the comparison of four manuscripts: Codex Sinaiticus, Codex Alexandrinus, Codex Paris and Codex Vaticanus. Thus, Tischendorf proved that the New Testament in modern bible without distortion came from the 4th century to the present. But, as you know, by this time the Ecumenical Council of Nicaea had already approved the canonical Gospels. Therefore, then it did not cause additional flashes from the apologists of Christianity.
Subsequently, the Codex Sinaiticus was presented to the Russian Tsar. In 1933 it was sold to England and exhibited in the British Museum in London. In total, four fragments of the manuscript are known in the world, the largest of them - 347 out of 400 pages - is stored in the British Library, the rest - in the University Library in Leipzig (Germany), the Russian National Library in St. Petersburg and in the monastery of St. Catherine.
However, the tradition of public contemplation of ancient manuscripts is only the first step towards the discovery of many new places in the Old Testament. The so-called apocrypha, non-canonical books, have become the object of increased study by both theologians and enthusiasts. The Qumran manuscripts found in Israel in 1947, among which there are many apocrypha that interpret disputed places in the Bible in a new way, have already become the subject of a dispute between priests rooted in dogmas and researchers striving to get to the bottom of the truth. And if earlier the main sources were kept under lock and key in religious and secular libraries, now bit by bit the ancient texts are beginning to come out. When comparing such primary sources, dismissively referred to the Apocrypha, the incomplete narrative of the Old and New Testaments becomes apparent. Moreover, we are not talking about minor events, but about root ones. But, according to the predictions of many prophets and saints, at the End of Times, many secrets of the Earth and the Universe should be revealed to people. And from how they will be able to use it, the future of Mankind will be determined.
Note. (The Septuagint is a translation of the Old Testament, executed by the decree of King Ptolemy by the Seventy Interpreters (hence the name). It is the base for Orthodoxy. All translations into national languages were made from it. Catholicism uses the translation made by Blessed Jerome - the Vulgate).
Andrey Polyakov
