CODEX SCHØYEN
| MS | 2650 |
| MS Short Title | CODEX SCHØYEN |
| Text | BIBLE: MATTHEW |
| Description |
MS in Mesokemic (Middle Egyptian or Oxyrhynchite dialect) on papyrus, Oxyrhynchus region, Egypt, 1st half of 4th c., 39 ff. (- ca. 6 ff.), 23x20 cm, single column, (18x14-16 cm), 25-28 lines in a fine regular Coptic uncial. |
| Context |
MSS 2648, 2649, 2651 and 14 ff. of Isaiah (in Mesokemic, ca. 300) were found tipped in among the leaves of the present codex, which originally had ca. 45 ff. There is no reason why MS 2648 and 2649 should not come from the same hoard as the Chester Beatty papyri, now in Dublin, Chester Beatty Library, according to kind information by Dr. Professor Kristin de Troyer, University of Salzburg. Prof. Brent Nongbri, God's Library, Yale, 2018, pp. 134, 153-4: Posssibly MS 2648 and 2649 also come from the Beatty find of Biblical papyri. The present MS more likely come from the Bodmer papyri. When the Beatty and Bodmer papyri shifted hands they were frequently mixed together. |
| Provenance | 1. Monastery of the Pachomian order in the Dishna region, Egypt (4th c. -); 2. Phokio Tanio, Alexandria, 1952 -; 3. Financial investor and heirs, Zürich, acquired April 1998 from Noele Mele, New York. |
| Commentary |
The text here opens at ch. 5:38 and goes more or less continuously to the end. The present codex is the earliest Matthew in any Coptic dialect. The 11 chs., 6-9, 13-17, 22 and 28, and a great number of verses elsewhere (actually about 90% of the text), are the earliest witnesses to the Gospel of Matthew in any language. The text is unique, not following any Coptic or Greek manuscripts known of Matthew. Prof. Dr. Hans-Martin Schenke in his editio princeps of the text named the manuscript Codex Schøyen, with the siglum Mae 2 (siglum Mae 1 being the Scheide Codex of the 5th c.). His conclusions are that the text does not represent a free text transmission, but that it is a correct translation of an entirely different Gospel of Matthew. There is only one other Gospel of Matthew known, the lost Hebrew Gospel of the Jewish Christians mentioned by the Church Fathers. This would have been the Hebrew exemplar of the Greek translation that the present manuscript is based upon. Actually the famous statement by Papias that the Hebrew Gospel of Matthew was translated into Greek several times, now appears in a new light. Due to a series of textual differences between Codex Schøyen and the canonical Gospel, it appears that both Gospels derive from different versions of the Hebrew Matthew. The consequence is that the relationship among the Synoptic Gospels may have to be entirely re-evaluated, causing far-reaching and dramatic consequences for New Testament research. However, J.M. Leonard in his PhD thesis, 'Codex Schøyen 2650: Discerning a Coptic Manuscript's Witness to the Early Text of Matthew's Gospel', University of Cambridge (submitted 2011), came to the opposite conclusion that the Greek text is exceptionally pure, attesting to the best Greek original text so far known. |
| Published |
H.-M. Schenke, ‘Das Matthäus-Evangelium in einer Variante des mittelägyptischen Koptish auf Papyrus (Codex Schøyen)’, Enchoria, Zeitschrift für Demotistik und Koptologie, 26 (2000), pp. 88-107, tafel 12. H.-M. Schenke, Coptic Papyri, I: Das Matthäus- Evangelium im mittelägyptishen Dialekt des Koptischen (Codex Schøyen), Manuscripts in The Schøyen Collection Series, vol. 2, Hermes, Oslo, 2001. W. Willker, ‘A Textual Commentary on the Greek Gospels. Some notes on the Coptic Mt. Schoyen MS 2650 = mae-2’, online article, now discontinued but incorporated into http://www.willker.de/wie/TCG/index.html (accessed June 2017). M.-É. Boismard, L’Évangile selon Matthieu d’apres le papyrus copte de la Collection Schøyen, analyse litteraire, Cahiers de la revue Biblique, 55, Paris, J. Galbalda, 2003. T. Baarda, ‘Mt. 17:1-9 in “Codex Schøyen”’, Novum Testamentum 46 (2004), pp. 265-287. |
| Image featured in |
Illustration reproduced in: Die Bibel, Geschichte und Gegenwart, Stuttgart, Belser Verlag, 2002, p. 15. S. Cingolani, Dizionario di critica testuale Nuovo Testamento, Milano, Edizioni Sao Paulo, 2008, p. 220. Image reproduced as front cover of M. Rasche, Mythos und Metaphysik im Hellenismus, Die Wege zu Origenes und Plotin, Academia Verlag, Sankt Augustin, 2011. |
| Mentioned | Sergio Cingolani: Dizionario di critica testuale Nuovo Testamento. Milano, Edizioni Sao Paulo, 2008, p. 220. |
| Place of origin | Egypt |
| Dates | first half 4c AD |