Ah yes, P75, I know it well…

P75–or as it is better known–the “Bodmer Papyrus–was one of those strange little alphanumerals that appeared in the critical apperatus of my Greek bible back at Luther Sem. We never paid these much attention. That’s what editors are for. But there is much to recommend ol’ P75.

In fact, P75 has just been donated to the Holy See as a gift. It is a papyrus codex–yep, a book–which has been dated to around 175AD and is in fact the oldes extant copy of parts of the Gospels of Luke and John. But here is the really cool part: there is one page on which the gospel of Luke ends and the Gospel of John begins.

So what? you say–that’s how it is in every bible on my bookshelf. Exactly. Think about it. 150 years before the Council of Nicea, at which folk like Dan Brown would have you believe that the bishops sifted through 300 gospels and chose the ones that suited their tastes, there was a clear canon of scripture in which the Gospel according to St Luke WAS DIRECTLY FOLLOWED by the Gospel of St John.

As they say in the classics, put that in your pipe and smoke it.

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2 Responses to Ah yes, P75, I know it well…

  1. clara says:

    Thanks for the P75 image. I think I will use it as an introdution to document analysis for my Early Church History class. It also ties in well with my lecture on Gnosticism and Ireneus’ refutations of gnostic teaching.

    Clara

  2. Schütz says:

    There have been some other images floating around–for instance I got an item that alerted me to the story from St Mary’s Star of the Sea in their mail out which included a picture of P66–which is the start of St John’s Gospel, but doesn’t have St Luke on the end. I looked this image up on the net. It’s the real deal.

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