Minuscule 157 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering), ε 207 (Soden), is a
GreekGreek , an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, is the language of the Greeks. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. In its ancient form, it is the language of classical...
minuscule
manuscriptA manuscript is a recording of information that has been manually created by someone or some people, such as a hand-written letter, as opposed to being printed or reproduced some other way...
of the
New TestamentThe New Testament is the name given to the second major division of the Christian Bible, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament, both terms being associated with Supersessionism...
, on vellum. Dated to 1122. Formerly date was wrongly deciphered as 1128? (Gregory).
The codex contains a complete text of the four
GospelA gospel is a writing that describes the life of Jesus. The word is primarily used to refer to the four canonical texts: the Gospel of Matthew, Gospel of Mark, Gospel of Luke and Gospel of John, probably written between AD 65 and 80...
s on 325 parchment leaves (size 18.6 cm by 13.6 cm). Beautifully written in one column per page, in 22 lines per page. It contains the
Epistula ad CarpianumThe Epistula ad Carpianum is the title traditionally given to a letter from Eusebius of Caesarea to a Christian named Carpianus on the Gospel canons....
, prolegomena, Eusebian tables, lists of κεφαλαια, κεφαλαια, τιτλοι, lectionary equipment, subscriptions ornaments and pictures in vermillon and gold.
Minuscule 157 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering), ε 207 (Soden), is a
GreekGreek , an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, is the language of the Greeks. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. In its ancient form, it is the language of classical...
minuscule
manuscriptA manuscript is a recording of information that has been manually created by someone or some people, such as a hand-written letter, as opposed to being printed or reproduced some other way...
of the
New TestamentThe New Testament is the name given to the second major division of the Christian Bible, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament, both terms being associated with Supersessionism...
, on vellum. Dated to 1122. Formerly date was wrongly deciphered as 1128? (Gregory).
Description
The codex contains a complete text of the four
GospelA gospel is a writing that describes the life of Jesus. The word is primarily used to refer to the four canonical texts: the Gospel of Matthew, Gospel of Mark, Gospel of Luke and Gospel of John, probably written between AD 65 and 80...
s on 325 parchment leaves (size 18.6 cm by 13.6 cm). Beautifully written in one column per page, in 22 lines per page. It contains the
Epistula ad CarpianumThe Epistula ad Carpianum is the title traditionally given to a letter from Eusebius of Caesarea to a Christian named Carpianus on the Gospel canons....
, prolegomena, Eusebian tables, lists of κεφαλαια, κεφαλαια, τιτλοι, lectionary equipment, subscriptions ornaments and pictures in vermillon and gold. It has the famous
Jerusalem ColophonThe Jerusalem Colophon is a colophon found in a number of New Testament manuscripts, including Λ , 20, 157, 164, 215, 262, 300, 376, 428, 565, 686, 718, 1071, etc. The colophon states that the manuscript was "copied and corrected from the ancient exemplars from Jerusalem preserved on the holy...
("coppied and corrected from the ancient manuscripts of Jerusalem preserved on the Holy Mountain") at the end of each of the Gospel. It is ver beautifully written.
Text
Although the manuscript was made for the Emperor its text is not the standard
ByzantineThe Byzantine text-type is one of several text-types used in textual criticism to describe the textual character of Greek New Testament manuscripts. It is the form found in the largest number of surviving manuscripts, though not in the oldest...
but a mixture of text-types with strong the
AlexandrianThe Alexandrian text-type is one of several text-types used in New Testament textual criticism to describe and group the textual character of biblical manuscripts...
element. Its readings often agree with
Codex BezaeThe Codex Bezae Cantabrigensis, designated by Dea or 05 , δ 5 , is an important codex of the New Testament dating from the fifth-century. It is written in an uncial hand on vellum and contains, in both Greek and Latin, most of the four Gospels and Acts, with a small fragment of the Third...
, with some affinities to
DiatessaronThe Diatessaron is the most prominent Gospel harmony created by Tatian, an early Christian apologist and ascetic. The term "diatessaron" is from Middle English by way of Latin, diatessarōn , and ultimately Greek, dia tessarōn The Diatessaron (c 160 - 175) is the most prominent Gospel harmony...
, and to Marcion's text of
LukeThe Gospel of Luke is the third and longest of the four canonical Gospels. This synoptic gospel is an account of the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth. It details his story from the events of his birth to his Ascension...
.
AlandKurt Aland was a German Theologian and Professor of New Testament Research and Church History. For many years he was head of the Institut für neutestamentliche Textforschung and the principal editor of the Nestle-Aland edition of Novum Testamentum Graece .- Life :Aland was born...
placed it in Category III.
In Matthew 6:13 it has unusual ending of the
Lord's PrayerThe Lord's Prayer, also known as the Our Father or Pater noster, is perhaps the best-known prayer in Christianity. On Easter Sunday 2007 it was estimated that 2 billion Catholic, Protestant and Eastern Orthodox Christians read, recited, or sang the short prayer in hundreds of languages...
:
ὅτι σοῦ ἐστιν ἡ βασιλεία καὶ ἡ δύναμις καὶ ἡ δόξα, τοῦ πατρὸς καὶ τοῦ υἱοῦ καὶ τοῦ ἁγίου πνεύματος εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας. ἀμήν (For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit for ever. Amen.)
This ending have only two other manuscripts:
225Minuscule 225 , ε 1210 , is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament, on parchment. Dated by a colophon to the year 1192.- Description :...
and
418Minuscule 418 , ε 504 , is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament, on paper. Paleographically it had been assigned to the 14th century.- Description :...
.
It does not include
Matthew 16:2b-3Gospel of Matthew 16:2b–3 , the passage describes a confrontation between Jesus and the Pharisees and Sadducees over their demand for a sign from heaven. It is one of several passages of the New Testament that are lacking in the earlier and better manuscripts...
and Pericope Adulterae (John 7:53-8:11).
History
It was written in 1122 for
John PorphyrogenitusJohn II Komnenos or Comnenus was Byzantine emperor from 1118 to 1143. Also known as Kaloïōannēs , he was the eldest son of emperor Alexios I Komnenos and Irene Doukaina...
(1118-1143). The manuscript belonged to the Ducal Library at
UrbinoUrbino is a walled city in the Marche region in Italy, south-west of Pesaro, a World Heritage Site notable for a remarkable historical legacy of independent Renaissance culture, especially under the patronage of Federico da Montefeltro, duke of Urbino from 1444 to 1482...
, and was brought to the Rome by
Pope Clement VIIPope Clement VII , born Giulio di Giuliano de' Medici, was a cardinal from 1513 to 1523 and was Pope from 1523 to 1534.-Early life:...
(1523-1534).
Andrew BirchAndrew Birch , professor from Copenhagen, Birch was sent in 1781-1783 by the king of Denmark, Christian VII, to examine manuscripts in Italy, Germany, and other European countries. In 1798 Birch published a collection of various readings to the Acts and Epistles...
in 1788 made a facsimile. According to Birch it is the most important manuscript of the New Testament, except Codex Vaticanus. It was examined by Scholz, collated by
HoskierHerman Charles Hoskier , biblical scholar, British textual critic, son of Herman Hoskier, , merchant banker.Hoskier supported the Byzantine text-type against the Alexandrian text-type...
.
Scrivener noted that this codex is often in agreement with codices B,
DThe Codex Bezae Cantabrigensis, designated by Dea or 05 , δ 5 , is an important codex of the New Testament dating from the fifth-century. It is written in an uncial hand on vellum and contains, in both Greek and Latin, most of the four Gospels and Acts, with a small fragment of the Third...
,
LCodex Regius designated by Le or 019 , ε 56 , is a Greek uncial manuscript of the New Testament, dated paleographically to the 8th century.- Description :...
,
69Minuscule 69 , δ 505 , known as Codex Leicester, or Codex Leicestrensis, is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament on paper and parchment leaves. The manuscript paleographically had been assigned to the 15th century.- Description :The codex contains the entire New Testament with four...
,
106Minuscule 106 , ε 1380 , is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament, on parchment leaves. Paleographically it had been assigned to the 10th century.- Description :...
, and especially with
1Minuscule 1 , δ 254 ; formerly it was designated by 1eap . It is a Greek minuscule manuscript of the New Testament, usually dated paleographically to the 12th century.The codex is located now at the Basel University Library with the shelf number A. N...
.
It is currently housed at the
Vatican LibraryThe Vatican Library is the library of the Holy See, currently located in Vatican City. It is one of the oldest libraries in the world and contains one of the most significant collections of historical texts. Formally established in 1475, though in fact much older, it has 75,000 codices from...
(Urbinas gr. 2), at
RomeRome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated municipality , with over 2.7 million residents in , while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat to be 3.46 million. The metropolitan area of Rome is estimated by OECD to have a population of 3.7 million...
.
See also
- List of New Testament minuscules
- Biblical manuscript
A biblical manuscript is any handwritten copy of a portion of the text of the Bible. The word Bible comes from the Greek biblion ; manuscript comes from Latin manu and scriptum...
- Textual criticism
Textual criticism is a branch of literary criticism that is concerned with the identification and removal of transcription errors in the texts of manuscripts...
Further reading
- H. C. Hoskier, "Evan. 157", JTS XIV (1913), pp. 78-116, 242-293, 359-384.
- B. H. Streeter, "Codices 157, 1071 and the Caesarean Text", in Lake F/S (London, 1937), pp. 149-150.
- Edward Maunde Thompson
Sir Edward Maunde Thompson, GCB was a British palaeographer, best remembered today for his study of William Shakespeare's handwriting in the manuscript of the play Sir Thomas More....
, An Introduction to Greek and Latin Paleography (plate 68).
External links