the use and abuse of p52 papyrological pitfalls in the dating of the fourth gospel by brent nongbri

8/13/2019 The Use and Abuse of P52 Papyrological Pitfalls in the Dating of the Fourth Gospel by Brent Nongbri

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HTR 98:1 (2005) 2348

The Use and Abuse of 52:Papyrological Pitfalls in theDating of the Fourth GospelBrent NongbriYale University

IntroductionThe thesis of this paper is simple: we as critical readers of the New Testament

often use John Rylands Greek Papyrus 3.457, also known as 52

, in inappropriateways, and we should stop doing so.1A recent example will illustrate the problem.In what is on the whole a superb commentary on Johns gospel, D. Moody Smithwrites the following about the date of John:

For a time, particularly in the early part of the twentieth century, the possibilitythat John was not written, or at least not published, until [the] mid-second cen-tury was a viable one. At that time Justin Martyr espoused a logos Christology,without citing the Fourth Gospel explicitly. Such an omission by Justin wouldseem strange if the Gospel of John had already been written and was in circula-

tion. Then the discovery and publication in the 1930s of two papyrus fragmentsmade such a late dating difcult, if not impossible, to sustain. The rst and most

important is the fragment of John chapter 18 . . . [52], dated by paleographers tothe second quarter of the second century (125150); the other is a fragment of ahitherto unknown gospel called Egerton Papyrus 2 from the same period, whichobviously reects knowledge of the Gospel of John. . . . For the Gospel of Johnto have been written and circulated in Egypt, where these fragments were found,a date no later than the rst decade of the second century must be presumed. 2

1Colin H. Roberts produced the editio princeps asAn Unpublished Fragment of the Fourth

Gospel in the John Rylands Library(Manchester: The University Press, 1935). I shall discuss thecircumstances of publication in some detail below.2John(Nashville, Tenn.: Abingdon, 1999) 4142. In the course of the discussion of 52, I shall

also address the other papyrus to which Smith refers, Egerton Papyrus 2.


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24 HARVARD THEOLOGICAL REVIEW

Moody Smith is not alone in his assessment of the situation.3In the introductionto his inuential commentary on the Fourth Gospel, Raymond Brown concludesthe section on the latest plausible date of John with the following:

The most conclusive argument against the late dating of John has been thediscovery of several 2nd-century papyri texts of John. In 1935 C. H. Roberts

published Rylands Papyrus 457 (52). . . . The dating of this papyrus to135150 has been widely accepted; and the latest attempt to date NT papyri

by K. Aland . . . assigns to 52a date at the beginning of the 2nd cent.4

For Brown, this papyrological evidence is enough to mark 100 C.E.as the latestpossible date of composition of John. While both authors mention other papyripaleographically dated to the second century, they both view 52as the main evi-dence for an early dating of John. Many scholars have followed this judgment.5

3Indeed, such assertions began on the very day Robertss monograph was published (12 November1935). C. H. Dodd wrote in that days edition of theManchester Guardian: There has been a greatdeal of controversy about the date to which the composition of the Fourth Gospel is to be assigned.One school of critics has long upheld the view that it was not written until about A.D. 135140.Unless the experts are very far wrong in their judgement upon the new papyrus, this date becomesobviously impossible. Dodds remarks are reprinted in full in BJRL20 (1936) 46. In the sameissue, RobertssAn Unpublished Fragmentis reprinted in full with minor changes (4455).

4The Gospel according to John (IXII) (AB 29; New York: Doubleday, 1966) lxxxiilxxxiii;Brown maintains this position in An Introduction to the Gospel of John(ed. Francis J. Moloney;

New York: Doubleday, 2003) 209. The other papyri to which Brown refers are 66(P.Bodmer IIand other fragments, paleographically dated to the late second or early third century) and 75(P.Bodmer XIV and XV, paleographically dated to the third century). Similar statements of theimport of 52for the dating of John abound in the scholarly literature of the last sixty-ve years,though few match the literary air of Bruce Metzger, who writes, Just as Robinson Crusoe, seeingbut a single footprint in the sand, concluded that another human being, with two feet, was presenton the island with him, so 52proves the existence and use of the Fourth Gospel during the rsthalf of the second century in a provincial town along the Nile, far removed from its traditionalplace of composition (Ephesus in Asia Minor) (The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission,Corruption, and Restoration [3rd ed.; New York: Oxford University Press, 1992] 39). See alsoWerner KmmelsIntroduction to the New Testament(rev. ed.; trans. H. C. Kee; Nashville, Tenn.:

Abingdon, 1975) 246. Martin Hengel has made a similar argument with great vigor, claiming thatwith the discovery of 52, which according to Aland is now by general consensus put around125 . . . the nal redaction of the Fourth Gospel must be put at least a generation earlier than wasusual in so-called critical scholarship. The Gospel of John in its present form (and the letters) wassurely published a decade or so before the letters of Ignatius (The Johannine Question[trans. J.Bowden; London: SCM Press, 1989] 8889). Brown and Hengel both refer to Kurt Alands datingof 52, on the problems of which see n. 22, below.

5See the literature in the previous note. In the entry for Johns gospel in theAnchor Bible Diction-ary, often a good barometer of widely-held scholarly opinions, Robert Kysar writes that the latest

possible date [of John] has been xed by the discovery in Egypt of the Rylands Papyrus 457 (52)

(ABD3:918, my italics). The comments of J. K. Elliott are similar (The Biblical Manuscripts of theJohn Rylands University Library of Manchester,BJRL81 [1999] 7). A few scholars, such as C. K.Barrett, have been somewhat more careful in their assessment of the evidence. Barrett wrote in therst edition of his The Gospel according to St. John: An Introduction with Commentary and Notes onthe Greek Text(New York: Macmillan, 1957) that 52, which cannot be dated more precisely thanthe middle of the second century, established 140 C.E. as the terminus ante quemfor the Gospel of


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This assessment is not, however, without problems. First, paleographic datingof papyri is never a simple matter,6and because of the constant accumulation ofnew evidence, the dating of manuscriptseven more so than other aspects of ourdisciplineis an ongoing process.7Second, as Smiths observation suggests, inearly Christian writings there are few early quotations of and allusions to John, andeven those few are highly questionable. Scholars were debating the nature of thesealleged references to John in early Christian authors until the publication of 52in1935, when such debates, so scholars thought, had now become moot.8

This state of affairs calls for two responses. First, as Georg Strecker noted almostfteen years ago, there is an urgent need for a new analysis of 52 that wouldobjectively set out the pros and cons of a possible dating.9Second (but outside the

John (p. 108). Though he adopted a more standard position in the second edition of his commentary(London: SPCK, 1978), he maintained that outside of Egerton Papyrus 2 and 52, there is no othersatisfactory evidence of the existence of the Fourth Gospel before A.D. 150 (p. 110).

6The assertion is commonplace. Paleography is a last resort for dating. See, e.g., Eric G. Turner,Greek Manuscripts of the Ancient World(2d rev. ed.; London: Institute of Classical Studies, 1987) 1923.We would also do well to remember the standard rule of thumb for precision in paleographic dating.Turner writes, For book hands, a period of 50 years is the least acceptable spread of time (ibid., 20).

7The ow of new evidence is constant. See Ann Ellis Hanson, Papyrology: A Discipline inFlux, in Disciplining ClassicsAltertumswissenschaft als Beruf (ed. G. W. Most; Gttingen:Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2002) 191206.

8In the last quarter of the nineteenth century, Johannine scholars main interest in the writings

of the Apostolic Fathers and Justin pertained to the issue of Johannine authorship of the gospel.James Drummond (An Inquiry into the Character and Authorship of the Fourth Gospel [NewYork: Charles Scribners Sons, 1904] 351) had strongly argued that the evidence of Justin and theFathers conrmed Johannine authorship of the gospel, ignoring the opinion of William Sanday (TheAuthorship and Historical Character of the Fourth Gospel[London: Macmillan, 1872] 3), who had(correctly) asserted that this external evidence on its own could not answer the question of authorshipafrmatively or negatively. At the close of the nineteenth century, Paul W. Schmiedel sharpenedthe question, noting that while the external evidence could not determine authorship, it could shedlight on the question of whether or not the gospel even existed in the late rst and early secondcenturies. See his John, son of Zebedee, in Encyclopaedia Biblica: A Critical Dictionary of theLiterary, Political, and Religious History; The Archaeology, Geography, and Natural History ofthe Bible (rev. ed. in one volume; New York: Macmillan, 18991903) cols. 254550. Benjamin W.Bacon provides a good overview of these debates in the essays collected in his The Fourth Gospelin Research and Debate: A Series of Essays on Problems Concerning the Origin and Value of theAnonymous Writings Attributed to the Apostle John (2d ed.; New Haven, Conn.: Yale UniversityPress, 1918). To be sure, there has been subsequent debate in the twentieth century about the roleof John in authors of the second century, but these inquiries have usually assumed the gospelsexistence and been concerned with other matters, such as the old issue of the authorship of John.See, e.g., John S. Romanides, Justin Martyr and the Fourth Gospel, GOTR4 (1958) 11534; andD. M. Davey, Justin Martyr and the Fourth Gospel, Scr17 (1965) 11722.

9The Johannine Letters: A Commentary on 1, 2, and 3 John(trans. L. M. Maloney; Minneapolis:

Fortress, 1996) xli n. 78; trans. of Die Johannesbriefe (KEK 14; Gttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ru-precht, 1989) 2728 n. 27. To my knowledge, the most recent examination of the early manuscriptsof the New Testament is that of Philip W. Comfort and David P. Barrett, The Text of the EarliestNew Testament Greek Manuscripts(Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale, 2001), a problematic volume. (It is acorrected, enlarged edition of the same authors The Complete Text of the Earliest New TestamentManuscripts [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Books, 1999].) The editors display a very marked tendency


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purview of this study), we should reopen some of the debates of the early twentiethcentury that tapered off with the publication of 52, namely, debates about the pres-ence (or absence) of references to John in the writings of early Christian authors,both orthodox and non-orthodox.10

With regard to the rst point, although Victor Salmon published in 1969 a shortmonograph with images of three of the six papyri rst used to date 52, there isnot to my knowledge a convenient and comprehensive collection of images of thepapyri that have contributed to the discussion of the date of 52.11I hope that bybringing together the images of the manuscripts cited in previous treatments of 52,as well as some of my own comparanda, I can highlight the uncertainty involved

to date manuscripts early. Of the 64 manuscripts they present, Comfort and Barrett depart from the

original editors dating on at least 27 manuscripts. For 25 of those 27 manuscripts, they proposetheir own earlier date or accept an earlier date advanced in scholarly discussion; they accept a laterdate from the scholarly discussions in only 2 cases. Their bias is clear. With slim and weak evidence(discussed in detail in n. 26, below), Comfort and Barrett push the date of 52back to the earlysecond century (ca. 100125) or even A.D. 100, plus or minus a few years, 36567.

10I should be clear about precisely which debates I mean to resurrect. Late dating of John (afterca. 130 C.E.) is most often associated with the work of F. C. Baur, who argued John was late becauseits theological development fell on the late end of his linear model of early Christian thought; see hisKritische Untersuchungen ber die kanonischen Evangelien(Tbingen: L. F. Fues, 1847) 77389.Such arguments are unconvincing, given that most scholars now accept that the early followers ofJesus demonstrated a wide variety of beliefs from the time very soon after Jesus death. The debates

that interest me are those of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that focused on theexternal evidence for Johns gospel (see n. 8, above). More recently, Melvyn Raymond Hillmerthoroughly examined the evidence in his Harvard dissertation, The Gospel of John in the SecondCentury (Th.D. thesis, Harvard Divinity School, 1966). While he rather uncritically accepted anearly date for 52and hence for the composition of John (1 n. 2), he nonetheless concluded thatthere is no clear example of a literary relationship [with Johns gospel] in any writing before 150AD (171). Titus Nagel has recently reopened some of these questions with his study,Die Rezeptiondes Johannesevangeliums im 2. Jahrhundert: Studien zur vorirenischen Aneignung und Auslegungdes vierten Evangeliums in christlicher und christlich-gnostischer Literatur(Leipzig: EvangelischeVerlagsanstalt, 2000), which examines the possible use of Johns gospel in all manner of Christianliterature assigned to the second century. Another noteworthy contribution to this debate came intomy hands just as this article went to press, Charles E. Hills The Johannine Corpus in the EarlyChurch(New York: Oxford University Press, 2004). While Nagel and Hill both loosen (withoutsufcient justication, to my mind) the criteria of what constitutes an allusion to Johns gospel, theirclose examinations of authors of the second century is just the kind of study that is needed.

11See (with considerable caution) SalmonsHistoire de la tradition textuelle de loriginal grecdu quatrime vangile(Paris: Letouzey et An, 1969) 1921, published in English as The FourthGospel: A History of the Textual Tradition of the Original Greek Gospel (trans. M. J. OConnell;Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 1976) 1516 and plates 6, 8, and 10. Plate 12 is what hecalls Berlin Greek Papyrus 173 (I believe this is actually B.G.U. 1.73), a text that Salmon claimsRoberts used to date 52 (ibid., p. 16). I have not yet found such a citation in Robertss work.

Salmon himself suggests that P.Ryl. 3.544 (a fragment of the Iliad) is an illuminating parallel interms of letter formation, but the parallels are not even close. (Incidentally, P.Ryl. 3.544 is plate 15in Salmons text, not plate 12 as the English translation indicates on p. 16, and the caption to plate15 incorrectly states that this is a papyrus certainly dating from the end of the rst century. It isassigned to the beginning of the second century on p. 16 of the text.) In any event, neither B.G.U.1.73 nor P.Ryl. 3.544 is as close to 52as Robertss other comparanda.


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in paleographic dating and encourage caution when using 52to assess the date(and thus the social setting) of the Fourth Gospel.12

The Original Publication of 5213

In 1920, Bernard P. Grenfell acquired in Egypt, for the John Rylands Library, thelot of papyrus fragments that included 52.14The duty of sorting and publishing thepapyri accumulated for the Rylands collection fell to the other giant of the early studyof papyri, Arthur S. Hunt. Hunt published two volumes of the Catalogue of GreekPapyri in the John Rylands Libraryin 1911 and 1915. After only a small amount ofpreliminary work with the remainder of the early material and the newer acquisi-tions, which included P.Ryl. 3.457, Hunt died in 1934, and Colin H. Roberts tookup the task. It was Roberts who identied the fragment containing John 18:3133

12Some more recent German scholarship has questioned the date of 52, creating an atmospherequite distinct from that of Anglo-American scholarship. Andreas Schmidt has proposed that thesimilarities between 52and P. Chester Beatty X and III might suggest a considerably later date ofaround 170 C.E.for 52. See his Zwei Anmerkungen zu P. Ryl. III 457,APF35 (1989) 1112 (forcriticism of Schmidts work, see nn. 49 and 51, below). Walter Schmithals has commented that 52was probably not written before the end of the second century and es ist also fr die Datierung desJohEv praktisch ohne Wert (Johannesevangelium und Johannesbriefe. Forschungsgeschichte undAnalyse[Berlin: de Gruyter, 1992] 9). Nagel even prefaces his study of the second-century reception

of Johns gospel with the following remark: Wenn der 52seine Funktion als sicherer terminus nonpost quem in der Diskussion verliert . . . (23). The work of R. Alan Culpepper is an exception within

recent English-language scholarship in entertaining (albeit briey) the idea of a later date for 52. SeehisJohn, the Son of Zebedee: The Life of a Legend(Columbia: University of South Carolina Press,1994) 108. For similar caution about an early date for 52, see Stuart R. Pickering, Short Notes,New Testament Textual Research Update2 (1994) 56; Bart D. Ehrman, The Text as Window: NewTestament Manuscripts and the Social History of Early Christianity, in The Text of the New Testa-ment in Contemporary Research: Essays on the Status Quaestionis(ed. Bart D. Ehrman and MichaelWilliam Holmes; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995) 37172 and n. 49; and Larry W. Hurtado, 52(P.Rylands Gk. 457) and the Nomina Sacra: Method and Probability, TynBul54 (2003) 7 n. 20.

13It must be said at the outset that I am very hesitant to critique the work of one of the greatpapyrologiststhe person who, quite literally, wrote the book on dating literary hands: Greek Lit-erary Hands.350 B.C.A.D. 400(Oxford: Clarendon, 1955). Two reasons suggest the undertakingis necessary: First, a sizeable amount of evidence has been published since 1935 that no one hasbrought to bear on the question of dating 52. Second, the publication of 52occurred very early inRobertss life; its publication predated his work on the remainder of the Rylands collection and therest of his impressive career, although before 52he had published individual papyri in theJournal ofEgyptian ArchaeologyandAegyptus. On the early career of the precocious Roberts, see the memorialin Proceedings of the British Academy84 (1994) 47980. Roberts maintained the second-centurydate for 52in his later work, although he did not put forward new evidence. See his The Birth ofthe Codex, coauthored by T. C. Skeat (London: Oxford University Press, 1987) 40.

14Descriptions of this hoard of fragments are disappointingly vague. Roberts (An UnpublishedFragment, 24) writes, The group to which it belongs consists of some literary texts and documents

of the Ptolemaic and Roman periods, all of which are stated to have come either from the Fayumor from Oxyrhynchos. Even absent that statement of provenance, we would be on safe groundassuming one of those two locales simply given the relative numbers of papyri discovered at thoselocations. Comfort and Barretts strange claim that 52may have circulated in bothOxyrhynchusandthe Faym (Text of the Earliest Greek New Testament Manuscripts, 365, 367), and their attribu-tion of this view to Roberts (367), are, as far as I can tell, simply errors.


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on the recto and 18:3738 on the verso. An image of 52is reproduced in gure 1,along with an adapted version of Robertss transcription.15

Before comparing 52with other papyri, I shall describe some of its importantfeatures. Roberts called the hand heavy, rounded and rather elaborate.16There aretwo forms of alpha, both noteworthy. One (of the type in ajlhqe[iva~] on line 3 ofthe verso) has an arched vertical stroke; the other (of the type in aujtw/on line 4 ofthe verso) is written in a single sequence with a loop. The upsilon is also sometimeswritten in two strokes (see oujdevnaon line 2 of the recto) and sometimes with aloop (see aujtw/on line 4 of the verso). The center of the mu dips all the way to thebaseline (see hJme[in] on line 1 of the recto), and the delta has an arch much likethat of the rst type of alpha (see ijoudai[oi] on line 1 of the recto). These lettersare the main points Roberts uses for comparison.17

In addition to these characteristics, I would add a few comments. In more generalterms, the hand is upright with perhaps a slight tilt to the left (visible, for instance,in the iota of i{naon line 2 of the verso). The space between each line is about equalto the height of a line. There is an impression of a rough bilinearity,18although thehooking alpha breaches the top line, as do the upsilon and iota on occasion, and bothexamples of the rho extend well below the line. The iota and the kappa also meritnotice. As mentioned, the iota occasionally extends vertically beyond surroundingletters, particularly in -[d]aiw[n] in line 7 of the recto; it also features hooks on itsends. The only fully preserved kappa was written like the looping upsilon, with the

lower leg added in a second stroke. Finally, it is also worth noting the rather small sizeof the paleographic sample (111 fully visible letters, with 8 partially visible accordingto Robertss transcription). Eighteen of the twenty-four letters of the Greek alphabetare represented. Lacking are letters that can extend above and below the line, suchas phi and psi, whose presence would provide a better paleographic sample.

15My transcription abstains from some of Robertss reconstruction and leaves the spelling ofIhsou`nand Ihsouopen. See n. 17, below.

16An Unpublished Fragment, 13.17Although none of the terms usually abbreviated in early manuscripts of the New Testament

(the so-called nomina sacra) are present in 52, Roberts speculated, on the basis of the numberof letters in each line, that Ihsou`n(which likely would have appeared on line 5 of the recto) andIhsou(which would have likely appeared on line 2 of the recto) were not abbreviated. He arguedthat this conjecture provided slight support for the early date (An Unpublished Fragment, 19).Three scholars have very recently revisited this question of abbreviation. See Christopher M. Tuckett,

52 and Nomina Sacra, NTS47 (2001) 54448; Charles E. Hill, Did the Scribe of 52use theNomina Sacra? Another Look, NTS48 (2002) 58792; and Hurtado, 52(P. Rylands Gk. 457)and the Nomina Sacra, 114. Tuckett gives reasons to believe the names were not abbreviated,and Hill counters those reasons and tentatively suggests that the names were indeed abbreviated.

Hurtado presents a stronger case in favor of abbreviation. Either way, Roberts correctly notedthat for the purposes of dating the fragment, not much stress can be laid on this argument (AnUnpublished Fragment, 1819).

18That is, while the letters do not maintain perfect regularity in height, the strings of letters givea fairly strong impression of the upper and lower notional lines that the scribe used to determinethe heights of the letters. See Turner, Greek Manuscripts of the Ancient World, 3.


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Figure 1 52(P.Ryl. 3.457). 6.0 cm W x 8.9 cm H. Reproduced by courtesy of the Librarianand Director, The John Rylands University Library, The University of Manchester.

Verso[ . . . to]uto g[e]gennhmai[ . . . ko]smon i>na martu[rhsw th alhqeia pa~ o wn] ek th~ alhqe[i][a~ akouei mou th~ fwnh~] legei autw[o pilato~ ti estin alhqeia k]ai touto[eipwn palin exhlqen pro~]tou~ io[u][daiou~ kai legei autoi~ egw oud]emi[an]

Recto

oi i>oudaioihme[in ouk exestin apokteinai]oudena i>na o lo[go~ tou. . . plhrwqhonei]pen shmainw[n poiw qanatw hmellen apo]qnhskein is[hlqen oun palin ei~ to praitw]rion o p[ilato~ kai efwnhsen ton. . . ]kai eip[en autw su ei o basileu~ twniou][d]aiw[n. . . ]


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In 1935, this fragment was rushed into publication before the rest of the thirdvolume of the Catalogue. It appeared in its own thirty-ve-page volume,An Un-published Fragment of the Fourth Gospel in the John Rylands Library.19The reasonfor the hurry was excitement concerning Robertss dating of the fragment: On thewhole, we may accept with some condence the rst half of the second century asthe period in which P.Ryl. Gk. 457 was most probably written.20Robertss ownspeculation about the date of Johns gospel in light of his dating of the papyruswas relatively cautious: But all we can safely say is that this fragment tends tosupport those critics who favor an early date (late rst to early second century)for the composition of the Gospel rather than those who would still regard it as awork of the middle decades of the second century.21

Subsequent scholars have been bolder; they have tended to assign to 52a date

closer and closer to the early end of Robertss tentative range, and without provid-ing new evidence.22They have, moreover, done so in spite of the encouragement ofcaution from other papyrological experts. In 1977, Eric Turner had the followingto say about Robertss dating of 52: I have no evidence to invalidate the rst

19The publication of P.Ryl. 457 produced a small international sensation. See Adolf Deissmann,Ein Evangelienblatt aus den Tagen Hadrians,Deutsche allgemeine Zeitung564 (3 December 1935;English trans. inBritish Weekly, 12 December 1935); Giuseppe Ghedinis review of Roberts inAeg15 (1935) 42526; Hans Lietzmann, Neue Evangelienpapyri,ZNW34 (1935) 28593; AugustMerk, De Fragmento Quarti Evangelii Vetustissimo,Bib 17 (1936) 99101; and Joachim Jeremias,

Das neugefundene Fragment des Johannesevangeliums, TBl15 (1936) 9799. The fragment waslater published as part of the third volume of the Catalogue of the Greek and Latin Papyri in theJohn Rylands Library(Manchester: The University Press, 1938).

20An Unpublished Fragment, 16.21Ibid., 26.22The slippage in terminology here is remarkable. Most early commentators did not add anything

to Robertss analysis and maintained the exact wording of his fairly loose date of the rst half ofthe second century (e.g., Wilhelm Schubart and H. Idris Bell,An Unpublished Fragment, 16). SeeEllwood M. Schoeld, The Papyrus Fragments of the Greek New Testament (Ph.D. thesis, SouthernBaptist Theological Seminary, 1936) 330, 339; W. H. P. Hatch, The Principal Uncial Manuscriptsof the New Testament(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1939) plate I; Frederic Kenyon, OurBible and the Ancient Manuscripts(4th ed.; New York: Harper and Brothers, 1940) 128; Bruce M.Metzger, Recently Published Greek Papyri of the New Testament,BA10 (1947) 39; and GeorgMaldfeld, Die griechischen Handschriftenbruchstcke des Neuen Testamentes auf Papyrus,ZNW42 (1949) 251. Ulrich Wilcken made a passing comment that 52knnte vom palographischenStandpunkt aus gleichaltrig mit den Bremer Papyri [which date to around 120 C.E.] sein, althoughhe provided no specic examples. See his Die Bremer Papyrus-Sammlung, FF12 (1936) 90.Deissmann asserted (with no new evidence) a more precise date in the time of Hadrian or possiblyeven Trajan (see n. 19, above). Kurt Aland appears to be the one guilty of popularizing this earlierdating. In his many lists of New Testament papyri, Aland describes 52as Anfang 2. Jahrhun-dert, citing only the authorities listed above; see, e.g., Alands Zur Liste der neutestamentlichen

Handschriften VI, ZNW48 (1957) 149. He has even come to speak of a consensus dating ofthe papyrus in the early part of the second century, transforming Robertss rst half of the secondcentury to an overly specic about 125: Er wird im allgemeinen Konsens in die Zeit um 125n. Chr. angesetzt (Der Text des Johannesevangeliums im 2. Jahrhundert, in Studien zum Textund zur Ethik des Neuen Testaments. Festschrift zum 80. Geburtstag von Heinrich Greeven [ed.W. Schrage; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1986] 1). He and Barbara Aland reassert this consensus in their


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editors dating to the rst half of the second century. But I should echo his warningabout the need for caution.23He goes on to cite P.Amh. 2.78, a petition of 184 C.E.,which is as good a parallel to 52as any of those adduced by Roberts.24

What is needed, then, is a re-examination of all Robertss evidence and particu-larly an update of comparanda, preferably documentary papyri with dates,25in orderto question New Testament scholars early and overly specic dating of 52, typiedby the recent work of Comfort and Barrett. In the latest edition of their collection of

standard handbook on textual criticism and (with absolutely no evidence) push the date still earlier:The critical signicance of 52, which preserves only a fragment of John 18, lies in the date ofabout 125 assigned to it by the leading papyrologists. Although about 125 allows for a leewayof about twenty-ve years on either side, the consensus has come in recent years to regard 125 asrepresenting the later limit, so that 52must have been copied very soon after the Gospel of John was

itself written in the early 90s A.D. (The Text of the New Testament: An Introduction to the CriticalEditions and to the Theory and Practice of Modern Textual Criticism[trans. E. F. Rhodes; 2d rev.ed.; Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1989] 85). Finally, Eldon Epp has subsequently claimed that52was written in the rst quarter of the second century, but probably nearer 100 than 125, andin a footnote adds, Though at an earlier time dated 125150, recent opinion moves it back into the100125 period, perhaps very early in that quarter century. He cites only Roberts and the abovequotation from the Alands as evidence (The Signicance of the Papyri for Determining the Natureof the New Testament Text in the Second Century: A Dynamic View of Textual Transmission, inStudies in the Theory and Method of New Testament Textual Criticism[ed. E. J. Epp and G. D. Fee;Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1993] 27879 and 279 n. 10 [original article 1989]). This so-calledconsensus in recent opinion, as it rests on assertions with no evidence, is highly dubious.

23The Typology of the Early Codex(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1977) 100.Although Turner noted that for 52s format there are no parallels among early papyrus codices,but there are among later parchment codices, he pushed the date of 52only slightly later thanRoberts, and, on the whole, he approved of Robertss work: The Rylands papyrus may therefore beaccepted as of the rst half of the second century. It is the only codex in my list that I would placeso early, for I would not be willing to admit any of the others to a date earlier than the second halfof the century. While this appreciation removes to a slightly later period in time the particular manu-scripts on which C. H. Roberts has built his account of the codex, I do not think it does any seriousdamage to his general theory. Indeed I should think that this independent critical assessment of theevidence has reinforced its acceptability (ibid.). It is noteworthy, though, that in Turners typologyof codices, 52actually falls into Aberrants of Group 5 with ve other examples, none of whichare earlier than the late third or early fourth century (ibid., 18). In addition, the parchment codicesthat more nearly match Turners estimated dimensions of the pages of 52(18 cm W x 21.3 cm H)are from the fth century (ibid., 27). H. Idris Bell, who generally approved of Robertss edition ofP.Ryl. 3.457, also emphasized caution in the dating, preferring not later than about the middle ofthe second century to Robertss rst half of the second century, though he later remained open toa date considerably earlier than 150. See Bells review of Roberts inJEA21 (1935) 26667 andhis Recent Discoveries of Biblical Papyri: An Inaugural Lecture Delivered before the Universityof Oxford on 18 November 1936(Oxford: Clarendon, 1937) 21.

24I provide an image and discussion of P.Amh. 2.78 below (g. 13, p. 42).25Turner (Greek Manuscripts of the Ancient World, 1920) notes that the ideal situation would be

to compare literary hands to other dated literary hands. Unfortunately, examples of literary papyriwith rm dates are in short supply, especially relative to the number of dated documentary papyri(see further the discussion in Roberts, Greek Literary Hands, xiixv). While the distinction betweenliterary papyri, most often written in neat book hands, and documentary papyri, often writtenin cursive hands, has been fundamental from the inception of Greek papyrological paleography(see, e.g., Frederic Kenyon, The Palaeography of Greek Papyri[Oxford: Clarendon, 1899] 9), these


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early manuscripts of the New Testament (2001), they bring only one new papyrusinto the discussion of dating 52, P.Oxy. 31.2533, a fragment of New Comedy ofunknown authorship published in 1966 and dated paleographically by its editorsto the second century.26With only this sliver of evidence in hand, Comfort andBarrett assert a date closer to A.D. 100, plus or minus a few years for 52!27

Robertss Dating of 52

So that readers can judge for themselves, I have assembled images of all of Robertsscomparanda, and shall discuss them in the order Roberts presents them. Afterwards,I shall provide examples of more recently published papyri that show that manyof the characteristics of Robertss comparanda are present in papyri produced wellinto the third century.28

The closest parallels that Roberts presents are other literary texts that alsolack rm dates. Figure 2 reproduces a portion of a scroll of the Iliadcontainingbook 8, published as P.Berol. 6845, to which the original editor assigned a date

designations do not imply that the handwriting of every papyrus falls neatly into one of the twogroups. As Roberts (Greek Literary Hands, xixii) correctly observes, No sharp line was drawnbetween book hands and the documentary hands used for ofcial, business, and private purposes.Though the extremes of the literary type and the documentary or cursive type are distinctly dif-ferent, the gradations between the most elegant book hand and the most uent cursive are almost

innite. The comparanda I have chosen are (like Robertss own documentary comparanda) legiblewith reasonably uniform style and some ligatures.

26Comfort and Barrett chose in P.Oxy. 31.2533 a difcult papyrus for comparative dating purposes.The original editors full statement of dating is as follows: The text of the recto of this papyrusis a document, written in a practised upright business hand, neat but employing cursive forms ofvarying size, all of which could be paralleled in rst-century documents; the general impression,however, suggests the second century. [A transcription of this highly fragmentary document appearsbefore the editors continue.] On the verso is written a passage of New Comedy in a semi-literaryhand, upright, rounded, and clear; the letters are somewhat variable in size, and several (notablyeand k) show cursive forms; ligature is common. The appearance of the recto and verso texts issupercially dissimilar, but examination of the letters shows so many identical forms that it seems

likely that the writer was the same (J. W. B. Barns et al., eds., The Oxyrhynchus PapyriXXXI[London: Egypt Exploration Society, 1966] 9 and plate II). The dating of the New Comedy passageis thus itself fairly questionable, and the similarities between 52and either side of P.Oxy. 31.2533are not particularly striking. An image of the recto and verso of P.Oxy. 31.2533 is nonethelessprovided below in appendix 1, p. 47.

27The Text of the Earliest New Testament Greek Manuscripts, 367. This kind of precision datingdees the realities of scribal activity. The productive writing life of a scribe was probably aroundthirty or thirty-ve years. Add to that the fact that the scribal profession was an apprenticed trade,with students learning a particular style from a teacher, and we nd that a given hand may be presentover multiple generations of scribes. Thus the rule of thumb should probably be to avoid datinga hand more precisely than a range of at least seventy or eighty years. The evidence presentedbelow bears out this reasoning.

28Strecker (The Johannine Letters, xli n. 78) makes a valid point about Robertss choice ofcomparanda: It is indicative that the editor adduced only older papyri for the handwriting com-parison, without verifying whether other manuscripts, dated near the end of the second or in thethird century, might reveal similarities.


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BRENT NONGBRI 33

(on paleographic evidence) in the early second century.29 There are some denitesimilarities between letters in the two manuscripts, particularly upsilon and mu,but the pi and alpha of 52are quite distinct from those of P.Berol. 6845. The ep-

silon of P.Berol. 6845, with its middle bar consistently approaching and frequentlymeeting the upper bar, is also different from that of 52. The rho of P.Berol. 6845does not stretch below the other letters, as does the rho of 52. Overall, the handis not dissimilar from 52, but, as we shall see, the similarities seen here persist indocuments of the third century C.E.

29Wilhelm Schubart, Papyri Graecae Berolinenses(Bonn: A. Marcus et E. Weber, 1911) XVIIwith plate 19c. Another description is available in Wilhelm Schubart and U. von Wilamowitz-

Moellendorff,Berliner Klassikertexte V(Berlin: Weidmannsche Buchhandlung, 1907) 1. The text hasbeen re-edited since Robertss publication of 52, but its dating is essentially the same. See WilliamLameere,Aperus de palographie homrique propos des papyrus de lIliadeet de lOdyssedescollections de Gand, de Bruxelles et de Louvain(Paris: ditions rasme, 1960) 8183. The text isentry 831 in Roger A. Pack, The Greek and Latin Literary Texts from Greco-Roman Egypt(2d rev.ed.; Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1965).

Figure 2P.Berol. 6845. 13.5 cm W x 13.0 cm H. Courtesy of the Staatliche Museen zuBerlin, Preuischer Kulturbesitz, gyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung, Berlin.


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Figure 3Egerton Papyrus 2 (Recto, Leaf 2). Complete fragment measures 9.7 cm W x11.8 cm H. By permission of The British Library.

The next text that Roberts mentions as a close overall parallel is the famous

fragment of an unknown gospel, Egerton Papyrus 2.30The recto of the second leafis reproduced in gure 3. Roberts notes the similar upsilon, mu, and delta. Thealpha, however, is only of the looped type. The original editors of this set of frag-ments dated it to the middle of the second century, but the problematic nature ofpaleographically dating these papyri comes into even sharper relief when we noticethat the principle comparanda for dating Egerton Papyrus 2 are for the most partthe sameasthose later used by Roberts to date 52.31The independent value ofEgerton Papyrus 2 for dating 52is thus minimal. Also, in 1987, Michael Gronewaldidentied P.Kln 6.255 as an additional fragment of Egerton Papyrus 2.32He noted

30The fragments, also sometimes called P.Lond.Christ. 1, were rst published in 1935. SeeH. Idris Bell and T. C. Skeat, Fragments of an Unknown Gospel and Other Early Christian Papyri(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1935). The same authors produced a corrected and popularizededition later in the same year, The New Gospel Fragments(London: Trustees of the British Museum,1935). Both the portion of the editio princepsdealing with the Egerton fragments and The NewGospel Fragmentsare available online at Wieland Willkers The Papyrus Egerton 2 Homepage,http://www-user.uni-bremen.de/~wie/Egerton/egerton-publicat.html (accessed 2 February 2005). Anup-to-date bibliography of recent work on Egerton Papyrus 2 is also available there at http://www-user.uni-bremen.de/~wie/Egerton/egerton-biblio.html.

31

Bell and Skeat discuss P.Berol. 6854 (= B.G.U. 1.22), P.Lond. 1.130, and P.Faym 110; seeFragments of an Unknown Gospel, 12. Only P.Lond. 1.130, another literary text without a denitedate, is absent from Robertss discussion of 52. I have included an image of P.Lond. 1.130 belowin appendix 2, p. 48.

32Klner Papyri VI (ed. M. Gronewald et al.; Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1987) 13645 andplate V.


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BRENT NONGBRI 35

that P.Kln 6.255 displayed an apostrophe between two consonants, a feature thatled him to date Egerton Papyrus 2 considerably later, ca. 200 C.E.33

While Roberts notes that the similarities are not as close, he does provide someparallels from dated documentary papyri. Figure 4 shows P.Faym 110, from 94 C.E.34

33Strecker has already brought this point to bear in reconsidering the date of 52(The JohannineLetters, xli n. 78); so also Hurtado, 52 (P. Rylands Gk. 457) and the Nomina Sacra, 7 n. 20.Stuart R. Pickering is also appropriately cautious about the paleography of Egerton Papyrus 2(The Egerton Gospel and New Testament Textual Transmission, in The New Testament Text inEarly Christianity: Proceedings of the Lille Colloquium, July 2000[ed. C.-B. Amphoux and J. K.Elliott; Lausanne: ditions du Zbre, 2003] 22933). Even those scholars who argue that the gospel

on Egerton Papyrus 2 is independent of the synoptics and John, such as Helmut Koester, endorseGronewalds later dating of the papyrus at ca. 200 C.E.See KoestersAncient Christian Gospels:Their History and Development(London: SCM Press, 1990) 206.

34Bernard P. Grenfell, Arthur S. Hunt, and David G. Hogarth, Faym Towns and Their Papyri(Lon-don: Egypt Exploration Fund, 1900) 26164 and plate V (not plate VI, as p. 261 suggests). Robertsreprinted this image in his Greek Literary Hands and reasserted its resemblance to 52(p. 11).

Figure 4P.Faym 110. Complete fragment measures 10.2 cm W x 26.9 cm H. Courtesy ofthe Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Columbia University.


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Roberts especially emphasizes the importance of P.Faym 110 because it shows, asdoes our text, the simultaneous use of two forms of alpha.35In gure 5, I have enlargedthe ends of lines 79, which display this characteristic. The alpha of bavqo~in line 8

is looped; the alpha of ejlai- at the end of line 7 is not looped, but neither is it archedlike the non-looping alpha of 52.The alpha of P.Faym 110 looks more like the alphaofmartu[rhvsw] in line 2 on the verso of 52. The delta is also similar to that of 52.

He next notes similarities with P.Lond. inv. 2078 (=SB5.7987), a letter writtenunder the reign of Domitian (8196 C.E.).36SB5.7987, reproduced in gure 6, is, inmy opinion, the least convincing of Robertss parallels. Its upsilon is distinctly dif-ferent, the alpha has neither arches nor loops, and the delta is not at all similar. Onlythe mu closely resembles that of 52(and occasionally the rho, as in kaivsaro~inthe middle of the penultimate line).

35An Unpublished Fragment, 15.36This papyrus was published in the New Palaeographic Societys Facsimiles of Ancient Manu-

scripts, etc.(London: Oxford University Press, 19131930) series ii, plate 98.

Figure 5 Detail of P.Faym 110. Courtesy of the Rare Book and Manuscript Library,Columbia University.


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BRENT NONGBRI 37

Figure 6P.Lond. inv. 2078 (=SB5.7987). 17.1 cm W x 21.6 cm H. By permission of TheBritish Library.


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37Samson Eitrem and Leiv Amundsen, Papyri OsloensesII(Oslo: Norske videnskaps-akademi iOslo, 1931) 48 and plate iii. The same editors published a new edition with slight changes, Com-plaint of an Assault, with Petition to the Police,JEA40 (1954) 33.

Roberts then refers to P.Oslo 2.22, here gure 7, a petition to a strateguswrit-ten in 127 C.E.37He sees resemblances in the eta, mu, and iota. In gure 8, I haveenlarged the beginning of line 3, which reads -mh~ qeadelfeiva~ and shows all threeof those letters. The overall appearance is not terribly close to that of 52, but theletters that Roberts identies are similar. Some letters, however, are very different,such as the sigma, which curves sharply downward in P.Oslo. 2.22.

Figure 7 P.Oslo. 2.22. Complete fragment measures 9.1 cm W x 20.5 cm H. Courtesy ofthe Oslo University Library.

Figure 8 Detail of P.Oslo. 2.22. Courtesy of the Oslo University Library.


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BRENT NONGBRI 39

38Aegyptische Urkunden aus den koeniglichen Museen zu Berlin(Berlin: Weidmannsche Buch-handlung, 1895) 36. There is no plate in the rst edition, but a plate with transcription appeared inWilhelm Schubarts Griechische Palaeographie (Munich: C. H. Becksche Verlagsbuchhandlung,1925) 59, plate 34. The image reproduced here shows lines 621 of the 43-line papyrus.

The next papyrus Roberts mentions is now known as B.G.U. 1.22 (g. 9), a docu-ment dated to 114 C.E.38Roberts does not point out any specic characteristics of thispapyrus, and I am uncertain what similarities he sees here. The alpha is different,lacking both the arch and loop of 52s two types of alpha. The vertical stroke ofthe tau of B.G.U. 1.22 often leans to the right. The upsilon is perhaps similar, buton the whole, this document is not an overly impressive parallel.

Figure 9B.G.U. 1.22. Complete fragment measures 7.5 cm W x 25.5 cm H. Courtesy ofthe gyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung, Berlin. Photo: Margarete Bsing.


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39

Girolamo Vitelli, Papiri greco-egizii, volume primo: Papiri orentini(Milan: Ulrico Hoepli,1905) 14.40Guglielmo Cavallo et al., Scrivere libri e documenti nel mondo antico: Mostra di papiri della

Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana Firenze 25 agosto 25 settembre 1998(Florence: Edizioni Gonnelli,1998). Gabriella Messeri discusses P.Flor. 1 on pp. 19798, and the images are on plates 11314.

41An Unpublished Fragment, 16.

The nal papyrus Roberts mentions in his discussion of dating 52is P.Flor. 1.1,a document from 153 C.E.brought to his attention by Frederic Kenyon.39The plateof P.Flor. 1.1 published with the editio princepsis of poor quality; but fortunately,

color images of two large portions of this scroll have been recently published.40Ireproduce a portion of the left end of this scroll in gure 10. Roberts writes, Inthis text the upsilon, the omega and sometimes the alpha are similar to those in ourtext, but other letters are radically different and its general style is not very closeto that of 52.41Roberts prefers the late-rst- and early-second-century parallelshe presented earlier.

I agree with some of the similarities that Roberts points out in these papyri. Thedifculty is that the features he isolates in papyri from the late rst to mid second

centuries persist into the late second and the third centuries. We can clearly seethese examples in P.Amh. 2.78 and in more recently published papyri.

Some New ComparandaSince Roberts downplayed similarities between 52and P.Flor. 1.1, the latest docu-ment that he examined, I shall begin with a document from the same period. P.Mich.

Figure 10P.Flor. 1.1. Complete scroll measures 100 cm W x 23 cm H. Image appears courtesyof the Ministero per i Beni e le Attivit Culturali, the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana,Florence. Reproduction prohibited.


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BRENT NONGBRI 41

42This papyrus was published by P. J. Sijpesteijn, Known and Unknown Ofcials, ZPE106(1995) 21618 and plate VIIIa.

inv. 5336 (=SB22.15782), reproduced in gure 11, is a petition from ca. 152 C.E.42Several individual letters resemble those of 52, and the overall impression is similar.The vertical spacing of the lines is more compressed, but the spacing between letters iscomparable, as is the rough bilinearity. Notice in particular the alpha forms in ajrgurivouat the beginning of line 2 and in the next word in line 2, dracmwn. Although the rho ofdracmwnis like the rho of martu[rhvsw] of 52, the rho of SB22.15782 generally doesnot dip below the other letters and often curves to the right. The delta of dhmovsionatthe beginning of line 5 is also noteworthy. The entire word th~at the beginning of line 4is remarkably close to the th~ in line 3 on the verso of 52. The two words are enlargedin gure 12. The tau-omega sequence in tw/of line 5 of SB22.15782 also matches that

of the aujtw/on the verso of 52

. The afnities in letter forms between SB22.15782 and52are as close as any of Robertss documentary parallels.

Figure 11 P.Mich. inv. 5336 (= SB22.15782). 18 cm W x 12.4 cm H. Courtesy of thePapyrology Collection, Graduate Library, The University of Michigan.

Figure 12Detail of gure 11, SB22.15782 (left), and gure 1, 52(right).


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43This papyrus is now in the collection of the Pierpont Morgan Library. The image reproducedhere is from the original publication by Bernard P. Grenfell and Arthur S. Hunt, The Amherst PapyriII(London: Oxford University Press, 1901) 9798 and plate xvii.

The next document to consider is P.Amh. 2.78 (g. 13), which Turner had put forthas an illuminating parallel.43As Turner noted, this petition to a centurion from 184 C.E.shows similarities in its overall uprightness (or even slight lean to the left), roundness

Figure 13 P.Amh. 2.78. Complete fragment measures 9.0 cm W x 26.6 cm H. Courtesy ofthe Pierpont Morgan Library and Oxford University Press.


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BRENT NONGBRI 43

44The Typology of the Early Codex, 100.45J. R. Rea, ed., The Oxyrhynchus PapyriLI (London: Egypt Exploration Society, 1984) 3538

and plate V.

and scale, and in the forms of particular letters. . . . But the letters are crushed moreclosely together and not so even in size, as would in any case be expected in a docu-ment.44P.Amh. 2.78 displays both forms of the alpha (e.g., the arch in eujporaand theloop in aujth~, both in line 6) and a very similar omega (e.g., kwvmh~in line 3). Turnernotes a similar epsilon, pi, and iota as well. While the epsilon-iota combination in P.Amh.2.78 is generally much sloppier than that of 52(see, e.g., the second word of line 8of P.Amh. 2.78, eij~), it sometimes resembles the combination in levgeiin line 4 of theverso of 52(see the eij~at the beginning of line 19 of the Amherst papyrus).

A more cursive document that bears some resemblance to 52is P.Oxy. 51.3614(g. 14). This piece records a judgment of Septimius Severus from 200 C.E., so thepapyrus must date from sometime after that.45P.Oxy. 51.3614 shows more ligaturesthan 52, but the vertical and horizontal spacing is similar. Several individual lettersalso show afnities. The long iota with hooks on top and bottom (such as those in

ejpivtropoiin the middle of line 4) recalls the iota in -[d]aiw[n] in line 7 of the rectoof 52. The pi and eta, with their hooking right legs, also match those of 52. The rhohas a small loop and extends below the line, but the rho of P.Oxy. 51.3614 displays ahook at the bottom of the vertical stroke that is absent from the rho of 52. While thekappa in lines 1 and 7 is distinctive because of its height, it was written in the sametwo-stroke manner as the kappa of 52. Looping and non-looping forms of alpha areboth represented, although the non-looping alpha (as in the tavafter the rst hole inline 5) lacks a clear hook and more closely resembles the alpha of i{nain line 2 of theverso of 52. The sequence autin the au{thof line 9 closely matches the sequence

in 52s aujtw/, though the tau leans in the opposite direction.

Figure 14 P.Oxy. 51.3614. 14.0 cm W x 9.5 cm H. Courtesy of the Egypt Exploration Society.


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In terms of the individual letter forms that Roberts pointed out, it will be usefulto look at a somewhat later documentP.Oxy. 52.3694, an invitation to a strategusthat dates either between 218 and 225 C.E.or to 278 C.E. (g. 15).46The editors favorthe earlier date range. The same features that Roberts notes in his parallels (the oddly

formed alpha, the looping upsilon, the mu dipping to the bottom of the line) are allpresent here. We even see both forms of the alpha, the loop (in strathgw/at the endof line 1) and the arch (in kaleiin line 3). The eta, such as the one in kwvmh~in line 2,is also similar to those of our papyrus. The hand of P.Oxy. 52.3694 is obviously lesswell formed and less regular than that of 52, but it is to be expected that a documentwould be written more quickly and less deliberately than a literary text.

The same can be said about our next example, P.Oxy. 41.2968 (g. 16), a receiptthat is part of a group that dates to the later part of 190 C.E.47This text also displays

the two characteristic forms of the alpha (the loop is clear in the parof line 8 andthe kaivbeginning line 10; the arch is clear in the rst letter of the name ajmmwnato~at the end of line 3 and in the ajpovof line 14). The upsilon of P.Oxy. 41.2968 (e.g., inthe name dionusivouin line 1) is also very similar to those of 52, as is the mu (e.g.,mhtrov~in the middle of line 4). The rho of the mhtrov~that extends below the line isalso fairly close to the rho of -rionat the beginning of line 5 on the recto of 52.48

46H. M. Cockle et al., eds., The Oxyrhynchus PapyriLII (London: Egypt Exploration Society,1984) 14446 and plate VIII. The name of the strategus, Aurelius Harpocration, is attested twice in

the Oxyrhynchite nome. See J. E. G. Whitehorne, A Checklist of Oxyrhynchite Strategi, ZPE29(1978) 16789; and more recently, Guido Bastianini and John Whitehorne, Strategi and Royal Scribesof Roman Egypt: Chronological List and Index(Florence: Edizioni Gonnelli, 1987) 155.

47G. M. Browne et al., eds., The Oxyrhynchus PapyriXLI (London: Egypt Exploration Society,1972) 5254.

48In order to keep the length of this paper to a minimum, I will simply list some other third-century

Figure 15P.Oxy. 52.3694. Complete fragment measures 12.4 cm W x 11.1 cm H. Courtesy ofthe Egypt Exploration Society.


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BRENT NONGBRI 45

Figure 16P.Oxy. 41.2968. 8.4 cm W x 16.4 cm H. Courtesy of the Egypt Exploration Society.

documentary texts that are worth comparing to 52: P.Oxy. 41.2997 (214 C.E.); P.Oxy. 67.4593 (apetition to a prefect dating from between 206 and 211 C.E.; note the two forms of alpha, the etawith a high horizontal, the delta, and the mu); and P.Mich. inv. 2789a+b (= SB22.15775, between203 and 206 C.E.), which was published in Sijpesteijn, Known and Unknown Ofcials, 2089and plate VIc (note the delta, mu, epsilon, and omega).


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49Even though some literary papyri have come to light that bear a resemblance to 52 (mostnotably P.Oxy. 64.4404 [now 104], a small fragment of Matthews gospel dated by its editor to thesecond half of the second century), they are of no help in the present project since they are them-selves paleographically dated. Although Turner recommends comparing literary hands with literaryhands, such a process can become very circular without the inclusion of some rmly dated (usuallydocumentary) manuscripts to act as a control. Thus, using other biblical papyri often regarded asearly (46, 66, 90, etc.) to date 52(or vice versa) is also an unhelpful exercise. For this reason,Schmidts arguments in Zwei Anmerkungen (pp. 1112) are not very strong.

50Roberts writes, Any exact dating of book hands is, of course, out of the question (An Un-published Fragment, 13).

51Schmidts argument falters on this ground just as much as the arguments of those who wantan overly specic early date for the papyrus. Schmidt claims (Zwei Anmerkungen, 11) thatpaleographic similarity between 52and P. Chester Beatty X and III (each paleographically datedto the third century) would exclude a date of 125 C.E. for 52. This claim is untrue. Nor would pa-leographic similarities to documents from 40 C.E.in any way rule out a third-century date for 52.Such examples would simply increase the range of possible dates for 52 and conrm my thesis thatwe should avoid building arguments on unrealistically specic dates proposed for papyri.

52The papyri of Herculaneum, which cannot postdate 79 C.E., would fall into this category.53I have incurred more than the usual number of debts in the course of this project. I happily of-

fer my thanks to the numerous librarians and keepers of manuscripts who gave me access to variouspapyrus pieces or helped me to acquire such access. Also, for helpful advice and criticism on thisproject (more of which I probably should have heeded), I would like to thank Harold W. Attridge,Robert G. Babcock, Ann Ellis Hanson, and William A. Johnson, as well as the anonymous readersat HTR.Finally, thanks also to my colleague Tudor Sala for a couple of timely favors during theproduction of this piece.

ConclusionWhat emerges from this survey is nothing surprising to papyrologists: paleographyis not the most effective method for dating texts, particularly those written in a

literary hand.49Roberts himself noted this point in his edition of 52.50The realproblem is thus in the way scholars of the New Testament have used and abusedpapyrological evidence. I have not radically revised Robertss work. I have notprovided any third-century documentary papyri that are absolute dead ringersfor the handwriting of 52, and even if I had done so, that would not force us todate 52at some exact point in the third century. Paleographic evidence does notwork that way.51What I have done is to show that any serious consideration of thewindow of possible dates for 52must include dates in the later second and earlythird centuries. Thus, 52cannot be used as evidence to silence other debatesabout the existence (or non-existence) of the Gospel of John in the rst half of thesecond century. Only a papyrus containing an explicit date or one found in a cleararchaeological stratigraphic context could do the work scholars want 52to do.52As it stands now, the papyrological evidence should take a second place to otherforms of evidence in addressing debates about the dating of the Fourth Gospel.53


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BRENT NONGBRI 47

Verso

Recto

Appendix 1: P.Oxy. 31.2533

Figure 17 P.Oxy. 31.2533. 7.5 cm W x 11.3 cm H. Courtesy of the Egypt Exploration Society.

Comfort and Barrett argue that P.Oxy. 31.2533, the fragment of New Comedypictured here (verso), is a good parallel for 52. Aside from the looping upsilon,

I do not see many similarities (although an argument could be made that the muand rho are similar to those of 52). The delta is quite different. Of the few letterslegible on the recto, the tau and eta occasionally resemble those of 52. In anyevent, the dating of P.Oxy. 31.2533 is itself so uncertain (see n. 26, above) that itcan be of little use for dating 52.


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Appendix 2: P.Lond. 1.130

Figure 18 P.Lond. 1.130. Complete scroll measures 64.8 cm W x 25.4 cm H. By permission

of The British Library.

Bell and Skeat suggest that the hand of P.Lond. 1.130 resembles that of EgertonPapyrus 2 (Fragments of an Unknown Gospel and Other Early Christian Papyri[Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1935] 2). Although there is some similarity inthe upsilon and delta, I am not particularly impressed. P. Lond. 1.130 is a horo-scope with an introductory letter attached. The editor dated the piece to the rst orsecond century C.E.The text was published in 1893 in Frederic G. Kenyons Greek

Papyri in the British Museum: Catalogue, with Texts(5 vols.; 18931917; repr.,Milan: Cisalpino-Goliardica, 1973) 1:13239, but no images were included. Thisimage comes from the top of column 4. A similar image was published in WilhelmSchubarts Griechische Palaeographie(Munich: C. H. Becksche Verlagsbuch-handlung, 1925) 122, plate 81.

the use and abuse of p52 papyrological pitfalls in the dating of the fourth gospel by brent nongbri

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