There are perhaps 6,000 manuscripts of the entire Hebrew Scriptures or portions of it and some 5,000 of the Christian Greek Scriptures.

In contrast with this, the text of the Christian Greek Scriptures (completed in the first century C.E.) is attested to by fragments from the second century and by complete copies from the fourth century. According to Kroll, there are 81 papyri from the 2nd to the 7th century, 266 uncial manuscripts from the 4th to the 10th century, and 2,754 cursive manuscripts from the 9th to the 15th century, as well as 2,135 lectionaries. All of these help us to establish the text of the Christian Greek Scriptures. So, yes, it is very well attested to indeed.

A Vital Fragment of John’s Gospel

Who would expect to find part of a valuable Bible manuscript in a heap of rubbish? Yet, that is where a treasured fragment of chapter 18 of John’s Gospel was found. Now known as the John Rylands Papyrus 457 (P⁵²), it is preserved in Manchester, England. How was it discovered, and why is it so important?

At the turn of the century, archaeologists dug up a mass of papyrus fragments, including letters, receipts, petitions, and census documents, along with many other texts, outside the town of Oxyrhynchus in the district of El Faiyûm, Egypt. Most written in Greek, they had all been preserved for centuries in the dry sand.

In the year 1920, a collection of these papyri was acquired by the John Rylands Library of Manchester. Fourteen years later, scholar C. H. Roberts, in sorting through some of the pieces, came across a few words that seemed familiar to him. Imagine his excitement when he realized that they were from John chapter 18, parts of Joh 18 verses 31 to 33 being on one side of the fragment and parts of Joh 18 verses 37 and 38 on the other side (the verso). This papyrus fragment proved to be the earliest known portion of any Christian Greek Scripture manuscript yet discovered. Written in Greek capital letters called uncials, it originated in the first half of the second century of our Common Era.

This fragment measures only 3.5 by 2.5 inches [8.9 by 6.4 cm]. How is it possible to date this piece of papyrus so accurately? Mainly by examining the style of writing, a study known as paleography. All handwriting changes gradually over the years, and it is these changes that indicate the age of a manuscript, with a margin of error of some years either way. The complete manuscript of which the fragment is such a small part was therefore copied very close to the time of writing of the original Gospel account penned by John himself. Likely, the gap was as little as 30 or 40 years. We can also be sure that John’s account was not significantly altered by later scribes, for the text of the fragment agrees almost exactly with that found in much later manuscripts.

Prior to this find, critics had argued that John’s Gospel was not a genuine writing of Jesus’ apostle but had been penned sometime later, toward the end of the second century. On the contrary, it is now clear from this fragment that John’s Gospel existed in Egypt in the first half of the second century C.E., not as a scroll, but in book form as a codex. How astonishing that such a seemingly insignificant papyrus fragment could silence the critics so effectively!