Rescuing an Ancient Gem From the Trash

WHAT comes to your mind when you think of a rubbish heap? You likely associate such a sight with refuse and an unpleasant smell. So you would hardly expect to find anything of value there, much less a priceless gem.

Yet, a century ago a treasure of sorts was found in just such a place​—the trash. The treasure was, not a literal gem, but something else of great value. What kind of treasure was uncovered? Why is its discovery important to us today?

AN UNEXPECTED FIND

At the turn of the 20th century, Bernard P. Grenfell and Arthur S. Hunt, scholars at the University of Oxford, visited Egypt. There, among the garbage heaps close to the Nile Valley, they discovered a number of papyrus fragments. Later, in 1920, while the two colleagues were busy cataloging the collection, Grenfell acquired some additional fragments that had been dug up in Egypt. He acquired these on behalf of The John Rylands Library in Manchester, England. However, both men died before the catalog was finished.

Colin H. Roberts, another scholar at Oxford University, completed the task. While he was sorting the fragments, he spotted a papyrus scrap measuring 3.5 by 2.4 inches (9 x 6 cm). To his amazement, the Greek handwriting contained words that were familiar to him. On one side were words taken from John 18:31-33. The other side contained parts of verses 37 and 38. Roberts realized that he had stumbled upon a priceless gem.

DETERMINING ITS AGE

Roberts suspected that this papyrus scrap was very old. But how old? To find out, he compared the handwriting on it with other dated ancient manuscripts​—a discipline called paleography.a By applying this method, he was able to assign an approximate age. But he wanted to be sure. So he photographed the fragment, sent copies of it to three papyrologists, and asked them to determine its age. What did these experts conclude?

By studying the style of the script and the strokes, all three of the expert scholars agreed that the fragment had been written in the first half of the second century C.E.​—just a few decades after the apostle John’s death! Paleography, however, is not a foolproof method of dating manuscripts, and another scholar believes that the text could have been written anytime during the second century. Yet, this tiny scrap of papyrus was​—and still is—​the oldest existing manuscript fragment of the Christian Greek Scriptures that has ever been found.