125
Friderico- Avgvstanvs Lipsiensis, The Old Testament.
34
The ancient library at
Caesarea, still flourishing in the third, possibly early fourth century, is the likely
location where scribes edited this oldest known Greek translation from the Hebrew
before it was moved to St. Catherine’s Monastery. Prior to that, it may have come
from Alexandria. Replete with fabulous details—the vellum itself, the inks, notations, palimpsests, styles, corrections, and as yet unaccountable versions, wordtweaks, literal-versus- generic translations—the Codex and its enigmatic history is
unquestionably one of the most perplexing and influential books ever written.
Tischendorf attributed the entire New Testament portion of the Codex, held by
the Vatican, as having been written down by the scribe denominated as “D.” What is
generally not fully appreciated, brought to light by Tischendorf and noted at the end
of Kirsopp’s own introduction to the Facsimile,
35
is the likelihood “that D actually
wrote the whole of Tobit and Judith, and probably the Pentateuch in the Old
Testament, so that he was clearly a member of the scriptorium.” This places the
Codex to within a century or two centuries, probably no more, from the living
Christ. And that, in turn, conveys some sense of the sacralities swirling around that
garden, those courtyards, the library, the basilica, the monks’ quarters, and the
refectory of St. Catherine’s. Of the evening shadows through the olive grove, and
the sweet morning songs of the Sinai rosefinch (the national bird of Jordan).
Such sentiments are quintessentially logical, because of everything we imagine
paradise to be: all those qualia and noumena remote from the here and now, but
magnified in our thirst to escape imperfect realities. Of course, that same paradise is
at odds with natural history. If evolution, as so many theologians after Darwin
would argue, were pointed toward a purposeful, human odyssey, then why obsess so
in the interest of renouncing our biological presence in favor of words targeting the
unknown? Words amalgamated in the complex tapestry of edits and elusive source
material that make up the Codex Sinaiticus? (Fig. 13.3).
Of particular interest to us is the Old Testament and its fragmented incarnation in
the Codex. As many as 929 chapters were predominantly written during the postexilic years of the fifth and fourth centuries BCE. Predictions (of a coming Messiah),
ambiguities, and paradise lost. A God as real as any vertebrate, with mood swings,
tremendous anger, captivating love, an ability to alter his/her/its thinking, to forgive,
to promulgate premonitory warnings (Moses and the Commandments) (Fig. 13.4).
Browsing week after week through the monastery’s library and viewing firsthand
many of its icons were dazzling enough. I spent days soloing the headwalls of Sinai,
and the countless other nearby granite peaks and escarpments, in both snow-covered
and blisteringly hot weather. I held up in a cave, a deep crevice which could easily
34 ibid., p. xxiii.
35 See “The Cryptic African Wolf: Canis aureus lupaster Is Not a Golden Jackal and Is Not Endemic
to Egypt,” Eli Knispel Rueness, Maria Gulbrandsen Asmyhr, Claudio Sillero-Zubiri, David
W. Macdonald, Afework Bekele, Anagaw Atickem, and Nils Chr. Stenseth, Thomas
M. Gilbert, Editor, PLoS One. 2011; 6(1): e16385.Published online 2011 Jan 26, doi: https://doi.
org/10.1371/journal.pone.0016385, PMCID: PMC3027653, PMID: 21298107, Accessed March
10, 2019.
13.3 The Incarnation of Fragments
Friderico- Avgvstanvs Lipsiensis, The Old Testament.
34
The ancient library at
Caesarea, still flourishing in the third, possibly early fourth century, is the likely
location where scribes edited this oldest known Greek translation from the Hebrew
before it was moved to St. Catherine’s Monastery. Prior to that, it may have come
from Alexandria. Replete with fabulous details—the vellum itself, the inks, notations, palimpsests, styles, corrections, and as yet unaccountable versions, wordtweaks, literal-versus- generic translations—the Codex and its enigmatic history is
unquestionably one of the most perplexing and influential books ever written.
Tischendorf attributed the entire New Testament portion of the Codex, held by
the Vatican, as having been written down by the scribe denominated as “D.” What is
generally not fully appreciated, brought to light by Tischendorf and noted at the end
of Kirsopp’s own introduction to the Facsimile,
35
is the likelihood “that D actually
wrote the whole of Tobit and Judith, and probably the Pentateuch in the Old
Testament, so that he was clearly a member of the scriptorium.” This places the
Codex to within a century or two centuries, probably no more, from the living
Christ. And that, in turn, conveys some sense of the sacralities swirling around that
garden, those courtyards, the library, the basilica, the monks’ quarters, and the
refectory of St. Catherine’s. Of the evening shadows through the olive grove, and
the sweet morning songs of the Sinai rosefinch (the national bird of Jordan).
Such sentiments are quintessentially logical, because of everything we imagine
paradise to be: all those qualia and noumena remote from the here and now, but
magnified in our thirst to escape imperfect realities. Of course, that same paradise is
at odds with natural history. If evolution, as so many theologians after Darwin
would argue, were pointed toward a purposeful, human odyssey, then why obsess so
in the interest of renouncing our biological presence in favor of words targeting the
unknown? Words amalgamated in the complex tapestry of edits and elusive source
material that make up the Codex Sinaiticus? (Fig. 13.3).
Of particular interest to us is the Old Testament and its fragmented incarnation in
the Codex. As many as 929 chapters were predominantly written during the postexilic years of the fifth and fourth centuries BCE. Predictions (of a coming Messiah),
ambiguities, and paradise lost. A God as real as any vertebrate, with mood swings,
tremendous anger, captivating love, an ability to alter his/her/its thinking, to forgive,
to promulgate premonitory warnings (Moses and the Commandments) (Fig. 13.4).
Browsing week after week through the monastery’s library and viewing firsthand
many of its icons were dazzling enough. I spent days soloing the headwalls of Sinai,
and the countless other nearby granite peaks and escarpments, in both snow-covered
and blisteringly hot weather. I held up in a cave, a deep crevice which could easily
34 ibid., p. xxiii.
35 See “The Cryptic African Wolf: Canis aureus lupaster Is Not a Golden Jackal and Is Not Endemic
to Egypt,” Eli Knispel Rueness, Maria Gulbrandsen Asmyhr, Claudio Sillero-Zubiri, David
W. Macdonald, Afework Bekele, Anagaw Atickem, and Nils Chr. Stenseth, Thomas
M. Gilbert, Editor, PLoS One. 2011; 6(1): e16385.Published online 2011 Jan 26, doi: https://doi.
org/10.1371/journal.pone.0016385, PMCID: PMC3027653, PMID: 21298107, Accessed March
10, 2019.
13.3 The Incarnation of Fragments