THE FORMATION AND SIGNIFICANCE OF THE CHRISTIAN BIBLICAL CANON A STUDY IN TEXT, RITUAL AND INTERPRETATION

TOMAS BOKEDAL: THE FORMATION AND SIGNIFICANCE OF THE CHRISTIAN BIBLICAL CANON A STUDY IN TEXT, RITUAL AND INTERPRETATION 2 TO DEAREST ANNA 3 PREFACE The present monograph is a revised version of my ThD thesis The Scriptures and the LORD: Formation and Significance of the Christian Biblical Canon. A Study in Text, Ritual and Interpretation (Lund University, 2005). In this work I study the emergence and the significance of the Christian biblical canon for the early as well as for the contemporary church. Throughout the discussion I present some major challenges to previous research on the biblical canon. The issue of the church’s canon can be made indefinitely vast. At the heart of this investigation are some central theological concerns. Others are left out, or have only surfaced, such as a comprehensive historical account, usually treated in manuals on the canon formation. In order to grasp the complex phenomenon of biblical canonicity, I have chosen to focus on four aspects, namely effective-historical, textual and material, performative, and ideational dimensions of the canon. The apostolic formula “the Scriptures and the Lord” is defended as a good summary of the Christian canon, its formation and significance. In short, I conclude that the canon was formed in a process, with its own particular intention, history, and direction. History and theology, past and present, are considered alongside one another throughout the study. By using a Gadamerian hermeneutics of tradition, I wish to draw the reader’s attention to historical dimensions of the canon and its interpretive possibilities for our time. The notion of Wirkungsgeschichte (effective-history) as well as the interaction between text, community and reader are crucial to my argument. The canonical text as text, its interpretation and ritual contextualization are highlighted as unifying elements for the communities being addressed. An important outcome of the study is the appeal for the reintroduction of the triadic system of the nomina sacra in contemporary Bibles. I am indebted to a number of individuals and institutions for their support. University of Aberdeen awarded various travel grants between 2009 and 2012. Thanks are due to my colleagues Dr. Donald Wood and Dr. Jane Heath for feedback on parts of the text. I am also grateful to the anonymous reviewers of the first draft of the manuscript for helpful suggestions, and to Dominic Mattos and Caitlin Flynn at T & T Clark for accepting the book for publication and for their patience with the manuscript. Finally, I wish to 4 thank Professor John Webster for his encouragement and for commenting on the manuscript. This monograph is gratefully dedicated to my dear wife Anna. Aberdeen, Scotland, in April 2013 Tomas Bokedal FROM THE PREFACE TO THE 2005 DISSERTATION I would like to thank several persons and institutions that have supported this project in different ways. First of all, I want to thank my Doktor-Vater, Professor Werner G. Jeanrond for his very generous, patient and caring supervision. I wish to express my deep gratitude to my supervisor for tirelessly seeking to teach me classic and modern theology for our time. Without his love of theology and expertise within the fields of systematic theology and hermeneutics my work would have turned out very differently. I would also like to thank Professor Oskar Skarsaune, The Norwegian Lutheran School of Theology, who helped me in his capacity as external expert. I am most thankful for his warm and devout assistance during these years. Special thanks to Docent Rune Söderlund for accepting me as a doctoral student and for suggesting, and introducing me to, the topic of my work. I also thank Dean Dr. Rune Imberg, The Lutheran School of Theology, Göteborg, for his constant encouragement and for giving me the opportunity to teach in various fields of theology. I am most grateful for his determined support and steadfastness. Initial conversations with Professors Bengt Hägglund, Gösta Hallonsten, Samuel Rubenson and Peter Stuhlmacher were also important to me. I furthermore had some inspiring discussions on parts of my work with Professors Robert W. Jenson, Christoph Schwöbel and Francis Watson, as well as with Docent Arne Rasmusson and Rev. Axel W. Karlsson. I am most grateful to Per Holmer for proofreading the whole manuscript, not forgetting our inspiring talks on theology and life. I wish to express my 5 special gratitude to my wife Anna Bokedal for reading, discussing and editing the text. My sincere thanks also go to Marie Asking for her generous support, and to Docent Arne and Mrs. Nina Hjorth. My parents, Roger and Lilly Hansson, and parents-in-law, Rev. Torsten and Mrs. Margareta Bokedal, have wholeheartedly supported me and my family during these years. I regret that my mother, father- and mother-in-law were not able to see the completion of this study. I owe thanks to the Royal Society of Letters at Lund for a full year’s grant, and to Insamlingsstiftelsen Bo Giertz 90-årsfond as well as various funds at Lund University for travel scholarships. I am grateful to the Centre for Theology and Religious Studies, Lund University, for having granted me a two-year fellowship in support of my research, and to the Lutheran School of Theology, Göteborg. My children: Johanna, Naomi, Benedikta, Elias and Josef, all at an early age learned to imitate their father, sitting silent in a row on the sofa, each with a book in their hands. I envy them their energetic concentration and wish them all the best for the future! I dedicate this book to my wife Anna for endless support and care. Göteborg, Sweden, in August 2005 Tomas Bokedal PART B: MATERIAL AND TEXTUAL ASPECTS OF THE CANON CHAPTER 3 THE NOMINA SACRA – HIGHLIGHTING THE SACRED FIGURES OF THE TEXT Practically all dimensions of canonicity discussed in the previous owe some of their functioning to the specific textuality of the emerging Christian Bible.1 A central feature of this textuality comes to expression by consistently highlighting some four to fifteen keywords throughout the Christian manuscript tradition, most notably the Greek names for God, Lord, Jesus, Christ, and for the most part also Spirit. Although almost forgotten in modern times, until the fifteenth century this strictly limited selection of Christian keywords – the so called nomina sacra – were graphically marked off by contraction, suspension or a combination of both in basically all Greek and Latin Christian biblical manuscripts. Since 1907, when the classicist Ludwig Traube published his monumental study on this scribal phenomenon,2 these special abbreviations have been extensively studied. The question has also been raised whether their original function could somehow be set in connection with the canonization of the Christian Bible. In this chapter I shall try to answer this question affirmatively, by arguing that the introduction of the system of nomina sacra into the biblical texts – immediately indicating a Christian context for these writings – was a decisive step in the early stages of the canonical process. The nomina sacra attained this function by marking out a center – focusing on the Greek names for God, Jesus and Spirit – within the Christian Scriptures, a textually, devotionally and theologically determined Mitte der Schrift.3 And, as far as the extant manuscript evidence takes us, writings that did not contain these markers were not part of the Christian 1On text and textuality, see chs. 3-6, below, esp. ch. 6. 2 Traube, Nomina sacra: Versuch einer Geschichte der christlichen Kürzung (München: C. H. Beck’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1907) . 3On the notion Mitte der Schrift, see Stuhlmacher (Wie treibt man Biblische Theologie? [Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 1995], 68-76) for further references. 8 Scriptures. Furthermore, the system added an unmistakable Christian stamp to the texts containing them, especially as the scribal pattern for using the demarcations became relatively standardized and recognizable throughout the text corpora forming the New Testament.4 Most significantly, this scribal practice embraced both what came to be labeled the ‘Old’ and the ‘New Testament’ writings – and thus textually–editorially placing old (the OT) and new (the NT) Christian Scripture on a par from early on. 3.1 General Usage of Nomina Sacra in the Biblical Manuscripts An excerpt from the Chester Beatty papyri – P46 (Chester Beatty II) – appears in a somewhat different form than we are used to from modern editions of the Greek biblical text. It consistently highlights these specially abbreviated names, central for Christian faith – since the time of Traube usually labelled nomina sacra: oida t[e oti erxomenov prov umav en plhrwmati] eulogiav X8r8u8 eleusomai parakalw de umav dia tou K8u8 hmwn I8h8u8 X8r8u8 kai dia thv agaphv tou P8n8v8 sunagwnisasqai moi en taiv proseuxaiv uper emou prov ton Q8n8 (Rom 15:29-30).5 In fact, before the art of printing, nearly all Christian Greek biblical manuscripts contain this system of abbreviation with a stroke over the contracted or suspended forms.6 The abbreviated names above, and at most 4For some critical comments on the standardization of the early system of nomina sacra, see Kim Haines- Eitzen, Guardians of Letters: Literacy, Power, and the Transmitters of Early Christian Literature (Oxford: Oxford, 2000), 92-94. Haines-Eitzen is partly right in emphasizing that some of the scribal variations, inconsistencies and idiosyncracies in the way nomina sacra were written, found among our earliest manuscripts, point “toward a mode of transmission in which standardization and uniformity was not in existence” (93). However, the basic four or five nomina sacra abbreviations are present everywhere and contain only minor variations (e.g., I8h8, I8h8v8, I8v8, and in P66 I8h8u8v8, for forms for Jesus). That we are dealing here with an easily recognizable scribal system of demarcating these words even in the earliest period is not in doubt, however – and to that extent the scribal standardization is very early. No extant manuscripts demonstrate the developing nomina sacra convention prior to the standard practice of regularly marking off the four names God, Lord, Jesus and Christ. 5P46 (Chester Beatty II and P. Mich. Inv. 6238; ca. AD 200); cf. Aland, The Text of the New Testament: An Introduction to the Critical Editions and to the Theory and Practice of Modern Textual Criticism (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1989), 88. 6The abbreviations occur in the form of contractions, suspensions, or combinations of both. The system of nomina sacra is kept more or less intact also in the Latin, Coptic, Slavonic and Armenian versions of the 9 some ten other words, are apparently for reverential reasons (“highlighting the sacred figures of the Christian faith”)7 given special treatment in writing. Due to a “certain broad phenomenological similarity between the nomina sacra and Jewish reverential treatment of the divine name”, this scribal practice has commonly been associated with the special treatment accorded the divine name(s) in Early and Rabbinical Judaism.8 In one way or another, the immediate background, as well as parallel, to the above five nomina sacra (or at least the earliest four; see 3.2 below) – K8u8, I8h8u8, X8r8u8 (Kuriou Ihsou Xristou), P8n8v8 (Pneumatov) and Q8n8 (Qeon) – thus seems to be the reverential treatment associated with the Tetragrammaton, hwhy, in the Jewish Scriptures (see 3.4 below). In terms of significance, we may also point to the immediate textual association between the words marked off in this way: the Greek words for Lord and God being graphically associated with Jesus and Christ,9 and the other way around. In any case, the emergence of what is probably the four earliest nomina sacra – the characteristic abbreviations of Jesus, Christ, Lord and God – seems to be closely linked to early devotional practices and christological reflection in the faith communities (see below). However, to many scribes, Christian biblical writings. Two major works that treat the nomina sacra in the Greek biblical manuscripts are Traube, Nomina sacra; and Paap, Nomina sacra in the Greek Papyri of the First Five Centuries A.D.: The Sources and Some Deductions (Leiden: Brill, 1959). Paap’s investigation has more recently been supplemented by Jose O’Callaghan, Nomina Sacra in Papyrus Graecis Saeculi III Neotestamentariis (Rome: Biblical Institute Press, 1970). Cf. also O’Callaghan, “‘Nominum sacrorum’ elenchus in Graecis Novi Testamenti papyris a saeculo IV usque ad VIII”, Studia Papyrologica 10 (1971): 99-122. For treatment of the nomina sacra in the Septuagint, see Bedodi, “I ‘nomina sacra’ nei papiri greci veterotestamentari precristiani”, Studia Papyrologica 13 (1974): 89-103; Jankowski, “I ‘nomina sacra’ nei papiri dei LXX (secoli II e III d. C.)”, Studia Papyrologica 16 (1977): 81-116. Cf. also Parker, Codex Bezae: An Early Christian Manuscript and Its Text (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1992), 97-106; and Kenyon, “Nomina Sacra in the Chester Beatty Papyri”, Aegyptus (1933): 5-10. 7Heath, “Nomina Sacra and Sacra Memoria Before the Monastic Age”, JTS 61, no. 2 (2010): 536. Tuckett’s suggestion (“‘Nomina Sacra’: Yes and No?”, in The Biblical Canons, eds. J.-M. Auwers and H. J. de Jonge (Leuven: Leuven University, 2003, 431-58) that nomina sacra may have been introduced as reading aids in the Christian manuscripts has been criticized by Hurtado (Artifacts, 122-34) and Heath, “Nomina Sacra and Sacra Memoria Before the Monastic Age”, 518-23. See further 3.4.1 below. 8Hurtado, Artifacts, 106. For a different view, see Tuckett, “‘Nomina Sacra’: Yes and No?”. 9On Paul’s use of Xristov, cf. Hurtado, Lord Jesus Christ, 99-100: “On the one hand, in Paul’s letters the term “Christ” has clearly become so closely associated with Jesus that it functions almost like an alternate name for him … On the other hand, the varying position of the term in the fuller expressions is one of several indications that for Paul and others who used these terms, Christos had not simply been reduced to a name (e.g., Jesus’ cognomen) but instead retained something of its function as a title [cf., e.g., Rom 9:3, 5].” 10 already by the early fourth century, the nomina sacra practice very much seems to have become a convention. From a hermeneutical viewpoint, it may be helpful to think of the initial use of these four or five early nomina sacra as an implicit dialogue between two practices happening on the written page: a new Christian scribal treatment of the divine/sacred name(s), on the one hand, and early Jesus devotion, on the other. The dialogical components then would consist of: on the one hand, finding a Christian identity in Jewish scribal treatment of the divine Name – association of the name of Jesus and Christ with reverential treatment of God and Lord (the two standard christological titles, e.g., in Ignatius of Antioch); and, on the other hand, modifying Jewish reverential traditions associated with the one God by associating them with other sacred names from the Christian religious sphere. Having in mind the scribal demarcation of these names – the textual association of Qeov and Kuriov with Ihsouv, Xristov and Pneuma – as well as the common reading of the Tetragrammaton as “LORD” in the Old Testament of current English Bibles, a possible modern rendering of Rom 15:29-30 (cited above) that takes into account the presence of nomina sacra (highlighted in both Greek Old and New Testament manuscripts) – could look as follows: 10 ... and I know that when I come to you I shall come in the fulness of the blessing of CHRIST. I appeal to you, brethren, by our LORD JESUS CHRIST and by the love of the SPIRIT, to strive together with me in your prayers to GOD on my behalf ... No doubt, a particular emphasis is here (cf. Greek text above) provided for the five words in capitals, the potential significance of which seems to affect the biblical text as a whole. The relatively consistent Christian usage of the nomina sacra from the first to the fifteenth century11 meant that the Jewish practice of giving only the 10On nomina sacra in early OT manuscripts, see, e.g., Hengel, The Four Gospels and the One Gospel of Jesus Christ (London: SCM, 2000), 280 n. 480. 11From the sixteenth century on, printed editions of the Bible began to replace the manuscripts. Many printed versions preserved some of the features characteristic of the nomina sacra, e.g., the Luther Bible of 1534, where the Tetragrammaton is rendered by HErr, God by GOtt and Jesus by JEsus. In the Swedish Bible edition of 1703, the Bible of Charles XII, the Tetragrammaton is similarly rendered by HERren and Jesus by JEsus. The editors of the King James Bible, on the other hand, have chosen to treat only the Tetragrammaton, rendered as LORD, in the Old Testament as a nomen sacrum. 11 Tetragrammaton, YHWH,12 special graphic treatment in the biblical texts, from early on was modified by the church.13 To the extent that this nomina sacra practice had significance – which has recently been disputed by Christopher Tuckett (see below) – a key issue involved seems to have been the scribal intention to textually link the name of God with that of Jesus, or to give textual expression to a devotional pattern in which Jesus features beside God. The later additions of some short forms to the list of nomina sacra, such as Father (P8h8r8) and Son (U8v8), seem to have been similarly motivated.14 In Pauline language, the new unique way “the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob” is spoken of in the Christian life-setting is as the “God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom 15:6; 2 Cor 1:3; 11:31; Eph 1:3).15 As it was associated with such language, describing the Christian God, the logic behind the early nomina sacra convention may be theologically–devotionally, rather than, christologically–devotionally motivated: God cannot be spoken of or honored except by means of reference to Jesus (cf. Phil 2:9-11; Joh 5:23).16 As Hurtado recently put it: “Early Christians thought God demanded Jesus worship”.17 In other words, if we assume a close connection between Jesus devotion and the nomina sacra practice, the primary question behind the introduction of the nomina sacra into the early NT writings might not have been whether or not Jesus was thought to be divine, but how the community 12For other Hebrew names of God treated like the Tetragrammaton, see Howard, “The Tetragram and the New Testament”, JBL 96 (1977): 63-83. 13 The Christian scribal practice of using nomina sacra seems to be in agreement with the earliest christology, which, as Richard Bauckham argues, “was already the highest Christology”. Jesus was from the earliest post-Easter beginnings of christology onwards included, “precisely and unambiguously, within the unique identity of the one God of Israel”; and this was done by including Jesus in “the unique, defining characteristics by which Jewish monotheism identified God as unique.” Bauckham, God Crucified: Monotheism and Christology in the New Testament (Carlisle, UK: Paternoster, 1998), vii-viii. Cf. also Newman, The Jewish Roots of Christological Monotheism: Papers from the St. Andrews Conference on the Historical Origins of the Worship of Jesus (Leiden: Brill, 1999). 14arguably including also man/human being. However, both son and man/human being as nomina sacra tend to have a broader denotation than Jesus. 15Cf. Hurtado, God in New Testament Theology (Nashville: Abingdon, 2010), 37-38. 16Hurtado (God in New Testament Theology, 44) underlines that this Christian devotional pattern “is not ‘ditheism,’ the worship of two gods, but a new kind of monotheistic devotional practice in which ‘God’ is worshiped typically with reference to Jesus, and Jesus is reverenced in obedience to ‘God’ and to the glory of this God.” Cf. also Schrage, Unterwegs zur Einheit und Einzigkeit Gottes: Zum “Monotheismus” des Paulus und seiner alttestamentlich-frühjüdischen Tradition, Biblisch-theologische Studien 48 (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener, 2002), 135-86. 17Oral response by Hurtado at the Day in Honour of Professor Larry W. Hurtado arranged by the Centre for the Study of Christian Origins in Edinburgh on October 7th, 2011. 12 were to speak meaningfully about (the one) God who had revealed himself in and through Jesus Christ. In any case, the core group of nomina sacra introduced are very likely directly related to first-century Christian God-talk and devotional practices. 3.2 Frequency of Nomina Sacra in the Earliest Manuscripts Since Traube’s palaeographic work on the nomina sacra, some rather detailed discussion as to the origin, development and meaning of the contractions adopted by Christian scribes can be noted. What Traube named nomina sacra are a strictly limited number of words in Christian sources written in special abbreviated forms, apparently indicating their intrinsic or contextual religious or sacred character. And, as argued by some scholars, the earliest four contracted words – God, Lord, Jesus and Christ – may, perhaps more accurately, be called nomina divina (Shuyler Brown) or nomina dei (Christian von Stavelot).18 Although abbreviations were generally used by Hellenistic and Jewish scribes in the first and second century AD,19 the system of nomina sacra, embracing some four to fifteen words (mainly nouns), most probably originated within the Christian scribal practice for reasons other than the saving of time and space.20 To judge from our second- and third-century 18 Traube, Nomina sacra, 6, 17f., 33: Traube introduced the latin designation nomina sacra. Earlier terminology that influenced Traube’s is: E. M. Thompson’s expression sacred and liturgical contractions, H. Omont’s designation mots consacrés and Christian von Stavelot’s label nomina dei. Following Shuyler Brown (“Concerning the Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, Studia Papyrologica (1970): 7-19), the designation nomina divina, is in some regards an even better term than nomina sacra. I choose, however, to stick to the conventional designation initiated by Traube. My reason for this is twofold: First, there seems to be relative agreement nowadays regarding the use of the term nomina sacra, and I find no compelling reason to deviate from this consensus. Secondly, this designation is better suited for the group of fifteen abbreviations taken as a whole. 19 Nachmanson, “Die schriftliche Kontraktion auf den griechischen Inschriften”, Eranos 10 (1910): 10141; Rudberg, Neutestamentlicher Text und Nomina sacra (Uppsala: A.-B. Akademiska Bokhandeln, 1915); Driver, “Abbreviations in the Massoretic Text”, Textus 1 (1960): 112-31; McNamee, “Abbreviations in Greek Literary Papyri and Ostraca”, Bulletin of the American Society of Papyrologists, Supplements 3 (1981). 20 Paap, Nomina sacra in the Greek Papyri of the First Five Centuries A.D., 2: Paap lists four peculiar characteristics of the nomina sacra that set them apart from the ordinary manner of abbreviation: 1) There is always a horizontal stroke over the whole of the contraction or suspension. 2) The number of the nomina sacra is strictly limited. 3) The beginning and end of the contractions are regulated by certain rules. Finally, 4) saving of space and time is not the reason why the abbreviated forms are used. To this list can be added the christological and trinitarian reverential dimension of the nomina sacra paralleling the Jewish reverence of the Name. 13 Bible manuscripts,21 it quickly found universal acceptance among the regional churches. Hence, all our extant Greek and Latin manuscripts22 of the Old and New Testaments contain the nomina sacra, papyri as well as manuscripts, uncial as well as minuscule manuscripts, Old Testament Scriptures as well as gospels, acts, letters, apocalypses, but also apologetic and other literary writings produced within the Christian religious sphere.23 Interestingly, however, the scribal practice was more consistently carried out in OT and NT texts and other Christian literary writings than in Christian “documentary” texts, such as letters.24 Usually included are the following fifteen words (or seventeen, if the words for cross and crucify, on the one hand, and Spirit and spiritual, on the other, are treated separately). The approximate frequency of these nomina sacra forms in 74 early NT manuscripts are given in the table below (roughly second to early fourth century, up to and including P123):25 1. The primary group (99-100% nomina sacra forms in the singular): Frequency Greek English Nominative Genitive 100% 100% 100% 99% Qeov Xristov Ihsouv Kuriov GOD CHRIST JESUS LORD Q8v8 X8r8, X8r8v8, X8v8 I8h8, I8h8v8, I8v8 K8v8 Q8u8 X8u8 I8u8 K8u8 2. The secondary group (89-95% nomina sacra forms) 95% 89% staurov Pneuma CROSS SPIRIT s8t8v8, s8t8r8v8 P8n8a8 s8t8u8 P8n8v8 21See Roberts and Skeat, The Birth of the Codex (London: Oxford University, 1983); Turner, The Typology of the Early Codex (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania, 1977); and Haelst, Catalogue des papyrus littéraires juifs et chrétiens (Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 1976). 22Coptic, Armenian and Slavonic manuscripts could be added as well. 23See Aland, Repertorium der Griechischen Christlichen Papyri, I-2 (Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1976); However literary writings, as for example Irenaeus’ Adversus Haereses, were often published as scrolls, the regular book format. See, e.g., Roberts and Skeat, The Birth of the Codex. 24Hurtado, Artifacts, 98. 25For details on the frequency of nomina sacra in 74 early NT manuscripts (based on the November 2009 Accordance version of P. W. Comfort and D. P. Barrett, eds., The Text of the Earliest New Testament Greek Manuscripts [Corrected and enlarged, Accordance electronic ed.; Wheaton: Tyndale House Publishers, 2001]), see my “Notes on the Nomina Sacra and Biblical Interpretation”, in Beyond Biblical Theologies, eds. H. Assel, S. Beyerle and C. Böttrich (WUNT 295; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2012), 263-95. . 14 3. The tertiary group (23-62% nomina sacra forms) 62% 53% 45% 44% 36% 24% 23% staurow Pathr anqrwpov Ierousalhm Uiov Israhl pneumatikov CRUCIFY FATHER HUMAN BEING JERUSALEM SON ISRAEL SPIRITUAL Verbforms P8h8r8 a8n8o8v8 I8l8h8m8 U8v8 I8h8l8 mhthr Dauid swthr MOTHER DAVID SAVIOR U8u8 Adjectival forms 4. The quarternary group (0-5% nomina sacra forms) 5% HEAVEN ouranov o8u8n8o8v8 3% 0% 0% P88r8v8 a8n8o8u8 m8h8r8 D8a8d8 8s8h8r8 o8u8n8o8u8 m88r8v8 s88r8v8 The suprascript line above the contraction had the function of drawing the reader’s attention – a warning that the word could not be pronounced as written (due to the strange letter sequence). And, as we will see below, originally it might also have had the function of classifying the word as a numerical sign (cf. Barn. 9.7-9). Based on the frequency of the nomina sacra forms listed above, in the following I shall focus attention first of all on the primary group (ca. 100% nomina sacra forms), but also on the secondary (ca. 90% nomina sacra forms) and tertiary (ca. 25-60% nomina sacra forms) groups. The frequency of nomina sacra in the two fourth-century codices Vaticanus and Sinaiticus serve as good illustrations of the significance of the scribal practice, at least as far as consistency goes: in the NT portion of Vaticanus the core group of four words (Qeov, Kuriov, Ihsouv, Xristov) are abbreviated in almost every case, whereas Pneuma is written as a nomen sacrum in only 3% of the occurrences of the noun.26 In Codex Sinaiticus (OT and NT), on the other hand, the core group consists of five words (Qeov, Kuriov, Ihsouv, Xristov, Pneuma), all of which are almost exclusively written as nomina sacra. Here Pneuma is abbreviated in 99% of the occurrences of the word and the other four names in 98-100%.27 The NT of Vaticanus, on the other hand, seems to demonstrate what is probably a 26Ibid., 277. 27Jongkind, Scribal Habits of Codex Sinaiticus (Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias, 2007), 67-68; and Bokedal, “Notes on the Nomina Sacra and Biblical Interpretation”, 277f. 15 conservative use of contractions delimiting the words treated in this way to four. Nevertheless, in this regard Vaticanus turns out to be an exception when compared to other extant manuscripts. The palaeographer C. H. Turner therefore could say in 1924 that of all our Greek manuscripts one hand of Vaticanus provides the only exception to the universal usage of abbreviating Pneuma as a nomen sacrum.28 So, in line with the overall impression we get from the manuscript tradition, we may describe these textual markers as triadic (a core group of five nomina sacra as found in most Christian Greek OT and NT manuscripts), or dyadic (a core group of four nomina sacra, as found in the NT portion of Vaticanus). Most importantly when seeking to establish links between the nomina sacra convention and the early Christian canon formation, we should note the tendency to variously delimit the number of nomina sacra in some early manuscripts: four or five (P13; the NT portion of Codex Vaticanus; the Latin text of Codex Bezae), eight (P45; Codex Bezae), nine (P46; P66), eleven (P75), thirteen (Codex Washingtonianus), or some fifteen Christian keywords in the more developed fourth- and fifth-century system (Codex Sinaiticus; Codex Alexandrinus).29 3.3 Nomina Sacra and Canonization The four earliest nomina sacra – the abbreviated forms of Jesus, Christ, Lord, and God – most probably originated in a Jewish Christian milieu, no later than the late first or early second century. Due to the consistent treatment of Ihsouv, Xristov, Kuriov and Qeov as nomina sacra (next to perfect consistency in the earliest Christian NT manuscripts) and Pneuma (next to perfect consistency, e.g., in Codex Sinaiticus; ca. 90% consistency in the second- to fourth-century NT manuscripts), the divine name as it relates to the name of Jesus receives continuous readerly attention. The major effects, which I would like to emphasize here, of the introduction of these scribal 28Turner, “The Nomina Sacra in Early Latin Christian MSS.”, Studi e Testi 40 (1924): 66-69. See also Bokedal, “Notes on the Nomina Sacra and Biblical Interpretation”, 272-79: Pneuma is abbreviated as a nomen sacrum in 83% of the occurrences of the noun in the Latin and 84% in the Greek text of Codex Bezae; in Codex Washingtonianus the frequency is 91% (with the nine occurrences of the word written in full being non-sacred uses of Pneuma); and in the 74 second- to fourth-century NT manuscripts up to and including P123 referred to above, Pneuma is abbreviated in 89% of the occurrences of the word. In Codex Vaticanus, as mentione above, the corresponding figure is 3%. 29See further my “Notes on the Nomina Sacra and Biblical Interpretation”. 16 demarcations into the Christian writings with an impact on the canonical process, were: 1) to graphically identify the sacred Tetragrammaton (in Greek rendered as Qeov and Kuriov) with the Greek names for Jesus and Christ (section 3.4), thereby textually indicating an already existing binitarian pattern of devotion in the faith communities and the typical manner in which Christians spoke of the one God. (In Hurtado’s wording, and within the broader theological context of the NT, “we can say that in the view attested in the NT, ‘God’ is so closely linked with Jesus and Jesus so closely linked with ‘God’ that one cannot adequately identify the one without reference to the other.”);30 2) to modify the identity of the Scriptures as Scriptures over against the synagogue, making them specifically Christian, and/or vice versa, making the Scriptures specifically Christian, thereby modifying the identity of the Scriptures as Scriptures vis-à-vis the synagogue (section 3.5);31 3) to editorially indicate a unity of the Scriptures and a Christian narrative and theological32 focus (sections 3.4; 3.5; 3.6 and 3.8); 4) to engraft, using the wording of C. H. Roberts, “what might be regarded as the embryonic creed of the first Church”33 into the textuality of the Scriptures (sections 3.6 and 3.8). The nomina sacra word-group and the 30Hurtado, God in New Testament Theology, 43. 31In a Jewish context, the Torah made up the center and ground of the biblical writings. With the introduction of the nomina sacra this was arguably exchanged for a Christian narrative reading. The Scriptures from now on received a new identity as clearly Christian Scriptures, lacking the most characteristic Jewish scriptural marker, the Tetragrammaton. See also Barton, The Spirit and the Letter: Studies in the Biblical Canon (London: SPCK, 1997), 108-21: In the Mishnah, in the tractate Yadaim 3.5, it is stated that “all holy scriptures (kitbe ha-qôdesh, ‘writing of holiness’) make the hands unclean”. If treated outside the sphere of the Temple or of Synagogue worship the Scriptures are thought to make the hands unclean. The technical term for “Scriptures” is here “Writings of holiness” (kitbe ha-qôdesh). Barton contends that it is the very occurrence of the sacred Tetragrammaton (or other names for God) that makes a writing holy with the result of defiling the hands of anyone handling it outside the context of the sacral. Thus, “writings of holiness” perhaps means, not “holy scriptures”, but “writings containing the Name”. If this is correct, the Christian writings could not be regarded as Scripture because of their lack of the Name, or at least the Name in its proper form, correctly rendered according to the strict regulations connected with the writing of the Name. (see further below, 3.5 n. 120). From this, or against a similar Jewish background, the introduction of the nomina sacra could arguably have meant an important stage in the process of canonization of the Christian Scriptures, the “Old” as well as the newly written “New Testament” portions. 32The particular character of these limited number of words pertains to the sacred (cf. the modern designation nomina sacra; cf. n. 18 above), especially the divine name and some central christological titles and sacred figures of early Christian faith. 33Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt (Oxford: Oxford University, 1979), 46. 17 emerging vocabulary profile typical of the Rule/Canon of Faith here finds a common textual platform;34 and 5) to juxtapose the new Christian writings used for worship, missionary preaching, argumentation and devotion to the Jewish Scriptures (section 3.7). Given these features and assumptions, the inauguration of the nomina sacra may be characterized as a key element in the early canonization of the Christian Bible. It could perhaps even be argued that it would be difficult to envisage a Christian scriptural canon formation without the nomina sacra practice preparing the ground for placing OT texts side by side with newly composed “apostolic” writings. For early Christianity as for early Judaism, it seems to have been the case that a writing without a strong emphasis on the sacred name(s), could not make any strong claim towards scripturality (cf. n. 31 above). 3.4 Origin and Development of the Nomina Sacra 3.4.1 On the Origin of the Nomina Sacra – Three Major Models Since Traube’s pioneering work a century ago, a handful of publications have appeared that treat the question of the origin of the nomina sacra.35 According to Traube, the practice of writing the Tetragrammaton in a special reverential form had been transferred to the word Qeov by the Greek-speaking Jews, through omission of the vowels, using the contracted form Q8v8. From this term the system of nomina sacra was developed, first by the Jews who began to use contracted forms of Kuriov, Pneuma, Pathr, ouranov, anqrwpov, Dauid, Israhl and Ierousalhm, and later by the Christians who added the contractions of Ihsouv, Xristov, Uiov, swthr, staurov, and mhthr.36 34See my “The Rule of Faith: Tracing Its Origins”, Journal of Theological Interpretation 7, no. 1 (2013; forthcoming). 35Nachmanson, “Die schriftliche Kontraktion auf den griechischen Inschriften”; Rudberg, Neutestamentlicher Text und Nomina sacra; Paap, Nomina sacra in the Greek Papyri of the First Five Centuries A.D.; Brown, “Concerning the Origin of the Nomina Sacra”; Howard, “The Tetragram and the New Testamen”; Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt; Treu, “Die Bedeutung des Griechischen für die Juden im römischen Reich”, Kairos 15 (1973): 123-44 (English translation by Adler and Kraft can be found at http://eawc.evansville.edu/essays/nepage.htm [accessed 15/10/11]; Trobisch, Die Endredaktion des Neuen Testaments: Eine Untersuchung zur Entstehung der christlichen Bibel (Freiburg, Switzerland: Universitätsverlag Freiburg and Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996); Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra: A Proposal”, JBL 117 (1998): 655-73; idem, Artifacts, 99ff. 36Traube, Nomina sacra, 27-44. 18 A. H. R. E. Paap, who in 1959 updated Traube’s results,37 basically took over this scheme of development. Paap, however, thought that the initial word Qeov was the only Jewish contribution. The rest of the terms had, in his view, been elaborated by the Christians.38 A decade later Schuyler Brown proposed the contraction of Kuriov as the initial nomen sacrum introduced, not by the Jews, but by the church. As this term for the early Christians referred both to the God of Israel and to Jesus Christ, the practice of reverential contraction soon was extended “in one direction to Qeov and in the other direction to Ihsouv and Xristov.”39 Still another suggestion as to the original term was made by Kurt Treu and George Howard, who argued that Kuriov as well as Qeov were the original contractions, according to Treu introduced by the Jews and in Howard’s view by the Christians as substitutions for the Tetragrammaton. More recently Robert Kraft has argued along the lines of Treu, favoring a Jewish origin for the earliest contraction of Kuriov.40 Despite the relative strength of the above listed options, I shall here follow the suggestion made by C. H. Roberts and Larry Hurtado, who both opt for a Christian origin of the system, and the abbreviation of Ihsouv as the first nomen sacrum.41 Hurtado argues as follows (points 1-6 below):42 1) The provenance of the manuscript evidence points to a Christian origin reflecting the Jewish reverence for the Name.43 2) The early variation in the spellings of some of the nomina sacra (contraction, suspension and combinations of both) suggests a Christian origin, rather than an already developed Jewish practice. 3) The early occurrence of both the contracted form, I8v,8 and the suspended form, I8h,8 of Ihsouv, over against the more 37Paap, Nomina sacra in the Greek Papyri of the First Five Centuries A.D.: The Sources and Some Deductions. 38Ibid., 119-27. 39Brown, “Concerning the Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 18. 40Treu, “Die Bedeutung des Griechischen für die Juden im römischen Reich”; English translation by Adler and Kraft can be found at http://eawc.evansville.edu/essays/nepage.htm [accessed 23/03/13]. Howard, “The Tetragram and the New Testament”. Cf. Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 665. Kraft, “The ‘Textual Mechanics’ of Early Jewish LXX/OG Papyri and Fragments”, in The Bible as Book: The Transmission of the Greek Text, ed. S. McKendrick and O. O’Sullivan (London: British Library, 2003), 51-72. Cf. Hurtado, Artifacts, 107f. 41Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt, 35-48; Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 665-71. 42Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 664-71. 43Cf. Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt, 34. 19 regularly rendered forms of the other three44 of the earliest nomina sacra supports Ihsouv as the initial term. 4) The only one of the earliest attested nomina sacra commented on in the Patristic material, is the suspended form of Ihsouv, I8h8.45 Pre-Constantinian mosaics and graffiti also support “Jesus” as the primary nomen sacrum.46 5) I8h8 is proposed as the first nomen sacrum, which is consistent with the religious significance associated with Jesus’ name, and its ritual use in the early church.47 6) In Barn. 9.7-8 and Clem. Strom. VI, 11, the nomen sacrum I8h8 which here represents the number 18, is associated with a Jewish Christian reflection on the number 318 (see section 3.4.2), which provides an explanation of the peculiar suprascript line normally associated with the nomina sacra. The existence of this type of linea superscripta, placed squarely over the abbreviated word may otherwise be difficult to explain. It does not look like the overbar used for ordinary abbreviations placed at the end of the word. The suprascript line attached to the nomina sacra, on the other hand, looks like the strokes used above letters which served as number signs. Hurtado concludes his argumentation by suggesting I8h8 (=18) as an early Jewish Christian play with gematria, numerically equivalent with the Hebrew word for life, yx (=18; x=8; y=10). Having given examples of gematria associations across the Hebrew and the Greek alphabets, Hurtado even hints at a connection between I8h8 and John 20:30, where the words “have life in his name” are put forth as a possible allusion to the proposed gematria (cf. also 3.4.5 below).48 44In particular Kuriov and Qeov. As regards Xristov, one of the earliest four nomina sacra, which is not as regularly rendered, further discussion is needed. See below. 45Barn. 9.7-8. For Clement of Alexandria the attribution of 18 as the numerical value of I8h8 seems to be regarded as an old and perhaps no longer current tradition (Strom. VI, 11; ANF 2:499): “As then in astronomy we have Abraham as an instance, so also in arithmetic we have the same Abraham. ‘For, hearing that Lot was taken captive, and having numbered his own servants, born in his house, 318 (TIH),’ he defeats a very great number of the enemy. They say, then, that the character representing 300 is, as to shape, the type of the Lord’s sign, and that the Iota and the Eta indicate the Saviour’s name; that it was indicated, accordingly, that Abraham’s domestics were in salvation, who having fled to the Sign and the Name became lords of the captives, and of the very many unbelieving nations that followed them. Now the number 300 is, 3 by 100. Ten is allowed to be the perfect number. And 8 is the first cube, which is equality in all the dimensions – length, breadth, depth.” 46Wicker, “Pre-Constantinian Nomina Sacra in a Mosaic and Church Graffiti”, Southwestern Journal of Theology 52, no. 1 (2009): 68. I am grateful to Benjamin Laird for drawing my attention to this article. 47Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 670; Hurtado, One God, One Lord: Early Christian Devotion and Ancient Jewish Monotheism (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1998). 48Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 664-71. Cf. also McHugh, “In Him was Life” (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1989), 123: “It is a commonplace to say that where the Synoptic Gospels speak of the 20 A quite different view on the origin and significance of the scribal practice as compared to the ones discussed above is attained by C. M. Tuckett. In an essay titled “‘Nomina Sacra’: Yes and No?” he sets out to underline some incongruities in recent research on the nomina sacra. Criticizing David Trobisch’s account of the New Testament canon formation,49 for example, he argues that the system of the nomina sacra “does not appear to be a feature which distinguishes Christian Scripture”.50 Though he notes some inconsistencies in previous scholarship on origin and Christian identity tied to these abbreviations, he does not convincingly offer any real alternative historical account to that of Traube, Roberts and Hurtado. As Hurtado and Heath has argued (see n. 7 above), his suggestion that these short forms primarily functioned as reading aids, seems unlikely. Furthermore, the theological and textual issues at stake, with which I am here concerned, are only addressed in passing, with a rather questionable conclusion: “They may be ‘nomina’ – yes (or at least in part and perhaps in origin); but ‘sacra’ – no!”51 To sum up, three major models accounting for the origins and significance of the nomina sacra convention are still in play: 1) The nomina sacra are of Jewish origin and they mean something (Treu and Kraft);52 2) the nomina sacra are of Christian origin and they have no meaning (Tuckett); and 3) the nomina sacra are of Christian origin and they mean something (Roberts, Hurtado).53 kingdom, the Fourth Gospel, with the sole exception of Jn. 3:3,5, speaks instead about life.” For caution on the use of the notion of gematria, see Hvalvik, “Barnabas 9.7-9 and the Author’s Supposed Use of Gematria”, NTS 33 (1987): 276-82; and Heath, “Nomina Sacra and Sacra Memoria Before the Monastic Age”, 539 n. 67. 49On Trobisch, see below. 50Tuckett, “‘Nomina Sacra’: Yes and No?”, 443. 51Ibid., 458. 52The theory of a possible Jewish origin of the nomina sacra was first suggested by Ludwig Traube and has recently been argued by James R. Edwards for the occurrence of Qeov written as a nomen sacrum in the Sardis Synagogue, JBL 128, no. 4 (2009): 813–21. For a wider discussion on the possible Jewish origin of the practice, see Treu, “Die Bedeutung des Griechischen für die Juden im römischen Reich”, Kairos 15 (1973); English translation by Adler and Kraft can be found at http://eawc.evansville.edu/essays/nepage.htm [accessed 23/03/13]. 53I owe the formulation behind this simple structuring of the various players to a recent conversation with Professor Larry Hurtado. 21 3.4.2 The Tetragrammaton and the Nomina Sacra Now, if we stick to Roberts’ and Hurtado’s model on origins, assuming that Ihsouv was the first Christian nomen sacrum, presumably soon followed by Xristov, a next step in the development of the scribal practice would then be the inclusion of Kuriov and Qeov. The change that took place with the latter two being added may not have been obvious to the contemporary church, given the reverential practice already associated with the name of Jesus.54 However, looked at from a Second Temple or Rabbinic Judaism perspective, the decisive step from a single nomen sacrum (Ihsouv; I8h8, I8h8v8, I8v)8 to the graphic association of Jesus and Christ with Lord and God (I8v8, X8v8, K8v8 and Q8v8) seems to have been crucial (if this is the way the scribal practice developed). From the moment Kuriov and Qeov were graphically treated just like the initial nomen sacrum, Ihsouv – which was arguably soon followed by Xristov – and at the same time attained the function as transcriptions of the Tetragrammaton in the Christian writings, a shift in the status of these short forms arguably took place. Graphically they now were to parallel the very source of sacredness in the Jewish Scriptures, the ineffable nomen divinum, Shem hameforash,55 YHWH.56 In Hurtado’s phrasing: [I]t seems likely that Jewish reverence for the divine name, and particularly the Jewish practice of marking off the divine name reverentially in written forms, probably provides us with the key element in the religious background that early 54See Hurtado, One God, One Lord, for references. 55According to the Mishnah tractate Yoma, the Name was uttered only once each year by the High Priest during the liturgy of Yom Kippur (Laato, Monotheism, the Trinity and Mysticism: A Semiotic Approach to JewishCristian Encounter (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1999), 55). What S. Cohon says about the role played by the other names of God in Jewish theology is of interest for my treatment of the nomina sacra (cf. esp. 3.8 below): “All the names of God represent the efforts of men to make His being real to themselves, and to express the prevailing ideas of His nature and actions, i.e. His attributes.” (Cohon, Jewish Theology (Assen: Royal van Gorcum, Prakke & Prakke, 1971), 213. Cited from Laato, Monotheism, the Trinity and Mysticism, 55.) 56See, e.g., the Septuagint rendering of the prohibition in Lev 24:16, where death is invoked on one who “pronounces the name of the Lord”, whereas the Hebrew text only forbids “blaspheming the name of Yahweh”, Migne CVI 1278 (as referenced by Traube); Christian von Stavelot in the ninth century used the terminus nomina dei to designate those of the Christian abbreviations that referred to the divine name or persons. The earliest abbreviations seem to have included only this category, while a somewhat later development in the late first or early second century also included the words “Cross”, “Israel”, “Jerusalem” and “Heaven” (Traube, Nomina sacra, 6). As already mentioned, Schuyler Brown (“Concerning the Origin of the Nomina Sacra”) prefers the term nomina divina to designate the earliest phase of the system of special Christian abbreviation; Hurtado similarly thinks that the (four) earliest words are more correctly designated nomina divina, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”. 22 Christians adapted in accordance with their own religious convictions and expressed in the nomina sacra.57 The collective role of the four earliest contracted forms seems to have been to function as Christian representations of the divine name(s), being associated with, or being substitutes/abbreviations for, YHWH, God and Lord, in the Scriptures, and in the new Christian writings. According to the new christological scheme, the names Jesus, Christ, Lord and God were thus graphically and textually placed on an equal level. Two features of the development of the nomina sacra confirm such a rendering. First, the psychological impulse to the origin of the system58 most likely derives from the Jewish practice of treating the divine name, the Tetragrammaton, with the utmost awe according to well defined rules, including also scribal and various ritual and creedal practices.59 Two of the four earliest nomina sacra – Q8v8 and K8v8 – are special abbreviations for God, Qeov, and Lord, Kuriov, respectively, and used as Greek transcriptions of YHWH.60 Furthermore, Jesus and Christ were analogously contracted in the same way as Lord and God. This is surprising, not so much because of the parallel graphic treatment of Lord and Jesus, but because of the potential interpretation that seems to be suggested to the reader, of a connection between the names Jesus and YHWH. This connection is by graphic analogy also established between the other nomina sacra and the Tetragrammaton through the Greek renderings Qeov (Q8v8) and Kuriov (K8v8). Most importantly, as the nomina sacra practice as a whole seems to be best accounted for by reference to the Jewish reverence for the divine name and the special scribal treatment of the Tetragrammaton, 57 Ibid., 662-63. See also idem, Artifacts, 104-106. 58It is proper to talk of a system of nomina sacra as soon as the four earliest nomina sacra, the abbreviations of Jesus, Christ, Lord and God, all are treated alike, as a group of nomina sacra. This stage of development is to be distinguished from the earliest phases of the phenomenon, when the first nomen sacrum, arguably the suspension of Jesus, began to be commonly used. 59The divine Name should not, for example, be pronounced aloud; Barton (The Spirit and the Letter, 108- 23). On scribal practises related to the Name, cf. ibid., 119-20. For creedal functions, see below, 3.4.3 and 3.6.2. A handy overview of some different positions on the pronunciation of the Name is found in De Troyer, “The Pronunciation of the Names of God”, in Gott Nennen, eds. Dalferth and Stoellger, Religion in Philosophy and Theology 35 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008). 60Metzger, Manuscripts of the Greek Bible: An Introduction to Greek Palaeography (New York and Oxford: Oxford University, 1981), 35; Howard, “The Tetragram and the New Testament”: In commenting on Psalm 2:2, Origen tells that among Greeks Adonai is pronounced ku/riov (Sel. in Psalmos, Ps. 2.2 Migne PG, xii, col. 1104A), as referred by Howard. 23 the basic motivation for the practice may have been fundamentally theological rather than christological or creedal (cf. 3.1 above). Even though the first nomen sacrum most likely was the suspended form for Jesus (I8h)8 , the new scribal practice will soon imply associations to the Tetragrammaton, at the latest when nomina sacra are systematically introduced into Christian Septuagint manuscripts.61 This event does not only form a part of the sanctioning of an official “Old Testament” translation in Greek. It also marks a crucial step in the canonization process of the Christian Scriptures. Septuagint and emerging New Testament texts are here treated alike, where some special features of the “New Testament” texts appear to be transferred back on to the “Old Testament” (cf., e.g., Barn. 9.7-9).62 Second, these four, five, eight, nine, eleven, or, in their developed Byzantine form, approximately fifteen contracted names in the biblical manuscripts (cf. 3.1 above) stand out as sacred contractions also for another reason. The abbreviated forms occur typically only when used in a sacral sense. Although not always consistently carried out, this is especially the case for the word Qeov.63 A clear distinction is made by scribes between God or 61A new awareness regarding the necessity of an edition of a specifically Christian Bible consisting of the Septuagint and a New Testament part is instigated towards the middle of the second century beginning with Justin and continuing with Irenaeus and Tertullian among others, for whom the Septuagint text as well as the delimitation of the New Testament portion of the one Bible are being focused. The formation of the “New Testament” may here be described as a process in three phases. Using the schema of Gerd Theiseen, the first phase can be viewed as a “fellowship with oral communication” (The New Testament: History, Literature, Religion [London: T. & T. Clark, 2003]). Secondly, from around AD 60 or 70 to AD 120 a “closed literary fellowship formed within the communities” (ibid.). From about 120 and 150 some problems regarding diverse and even “heterodox” handling of the Scriptures arose within the communities (Barnabas, Marcion, Christian Gnostics). In the third phase, between AD 145 and AD 200 (which – as in the case with the previous two phases – cannot be demarcated from the previous one) various attempts at closing the Christian literary canon are made, such as the formation and publication of an early “canonical archetype” (Trobisch) and other similar regional and/or catholic editions of the “New Testament”. The new notions of a literary “Old” as well as a “New Testament” are the primary outcome of this process. Parallel with this development Christianity “becomes a literary fellowship which is opening up.” This leads to the production of various apocryphal writings, apologetic writings addressed to the outside world, and Gnostic literature (Theissen, The New Testament). 62On canonization in two directions, from “Old” to “New Testament” and vice versa, see section 3.7. Cf. also Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 122f. For a brief overview of nomina sacra in early Old Testament manuscripts, see, e.g., Hengel, The Four Gospels and the One Gospel of Jesus Christ, 280 n. 480. 63See, e.g., Tuckett, “‘Nomina Sacra’: Yes and No?”. A good illustration of the consistency of the usage of nomina sacra forms only in a sacred context is the way Qeov in the plural regularly is written in full; it is found 8 times in the plural in the New Testament of Sinaiticus and Vaticanus (always with a non-sacral 24 Lord as sacred names (written as nomina sacra) and these words as profane words in the plural (gods and lords, written in full). Next to all 50 or so Greek manuscripts containing 1 Cor 8:4-6 included by Reuben Swanson in his New Testament Greek Manuscripts make this distinction.64 Again, the initial aim of the nomina sacra, it seems, is “to express religious reverence, to set apart these words visually in the way they are written”.65 If we allow ourselves to speculate a bit, we may ask whether this scribal practice may have been a parallel exegetical development to that of the gospel tradition focusing on the Greek text of Psalm 110. As creative exegesis of the Scriptures was “the principal medium in which early Christians developed even the most novel aspects of their thought”, Psalm 110:1 (and other texts brought into exegetical relationship with it such as Psalm 8:6 and Daniel 7:13-14) becomes the key text to indicate Jesus’ participation in the unique divine sovereignty,66 including God’s cosmic rule over all things.67 Further, in passages such as Heb 1:4 and Phil 2:9, where the exalted Jesus appears to be given the divine Name, as the Exalted One,68 the nomina sacra practice as a whole may give some graphical support to a high-christological reading (cf. above, 3.4.2).69 3.4.3 The Earliest Creedal Formulations and the Nomina Sacra70 In his learned, however much neglected, study Der Katechismus der Urchristenheit, Adolf Seeberg already a century ago pointed out the abundance of creedal elements present in the writings that were to form the New meaning; John 10:34, 35; 1 Cor 8:5 (twice), Gal 4:8, Acts 7:40, 14:11 and 19:26). The distinction between reference to the one God and the gods is here underlined. See n. 64 below. 64Swanson, ed., New Testament Greek Manuscripts: Variant Readings Arranged in Horizontal Lines Against Codex Vaticanus. 1 Corinthians (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House Publishers and Pasadena, CA: William Carey International University Press, 2003), 113f. 65Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 659; ibid. 658: “These abbreviated words are distinctive in form, subject matter, and function from other scribal phenomena, so much so that it is widely (but not universally) accepted that the presence of any of them in a manuscript is itself a good indication of its Christian provenance”. 66Bauckham, God Crucified, 29. 67Bauckham, Jesus and the God of Israel: ‘God Crucified’ and Other Studies on the New Testament’s Christology of Divine Identity (Colorado Springs, CO: Paternoster, 2008), 173. 68So Bauckham, God Crucified, 29-34, esp. 34. 69The particular nomina sacra in these passages are: SON in Heb 1:2; JESUS CHRIST in Phil 2:5, 10. 70The argument in this section is fuller developed in Bokedal, “The Rule of Faith”. 25 Testament.71 In accordance with second- and third-century ecclesial mainstream belief, he argued that what was later called the “Rule of Faith” was ultimately traceable to the apostolic age, or, in the words of Irenaeus, to “the Apostles and their disciples” (Adv. Haer. III, 4.1). In 1950, part of Seeberg’s research was furthered by J. N. D. Kelly in his investigation of early Christian creeds, with a second and a third revised edition appearing in 1960 and 1972.72 Likewise, Ferdinand Hahn and Bengt Hägglund have taken up and elaborated on Seeberg’s pioneering work.73 For my present purpose it will suffice to provide a few examples of christological creedal patterns found in the NT material. Already the early one-clause christologies will give us clues for linking them to the emerging system of the nomina sacra. Kelly provides some illustrative examples from the New Testament,74 the most popular of which seems to have been “Jesus is Lord” (K8v8 I8v;8 e.g., Rom 10:9, Phil 2:11). Another succinct formula is “Jesus is the Christ” (Mark 8:29 and 1 John 2:22); furthermore, “Jesus is the Son of God” (1 John 4.15). In addition to these brief formulas we find in the New Testament numerous christological kerygmas attaching the name of Jesus to “selected incidents in the redemptive story” (Rom 1:3f.; 1 Cor 15:3; Phil 2:6-11; 1 Pet 3:18ff. etc.).75 Typical stereotyped binitarian formulas occur as well, such as “the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (ton Q8n8 kai P8r8a8 tou K8u8 hmwn I8u8 X8u8; Rom 15:6, Eph 1:3 etc.), embracing, we may note, four (Codex Vaticanus, with “Father” written in full) or five (Codex Sinaiticus) nomina sacra. The early sources also evidence an emerging triadic (or Trinitarian) kerygmatic pattern (2 Cor 13:14; Matt 28:19). From this Kelly draws some important conclusions: “The binitarian schema, it is evident, was deeply impressed upon the thought of primitive Christianity; so, it would appear, was the 71Seeberg, Der Katechismus der Urchristenheit (Leipzig: A. Deichert’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung Nachf. [Georg Böhme], 1903). 72Kelly, Early Christian Creeds (New York: Longman Publishing, 1972). 73Bengt Hägglund has made use of A. Seeberg in some articles elaborating on his study from 1958 (Hägglund, “Die Bedeutung der “regula fidei” als Grundlage theologischer Aussagen”, Studia Theologica 12 [1958]: 1-44). See now also idem, Sanningens regel: Regula Veritatis: Trosregeln och den kristna traditionens struktur (Skellefteå: Artos & Norma bokförlag, 2003), for further references. Ferdinand Hahn wrote an introduction to A. Seeberg’s work for the 1966 edition published in Theologische Bücherei 26, München 1966. 74The examples are taken from Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, 13ff. Commenting on a draft of this chapter, Dr. Timo Laato reassured me of the likely connection of the nomina sacra with the earliest one-clause christologies. 75Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, 18. 26 Trinitarian”.76 And further, “[o]ur conclusion must be that one-membered, two-membered and three-membered confessions flourished side by side in the apostolic Church as parallel and mutually independent formulations of the one kerygma; and this is a datum of prime importance.”77 No doubt, these kerygmatic formulations, based on revelatory events, experiences,78 early devotional patterns and theological reflection, laid the foundation for the developing and variously expressed kerygma, with its threefold form of invocation, doxology and narrative.79 In the course of this process, Name and narrative become integral parts of the one gospel (1 Cor 15:1ff.).80 3.4.4 Dating, Location, Manuscript Types As to the origin of the use of nomina sacra, Hurtado estimates that “[a]llowing even minimal time for the practice to gain sufficient recognition and standardization would require an origin no later than the first century”.81 Roberts and Skeat arrive at a similar conclusion. Roberts somewhat speculatively even suggests a more precise dating as well as location, opting for a pre-seventy date in Jerusalem or Antioch.82 As for the emergence of the system of nomina sacra, the association of the practice with the Jewish treatment of the divine Name, the selection of words included such as “Christ” and “Jerusalem”, and the “strong sense of connection of the OT and Jewish traditions” all point in the direction of “a time prior to 70 CE when we commonly suppose the influence of Christian Jews was greater than in later decades”.83 The Jewish Christian isopsephy in Barn. 9, and possibly also in John 20:30 (see 3.4.1 and 3.4.6), similarly signal a first-century origin. 76Ibid., 22. 77Ibid., 24. 78See Hurtado, “Religious Experience and Religious Innovation in the New Testament”, JR 80 (2000): 183-205; and ibid. Lord Jesus Christ, 70-74. 79See further below, ch. 8, esp. 8.2 and 8.4; see also sections 5.2 and 5.3. 80See below, 3.6.2 and 3.8. 81Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 660. Peter Balla remarks that the nomina sacra point to the likelihood of recensions of the New Testament aiming at a standardized text for Christian worship; his dating of the nomina sacra in the second, and not later than the third century, however, can only be maintained for the development and expansion of a system of sacred abbreviations that had been introduced and partly standardized at the latest towards the end of the first century (Balla, “Evidence for an Early Christian Canon (Second and Third Century)”, in The Canon Debate, eds. J. A. Sanders and L. M. McDonald [Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2002], 376). 82Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt. 83Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 672. 27 For the establishment and sanction of the basic features of the practice, therefore, no later church authorities seem to have been needed. Nomina sacra, therefore, may have been employed by Christian scribes by the time the Fourth Gospel was written, and probably even earlier.84 As I have argued elsewhere, there are some indications that Ignatius of Antioch may point to knowledge of nomina sacra in his epistles; and if the Epistle of Barnabas can be “assigned, with fair probability, to the very end of the first century”, as William Horbury suggests, we have a first-century example of a probable reference to the nomina sacra practice (Barn. 9.7-9; see 3.4.6 below).85 The seemingly universal occurrence of nomina sacra in the earliest extant Christian documentary and literary manuscripts also points us towards a first-century origin. Hurtado lists three such early categories of texts: 1) Christian biblical manuscripts, 2) noncanonical religious texts (e.g., the Egerton Gospel fragment), and 3) “orthodox” and “unorthodox” Christian writings (e.g., the Coptic Gospel of Thomas, Acts of Peter, Acts of John). “All this”, he maintains, “indicates a remarkable instance of standardization that contrasts with the wide diversity we have come to associate with the earliest centuries of Christianity.”86 The fact that Gnostic texts draw from the same Christian “orthodox” list of nomina sacra add further testimony to an early date for their introduction.87 Ihsouv, the Staurogram and the Christogram 3.4.5 In addition to possible allusions in the New Testament to Ihsouv as a form of gematria (John 20:30), further indications of such allusions are found in some Patristic sources, e.g., in the christological exposition of Deut 28:66. As part of the oldest christological testimonies this verse was homogenously 84This thesis would combine in an interesting way with T. C. Skeat’s rather speculative hypothesis of the introduction of the codex format as a result of the publication of the Fourth Gospel, Skeat, “The Origin of the Christian Codex”, Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik 102 (1994): 263-68. Cf. also n. 48, above, on the phrase “life in his name” as used in the Fourth Gospel. See also below, 3.4.6. 85See Heath, “Nomina Sacra and Sacra Memoria Before the Monastic Age”; and Bokedal, “Notes on the Nomina Sacra and Biblical Interpretation”. On dating, see Horbury, Jews and Christians: In Contact and Controversy (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1998), 131-33. 86Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 658. 87Ibid., 672. 28 expounded by early Church Fathers.88 In Book Five of Adversus Haereses Irenaeus writes: He came to His own in a visible manner, and was made flesh, and hung upon the tree, that He might sum up all things in Himself. “And His own peculiar people did not receive Him,” as Moses declared this very thing among the people: “And thy life shall be hanging before thine eyes, and thou wilt not believe thy life” [Dtn. 28:66 LXX]. Those therefore who did not receive Him did not receive life. (Adv. Haer. V, 18.3)89 In Tertullian’s Adversus Iudaeos (ch. 11), where Deut 28:66 also is cited, “thy life”90 similarly refers to Jesus, which recalls the proposed tentative numerical connection above between the nomen sacrum I8h8 (=18) and the Hebrew word for life, yx (=18). The context here is the mystery of the Hebrew sign “Taw” (Ezekiel 9:4ff.). In his traditional Christian exposition, Tertullian combines the Old Testament meaning of “Taw”91 with the symbol of the cross: Now the mystery of this “sign”92 was in various ways predicted; (a “sign”) in which the foundation of life was forelaid for mankind; (a “sign”) in which the Jews were not to believe: just as Moses beforetime kept on announcing ... and thy life shall hang on the tree [in ligno] before thine eyes; and thou shalt not trust thy life. (Adv. Iud. 11)93 As has been convincingly shown by Erich Dinkler,94 the early church integrated the Hebrew symbol “Taw” (t) into the graphics of two other early nomina sacra, namely contractions of staurov and Xristov, both of which came to be represented by the same symbol, the staurogram/christogram.95 However, “Taw”, whose meaning was “sign” as well as “cross sign”, could be graphically rendered both as “x” and as “+”.96 This partly explains why the graphic analogy between the Hebrew “Taw” and the Greek letters “Chi” 88E.g., Irenaeus, Cyprian, Melito, Hippolytus, Lactantius, Novatian, Tertullian, Clement, Origen and others. Cf. Prigent, Justin et l’Ancien Testament (Paris: Librairie Lecoffre, 1964), 177f., 189-94 and 346; Reijners, The Terminology of the Holy Cross in Early Christian Literature: As Based upon Old Testament Typology (Nijmegen-Utrecht: Dekker & Van de Vegt, 1965), 146-162; see also Skarsaune, The Proof from Prophecy: A Study in Justin Martyr’s Proof-Text Tradition: Text-Type, Provenance, Theological Profile (Leiden: Brill, 1987), 437. 89ANF 1:547. 90Cf. Col 3:4; John 1:4, 14:6. 91See Dinkler, Signum Crucis (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1967), 1-54, esp. 15-21. 92The Septuagint rendering of “Taw” is shmei=on. 93ANF 3:168. 94Dinkler, Signum Crucis; Dinkler-von Schubert, “CTAYROC: Vom “Wort vom Kreuz” (1 Kor 1,18) zum Kreuz-Symbol”, in Byzantine East, Latin West: Art-Historical Studies in Honor of Kurt Weitzmann, eds. C. Moss and K. Kiefer (Department of Art and Archaeology Princeton University, 1995). 95See Black, The Chi-Rho Sign – Christogram and/or Staurogram? (Paternoster, 1970). 96Dinkler, Signum Crucis, 16. 29 (X) and “Tau” (T) was combined by the early Christians with the nomina sacra forms of staurov and Xristov. These two nomina sacra were graphically connected also by the staurogram/christogram. Further confirmation of the letter “T” as symbolizing the cross is given by Lucian97 and Tertullian.98 In the latter writer, Ezekiel 9:4-6 (“put a mark on the foreheads of those who sigh and groan over all the abominations ...”) is connected with the cross. This exposition of the cross is also found on Jewish ground.99 Accordingly, as Dinkler has argued, the “Taw” as cross in the Jewish setting is either a sign of protection (Schutzzeichen) or a sign of belonging to JHWH for those who obey him (Eigentumszeichen Jahwes für die ihm Gehorsamen).100 Such Jewish usage also explains the occurence of the sign of the cross found on Jewish graves from the first century AD. To conclude my argument above, there are reasons to accept Ihsouv (I8h8) as the initial nomen sacrum. However, as the early Christian exposition of the Scriptures developed, the symbol of the cross, combined with the Taw-sign, came to be influential together with the nomen sacrum Xristov. An argument for including Xristov among the two or three earliest nomina sacra would be the same as that listed above (3.4.1 and 3.4.2): On the one hand, the early occurrence in the manuscripts of the contracted form of Xristov, X8v,8 and on the other, a few occasions of the suspended form, X8r,8 as well as the combined form, X8r8v,8 over against the more regularly contracted forms of Kuriov, K8v8, and Qeov, Q8v8, give support to Xristov as an earlier nomen sacrum than these latter terms. This is also confirmed by Latin sources, e.g., Codex Bezae, where the suspension XR‰ is the normal form beside the combined form XR‰S‰.101 97Iudicio Vocalium 12; for reference see Dinkler, Signum Crucis. 98Adv. Marc. III, 22.5-7; Adv. Iud. 11; Reijners, The Terminology of the Holy Cross in Early Christian Literature: As Based upon Old Testament Typology, 146-62. 99Dinkler, “Zur Geschichte des Kreuzsymbols”, and idem, “Kreuzzeichen und Kreuz – Tav, Chi und Stauros”, in idem, Signum Crucis, 1-54. 100Dinkler, “Kreuzzeichen und Kreuz – Tav, Chi und Stauros”, in idem, Signum Crucis, 32. 101Cf. Traube, Nomina sacra, 152 ff., where both ihsous and cristos are treated as irregularly rendered; and Parker, Codex Bezae. See further Bokedal, “Notes on the Nomina Sacra and Biblical Interpretation”. 30 3.4.6 “Cross” and “Crucify” as Nomina Sacra The oldest explicit testimony to the use of nomina sacra that we know of is found in the epistle of Barnabas, written sometime AD 70–135.102 In Barn. 9.7-9 the author presents an allegorical reading of the circumcision of Abraham’s household by elaborating on the number 318 – in the source rendered by the Greek letters TIH, which is instanced also in some other contemporary Christian manuscripts.103 This seems to indicate that the author of Barnabas had a Christian copy before him of Gen 14:14:104 For Abraham, the first to perform circumcision, was looking ahead in the Spirit to Jesus when he circumcised. For he received the firm teachings of the three letters [labw\n triw=n gramma/twn do/gmata]. For it says, ‘Abraham circumcised eighteen and three hundred men from his household.’ What knowledge, then, was given to him? Notice that first he mentions the eighteen and then, after a pause, the three hundred. The number eighteen [in Greek] consists of an Iota [I], 10, and an Eta [H], 8. There you have Jesus. And because the cross was about to have grace in the letter Tau [T] [o3/ti de\ o( stauro\v e)n tw|= tau= h!mellen e!xein th\n xa/rin], he next gives the three hundred, Tau. And so he shows the name Jesus by the first two letters, and the cross by the other. For the one who has placed the implanted gift of his covenant in us knew these things. No one has learned a more reliable lesson from me. But I know that you are worthy.105 Here, the nomen sacrum for Jesus, represented by IH (=18), meets for the first time in our sources together with the symbol of the cross, the Greek letter T (=300). The specific meaning of the three letters may already be known by the readers. It is associated with certain “firm teachings” (do/gmata). The symbol of the cross is said to express grace – a theme further developed in Barn. 11 and 12, in connection with the Christian baptism and typological interpretation of the serpent raised by Moses in the desert. Extant Christian OT manuscripts that contain the shortform TIH for the Greek number 318, referred to by Barnabas, include the fourth-century Chester Beatty Papyrus IV and most probably also the early second- to third102Hvalvik (The Struggle for Scripture and Covenant: the purpose of the epistle of Barnabas and Jewish-Christian competition in the second century [Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1996], 23) dates Barnabas to AD 130–32, whereas William Horbury (Jews and Christians, 133) prefers a late first-century date. Since the dating of Barnabas is still much of an open question, what can be regarded as certain for its composition is a date between AD 70 and the end of the second century (ibid., 17). 103For references, see Hurtado, Artifacts, 146f. 104For references to extant OT manuscripts, see Hurtado, The Earliest Christian Artifacts: Manuscripts and Christian Origins (Grand Rapids and Cambridge: Eerdmans, 2006), 146f. 105Barn. 9.7-9; transl. Ehrman, The Apostolic Fathers, vol. 2., 45-47. 31 century P. Yale 1.106 That the symbolic interpretation of the number 318 was well known in Christian circles is further confirmed by Clement of Alexandria in his reading of Gen 14:14. However, for him such isophsephy seems to be more of a tradition than part of his own immediate exegesis (however, cf. n. 45 above). Clement comments: “For it is said [fasin] that the character for 300 is by its shape a symbol [tu/pov] of the cross of the Lord [to\ kuriako\n shmei=on].107 3.5 Provenance, Possession and Interpretation of the Scriptures The presence of any of the nomina sacra in a manuscript is itself a good indication of its Christian provenance. The selection and combination of these four to fifteen names in effect immediately indicate a Christian context.108 As textual markers they are distinctive “in form, subject matter, and function from other scribal phenomena”.109 The Christian texts containing them are thereby set apart from the Scriptures of the synagogue as well as from other writings. Thus, as characteristic identity markers, the nomina sacra arguably conveyed to the lector or teacher something like a textual code.110 106See Hurtado, The Earliest Christian Artifacts, 146f.; for P. Yale 1, see Dinkler, “Papyrus Yalensis 1 als ältest bekannter christlicher Genesistext: Zur Frühgeschichte des Kreuz-Symbols”, in Im Zeichen des Kreuzes: Aufsätze von Erich Dinkler, eds. O. Merk and M. Wolter (Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1992), 341-45. 107Strom. VI, 11. Quoted in n. 45 above. 108Cf. Schubert, Paul, “Editing a Papyrus”, in The Oxford Handbook of Papyrology, ed. Roger Bagnall (Oxord: Oxford University, 2009), 200. 109Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 658. 110Barn. 9.7-9 is our earliest indication of a connection between the graphics of the nomina sacra and their interpretation. In addition to being openly explained to the faith community, as in Barn. 9 and Clem. Strom. VI, 11, the information transmitted by the system of nomina sacra was probably also addressed to the professional reader and expositor of the text. Perhaps the parallel is too far-fetched, but, to me, there seems to be some similarity between the textual code transmitted by the nomina sacra and the “surplus” of information addressed to the instrumentalist sometimes contained in a musical score. During the Baroque era this type of communication between the composer and the musician was elegantly developed, e.g., in the full scores of J. S. Bach. A resemblance between the nomina sacra and these scores may be seen in the allusions to or symbolizations of the Christian cross in the manuscripts, and in the musical notes, respectively. None of these symbolizations were intended to sound as the text were read or the scores performed; they were rather meant as a piece of information/symbolization of a theoretical, spiritual or decorative kind, that could shape the interpretation on a higher level. Both in regard to the nomina sacra 32 Originally, such an implied code of sacred name/word combinations probably pertained also to the liturgical practice of the earliest communities.111 Theologically, these “sacred and liturgical contractions”, as E. M. Thompson labeled them, were initially shaped in a binitarian format, which was soon developed into a triadic schema. GOD, JESUS and SPIRIT, here “amount to a kind of summary of the Rule of Faith, and indicate that these texts were read within the contours of a developing creedal confession”.112 In his reconstruction of Jewish-Christian interrelations of the early decades of the second century, Reidar Hvalvik elaborates the theory that Jews and Christians were engaged in a contest for the possession of the Scriptures.113 In this struggle for Scripture – which took place within the broader process of “the parting of the ways”114 – the question “whose books” turns out to be central beside the issue of Scripture interpretation. As part of the polemics between church and synagogue, which reached a climax at the time of the second Jewish revolt, it could even be said that “possession of the books implied understanding of their content”.115 The introduction of the nomina sacra in the biblical manuscripts occurred at a time when Christians were adopting a distinctive identity as a tertium genus over against both Judaism and the pagan world.116 The issue of Christian distinctiveness could very well have been involved as the early nomina sacra – reflecting the binitarian structure of Christian devotion – were introduced into the Scriptures. As regards the second-century situation Hvalviks’ thesis that Jewish-Christian competition implied a mutually exclusivating identity of the Scriptures also accords with this assumption. To the author of the Epistle and these typical Baroque scores a similar relation between provenance and interpretation may suggest itself. 111See Hurtado, “Christ-Devotion in the First Two Centuries: Reflections and a Proposal”, Toronto Journal of Theology 12 (1996); and idem, One God, One Lord. 112Barton, Review of the 2005 ThD edition of the present book, JTS 58:2 (2007): 620. 113Hvalvik, The Struggle for Scripture and Covenant. 114The process was intensified between the fall of Jerusalem AD 70 and the second Jewish revolt AD 132–135. See Dunn, The Partings of the Ways: Between Christianity and Judaism and their Significance for the Character of Christianity (London: SCM, 1991); Lieu, “‘The Parting of the Ways’: Theological Construct or Historical Reality”, JSNT 56 (1994): 101-19; cf. also Taylor, Anti-Judaism and Early Christian Identity: A Critique of the Scholarly Consensus (Leiden, New York and Köln: Brill, 1995). 115Wilken, “The Jews and Christian Apologetics After Theodosius I Cunctos Populos.”, HTR 73 (1980): 468; cited from Hvalvik, The Struggle for Scripture and Covenant, 136. 116Cf. Stanton, “The Fourfold Gospel”, New Testament Studies 43 (1997): 339: Stanton’s claim concerns the the codex format, but it appears to be even more applicable to the system of nomina sacra. 33 of Barnabas, to Justin in his Dialogue with Trypho as well as to Tertullian in Prescription Against Heretics,117 the issue “whose Scriptures” was of utmost importance.118 In this connection the nomina sacra could very well have contributed to a distinct Christian textual identity of the Scriptures in relation to the synagogue.119 This hypothesis finds further support in some recent discussions on the close correlation between the concept of Scripture and the divine Name in Judaism during this period. John Barton, in his book The Spirit and the Letter, relates to this discussion: Perhaps a definition of a canonical text for Judaism in our period would be: a text in which it is legitimate to write the Tetragrammaton. Otto Betz argues along exactly these lines that the Qumran Temple Scroll was regarded by the community as ‘canonical’: it contains the Tetragrammaton (in square script). This is an entirely physical idea of the nature of a sacred book, and one which students of the canon may not have been sufficiently sensitive to. In the Middle Ages the idea that the divine Name or names were what gave the Bible its sanctity was more or less taken for granted within the Jewish mystical tradition.120 If the presence of nomina sacra in an “Old Testament” manuscript clearly sets it apart as of Christian provenance, it may also be of interest to mention the special Rabbinic rulings for destroying heretical scriptures. If we keep to the widely held supposition that it was the existence of the Tetragrammaton in a writing that made it a candidate for storage in a genizah, the usage by the Christians of writings containing the Name became problematic. As these were considered to be inaccurate writings, they could, of course, not be used by Jews, who happened to come across Christian scriptural (OT) writings. However, since they contained the Name, nor could they be destroyed according to the normal procedure. In these cases particular rulings for handling heretical writings were applied. In the Christian Scriptures the Name was sometimes transcribed as PIPI (pipi), or rendered in some other way, possibly also in Hebrew script.121 However, by far the most common rendering was usage of the two nomina 117Praescr. Haer. 15 (ANF 3:250): In his debate with the Gnostics Tertullian says that “it ought to be clearly seen to whom belongs the possession of the Scriptures”. 118Hvalvik, The Struggle for Scripture and Covenant, particularly 134-36, 203f. 119Cf. Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 658: “These abbreviated words are distinctive in form, subject matter, and function from other scribal phenomena, so much so that it is widely (but not universally…) accepted that the presence of any of them in a manuscript is itself a good indication of its Christian provenance.” 120Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 118-20. 121See citation below, n. 124; Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 186 n. 22. 34 sacra K8v8 (Kuriov) and Q8v8 (Qeov). Is this the typical Christian practice which the Rabbis refer to when prescribing particular rulings on the legitimacy of destroying heretical (especially Christian) scriptures “with their names”?122 If this is the case, then the question arises if “their names” refers not only to the Tetragrammaton when used in Christian Scriptures, but also to the early nomina sacra.123 Barton, who is sceptical as to this possibility, comments: It should be noted that Christian books, though they used nomina sacra for many holy words, which being contractions would not in Jewish eyes constitute ‘names’, sometimes transcribed the Tetragrammaton itself in Hebrew characters.124 Nevertheless, there is reason to consider the possibility that indeed the nomina sacra are referred to when the Rabbis talk of “their names” in the plural. If the Tetragrammaton or some Christian transcription of the divine name is meant, we should expect the use of the singular “their name”, which, of course, would appear rather strange, given that the divine name in that case would be identical with the name of YHWH, or an alternative rendering of the Name. In other words, “their names” could very well refer not only to “heretical” transcriptions of the Tetragrammaton but also to the ecclesiastical Greek contractions of Lord, God, Jesus, Christ, Father, Son and Spirit. We have reasons to believe that from early on Christian scribes took over many of the Jewish scribal practices (cf. 3.4.4 above).125 The church’s change of attitude towards the divine name, therefore, was arguably to some degree a conscious modification of the Jewish convention of meticulously regulating the reverence, pronunciation and writing of the Name.126 The abandonment of the older theory embraced by Traube and Paap, according to which the system of nomina sacra is of Jewish origin, is here presupposed. In the last decades, a Christian rather than a Jewish origin of the system has been forcefully argued by George Howards, C. H. Roberts, Hurtado and others. Roberts, in 1979, writes: Perhaps the most conclusive evidence is that of the Greek inscriptions from Palestine covering the period from Qumran to Bar Kokhba; there are 184 instances 122Shabbat 116a, t. Shabbat 13:5, t. Yadaim 2:13; referred to by Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 118. 123Included among the nomina sacra of the early second century were the Greek words for God, Lord, Jesus, Christ and Spirit. 124Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 186, n. 22. 125Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt; Barton, The Spirit and the Letter. 126Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 108-21; Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt, 2833. 35 of ku/riov in a sacral sense and 109 of Qeo/v and in not one is either word contracted. For the formal origin of nomina sacra we must look elsewhere.127 The place to look for the Christian origin, development and emerging standardization of the nomina sacra practice, hence, is the first- and secondcentury church. Here the Scriptures used for worship were not yet terminologically divided into Old and New Testament (at least not before Melito of Sardis, ca. AD 175); nor were the new Christian Gospel writings commonly named “Scripture”, grafh/, alongside the Old Testament writings. The new writings needed to be used parallel to and together with the old Scriptures for yet some decades before they could themselves be generally labelled grafh/ towards the mid-second century.128 In this process, the introduction of the nomina sacra into the manuscripts seems to have mattered more than has been previously recognized. Roberts’ view of the nomina sacra as forming “what might be regarded as the embryonic creed of the first Church”, engraved into the texts, certainly underlines their significance.129 Barton approvingly comments: Clearly in a sense the nomina sacra are related to the meaning of the texts, in that they are words with a special significance for Christians: Roberts remarks that they almost form a little creed – Jesus, Christ, Lord, and God could be treated as a quick guide to the essence of Christian faith.130 The system of nomina sacra marks the text with regard to provenance, subject matter and function.131 By this fusion of creedal-like elements and the biblical text, a distinct Christian sacred text was established for the faith communities. On the textual-graphic as well as the liturgical-theological level the nomina sacra, therefore, ought to be considered when discussing the 127Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt, 34. Similarly Howard, “The Tetragram and the New Testament”, 65f. Similarly Hurtado, Artifacts, 105. For alternative views, see De Troyer, “The Pronunciation of the Names of God”, 143-72 128For the development of the category of “Scripture” as applied to the Gospels, see below, chs. 4, 5 and 9. 129Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt, 46. 130Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 122: However, Barton immediately adds: “But the convention of writing them contracted is a purely graphic convention and does not affect the meaning of the texts so written. It does, however, mark them out as Christian manuscripts; and the fact that Christian scribes applied the same convention in writing Old Testament texts is one clear indication that they had begun to treat Old and New Testament books as sacred texts in much the same sense – transferring special features of the New Testament back on to the Old.” 131Hurtado, “The Origin of the Nomina Sacra”, 658 (cited above). 36 texture of the Greek biblical text.132 From the discussion above – on the supposed correlation between the concept of Scripture and the Tetragrammaton133 – we may even consider the possibility that without the adoption of nomina sacra into the Christian scriptures, these writings could not have attained the status of Scripture, eventually placing them on a par with the Jewish Scriptures. The passage cited above from the Epistle of Barnabas, which comments on the 318 (TIH=318) circumcised servants, is our earliest testimony to an emphasis on the role of nomina sacra for scriptural identity: He [Abraham] signifies, therefore, Jesus by two letters, and the cross by one, He knows this, who has put within us the engrafted gift of His doctrine. No one has been admitted by me to a more excellent piece of knowledge than this134 We have here an early indication of the supposed correlation between the graphics of the Christian text and its theological interpretation. The fact that nomina sacra from early on are “lifted out” of the biblical texts to be used in Christian graffiti and inscriptions, or in Christian art, particularly on icons, provides further indication of their status as sacral names in the texts.135 3.6 Distinct Textual Markers 3.6.1 Graphics In several ways the nomina sacra attained the function as distinct textual markers. To begin with, on the graphic level, the following elements can be noted: 1) The linea superscripta; 2) the free space that is left around the abbreviation, interrupting the normal scriptio continua;136 3) the contraction, which in the Hellenistic setting was only rarely used for the purpose of abbreviation; 4) the strictly limited number of words included among the Greek nomina sacra; and 5) the beautifully ornamented nomina sacra in some Christian manuscripts, such as the Codex Purpureus Petropolitanus (N). In this manuscript Pathr, Uiov and Pneuma – the three central divine names of the 132The place to elaborate on theological aspects implied by the scribal nomina sacra convention is first and foremost the liturgical, devotional and theological settings of the church, for which the Scriptures are crucial. 133See the citation from Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 118-20. 134Barn. 9.8-9 (ANF 1:142f.); cf. Ehrman’s translation above, 3.4.6. 135See further below. 136See Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt. 37 Nicene (and the Apostolic) Creed – are written in gold, and the rest of the nomina sacra in silver letters.137 The Book of Kells, in which the magnified nomen sacrum for Xristov, X8r8, is most elegantly designed, is another example of the particular emphasis ascribed to the names in the nomina sacra wordgroup.138 Theological Context: The Nomina Sacra and the Rule of Faith Getting behind the graphics, we recall two major contextual features that ought to be considered when analyzing the system of nomina sacra: 1) The connection between the (variously rendered) Tetragrammaton and the nomina sacra.139 On this C. H. Roberts writes: “[T]he ineffability of the name of God, expressed when the Law was read in Hebrew by replacing the vowels proper to it by those of Adonai (‘Lord’), is directly or indirectly the psychological origin of the nomina sacra” (cf. 3.1 and 3.4.2, above).140 2) The parallel between the nomina sacra, central terms embraced by the early Christian kerygma/creed, and early Christian scriptural interpretation (cf. section 3.4.3). In early kerygmatic formulations such as “Jesus is Lord” (K8v8 I8v)8 , or the five words that give the acronym IXQUS – Ihsouv Xristov Qeou Uiov Swthr – all words are nomina sacra. Furthermore, in the more comprehensive formulations expressed by the Rule of Faith and the emergent Trinitarian creeds with their articles of faith, the words marked off as nomina sacra seem to provide the central terms by a) marking out the two or three articles of faith (in boldface in the quote below), b) by elaborating on these articles, and c) by focusing – within a Christian monotheistic setting – on the divine Name(s), GOD, 3.6.2 137The practice of marking out the divine name in gold is found also among Jewish scribes in the first centuries AD; cf. Howard, “The Tetragram and the New Testament”. 138See O’Reilly, “Gospel Harmony and the Names of Christ: Insular Images of a Patristic Theme”, in The Bible as Book: The Manuscript Tradition, eds. J. L. Sharpe III and K. van Kampen (London: The British Library & Oak Knoll Press in association with The Scriptorium: Center for Christian Antiquities, 1998). 139On variations in the rendering of the Tetragrammaton, see Howard, “The Tetragram and the New Testament”; Williams, “The Tetragrammaton-Jahweh, Name or Surrogate?”, ZAW 54 (1936): 262-69; Brinktrine, “Der Gottesname ‘AIA´ bei Theodoret von Cyrus”, Biblica 30 (1949): 520-23; Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 120; cf. also Driver, “Abbreviations in the Massoretic Text”. 140Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt, 28f. For a more cautious phrasing, see Hurtado, Artifacts, 106. 38 JESUS and SPIRIT. Our oldest Christian catechesis, Proof of the Apostolic Preaching (6) – put down in writing by Irenaeus ca. AD 200 – provides a fine illustration (underlined are eight nomina sacra commonly employed at the time of Irenaeus, who himself seems to have made use nomina sacra in his writings; cf. 3.2 above):141 And this is the drawing-up of our faith, the foundation of the building, and the consolidation of a way of life. God, the Father, uncreated, beyond grasp, invisible, one God the maker of all; this is the first and foremost article [Armenian glux corresponding to Greek kefalh/, kefa/laion] of our faith. But the second article is the Word of God, the Son of God, Christ Jesus our Lord, who was shown forth by the prophets according to the design of their prophecy and according to the manner in which the Father disposed; and through Him were made all things whatsoever. He also, in the end of times, for the recapitulation of all things, is become a man among men, visible and tangible, in order to abolish death and bring to light life, and bring about the communion of God and man. And the third article is the Holy Spirit [cf. Epid. 3: “the Holy Spirit of God”], through whom the prophets prophesied and the patriarchs were taught about God and the just were led in the path of justice, and who in the end of times has been poured forth in a new manner upon humanity over all the earth renewing man to God. (Iren. Epid. 6)142 More generally, terms from the nomina sacra word-group involved in similar formulaic renderings of the christological kerygma and/or the Rule of Faith (as found in the author of 1 Clement, Ignatius, Justin, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria and others) include: The First Article of Faith: Qeov, Kuriov, Pathr The Second Article of Faith: Ihsouv, Xristov, Kuriov, Uiov, anqrwpov, Pneuma, mhthr, Dauid, staurov/staurow, swthr, ouranov, Qeov, Pathr The Third Article of Faith: Pneuma, Qeov (Israhl, Ierousalhm) Of these, Dauid appears as an element in early creedal formulations in the New Testament, as well as in the Apostolic Fathers (cf. 3.2 above).143 In 141For a fuller treatment of the relation between regula fidei and nomina sacra, see my “The Rule of Faith”. 142Irenaeus, Proof of the Apostoloc Preaching [Epideixis], translated and annotated by J. P. Smith, Ancient Christian Writers, no. 16 (New York: Newman Press, 1952), 51. Boldface and underlinings not in the original. The number of nomina sacra in some NT manuscripts demarcated by scribes around the time when Irenaeus writes is eight to eleven, as testified to by P45 (eight), P46 and P66 (nine), and P75 (eleven). 143 Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, e.g., 17ff, 68f.; Skarsaune, “The Development of Scriptural Interpretation in the Second and Third Centuries – except Clement and Origen”, in Hebrew Bible/Old Testament: The 39 Justin Martyr Israhl and Ierousalhm are also central concepts.144 The nomen sacrum for swthr appears somewhat later in the manuscripts, as does mhthr (third century on; see 3.2 above), which is contained in the Athanasian Creed of the late fifth or early sixth century. As regards the phrasing o uiov tou anqrwpou, it may have had some early connection with the nomina sacra convention, but this is difficult to prove.145 As seen in the quote from Epideixis 6 above, anqrwpov is part of the early church’s language when addressing the theme of incarnation. Pneuma seems to have been added to the list from the late first or early second century, and was not part of the core group of the earliest four names. This is supported by the lack of this nomen sacrum in several early Latin (and Greek) manuscripts (see also the figures under 3.2 above).146 As to the occurrence of creedal statements in this period, it can also be noted that two-clause and three-clause confessions are found side by side.147 Given this parallelism between the nomina sacra and the Rule-of-Faith pattern, it is worth repeating Robert’s judgment148 that the nomina sacra may be regarded as “the embryonic creed of the first Church”.149 Indeed, the addition, e.g., of Pneuma, Pathr and Uiov (arguably in that order; see the figures under 3.2 above) to the earliest core group of four words (cf. 3.4), gives further support to Robert’s assumption. The addition of these words, then, roughly appears to parallel the development of the emerging Rule-ofFaith pattern, as found in 1 Clement, Ignatius, Justin, Irenaeus, Tertullian and History of Its Interpretation, ed. M. Sæbø (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996), 379f.; Seeberg, Der Katechismus der Urchristenheit, esp. 73f. and 137f. 144As for testimonies on the church (Testimonies de ecclesia), see Skarsaune, “The Development of Scriptural Interpretation in the Second and Third Centuries – except Clement and Origen”, 401-404; cf. also Const. Apost. VII, 36.2, where the expression a0lhqino\v )Israh/l occurs. 145See Jongkind, Scribal Habits, 71-72. 146Cf. Parker, Codex Bezae, 97-106: A somewhat heterogenous use of the nomina sacra can be seen in some early manuscripts. The investigation of Codex Bezae by D. C. Parker, e.g., shows some layers of development in the Gospel writings of the practice. In the Latin version of the book of Luke, the development of the contraction of Spirit is only half complete, while the four earliest nomina sacra are more or less fully developed. This indicates that the old Latin original behind the book of Luke, in Codex Bezae, goes back to a date when the nomina sacra had been introduced but were still developing. 147Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, 24ff. 148Pace Tuckett and others, who do not ascribe the contractions any significance. Cf. also Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 122: “the convention of writing them [the nomina sacra] contracted is a purely graphic convention and does not affect the meaning of the texts so written. It does, however, mark them out as Christian manuscripts”. 149Roberts, Manuscript, Society and Belief in Early Christian Egypt, 46. Cf. above, 3.3. 40 others.150 In fact, these three terms, Father, Son and Spirit (preceded by the early nomina sacra word-groups God, Jesus and Spirit; and Jesus and cross) constitute the basis around which the Rule of Faith developed. The varying number of nomina sacra found in some early manuscripts containing Matt 28:19 (eiv to onoma tou Patrov kai tou Uiou kai tou agiou Pneumatov) are illustrative: Codex Vaticanus here has none of the words marked as nomina sacra, whereas Codex Bezae has one nomen sacrum (Spirit), Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Washingtonianus two (Father and Spirit) and Codex Alexandrinus and the Majority Text – probably influenced by the practice of baptizing in the Triune Name – three (Father, Son and Spirit). Besides the suitable designation “embryonic creed”, we could also speak of the nomina sacra as an important link bridging the potential structural, theological and narrative gap between the Scriptures and the second-century oral kerygma, the developing regula fidei. We have already seen possible connections between the second-century nomina sacra and the Rule of Faith in Irenaeus. The close relationship between the church’s regula fidei and the Scriptures will be further discussed below (see 3.8, 5.3 and ch. 8). 3.6.3 The Wider Devotional Context The nomina sacra are found not only in a scriptural and liturgical context but in the wider devotional setting as well, including inscriptions on houses, graves, ossuaries, churches, amulets, coins; and reproductions on frescoes, mosaics and icons.151 As James Wicker points out, the use of nomina sacra in a pre-Constantinian Christian mosaic and graffiti helps to show the use of nomina sacra at least by the third century AD may have been common among literate Christians – not just Christian scribes. Trained mosaicists used them, pilgrims etched them as graffiti in the House of St. Peter in Capernaum, and either clergy or members of the congregation etched them on the wall of the Dura-Europos domus ecclesiae.152 It is worth noticing, that, very likely, in the case of such inscriptions and reproductions “[e]ven an illiterate person could see the unusual feature of the overbar with the few letters of nomina sacra”.153 150Cf. Skarsaune, “The Development of Scriptural Interpretation in the Second and Third Centuries – except Clement and Origen”; and my “The Rule of Faith”. 151For a fine summary, see Wicker, “Pre-Constantinian Nomina Sacra”, 52-72. 152Ibid., 71. 153Ibid. 41 Regarding the interplay between the biblical text and early Bible illustrations, Kurt Weitzmann and others have argued that from early on in the history of Christian book production the biblical text was read in light of illustrations of various kinds, and the other way around.154 This is perhaps most clearly seen when studying the place of origin of much Christian art, which, according to Weitzmann, appears to be the Bible manuscripts themselves.155 Text and textual illustration in the early Christian setting seem to make up a single “textual” unit. As Christian art develops from the second century on, the nomina sacra become a common denominator between the biblical text and various Christian artwork. In this connection, we can note the early use of the staurogram, which is probably the earliest representation of a Christian visual culture: the pictographic representation in P66 and P75, and other early papyri, of the crucified Jesus.156 3.7 Canonization in Two Directions: From New to Old, from Old to New A traditional understanding of Scripture canonization seems to imply that the sacred status ascribed to the Jewish Scriptures by the synagogue and the early church was conveyed to the new Christian writings. The “New Testament” writings were therefore gradually given the same type of reverence as the “Old Testament”. The process whereby this took place is generally held to be complex. However, there are reasons to suspect that the nomina sacra within the early Christian high-christological context157 constitute an important link in this process. Depending on the way in which we conceive the emergence and development of the nomina sacra, various alternatives as how to envision the New Testament canon formation offer themselves. If the Christian system of contractions can be shown to be derived from the reverential contraction (and suspension) of Ihsouv, “the most important nomen sacrum of all”,158 there are good reasons to think that the system was first elaborated for the earliest “New Testament” material and perhaps also 154Weitzmann, Illustrations in Roll and Codex (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University, 1970); idem, Age of Spirituality: Late Antique and Early Christian Art, Third to Seventh Century (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, published in association with Princeton University, 1979). 155Weitzmann, Illustrations in Roll and Codex. 156See Hurtado, Artefacts, 135-54; and Dinkler, Signum Crucis. 157Cf. 3.1 and 3.4.2, above. 158Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 123. 42 for so called Christian Testimonies containing “Old Testament” texts intertwined with Jesus traditions.159 By the time the nomina sacra for Lord and God were introduced, the emerging system of sacred short-forms arguably began to be equally used for the “Old Testament” and the “New Testament” material.160 If so, there was arguably a mutual influence of the two types of texts or text corpora on one another: the “New Testament” material on the “Old Testament”; and, vice versa, the nomina sacra used in the “Old Testament” (substituting the Tetragram) on the “New Testament” texts. As regards their function, we may then even expect that “scriptural” (or “crypto-scriptural”) status was attributed to the emerging New Testament at an early date, even prior to the time when the included literature more generally were referred to as “Scripture”.161 Examples of such early attribution are found in 2 Pet 3:16, Rev 1:4 and Barn. 4.14 and 2 Clem. 2.4.162 Perhaps the “paradox” pointed to by Stuhlhofer here finds a partial explanation: We see here a paradox. The early Church cited the Old Testament as “Scripture”, but to begin with tended to possess it only in a fragmentary form. The New Testament, on the other hand, was widely available and was used much more heavily, but it was not yet cited as “Scripture”.163 Out of the statistical investigation of Scripture citation presented by Stuhlhofer, Barton concludes: The central importance of most of the writings that would come to form the New Testament is already established in the early second century, by the time of the Apostolic Fathers, and all but a very few Old Testament books (such as Isaiah or the 159See 4.2 below. 160Alternatively, nomina sacra for Lord and God had already been introduced on Jewish ground, or at least the reading Kyrios for YHWH, cf. Pietersma, “Kyrios or Tetragram: A Renewed Quest for the Original LXX”, in De Septuaginta: Studies in honour of John William Wevers on his sixty-fifth birthday, eds. A. Pietersma and C. Cox, (Mississauga, ON: Benben Publishers, 1984); in this case, the nomen sacrum for Jesus was juxtaposed with these earlier Jewish renderings of the Name. See further 3.4 above. 161This is in line with McDonald’s observation in this regard: “The fact that early Christian scribes contracted special words from both the Old Testament and the New Testament suggests that they viewed both collections as sacred in the same sense.” (McDonald, “Indentifying Scripture and Canon in the Early Church: The Criteria Question”, in The Canon Debate, eds. J. A. Sanders and L. M. McDonald [Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2002], 421); see also Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 122f. (cf. n. 126 above). 162W.-D. Köhler (Die Rezeption des Matthäusevangeliums in der Zeit vor Irenäus [WUNT 2/22; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1987)]) argues that dependence on Matthew is quite possible for Barn. 4.14; 5.8f and 7.9b. Metzger (The Canon of the New Testament: Its Origin, Development, and Significance [Oxford: Clarendon, 1987], 57) does not convince to the contrary. 163Stuhlhofer, Der Gebrauch der Bibel von Jesus bis Euseb: Eine statistische Untersuchung zur Kanonsgeschichte (Wuppertal: Brockhaus, 1988), 68. 43 Psalms) already play second fiddle to the Christians’ own writings. Indeed, it is not until the third century that citations begin to level out as between the two Testaments. All the indications are that the New Testament became almost instantly more important than the Old for the nascent Church[.]164 Part of the role that the Jewish Scriptures had during the Apostolic Age was carried over to the “New Testament” writings. Unexpectedly, the nomina sacra, as I have argued, seem to have played a role very early in this process, which partially explains how there could be such vivid reciprocity between the two collections of writings in the first place. 3.8 The Nomina Sacra as a Narrative and Theological Center in the Scriptures In our discussion above (3.6.2) we noticed some structural relationship between the nomina sacra and the Rule-of-Faith pattern. The Rule of Faith tended to develop around the following two (i and ii) or three (i, ii and iii) groups of nomina sacra: i) Qeov, Kuriov, Pathr, ii) Kuriov, Ihsouv, Xristov, Uiov, and iii) Pneuma. Given the essential role this typical creedal structure – binitarian and/or triadic/Trinitarian – had within the emerging Christian faith, it seems inappropriate not to take the suggested relationship between regula fidei and nomina sacra into serious consideration. The nomina sacra appear to have attained a textual-hermeneutical and theological function as part of the Christian Scriptures. Given this, it seems reasonable to conclude that the addition of the three nomina sacra Pathr, Uiov and Pneuma165 – included already in P46 and P66 (both ca. AD 200) – were directly or indirectly related to the second-century development of the regula fidei. We have previously seen that the Rule of Faith was structured around these three names. The gradual and sometimes ambivalent development, from a primarily two-clause to a mainly three-clause creedal formulation is also to be sought here.166 That the historical development of the three-clause formulas arguably goes from baptismal confession over nomina sacra to regula fidei does not contradict the theological interest in mutually relating the Rule of Faith 164Barton, The Spirit and the Letter, 64f. 165These additions were most probably inspired by the baptismal ritual (cf. Matt 28:19); see Balla, Challenges to New Testament Theology: An Attempt to Justify the Enterprise (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1997), 361f. 166See, e.g., Kelly, Early Christian Creeds, 24-26. We note here Kelly’s legitimate criticism of a stereotypical development (ibid, 24): “one-membered, two-membered and three-membered confessions flourished side by side in the apostolic Church as parallel and mutually independent formulations of the one kerygma; and this is a datum of prime importance.” See also Bokedal, “The Rule of Faith: Tracing its Origins”. 44 and the nomina sacra, and in making them interdependent on one another. The Rule of Faith, which we will discuss in chapters 5 and 8, has the crucial function of establishing a Mitte der Schrift and a textual biblical whole, as well as providing a fundamental framework for the canon formation process. This further legitimizes the close connection between the two. The five rules for scriptural interpretation proposed by Robert Jenson (see section 6.7) as well as my argumentation below of the Bible as pointer to the regula fidei, and vice versa (8.3.6 and 8.4), also have bearing on the postulated close – and, perhaps even necessary – connection between the nomina sacra and the Rule of Faith. As to their narrative and dogmatic imperatives, the following statement by Jenson seems to apply equally well to the – narratively, liturgically and theologically defined – Rule of Faith as to the second- and third-century system of nomina sacra:167 the phrase “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit” is simultaneously a very compressed telling of the total narrative by which Scripture identifies God and a personal name for the God so specified; in it, name and narrative description not only appear together, as at the beginning of the Ten Commandments, but are identical. … The church is the community and a Christian is someone who, when the identity of God is important, names him “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.” Those who do not or will not belong to some other community.168 3.9 Conclusion The nomina sacra established a relationship between the biblical text and some central Christian key words. This relationship has the following implications: 1) The divine Name, rendered by the Greek words for Lord and God, is marked out as the center in the biblical text, in close connection with the words Jesus and Christ (textually indicating an already existing binitarian pattern of devotion), and very soon also Spirit and cross (first/second century). 2) Additional words were added to the earliest list of nomina sacra (first to third century), such as Father, Son, man/human being, Israel and Jerusalem. These altogether eleven early nomina sacra (all present in P75) appear to connect the scribal practice to devotional patterns associated with the early Christian confession and creedal development. Editorially, the 167See further below, 7.2, 8.2 and 8.4. 168Jenson, Systematic Theology, vol. 1: The Triune God (New York: Oxford University, 1997), 46. 45 presence of nomina sacra indicates a unity of the Scriptures and a particular Christian narrative and theological focus, engrafting “what might be regarded as the embryonic creed of the first Church” (Roberts) into the textuality of the Scriptures. Various confessional/creedal structures (binitarian, Jesus and the cross; triadic/trinitarian, Rule of Faith) may readily be associated with the nomina sacra demarcations. The nomina sacra practice is an instance of editorial continuity shared by various early Bible versions that goes back to the very origins of Christian Scripture. 3) As nomina sacra are present in basically all Christian Greek biblical manuscripts, their seemingly universal reception by the early faith communities strongly suggests a doctrine of the unity of the Christian Scriptures, placing the emergent NT writings side by side with the Scriptures of Judaism (the OT). The Christian Scriptures contain the nomina sacra, which are being introduced also into the Jewish Scriptures, and both OT and NT writings are used together for the divine lection as part of the worship services. In this way – and of further significance for the canon formation – the Christian identity of the Scriptures as Scriptures vis-à-vis the synagogue is emphasized. Now, if the above analysis is correct, and if we make use of an essential component from von Harnack’s canon definition, we need to date a central aspect of the NT canon formation to around AD 100 (rather than ca. AD 200, as suggested by von Harnack), when the Christians’ own writings in this way are put on a par with the Jewish Scriptures (cf. 7.3 below). Justin Martyr in Rome testifies to an already established tradition in this regard, with the Gospel being read publically alongside the Prophets (see 7.7.4 below). The editorial graphic, textual, narrative and theological pattern provided by the nomina sacra, accordingly, suggests that these markers are key elements in the early canonization of the Christian Bible. The nomina sacra appear to have prepared the way for placing OT texts on a par with the new “apostolic” (NT) writings; and it seems rather difficult to envisage a Christian scriptural canon formation without them. As for early Judaism, so also for early Christianity which embraced the nomina sacra practice: it appears to have been the case that a writing without a strong emphasis on the sacred name(s) could not make any strong claim to scripturality; and 46 we seem to have a few very early such claims for the new Christian scriptures (2 Pet 3:16; Rev 1:4; Barn. 4.14, 2 Clem. 2.4; cf. section 9.6). 4) The next to universal presence of nomina sacra in Christian Greek, Latin, Coptic, Armenian and Slavonic Bible manuscripts, from the first to the fifteenth century AD, suggests a reintroduction in modern Bibleeditions of this characteristic textual identity marker (which at present is visible, more or less, only within the sphere of Christian inscriptions and Christian art, primarily on icons). Even today the nomina sacra could have the important ecclesiastical textual, liturgical and theological function of underlining the biblical books as a unified collection of writings that come to expression in the two concepts: “Bible” and “Scripture”. A suggestion for their outer appearance in modern Bibles was presented above (3.1): ... and I know that when I come to you I shall come in the fulness of the blessing of CHRIST. I appeal to you, brethren, by our LORD JESUS CHRIST and by the love of the SPIRIT, to strive together with me in your prayers to GOD on my behalf ... (Rom 15:29-30) This way of marking out the Christian Names, “the sacred figures of the Christian faith” (Heath), would highlight the textual and theological unity of the Scriptures, as was done in the manuscripts up to the sixteenth century (and often later). The reason why modern editors of Christian Bibles have followed the Jewish convention of graphically marking out only the Tetragrammaton – usually rendered “LORD” – in the biblical text (only the OT), seems to be due more to oblivion regarding the original function of the nomina sacra in the Christian biblical writings, than to a deliberate preference to a primarily Jewish rather than a Christian textual marker, representing the Name. In modern literary or scholarly editions of the biblical texts, where a more “neutral” or non-denominational version is aimed at, a possibility to avoid the preference to either Jewish or Christian scribal practices would be not to textually mark off any of the discussed sacred names at all, including also the Tetragrammaton. Nevertheless, from an ecclesial point of view, such a change may weaken the identity of the Bible as canon for the church.