| New Testament manuscript | |
 Folio 41v from the Codex Alexandrinus contains the end of theGospel of Luke with the decorative tailpiece found at the end of each book | |
| Name | Alexandrinus |
|---|---|
| Sign | A |
| Text | Greek Old Testament and GreekNew Testament† |
| Date | c. 400-440 |
| Script | Greek |
| Now at | British Library |
| Size | 32 × 26 cm (12.6 × 10.4 in) |
| Type | Byzantine text-type in Gospels,alexandrian in rest of NT |
| Category | III (in Gospels), I (in rest of NT) |
| Hand | elegantly written but with errors |
| Note | close to𝔓74 in Acts, and to𝔓47 in Rev |
TheCodex Alexandrinus (London,British Library, Royal MS 1. D. V-VIII) is amanuscript of the Greek Bible,[n 1] written onparchment. It is designated by the siglumA or02 in theGregory-Aland numbering of New Testament manuscripts, and δ 4 in thevon Soden numbering of New Testament manuscripts.[1] It contains the majority of theGreek Old Testament and the Greek New Testament.[1] It is one of the fourGreat uncial codices (these being manuscripts which originally contained the whole of both the Old and New Testaments). Along withCodex Sinaiticus andVaticanus, it is one of the earliest and most complete manuscripts of theBible.[1] Using the study of comparative writing styles (palaeography), it has been dated to the fifth century.[1]
It derives its name from the city ofAlexandria (inEgypt), where it resided for a number of years before it was brought by theEastern OrthodoxPatriarch Cyril Lucaris from Alexandria toConstantinople (modern dayIstanbul inTurkey).[2]: 152 It was then given toCharles I of England in the 17th century. BishopBrian Walton assigned Alexandrinus the capital Latin letter A in thePolyglot Bible (a multi-language version of the Bible with the different languages placed in parallel columns) of 1657.[3] This designation was maintained when the New Testament manuscript list system was standardized bySwisstheologian andtextual criticJohann J. Wettstein in 1751.[4] Thus Alexandrinus held the first position in the manuscript list.[5]: 340
Until the later purchase ofCodex Sinaiticus, biblical scholar and textual criticFrederick H. A. Scrivener described it as the best manuscript of the Greek Bible deposited in Britain.[6]: 51 Today, it rests along with Codex Sinaiticus in one of the showcases in the SirJohn Ritblat Gallery of theBritish Library inLondon,U.K.[7][8] A full photographic reproduction of the New Testament volume (Royal MS 1 D. viii) is available on the British Library's website.[9]
The manuscript is acodex (precursor to the modern book) made from 773vellum folios (specific name for pages in a codex) measuring 12.6 × 10.4 inches (32 × 26 cm),[10] bound inquarto format (parchment leaves placed on top of each other, folded in half vertically, and then folded in half again horizontally, to make a single block, then stitched together with others to create a book), which now comprise four volumes.[10][6]: 52 Most of the folios were originally gathered intoquires of eight leaves each (this being eight parchment leaves placed on top of each other, then folded as perquarto above). Scholar B. H. Cowper describes the vellum as "thin, fine, and very beautiful".[11] In modern times it was rebound into sets of six leaves each.[11] Cowper's further description of the pages note they are "often discoloured at the edges", which have been damaged by age and more so through "the ignorance or carelessness of the modern binder, who has not always spared the text, especially at the upper inner margin".[11] Scrivener noted that "[t]he vellum has fallen into holes in many places, and since the ink peels off for every age whensoever a leaf is touched a little roughly, no one is allowed to handle the manuscript except for good reasons."[6]: 52 Three volumes contain theSeptuagint (the Greek version of the Old Testament, also known as the LXX), of which the total count of folios for each volume is 279, 238, and 118 with ten leaves lost.[10][6]: 52 The fourth volume contains the New Testament in the remaining 144 folios, with 31 leaves lost.[10][6]: 51–52 In the fourth volume,1 and2 Clement are also missing leaves, perhaps 3.[12]
The text in the codex is written in two columns inuncial script, with between 49 and 51 lines per column, and 20 to 25 letters per line.[10][6]: 52 [1]: 30 [13] The beginning lines of each book are written in red ink,[6]: 53 and sections within the book are marked by a larger letter set into the margin.[6]: 52 The text is written continuously, with no division of words (known asScriptio continua), but some pauses are observed in places in which a dot should be between two words.[6]: 52 [2]: 153 There are noaccents orbreathing marks, except a few added by a later hand.[6]: 52 The punctuation was written by the first hand.[10] The poetical books of the Old Testament are writtenstichometrically (this being a new verse/phrase starting on a new line).[10] The Old Testament quotations in the text of New Testament are marked in the margin by the sign 〉(known as adiplai).[5]: 340
The only decorations in the codex are tail-pieces at the end of each book (see illustration), and it also shows a tendency to increase the size of the first letter of each sentence. The larger letters at the beginning of the sections stand out in the margin as in codicesEphraemi andBasilensis.[14]: 132 Codex Alexandrinus is the oldest manuscript to use larger letters to indicate new sections.[6]: 52 [15]: 59
Iotacistic errors occur in the text: αὶ is exchanged for ε, εὶ for ὶ and η for ὶ. This is, however, no more than seen in other manuscripts of the same date.[14]: 104 The lettersΝ andΜ are occasionally confused, and the clusterΓΓ (gg) is substituted withΝΓ (ng). This may be an argument which points to Egypt as where the codex was produced,[2]: 155 but it is not universally accepted.[16]
The handwriting from the beginning of Luke to 1 Corinthians 10:8 differs from that in the rest of the manuscript. Some letters haveCoptic shapes (f.e.Α (alpha),Μ (mu),Δ (delta), andΠ (pi)). The letters are more widely spaced and are a little larger than elsewhere. Δ has extended base and Π has extended cross-stroke.[17]: 5 Numerals are not expressed by letters except inRevelation 7:4; 21:17.[14]: 104 In the past the codex had been judged to have been carelessly written, with many errors of transcription, but not so many as inCodex Sinaiticus, and no more thanCodex Vaticanus.[14]: 104
Themajuscule letters have elegant shape, but a little less simple than those inCodex Sinaiticus andCodex Vaticanus.[6]: 52 At the end of a line, these letters are often very small, and much of the writing is very pale and faint.[11][18] Punctuation is more frequent, usually on a level with the top of the preceding letter, while a vacant space, proportionate to the break in the sense, follows the end of a paragraph.[6]: 52 At the end of each book thecolophon is ornamented by prettyvolutes from the initial copyist.[6]: 52 TheAmmonian Sections with references to theEusebian Canons (an early system of dividing the four Gospels into different sections, developed by early church writerEusebius of Caesarea) stand in the margin of the Gospels.[10][6]: 53 [11] It contains divisions into larger sections (known asκεφάλαια (kephalaia), orchapters), the headings of these sections (known asτίτλοι /titloi) stand at the top of the pages.[6]: 53-54 The places at which sections start are indicated throughout the Gospels, and in Luke and John their numbers are placed in the margin of each column. To all the Gospels (exceptMatthew, due to several pages missing at the beginning) is prefixed by a table of contents (also known asκεφάλαια).[19]
The variousEuthalian Apparatus sections into which the Acts, Epistles, and Apocalypse were divided (similar toEusebius' system for the Gospels) are not indicated in this manuscript. Across appears occasionally as a separation in theBook of Acts. A larger letter in the margin throughout the New Testament marks the beginning of a paragraph.[2]: 154
The number of scribes who worked on the codex has been disputed. According to biblical and classical scholarFrederic Kenyon there were five scribes, two scribes in the Old Testament (I and II) and three in the New (III, IV, and V).[10][20] Subsequently, textual criticsTheodore Skeat and Milne argued there were only two or possibly three scribes,[21][10][n 2] a view widely accepted by 20th-21st century scholars(such as biblical scholar and textual criticBruce Metzger, biblical scholar and textual criticKurt Aland, textual critic Juan Hernández Jr., and textual critic Dirk Jongkind).[18]: 101 [22]: 119–120
Many corrections have been made to the manuscript, some of them by the original scribe, but the majority of them by later hands.[10][6]: 55 The corrected form of the text agrees with that seen inCodex Bezae (D),Codex Petropolitanus Purpureus (N),Codex Monacensis (X),Codex Macedoniensis (Y),Codex Tischendorfianus IV (Γ),Codex Koridethi (Θ),Codex Petropolitanus (Π),Codex Rossanensis (Σ),Codex Beratinus (Φ) and the majority of minuscule manuscripts.[10] Kenyon observed that Codex Alexandrinus had been "extensively corrected, though much more in some books than in others". In the Pentateuch, whole sentences were erased and a new text substituted. Kings was the least corrected of the books.[20]: 10 In the Book of Revelation only 1 of its 84 singular readings was corrected, the rest remained uncorrected. This is in stark contrast withCodex Sinaiticus, in which 120 of the Apocalypse's 201 singular readings were corrected in the 7th century.[18]: 102–103
Each leaf has Arabic numeration, set in the verso of the lower margin. The first surviving leaf of Matthew has number 26. The 25 leaves now lost must have been extant when that note was written.[14]: 102
The codex contains a nearly complete copy of theLXX, including thedeuterocanonical books (those books not accepted as authoritative by someChristians, but accepted by certainChristian denominations)3 and4 Maccabees,Psalm 151 and the14 Odes. TheEpistle to Marcellinus (attributed toSaint Athanasius) and theEusebian summary of the Psalms are inserted before the Book of Psalms (an overview of the Psalms written by the early Christian writerEusebius of Caesarea). It also contains all of the books of the common modern 27-bookNew Testament, however the pages containing Matthew 1:1–25:5 are not extant. The codex also contains1 Clement (lacking 57:7–63; this is a letter attributed to the early Christian writerClement of Rome) and the homily known as2 Clement (up to 12:5a; another letter attributed to Clement of Rome). The books of the Old Testament are thus distributed:Genesis – 2 Chronicles (first volume),Hosea – 4 Maccabees (second volume), Psalms – Sirach (third volume).[23] The New Testament (fourth volume) books are in the order:Gospels,Acts of the Apostles,General epistles,Pauline epistles (Hebrews placed between2 Thessalonians and1 Timothy),Book of Revelation.
There is an appendix marked in the index, which lists thePsalms of Solomon and probably contained moreapocryphal/pseudepigraphical books (books written which have been attributed to certain famous people mentioned in the Bible, but likely of unknown authorship), but it has been torn off and the pages containing these books have also been lost.
Due to damage and lost folios, various passages are missing or have defects:
Textual critics have had a challenging task in classifying the text of the codex, specifically when it comes to the New Testament; the exact relationship to othertext-types and manuscript families is still disputed, and as such the Greek text of the codex is considered to be of mixed text-types.[1] The text-types are groups of different New Testament manuscripts which share specific or generally related readings, which then differ from each other group, and thus the conflicting readings can separate the groups. These are then used to determine the original text as published; there are three main groups with names:Alexandrian,Western, andByzantine.[7]: 205–230 The codex is a representative of theByzantine text-type in the Gospels (the text-type's oldest example),[7] and the rest of the New Testament books are of theAlexandrian text-type, with someWestern readings. As the text in the codex is believed to have come from several different traditions, different parts of the codex are not of equal textual value.[7]Aland placed it inCategory III in the Gospels, and inCategory I in rest of the books of the New Testament according to his manuscript text classification system.[1] Category III manuscripts are described as having "a small but not a negligible proportion of early readings, with a considerable encroachment of [Byzantine] readings, and significant readings from other sources as yet unidentified";[1]: 335 Category I manuscripts are depicted as featuring "a very high proportion of the early text, presumably the original text, which has not been preserved in its purity in any one manuscript."[1]: 335
The Byzantine text of the Gospels has a number ofAlexandrian features, with some affinities to the textualFamily Π. Biblical scholar and textual criticHermann von Soden associated the text of the gospels withFamily Π, though it is not a pure member of this family.[25] According to biblical scholar and textual criticBurnett Streeter, it is the earliest Greek manuscript which gives us approximately the text ofLucian the Martyr (who is believed to have created a critical recension of both the Old and New Testaments), but a small proportion of the readings seem to be earlier.[26]
Alexandrinus follows the Alexandrian readings through the rest of the New Testament; however, the text goes from closely resemblingCodex Sinaiticus in thePauline epistles to more closely resembling the text of a number ofpapyri (𝔓74 forActs,𝔓47 forthe Apocalypse). The text ofActs frequently agrees with the biblical quotations made by the 4th century Christian writerAthanasius of Alexandria.[27] In the Pauline Epistles its text is closer toCodex Sinaiticus than toCodex Vaticanus. In the General Epistles it represents a different subtype thanCodex Sinaiticus andCodex Vaticanus.[16] InRevelation it agrees withCodex Ephraemi and𝔓115 againstCodex Sinaiticus and𝔓47.[1] According to Metzger, inRevelation and in several books of the Old Testament it has the best text of all manuscripts.[10] In the Old Testament its text often agrees withCodex Sinaiticus.
(430 years) –A
Ezra 10:22 (9:22 LXX)
| Example of differences between Family Π and Codex Alexandrinus in Mark 10:50–51 | ||
| Family Π | Codex Alexandrinus | Differences |
|---|---|---|
| ο δε αποβαλων το ιματιον αυτου αναστας ηλθε προς τονιν· και αποκριθεις οις λεγει αυτω τι σοι θελεις ποιησω; ο δε τυφλος ειπεν αυτω· ραββουνι ινα αναβλεψω· | ο δε αποβαλων το ιματιον αυτου αναστας ηλθενπρος τονιν· και αποκριθεις λεγει αυτωοιςτι θελεις ποιησωσοι· ο δε τυφλος ειπεν αυτω· ραββουνι ινα αναβλεψω· | – Ν εφελκυστικον order of words – |
| Having discarded his cloak, standing up he came towards Jesus. And in response, Jesus said to him, "What for you do you want me to do? The blind man said to him, "Rabbi: that I would be able to see." | Having discarded his cloak, standing up hecame towards Jesus. And in response, said to himJesus, "What do you want me to dofor you? The blind man said to him, "Rabbi: that I would be able to see." | |
1 Timothy 3:16
Luke 22:43–44 (Christ's agony at Gethsemane)
Alexandrinus is an important witness for the absence ofPericope Adultera (John 7:53–8:11).Gregory asserted in regard to the lost two leaves (John 6:50–8:52), "For by counting the lines we can prove that it was not in the book. There was not room for it".[13]: 30 [5]: 343 A similar counting involving missing leaves is done withCodex Ephraemi.[31]: 187
The codex's original provenance is unknown.Cyril Lucaris was the first to suggestAlexandria as its place of origin, which has been the traditional view and is the most probable hypothesis.[18]: 100 This popular view is based on an Arabic note on folio 1 (from the 13th or 14th century), which reads: "Bound to the Patriarchal Cell in the Fortress of Alexandria. Whoever removes it thence shall be excommunicated and cut off. Written by Athanasius the humble."[34]: 6 "Athanasius the humble" is identified withAthanasius III, Patriarch of Alexandria from 1276 to 1316.[22]: 119
Burnett Hillman Streeter proposed Caesarea orBeirut for three reasons: 1) after the New Testament it contains the two Epistles of Clement; 2) it represents an eclectic text in the New Testament (Antiochian in the Gospels and Alexandrian in the Acts and Epistles), suggesting some place where the influence of Antioch and of Alexandria met; 3) the text of the Old Testament appears to be a non-Alexandrian text heavily revised by theHexapla, as the Old Testament quotations in the New Testament portion more often agree with Alexandrinus against Vaticanus than not.[35]
Theodore C. Skeat disputed the notion that the Codex Alexandrinus "had been in Alexandria from time immemorial".[36]: 235 Instead, he thought that the codex was brought to Alexandria from Constantinople between 1308 and 1316.[36]: 235 Cyril Lucaris then brought it back to Constantinople in 1621, and it was given to Charles I in 1627.[36]: 235
McKendrick proposed an Ephesian provenance for the codex.[34]: 10–11
A 17th-centuryLatin note on a flyleaf (from the binding in a royal library) states the codex was given to a patriarchate of Alexandria in 1098 (donum dedit cubicuo Patriarchali anno 814 Martyrum), although this may well be "merely an inaccurate attempt at deciphering the Arabic note by Athanasius" (possibly the patriarch Athanasius III).[37] The authority for this statement is unknown.[20]
According to an Arabic note on the reverse of the first volume of the manuscript, the manuscript was written by the hand of Thecla, the martyr, a notable lady of Egypt, a little later than theCouncil of Nicaea (A.D. 325).[5]: 341 [34]: 5–6 Tregelles made another suggestion, the New Testament volume has long been mutilated, and begins now in the twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew, in which chapter the lesson for Thecla's Day stands. "We cannot be sure how the story arose. It may be that the manuscript was written in a monastery dedicated to Thecla."[5]: 341 Tregelles thought that Thecla's name might have on this account been written in the margin above, which has been cut off, and that therefore the Egyptians imagined that Thecla had written it.[2]: 152–153 Cyril Lucaris believed in Thecla's authorship, but the codex cannot be older than from late 4th century.[20][34]: 5
Codex Alexandrinus contains the Epistle of Athanasius on the Psalms to Marcellinus, so it cannot be considered earlier than A.D. 373 (terminus post quem). In the Acts and Epistles we cannot find such chapter divisions, whose authorship is ascribed toEuthalius, Bishop of Sulci, come into vogue before the middle of the fifth century.[6]: 102 It isterminus ad quem. The presence ofEpistle of Clement, which was once read in Churches recalls to a period when the canon of Scripture was in some particulars not quite settled. It is certain that the writing of the manuscript appears to be somewhat more advanced than that of the Vaticanus or Sinaiticus, especially in the enlargement of initial letters. It is also more decorated, though its ornamentations are already found in earlier manuscripts.[20]
Codex Alexandrinus was written a generation after codices Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, but it may still belong to the fourth century. It cannot be later than the beginning of the fifth.[6]: 54 It is currently dated by theINTF to the 5th century.[1]
The codex was brought toConstantinople in 1621 byCyril Lucaris (a patriarch of Alexandria first, then later a patriarch of Constantinople). Lucaris was involved in a complex struggle with the Turkish government, the Catholic Church, and his own subordinates. He was supported by the English government, and presented the codex toJames I in 1624, as gratitude for his help.[16] The codex was presented through the hands ofThomas Roe (together withminuscule 49), the English ambassador at the court of the Sultan.King James I died before the codex was sent to England, and the offer was transferred toCharles I in 1627.[34]: 1 [6]: 50 It was saved from the fire at Ashburnham House (theCotton library) on 23 October 1731, by the librarian,Richard Bentley. It became a part of theRoyal Library at theBritish Museum, and since 1973 has been in theBritish Library.[34]: 2
The text of the Epistles of Clement from the codex was published in 1633 byPatrick Young, the Royal Librarian. A collation was made byAlexander Huish, Prebendary of Wells, for theLondon Polyglot Bible (1657). The text of the codex was cited in footnotes.[10]Richard Bentley made a collation in 1675.
The Old Testament was edited by Ernst Grabe in 1707–1720,[38]: 73 and the New Testament byCarl Gottfried Woide in 1786, in facsimile from wooden type, line for line, without spaces between the words, exactly mimicking the original.[39] For the text in 1 Tim 3:16, the facsimile hasΘΣἐφανερόθη, andWoide in hisprolegomenon combats the opinion ofWettstein,[4]: CDXCVIb–CIXCIXb who maintained thatοςἐφανερόθη was the original reading, and that the stroke, which in some lights can be seen across part of the Ο, arose from the middle-stroke part of a letter Ε being visible through the vellum.[2]: 156 Wettstein's assertion was also disputed by F.H. Scrivener, who found that "Ε cut the Ο indeed . . . but cut it too high to have been reasonably mistaken by a careful observer for the diameter of Θ."[14]: 453–454 Tregelles however agrees with Wettstein's reading of the codex, and states "as the result of repeated examinations, we can say distinctly that Woide was wrong, and Wetstein was right."[2]: 156
Woide's edition contained some typesetting errors, such as in theEpistle to Ephesians –ἐκλήθηθε for ἐκλήθητε (4:1) and πραόθητος for πραότητος (4:2).[2]: 156 These errors were corrected in 1860 by B. H. Cowper, and E. H. Hansell, with three other manuscripts, in 1860.[13]: 30 [40] The Old Testament portion was also published in three folio volumes by Baber in 1816–1828.[15]: 58 In 1879 and 1880, the entire codex was issued in photographic facsimile by the British Museum, under the supervision ofE. M. Thompson.[7][17] Frederic G. Kenyon edited a photographic facsimile of the New Testament with reduced size in 1909. The text of the Old Testament followed four parts in 1915.[20]
According to Bentley the codex is "the oldest and best in the world". Bentley assumed that by supplementing this manuscript with readings from other manuscripts and from theLatin Vulgate, he could triangulate back to the single recension which he presumed existed at the time of theFirst Council of Nicaea.[41][42] Wettstein highly esteemed the codex in 1730, but changed his opinion in 1751 and was no longer a great admirer of it. He came to the conviction thatAthos was the place of its origin, not Alexandria.[4]: 10 Michaelis also did not esteem it highly, either on account of its internal excellence or the value of its readings. The principal charge which has been produced against the manuscript, and which had been urged by Wettstein, was it had been altered from the Latin version.[39] Michaelis countered that the transcriber who lived in Egypt would not have altered the Greek text from a Latin version, because Egypt belonged to the Greek diocese, and Latin was not understood there. Woide, who defended the Greek manuscripts in general, and the Codex Alexandrinus in particular, from the charge of having been corrupted from the Latin,[39] discerned two hands in the New Testament.[43]
Griesbach agreed with Woide and expanded on Michaelis' point of view. If this manuscript has been corrupted from a version, it is more reasonable to suspect the Coptic, the version of the country in which it was written. Between this manuscript and both the Coptic and Syriac versions there is a remarkable coincidence.[39] According to Griesbach the manuscript follows three different editions: the Byzantine in the Gospels, the Western in the Acts and General epistles, and the Alexandrian in the Pauline epistles. Griesbach designated the codex by letterA.[39]
Tregelles explained the origin of the Arabic inscription, on which Cyril's statement appears to rest, by remarking that the text of the New Testament in the manuscript begins with Matthew 25:6, this lesson (Matthew 25:1–13) being that appointed by the Greek Church for the festival of St. Thecla.[6]: 102 [5]
It was the first manuscript of great importance and antiquity of which any extensive use was made by textual critics,[20] but the value of the codex was differently appreciated by different writers in the past.Wettstein created a modern system of catalogization of the New Testament manuscripts. Codex Alexandrinus received symbolA and opened the list of the NT uncial manuscripts. Wettstein announced in hisProlegomena ad Novi Testamenti Graeci (1730) that Codex A is the oldest and the best manuscript of the New Testament, and should be the basis in every reconstruction of the New Testament text.[44] Codex Alexandrinus became a basis for criticizing theTextus Receptus (Wettstein, Woide, Griesbach).
Vellum codex of the Bible
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