What Is The Codex Sinaiticus And What Does It Mean?

Conny Waters - AncientPages.com - Codex Sinaiticus  is one of the four great codices containing ancient, handwritten copies of the entire text of the Greek  Bible (Old and New Testament).

It is also one of the two oldest preserved biblical manuscripts (the second is the Vatican Codex kept in Rome).

Detail showing a skeletal parchment feature on Quire 41, folio 4 recto. Image credit: source

Codex Sinaiticus, which  literally means 'the Sinai Book',  was written on parchment and comes from the middle of the fourth century, from the times of the Roman Empire and Constantine the Great.

It comprises just over 400 large parchment leaves measuring 380 mm high by 345 mm wide. On these parchment leaves is written around half of the Old Testament and Apocrypha (the Septuagint), the whole of the New Testament, and two early Christian texts not found in modern Bibles.

Each line of the text has some twelve to fourteen Greek uncial letters, arranged in four columns (48 lines per column) with carefully chosen line breaks and slightly ragged right edges.

Most of the first part of the manuscript, containing a majority of the so-called historical books, from Genesis to 1 Chronicles, is now missing. It is believed it has been lost.

The number of the books in the New Testament in Codex Sinaiticus is the same as that in modern Bibles in the West, but the order of these books is different. The Letter to the Hebrews is placed after Paul's Second Letter to the Thessalonians, and the Acts of the Apostles between the Pastoral and Catholic Epistles.

The two other early Christian texts  include an Epistle written by an unknown author claiming to be the Apostle Barnabas, and 'The Shepherd', was written by the early second-century Roman writer, Hermas.

The history of the Codex Sinaiticus is closely related to the German theologian, paleographer and adventurer Constantin von Tischendorf (1815–1874) who found it in the Egyptian desert of Mount Sinai in the middle of the 19th century.

See also:

Codex Washingtonianus Contains A Passage Not Seen In Any Other Biblical Manuscript

Grolier Codex – Oldest, Unique, Genuine Pre-Columbian Maya Manuscript That Survived Spanish Inquisition

Dresden Codex – Probably The Oldest And Best Preserved Book Of The Maya

Codex Sinaiticus was copied by more than one scribe. Constantine Tischendorf identified four of them, in the nineteenth century. Each of the scribes had an individual way of writing and spelling many sounds, particularly vowels which scribes often wrote phonetically.

".... different scribes wrote the text in four columns on each page. But, more importantly, to include so many texts in one volume confirming the approved selection of Christian scripture, ”required a large number of manuscripts of individual texts or smaller groups of texts from which to copy the text of the
Codex.

It also required the development of a substantial binding structure capable of supporting and containing within one volume over 730 large-format leaves..." pointed out Ekkehard Henschke (Oxford, UK) in "Project Report, Digitising the Hand-Written Bible: The Codex Sinaiticus, its History and Modern Presentation".

By the time the codex was produced, works of literature were increasingly written on sheets that were folded and bound together in a format that we still use to this day.

At present, the Charter of the Sinai Code is kept in four places: St. Catherine’s Monastery near Mount Sinai, the University of Leipzig, the National Library in St. Petersburg and the British Library.

Written by Conny Waters – AncientPages.com Staff Writer

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