Bible Synapse
Codex Sinaiticus
Manuscript · mid-4th century AD · Bible manuscripts · also called Add MS 43725
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- Date
- mid-4th century AD (the copying (an estimate from the handwriting))
- Found
- St Catherine’s Monastery, Sinai, Egypt, 1844. Constantin von Tischendorf took 43 leaves to Leipzig in 1844. In 1859 he took the main part to St Petersburg, where it was presented to Tsar Alexander II. The Soviet government sold it to the British Museum in 1933, and more leaves turned up at the monastery in 1975.
- Now
- British Library (most of it), London (Add MS 43725)
- Passages
- Mark 16:9–20, John 7:53 – John 8:11, 1 John 5:7
What it is
A Greek Bible on parchment, now in pieces across four institutions, containing about half of the Greek Old Testament, the whole New Testament, and two other early Christian writings, the Epistle of Barnabas and part of the Shepherd of Hermas. Several scribes copied it, and a series of early correctors worked over the text.
How it connects to the Bible
It is the earliest complete copy of the New Testament. Mark’s Gospel ends at 16:8, without the longer ending (Mark 16:9–20), and John has no story of the woman taken in adultery (John 7:53–8:11). It also lacks the words about the Father, the Word and the Holy Ghost in 1 John 5:7, which no Greek manuscript is known to contain before the 14th century.
What scholars debate
St Catherine’s Monastery holds that the codex was lent to Tischendorf rather than given; others point to a deed of gift signed by the monks in the 1860s.