Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus - History

History

The manuscript was probably written in Egypt (or Palestine) before the middle of the fifth century. It was written by at least two scribes; according to Tischendorf, there were three scribes (A, B, C). Its text had been corrected by three correctors, designated by C1, C2, and C3 (Tischendorf designated them by C*, C**, and C***). Sometimes they are designated by Ca, Cb, and Cc. The first corrector (C1) worked in scriptorium, while the second corrector (C2) worked in Palestine in the sixth century. The latter's corrections are not numerous except in the Book of Sirach. At that time, the manuscript was probably housed in the Caesarea library, a famous theological library in ancient times.

The third and last corrector (C3) wrote in the ninth century, possibly in Constantinople. He revised readings of the codex to ecclesiastical use, inserting many accents, breathings, and vocal notes. He also added liturgical directions in the margin, and worked extensively on the codex. It was re-written in the twelfth century.

After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, the codex was brought to Florence by an émigré scholar. It belonged to Niccolo Ridolpho († 1550) Cardinal of Florence. After his death it was probably bought by Piero Strozzi, an Italian military leader, for Catherine de' Medici. Catherine brought it to France as part of her dowry, and from the Bourbon royal library it came to rest in the Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris. The manuscript was bound in 1602.

The older writing was first noticed by Pierre Allix, a Protestant pastor. Jean Boivin, a French scholar, made the first extracts of various readings of the codex (under the notation of Paris 9) to Ludolph Küster, who published Mill's New Testament in 1710. In 1834–1835 potassium ferricyanide was used to bring out faded or eradicated ink. The vellum defaced from green and blue to black and brown.

The first collation of the New Testament was made in 1716 by Johann Jakob Wettstein for Richard Bentley, who intended to prepare a new edition of the Novum Testamentum Graece. According to Bentley's correspondence, it took two hours to read one page, and Bentley paid Wettstein £50. This collation was used by Wettstein in his own Greek New Testament of 1751–1752. Wettstein also made the first description of the codex. Wettstein only occasionally examined the text of the Old Testament but he did not published them. Various editors made occasional extracts from the manuscript but Tischendorf was the first who read it completely (Old and New Testament). Tischendorf gained an international reputation when he published the Greek New Testament text in 1843 and the Old Testament in 1845:

Tischendorf, Codex Ephraemi Syri rescriptus, sive Fragmenta Novi Testamenti, Leipzig 1843

Tischendorf, Codex Ephraemi Syri rescriptus, sive Fragmenta Veteris Testamenti, Leipzig 1845.

Because Tischendorf worked by eye alone, his deciphering of the palimpsest's text was less than perfect. The torn condition of many folios, and the ghostly traces of the text overlaid by the later one, made the decipherment an extremely difficult task. Even with modern aids like ultra-violet photography, not all the text is securely legible. Robert W. Lyon published a list of corrections of Tischendorf's edition in 1959. This was also an imperfect work.

According to Edward Miller (1886) codices "B and probably א were procured under the dark gloom of Asian ascendency; A and C in the light of the most intellectual period of the early Church" (B – Vaticanus, א – Sinaiticus, A – Alexandrinus, C – Ephraemi Rescriptus).

According to Frederic Kenyon "the original manuscript contained the whole Greek Bible, but only scattered leaves of it were used by the scribe of St. Ephraem's works, and the rest was probably destroyed".

Swete examined only the text of the Old Testament. According to him the original order of the Old Testament cannot be reconstructed; the scribe who converted the manuscript into a palimpsest used the leaves for his new text without regard to their original arrangement. The original manuscript was not a single volume.

The manuscript is cited in all critical editions of the Greek New Testament (UBS3, UBS4, NA26, NA27). In NA27 it belongs to the witnesses consistently cited of the first order. Even readings of correctors (C1, C2, and C3) are regularly cited in critical editions (as in Sinaiticus, Vaticanus, Bezae, and Claromontanus).