Paul Maier - The Constantine Codex

“Incredible, Shannon!” Jon exclaimed. “Just look at that magnificent writing-it’s biblical uncial-just like the Sinaiticus and Vaticanus. And four columns per page versus three in the Vaticanus.”

Shannon shook her head in awe. “It’s stunning, absolutely stunning . And ancient, all right; look at all those words run together. I still wonder why they didn’t have enough sense to separate words in the early documents.”

“It’s called scriptio continua. And it’s the same with the Greek and Latin you find on most of the monuments in the ancient Mediterranean world. Actually, it was the Hebrews who had the great idea of separating words.”

Jon turned on his mini tape recorder and dictated. “September 4: In what we term the geniza -the decaying manuscript repository of the Eastern Orthodox Patriarchate in Istanbul-we are examining an extraordinary document, a codex with pages of vellum sewn together inside a front cover of thin wooden board layered over with thick dark tan vellum. The back cover is missing. This codex is most probably one of the fifty commissioned by Constantine late in his career and prepared by Eusebius. It is written with a very fine hand on leaves of vellum parchment-probably antelope or donkey skin, I think. Each page is about-” he pulled out a pocket tape measure-“about thirty-eight centimeters wide by… thirty-five high-similar to the Sinaiticus. There are four carefully justified columns per page, with slight variations in the lengths at the end of each line. There are about… twelve to… fourteen Greek letters in beautiful biblical uncials in each line, without serifs or any adornments. The lettering seems very similar to that of the Sinaiticus in the British Library in London-hence early fourth century. This accords very well with statements on the title page.”

They now carried the precious codex over to a table nearby, where they would carefully photograph each page. First, they had to see how many pages there were and which biblical books were included-or excluded. Again Jon pressed the Talk button on his recorder.

“The title page was found almost separated from the rest of the material but still joined at the highest sewn stitching. I suspect that the missing back cover is the reason this codex landed in the geniza. The page of material following the title page begins: “TO

“The Holy Gospel According to Matthew,” Shannon whispered. Jon heard the emotion in her voice, which echoed his own.

Shifting the heavy pages of the large codex from right to left with extreme care-almost as if they were a volatile mix of nitroglycerin threatening to explode-Jon came to the last page, which had only two columns and ended with a postscript: APOCALLYPSIS IOANNOU

“The Apocalypse of John the Theologian,” Shannon again translated. “That’s the book of Revelation! We probably have the whole New Testament here, Jon!”

Jon nodded, eyes momentarily closed, breathing a prayer of thanks to God for having permitted such a discovery as this. Wiping his eyes, Jon had a catch in his voice as he said, “First we should survey the whole document. Only then the photography.”

Now began the painstaking process of paging through the codex. The plan was easy, the accomplishment difficult. Time and less-than-ideal storage conditions over its probable seventeen-hundred-year history had apparently glued some of the pages together, likely due to excess humidity. These they would have to deal with on the morrow, but as they paged through the accessible text, their excitement was only compounded, because Kata Mathaion was followed by Kata Markon, next Kata Loukan, and then Kata Ioannen -Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John-the same order of the Gospels as in all later versions of the New Testament.

Nay, more. In turn followed Acts, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, and the rest of the Pauline corpus, the general epistles of James and Peter-virtually the same order of canonical books that appeared in contemporary Bibles. This was beyond all expectation, since the great Sinaiticus, while it also had all of these books, included the apocryphal Epistle of Barnabas and the Shepherd of Hermas too.

“I counted 151 pages, Jon. And you?”

“The same. Exactly.”

“You say this is vellum. So how many animal hides do you think were necessary to create this codex? A dozen or two?”

Jon thought for a moment, then replied, “No, more like eighty or ninety animals had to die for this codex-and that’s just for our New Testament segment here.”

“Incredible! Don’t tell the SPCA about this!”

“Sad, but true. It’s been estimated that the cost of one of these codices was a laborer’s lifetime earnings. That’s why they used papyrus instead of parchment as much as possible for biblical manuscripts. But even a papyrus scroll was expensive-not because of the material cost-reeds are cheaper than animals-but the huge effort in copying.”

Shannon nodded. “And that’s one reason, I suppose, that each of the Gospels is comparatively short.”

“Exactly. The early church had very limited resources.”

To test their equipment and the lighting, they took a small number of photographs in both digital and film. Then they carefully lifted the tome off the table and replaced it on the basement shelf.

They called it a day-but what a day! On the drive back to the Hilton, they said very little-both caught in the wonderment of their discovery.

When Ferris and al-Ghazali invaded their suite that evening, they brought a huge sheaf of media reports on world reaction to the debate. Predictably, most Western reviews in the print and broadcast media were “categorically certain” that Jon had won the debate, while reports from the Islamic world claimed victory for Abbas al-Rashid. Pleasant, though, were the reactions from neutral and Third World countries, which clearly gave the nod to Jon.

All remaining meals in Istanbul would be catered to their suite, according to the new arrangements, and Morton Dillingham phoned them periodically with further security plans. At ten o’clock that night, however, came a most welcome telephonic interruption. It was Adnan Yilmaz with news that the would-be assassin had been arrested. He turned out to be the brother of the student hothead from Bodrum who had cursed Jon rather vocally inside Hagia Sophia. Both militants had driven to Istanbul in a VW microbus well stocked with hate-America pamphlets, as well as assorted fireworks that included eight pipe bombs, four pistols, five rifles, and enough ammunition to supply this arsenal. Under separate interrogation, the brothers implicated no one else and proudly claimed to be “the only men in Turkey who served Allah properly.”

For some time, the conversation in their suite centered on how the shooter could have known Jon was staying at the Hilton or where they would have dinner that night.

“That’s really no mystery,” Ferris opined. “With all the press hanging around the entrance to the Hilton, it was pretty obvious. I think Hurriyet even wrote that you were staying here.”

“Yes, but that kid was just a little too bright, figuring that we’d also be dining at the hotel restaurant. I wonder if he was tipped off…”

While they pondered that possibility, Jon suddenly slammed his fist on the table. “No, he wasn’t. It just came to me. I noticed that during his tirade, the hothead was standing at the aisle of the ninth or tenth row at Hagia Sophia on the Islamic side. And who was sitting directly opposite him on the Christian side? Kevin Sullivan! When the debate resumed, I had asked Kevin to come to the Hilton for dinner. The shooter, the brother of the loudmouth, must have been sitting next to him and overheard.”