糖心Vlog

For the past six months the Seaver College Religion Division has been studying a significant piece of religious history that could impact the way scholars and theologians translate and understand a part of the Bible.

The document, a small piece of vellum containing a partial copy of Paul鈥檚 Epistle to the Romans in Greek, dates to the third century and is the oldest copy of Romans chapters 4 and 5 known to exist. However, the decisive letter in the crucial word that would favor one or the other of two competing interpretations of Romans 5:1 is missing.

For the past six months, professors Randall Chesnutt and Ron Cox, along with three student researchers, have been called upon by the Green Scholars Initiative, an international project dedicated to collecting, analyzing, and publishing ancient artifacts, to reconstruct this New Testament verse from the available manuscript鈥攃alled the Wyman Fragment, Manuscript 0220, or the 蔚蠂慰渭蔚谓(鈥渆chomen鈥�) document鈥攖hen analyze and publish their findings.

鈥淭he significance is huge by virtue of the fact that this is the earliest known copy of Romans, but hasn鈥檛 been appreciated because it鈥檚 so difficult to read,鈥� comments Cox. 鈥淲e are able to provide a much more substantive argument鈥攏ot just what we can reconstruct, but that our reading is the proper reading.鈥�

Previous attempts have been made by scholars to decipher the text, but without sophisticated imaging and restoration techniques, those efforts have proven inadequate. Through state-of-the-art tools and techniques developed by Bruce Zuckerman, director of the West Semitic Research Project at USC, Chesnutt, Cox, and their team have been able to study a three-dimensional rendering of the fragment鈥檚 previously illegible reverse side.

The group, including undergraduate students Natalie Lewis (鈥�13) and Vincent Quach and master of divinity student Matthew McCay, has relied on the recently developed Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI) to give them high-quality views of previously unseen data, such as ink residue and quill impressions.

Lewis, a Seaver English major, focused on trying to decide whether the manuscript had the subjunctive 鈥渓et us have peace鈥� or the indicative 鈥渨e have peace.鈥� The issue hinges on whether the crucial word had a long-o vowel or a short-o vowel in the defective spot in the manuscript. Using the RTI technology and careful analysis of handwriting, she pulled samples of the scribe鈥檚 handwriting from elsewhere in the manuscript and superimposed different letters to test which characters could fit.

鈥淚 ultimately determined it was one reading over another, 鈥榃e have peace with God, our Lord Jesus Christ,鈥欌�� she explains. 鈥淪ince it鈥檚 the oldest manuscript we have, solidifying this certain word would be the best attestation to this reading we have on file.鈥�

Cox confirms, 鈥淪ince this document was discovered, it was decided that this is how it was meant to be read. There鈥檚 still, however, being able to prove that鈥檚 exactly what the Greek text says.鈥�

Handwriting analysis also helped the group come to an enlightening discovery. McCay worked on capturing every letter written on the document and cataloging their exact size and dimension, shape, darkness, and even the depth of each quill stroke. 鈥淚t鈥檚 like a jigsaw puzzle: what would fit there?鈥� he explains. Because there is no evidence of the manuscript鈥檚 scribe writing a particular letter so small, McCay deduced that another particular letter 鈥渋s the only one that would fit the spot.鈥�

Quach, a biology student, reconstructed the damaged backside of the document and deciphered the reading not previously legible to scholars. 鈥淭he ink that is visible on the front is bleeding through the back, but I was able to separate what text was coming through the vellum to the other side using the RTI. It was extremely gratifying,鈥� he says.

The team, through careful research and observation, has been able to deduce and extract more information from the Wyman Fragment than anyone else has previously.

鈥淥ur students are making these discoveries that are not going on anywhere else in the world,鈥� enthuses Chesnutt. 鈥淪eeing the students involved in cutting-edge research unique to this place ... they realize the contributions they鈥檙e making to the study of these priceless religious texts. With these unprecedented images, it is now possible to decipher most or all of the text on the reverse and publish a reliable edition of this part of the New Testament as it existed in the third century.鈥�

For more than 20 years John Wilson, former dean of Seaver College, Dean Emeritus, and Professor Emeritus of Religion, traveled to the Middle East as a field archaeologist to study the relationship between archaeology and Christianity, specifically looking at the New Testament. One of the things he consistently came across was coins鈥攚hile visiting with the Bedouin tribes in Israel, in off-the-path, hole-in-the-wall shops in Syria, and even some on the side of the road that were minted by ancient Greeks.

鈥淭hey last a long time鈥攕ometimes they deteriorate, but they tend to hang on, so you just get interested in them, because you keep finding them and realize they were used by people who lived in ancient times,鈥� says Wilson, of the over 1,000 coins he has collected over the years. 鈥淥ften, you鈥檙e holding a coin that the last person who held it lived 2,000 years ago or even earlier than that, so there鈥檚 a sort of natural curiosity that comes out of these things.鈥�

While archaeological sites do not travel well, coins do. Consequently, Wilson has often used them to provide 鈥渉ands-on experience鈥� of the ancient world, like one particular coin minted under Pontius Pilate鈥檚 rule, which was used as a teaching tool in his religious studies classes.

鈥淚 would ask students, 鈥榃hat can we learn about Pontius Pilate from this coin?鈥� which was etched with symbols that were offensive to Jews,鈥� he explains. 鈥淚t鈥檚 so typical of how Pilate operated, that he could put anything on the coins that he wanted, but he chose imagery鈥攍ike crooks that pagan priests would hold while performing a sacrifice鈥攖hat he knew would offend the peoples he was ruling over, as if to rub their noses in paganism.鈥�

When approached by Zuckerman to compile a representative sample of his collection to photograph with the RTI technology, Wilson started with Alexander the Great and ended with the Crusaders. 鈥淚 tried to put together a group of coins for students to study that represents the whole history of the Middle East, especially the biblical period.鈥�

What immediately came to Wilson鈥檚 mind when Zuckerman introduced the idea was to connect students with this endeavor. 鈥淚 thought, 鈥楾his is a coin that鈥檚 never been seen or studied in a scientific or scholarly way, so why not let a student have the opportunity to be the first person in the world to take this coin and learn everything they can from it?鈥� Nobody else has done that before.鈥�

Wilson鈥檚 role in the unique endeavor is to provide his extensive background and knowledge of ancient coins to the participating students鈥攗ndergraduate Eric Kim and graduate student Virginia Weldon鈥攚ho will then work with Cox to help guide them through existing literature and help them ask the right questions about the materials. 鈥淭hese ancient coins have the power to better illuminate a world far away from us, but close in interest,鈥� muses Kim. 鈥淎s a religion major, you run into a plethora of information about the social and cultural context of the New Testament and wonder how anyone could gain such information with certainty. This process has shown me firsthand one of the ways by which scholars obtain such information and the work it takes to validate with enough certainty the information from such artifacts.鈥�

鈥淓very single one is a tiny work of art and a tiny piece of history,鈥� says Wilson, 鈥渟o the student can really feel like they鈥檙e doing something that鈥檚 fairly significant, something we thought only students in the hard sciences could do. Now, 糖心Vlog humanities students are doing primary research with primary material.鈥�

John Wilson talks about some of the ancient coins he has collected over the last two decades: