Grace Theological
Journal 2.2 (Fall 1981) 227-37.
[Cited with permission
from Grace Theological Seminary;
digitally prepared for use at
Gordon and
TRANSFORMED INTO
HIS IMAGE:
A CHRISTIAN PAPYRUS
D. BRENT SANDY
Published here for the .first time
is a Christian papyrus of the
fourth
century, The content of the document is of special interest to
biblical
students .for its statement about transformation. The position
of the
text on the page and the signs in the text are significant for
papyrology. This article begins with a brief summary
of the concept
of
transformation in the milieu of early Christianity, and against that
backdrop
presents the papyrus and its contents.
Basic to the entirety of this
article is the persuasiveness of the
excellent
teaching and scholarship of my esteemed pedagogue, Profes-
sor James Boyer. Through many undergraduate
and graduate courses,
he
created in this student an insatiable interest in the likes of Classical
panto<j, "The beginning is half of
everything." To the one therefore
ho
began a good work in me the following is dedicated.
* *
*
In the ancient world the concept of
transformation was very
common.1 Several literary pieces were entitled Metamorphoses, of
which
probably best known is Ovid's epic poem composed from
about A.D.
2 onwards.2 The dominant idea in much of this genre is of
gods
changing themselves into perceptible beings. But from Apuleius'
Metamorphoses,
written in the second century, we learn of the
initiation
rites typical of the mystery religions, where the devotee is
transformed into
a god-like being in a regeneration ritual.3 Tatian,
a
Christian
writing in the second century, mentions both aspects when
1 J. Behm, "metamorfo<w,"
TDNT 4. 756-57.
2 E. J.
Kenney, "Ovid,"
3 Apuleius,
Metamorphoses (= The Golden Ass), II. 23-29; J.
W. Duff, A Literary
History of
Barnes and Noble, 1960) 153.
228 GRACE THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL
he
ridicules the Greek and Roman gods: "There are legends of the
metamorphosis of men: with you the gods also are metamorphosed.
Rhea becomes
a tree; Zeus a dragon. . . a god, forsooth, becomes a
swan, or
takes the form of an eagle. . . . "4 Present also in the Jewish
literature, the
transformation motif occurs especially in apocalyptic
descriptions of an eschatological salvation.5
In the NT, deity and humanity again
undergo a change in form.6
Paul
describes the incarnation as a taking on of the form of a
servant.7 Jesus was transfigured, as recorded in three Gospels,8
mid-
way
through his public ministry. The post-resurrection appearances
of
Jesus evidence another change in form.9 However, that special
experience on
the Mount of Transfiguration viewed by three disciples
goes
almost unnoticed in the rest of Scripture10 and had little
apparent
effect on his followers.11 Paul speaks of a present and future
transformation of the Christian but makes no allusion to the trans-
figuration
of Jesus: th>n
au]th>n ei]ko<na
metamorfou<meqa, "we are
being
transformed into the same image;" metasxhmati<sei to> sw?ma
th?j tapeinw<sewj h[mw?n su<mmorfon
t&? sw<mati th?j do<chj au]tou?,
"He
will transform
the body of our humility into conformity with the
body of
his glory."12
Among the many volumes extant
representing the early Christian
movement,
Jesus' transfiguration and incarnation are treated in
numerous
commentaries and homilies,13 but the Christian's trans-
formation is
rarely mentioned,14 perhaps to avoid association with the
pagan
mystery religions.
4Tatian,
Address to the Greeks 10.1. See similar statements in Aristides, Apology
8.2; 9.6,7.
5 2 Bar.
51:3, 10. In the OT the only change of form recorded is Exod
34:29-35;
perhaps also
the angel of the Lord appearances imply a transformation of deity into ,
human
form. lf
6 Terms: metamorfo<w, metasxhmati<zw, summorfi<zw, su<mmorfoj,
7 Phil 2:7.
8 Matt 17:1-8; Mark
9:2-8; Luke 9:28-36.
9 Luke 24:37, 38; John
20:14-17; cf. Mark 16:12.
10 The only clear remark
is 2 Pet 1:17, 18.
11
Joseph B. Bernardin, "The Transfiguration,"
JBL 52 (1933) 188.
12 2 Cor
13 For complete
discussion see A. M. Ramsey, The Glory of
God and the
Transfiguration
of Christ (London/,New York/Toronto: Longmans and Green, 1949)
130-35.
14 The only examples I have found
are Methodius Olympius, The
Banquet 8.8,
". . . transformation into the image of the Word" and
Pseudo-Dionysius Areopagita,
De Divinis Nominibus 1.3. My search for references to transformation was conducted
in: G.
W. H. Lampe, A Patristic Greek Lexicon (Oxford: Clarendon, 1961-68);
E. J. Goodspeed, Index Patristicus sive Clovis Patrum Apostolicorum Operum ;
(Naperville,
IL: Allenson, 1907); E. J. Goodspeed,
Index Apologeticus sive
Justini Martyris Operum, (Leipzig: Hinrichs,
1912); H. Kraft, Clovis Patrum
Apostolicorum (Munich: Kosel, 1963).
THE PAPYRUS15
P.Rob.
inv. 28 was purchased in 1953 by the late Professor
David M.
Robinson, who bought it from a
of Sameda. Nothing more about the provenance is known.16
The papyrus is the bottom 4.4 cm. of
a leaf of a codex that was
apparently 14.7
cm. in width. Along the top edge of the fragment, on
both
sides, remain the lower portions of letters which were from the
last line
of the body of text. On H,17 below the
traces of letters at the
top of
the fragment (line 1), are five lines written in what was
originally the
margin .at the bottom of the page. The papyrus is light
brown m.
color, V being somewhat lighter than H. The fabric of the
papyrus is
of coarse quality.
The appearance of the writing and
the position on the papyrus is
informal and
almost careless. The amount written and the room on
the leaf
were not carefully coordinated, so that it is gradually more
crowded
together into the available space. The margin to the left is at
least 1.3
cm. and above, 1.3 cm.; but no margin exists to the right or
at the
bottom. As much as 0.7 cm. separate lines 2 and 3, while
between
lines 5 and 6 there IS at most 0.5 cm.
The bottom edge of the papyrus is
fairly straight, probably
representing the original bottom edge of the codex leaf. The side
edges are
both frayed and rounded on the corners. The left edge
(looking at H) is likely where the leaf was folded in the
binding of the
codex. The
top edge is not as straight as the bottom edge, nor is it as
frayed as
the side edges; here the papyrus was probably cut with a
knife by
the finders or dealers through whose hands it passed.
Perhaps we
can hypothesize that when the papyrus was cut it was not
connected to
its codex, but was a single leaf that was divided by at
least two
parties.
PALAEOGRAPHY
Although written, along the fibers,
the line of fibers is not
followed for
the Writing, nor were any rulings made. Brown Ink,
although
sometimes dark and sometimes light, was used for all the
Writing on the papyrus. Several places on H there appear to be some
traces of lampback, unrelated to what is written in brown ink. Little
care was gIven m the use of the pen; It was evidently rather blunt
and
not
carefully made. There are not neat thicks and thins
in the letters;
15 See the plates on pp.
234-35.
16 For permission to
publish P.Rob. inv. 28 I thank Professor William
Willis of
graciously
assisted in this publication of the papyrus.
17 H stands for the side
of the papyrus with the fibers lying horizontally; V is for
the side
with vertical fibers.
230 GRACE THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL
this is
true for what remains of the text above and for what is written
below. Palaeographically, the remains of line I on both sides re-
semble the style of lines 2-6 on H. Thus the
same hand with the same
pen and
ink may have written both.
The characteristics of the hand are best paralleled by P.Mert.
11,93 (a private Christian letter, dated to the fourth century
and
described in
relation to P.Jews 1927 as a fair sized, sloping,
literary
type),
and the Dyskolos papyrus of P. Bodmer,
dated late third or
fourth
century.18 For some letters, their size in relation to others is
quite
irregular (note the long descenders, especially on
upsilon, and
the
large epsilon), adding to the informal look of the writing. The
absence of
ligatures and the presence of diaeresis is standard
in book
hands of
this period.
SYMBOLS
Occurrences of :/.
in literary papyri that I have noted are as
follows:
P.Oxy. 16 first century Thucydides
696 first
century Thucydides
2442 third
century Pindar
2697 third
century Argonautica
2306 second
century Commentary on Alcaeus
P.F/or. third century Commentary
on Aristophanes
In four of
the six examples, it is placed in the margin; in the other
two it
is placed in mid-verse.
A partial explanation of this symbol is given by Diogenes
Laertius (iii, 66). He names and describes the use of various
signs in a
text of
Plato; in regard to :/. he says: o]belo>j periestigme<noj proj
ta>j ei]kaiouj a]qeth<seij,
"the obelos periestigmenos
is for random
rejections (of
passages)."
Nowhere has ↓ been found among literary papyri of Classical
authors.
The use of both signs, however, is frequent in Biblical and
Christian papyri. Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus demonstrate
the
frequent use of both signs, sometimes together and sometimes
separately, but
always where a correction has been made.19 When
used
together, ↓ stands in the margin and
:/. marks the precise place in
the line
for the correction. At the top or bottom of the page, ↓ stands
18 For
bibliographical data on various editions of papyri cited,
see John F. Oates,
Roger S. Bagnall, and William H. Willis, Checklist of Editions of
Greek Papyri and
Ostraca, 2nd ed.,
BASP: Supplements 1 (1978), distributed by Scholars Press.
19 See,
in addition to the codices, H. J. M. Milne and T. C. Skeat,
Scribes and
Correctors of the Codex Sinaiticus (London: British Museum, 1938) 40.
at the
beginning of what is to be inserted, and .1. stands at
the end.
Sometimes a@nw and ka<tw accompany :/.
In
dated to
the second century, ↓ is used identically as ↓ in Codices
Sinaiticus and Vaticanus.
Henry A.
Sanders notes the use of
:/. in some biblical manu-
scripts
dated to the fourth or early fifth century, marking the location
of the
omission and then repeated in the margin giving the words to
be
supplied.20
An exact parallel to P.Rob. inv. 28 is described in P. Tura, where ↓
and :/. stand together
in the margin at the beginning of the part to be
supplied. In
the text, ↓ marks the line and :/.the precise location
within the
line.21
A somewhat later function of :/.is described by Isidore (A.D. 602-
36), bishop
of
punctos jacens, opponitur in his locis, quae sacrae Scripturae
inter-
pretes eadem sensu, sed diversis
sermonibus transtulerent, "The
lemniscus, that is a stick lying between two
points, is placed in those
places
which the interpreters of Holy Scriptures transcribe in the
same
sense, but with different expressions."
The evidence therefore for the function of ↓ and :/.in the
fourth
century
suggests that lines 2-6 of P. Rob. inv. 28 were an omission in
the text
above and were supplied in the bottom margin of the page:2
CONTENT
The text of P. Rob. inv. 28 has not been found in the corpus
of
Patristic literature extant, nor has the rest of the papyrus from
which this
piece was cut been located in the editions of published
papyri.
Without that larger context it remains impossible to deter-
mine the
complete meaning of the text we have. Clearly, however, it
is a
Christian description of some form of transformation.
Transfiguration
Although the usual Christian discussions of a change in form
centered on
the transfiguration of Jesus, the present text does not
readily fit
that sense of transformation. The restoration of what sin
destroyed and
the visitation of the dead seem out of place in the
context of
the transfiguration. Some recent scholarship, however, has
20
Henry A. Sanders, The
MacMillan, 1912) 32.
21
Albert Henrichs, Didymos
der Blinde: Kommentar zu Hiob,
Teil I (
Rudolf Habelt, 1968) 17.
22 E.
G. Turner, Greek Manuscripts of the Ancient World (
University, 1971) 17, 18.
232 GRACE THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL
seen in the
transfiguration story a prediction of the resurrection, in
which case
inclusion of references to the passion week may be
appropriate.23 A. M. Ramsey, discussing Heb 2:9, says ". . . the
writer, who
cherishes greatly the traditions of the earthly life of Jesus
and
dwells especially upon the episode of
have the
event of the transfiguration specifically in mind."24 How-
ever,
this association of the transfiguration with the resurrection of
Jesus is
rare in the early Christian literature.
Incarnation
Perhaps the visitation of the dead should be understood in a
spiritual
sense, that Jesus came among the spiritually dead to raise
them up
to be citizens of heaven.25 Problematic, though, for this
explanation is
the statement that it was a transformation into his own
image,
hardly descriptive of the incarnation; unless this statement
refers to
the transformation of believers into his image, that their
obedience
might restore what sin destroyed.
A good example of an early Christian work which speaks of the
incarnation as a
transformation is Ascension of Isaiah 3:
. . . kai>
o![ti di ] a]u]tou? e]fane[rw<qh h[] e]ce<leusij [tou? a]ga]phtou? e]k
[tou?
e[bd]o<mou ou]ranou?,
kai> h[ metamo<rfwsij au]tou?, kai> h[ kata<basij
au]tou? kai> h[ i]de<a h{n dei? au]to>n metamorfwqh?nai e]n ei]dei a]nqrwpou. . .
. . . and that
through him was revealed the departure of the beloved
from the seventh
heaven, and his transformation, and his descent, and
the appearance
which had to be transformed in the form of man. ...
Descent into
hell
A third explanation for the meaning of P.Rob. inv. 28 is a fre-
quent topic in early Christianity, the descensus ad infernos.27 The
23 J. Schniewind, Das Evangelium Nach Markus (NTD;
and Ruprecht, 1956) 117; H. Baltensweiler,
Die Verkliirung Jesu: Historisches Ereignis
und synoptische Berichte (Zurich: Zwingli, 1959). R. Bultmann, Die Geschichte der
synoptischen Tradition (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1957)
278; but against
this see
G. H. Boobyer, St. Mark and the Transfiguration
Story (
T. & T. Clark, 1942) 21.
24
Ramsey, The Glory of God and the
Transfiguration of Christ, 126-27.
25 For
the use of "dead" in this figurative sense see BAGD, 534.
26 P. Amh.
27 See
J. A. MacCulloch, The
Harrowing of Hell: A Comparative Study of an
Early
Christian Doctrine
(Edinburgh: T. & T, Clark, 1930); Malcolm L. Peel, "The
'Descensus ad Infernos' in 'The Teachings of Silvanus' (CG VII, 4)," Numen
26
(1979)
23-49.
visitation of
the dead and raising them up to heaven and the
restoration of
what sin destroyed favor this interpretation.
Another passage of the Ascension of Isaiah is instructive here:28
. . .kai>
th>n kata<basin kai> e]ce<leusin tou?
a]gaphtou? e]k tou? e[bdo<mou
ou]ranou? ei]j to>n %!dhn, kai> th>n metamo<rfwsin h{n metamorfw<qh
e@mprosqen tw?n
au]tou? . . . .
. . . and the
descent and departure of the beloved from the seventh
heaven into
Hades, and the transformation which was transformed
before his
disciples. . . .
Against this understanding of P.Rob. inv. 28 is the transformation
phrase,
which hardly describes the dead, but could be taken to refer to
his
resurrection.
TRANSCRIPTION
P.Rob. inv. 28 14.7 x 4.4 cm. Fourth
Century
H ]to> [n] no [
↓ :/. e@rgon h#n ei]j i*]di<an au]tou? a]namo<rfwsij
ei]ko<na i*!n
] o{ sune<triyen h[ para<basij a]nanew<-
s^ h[ xa<rij th?j u*[pakoh?j.
dia> tau<thn th>n
ai]ti<an ge<-
gonen
e]n nekroi?j i*!na kai> nekrou>j
e[autw?i
a]nasth<s^ ou]ranou? poli<taj kj.
V ] a de> ge<graf [ ]u[ ]u [
TRANSLATION
The deed was a transformation into his own image in order that
what sin
shattered the grace of obedience might restore. For this
reason the
Lord came among the dead in order that he might raise up
to
himself even the dead as citizens of heaven.
NOTES
H I. Fragments of four letters remain, with
space between the
second and
third for another letter. The reading supplied in the
28 A.
M. Denis, Fragmenta Pseudepigraphorum
Quae Supersunt Graeca (
E. J. Brill.
1970) 105.
234 GRACE THEOLOGICAL
JOURNAL
236 GRACE THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL
transcription is one possibility of many. The letters listed below are
considered
feasible on the basis of the ink that remains of the four
letters.
1
_ 2 _
? _
3 _ 4
i e n a
r o u e
t j q
f w o
y
j
w
If the omega
is selected for letter 2, there would probably not be
room for
another letter following it before letter 3. It is assumed that
the line
continued following letter 4; however, letter I was probably
the
first in the line, considering the left margin of lines 2-6.
2. a]namo<rfwsij:
". . . The scribe apparently wrote ava-
morfwsew[j] initially, which he (or someone)
corrected to ava-
morfwsij; in other words, E was corrected to a
heavy exaggerated i,
and w was corrected to j."29
5. nekroi?j: ". . . The scribe apparently wrote
the third word
nekrooisi, then cancelled the second omicron and
erased the final
iota,
then proceeded to write i*na. . . ."
6. poli<taj:
". . . I believe the scribe wrote poli<taj, but
the top
stroke of
the sigma has flaked away leaving a form that could be
misread as iota,
except for the fact that his iotas never turn
to the
right at
the bottom. . . ."
V 1.
Fragments of ten letters remain, with possible space following
letters 6
and 7 for one other letter. The reading supplied in the
transcription is one possibility of many. The letters listed below are
considered
feasible on the basis of the ink that remains.
1 _ 2 _
3 _ 4 _
5 _ 6
_ ? _
7 _ 8
_ _ _
9 _ _
_ 10
a d
e g a
g r f u u
d j i e
h f y
k r o
i
y r
m t j
k
n g
CONCLUSION
The papyrus here published, though enigmatic because of its
brevity and
its separation from a wider context, is illustrative of the
29 My thanks again to Professor Willis for his reexamination of the
papyrus and
comments on
lines 2, 5, 6.
primary
evidence preserved on papyrus and of the theological litera-
ture of the early Christians. In addition to
the essential discussions of
the
papyrus itself, the signs, and the palaeography,
three possible
explanations for its content were explored. However until the rest of
the
piece of papyrus is located from which P.Rob. inv. 28
was cut or
until the
specific content of the papyrus is found in other extant
Patristic
literature, a decision regarding the significance of the state-
ments of the papyrus will remain premature.
This
material is cited with gracious permission from:
Grace
Theological Seminary
www.grace.edu
Please
report any errors to Ted Hildebrandt at:
thildebrandt@gordon.edu