The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1897-08-28
Is 1T REALLY "L0GIA2"

The publication OF the interesting
pamphlet giving ar account of the
recent discovery in Egypt, of the
Papyri, chiefly Greek, among which
is the fragment, single leaf, from
Papyrus book which is alleged to be
Logia, or Sayings of our Lord" draws
renewed attention to the discoveries
of Messrs. Grenfell and Hunt, and
reveals some interesting facts of which
the outline only have before been
given to the public. The pamphlet
contains collotype reproduction of
the ancient document and brief &C
count of the town where the discov-
cries were made:-
ION the edge of the Libyan desert,
120 miles south of Cairo, a series OF low
mouuds, covered with Roman and early
Arab pottery, marks the spot where
stood the capital of the Oxyrhynchite
Rome. The wide area of the site and
the scale of the buildings and city walls
where traceable. testify to its past size
and Importance; but it declined rapidly
after the Arab conquest, and its modern
representative, Behnesa, is mere ham,
let. A flourishing city in Roman times
and one of the chief centres of early
Christianity in Egypt Oxyrhynchus
offered peculiarly attractive field for
explorers who. like ourselves, make the
recovery of Greek papyri, with all the
manifold treasures they may bring their
principal AIM"
It was in rubbish heaps of this an
cient Egyptian city that the discov-
cries we're made, and among them
the fragment now presented to the
public. The pamphlet is onlya speci
men and forerunner of more COM
plete publication which will be made
hereafter The authors of the pam
phlet describe the fragment upon
which so much interest has been cen
tered, in the following words:-
THE document in question is leaf
from papyrus book containing collec-
ton Of Logia or Sayings of our Lord, Of
which some, though presenting several
novel features, are familiar; others are
wholly new. 1t was found at the very
beginning of our work upon the town
in a mound which produced great
number of papyri belonging to the first
three centuries of our era, those in the
immediate vicinity of our fragment be-
longing to the second and third centu.
ries. This fact. together with the evil
dence of the handwriting, which has
Enthusiastically Roman aspect. fixes
with certainty 300 A. D. as the lowest
limit for the date at which the papyrus
was written. The general probabilities
OF the case. the presence Of the usual
contractions found in Biblical MSS,
and the fact that the papyrus was in
book, not roll. form. put the first GEN.
fury out of the question, and make the
first half of the second unlikely. The
date. therefore, probably falls within
the period 10000 A. D."
The title which the editors place at
the head of the document we now
find is not in the papyrus but is a
part of the editorial work. The "Say-
ings of Jesus" is the title which will
more exactly express the fact, and the
minute scholarship of those who are
entitled to express an opinion de-
clares that there is nothing in the
Sayings" which make it certain that
the collector of them was of the opin-
ion that the sayings were oracular or
inspired 1t is not necessarily in
ferred from the fragment that the col
lector regarded Jesus as a divine
source of instruction, and it is posi-
BILE that hoever arranged the sayings
may have regarded Jesus in some
other light than that expressed in
the word, Lord" as used by Christian
believers in all ages of Christianity.
In other words, the "SayiDgs of
Jesus" does not convey the same idea
as the title Sayings of our Lord"
which the English editors have given
to the interesting discovery.
The Sayings" have already been
given in our columns and briefly de-
scribed. Their origin can only be
distantly conjectured, and they GER
tainly contain traces of teachings
which are not part of the divine
revelation through Christ, and pre-
sent indications of an early influence
on Christianity not identical with our
Gospels. The question arises, and is
already made the text of an import
ant article in the Athenaum, Is it
really "Logia" that Messrs. Grenfell
and Hunt have discovered7 cal
ready" says this writer, "critics have
objected that there are traces of
Gnosticism in the new document,
traces scarcely compatible with the
view of the two discoveries that here
we have fragment of some collection
of Christ's sayings earlier than, or at