the 1844 Leipzig CFA theft by Tischendorf - Julius, Kallinikos, intact quires, 1859 saved from fire story, Uspensky 1845, additional thefts

Steven Avery · Apr 17, 2023

Find quire lists LUL

New blog Mark Goodacre - palaeography
https://ntweblog.blogspot.com/2011/02/beauty-of-books-ancient-bibles-and.html
My note posted 2024
Steven Avery said...
Thanks for posting this amazing vide!
Considering the “phenomenally good condition” (Helen Shenton, British Library) that we can see for the parchment and ink, pages flexibly turning, and the controversies about its production, and the lack of provenance before 1840 —
We should want to revisit the “scholarly consensus” that this is an ancient manuscript,

Der Jahrhundertfund

Die Entdeckung des »Codex Sinaiticus«, des ältesten vollständigen Exemplars einer Bibel in griechischer Sprache, gehörte zu den großen Wissenschaftssensationen des 19. Jahrhunderts. Sie steht im Zusammenhang jener Orientreisen, die der Leipziger Theologe Constantin Tischendorf zwischen 1844 und...

books.google.com

Maybe Parker
(McGrane? )

=============================

1) his thief’s letter to Julius, explaining that leaves just came into his posession

2) five complete intact quires, easy to steal, that we see corroborated in the 1933 video
Quires begin and end in the middle of the books -
e.g. Jeremiah 10:25 -
Esther colophon, then start of Tobit

3) fact that Tisch fabricated the "saved from fire" story 15 years later, in 1859, (covered well by Kevin McGrane) as a cover story for the 1844 theft. Since the connection of the two ms. would come out in public sometime.

4) no monastery corroboration of his supposed right to take the 43 leaves.

5) the strategic “coincidental” remarkable notes right at the end of the first three quires of the supposedly random 43 leaves
The Esther colophon (also made sure to include the 2 Esdras colophon)
Critical for date arguments

6) the accurate account from Kallinikos about Tischendorf abstracting the 1844 leaves, (for which you think Simonides had a network of spies at the monastery)
‘Abstracted secretly..”
“By permission of the Librarian”

7) Tisch’s tendency to using “Prince Regent” for monastery sneakiness

8) the Uspensky report from 1845 shows an intact manuscript

9) From 1844-1859 Tischendorf kept the source carefully hidden

10) Even after 1859, Tischendorf publicly tried to avoid showing the connection for years.

Stole additional mss in 1844 - Featherstone list
ADD the similar 1853-1859 two-step theft and other thefts

NOT in 1840 Cyrillos catalogue

Warning from Cairo - watch manuscripts

Maybe add the midnight ride of Tischendorf Revere account

Knew of NT - Uspensky - another key lie the trd cloth surprise

That is more than enough to know Tisch was lying in a desperate attempt to cover for the 1844 theft.

Amazingly, we still have dupes.

============

Steven Avery · Apr 22, 2023

TwoNoteableCorruptions said:
Letter to his brother Julius
Cairo, 15th of June, 1844
Pages 83-84

"He must cut his trip short : he wants to go to the Patri-Arch in Constantinople in order to obtain the rest of the folia (beside the 43 he has) which remained at Sinai ; thus he has suspended making a public announcement of his find. That his trip to Sinai was of interest to him in thousands of other ways his brother will certainly understand."

Writing to his brother Julius he writes of additional manuscripts that came into his possession, a euphemism for theft.

The Discovery of the Codex Sinaiticus as reported in the personal letters of Konstantin Tischendorf
Jeffrey Michael Featherstone
https://www.academia.edu/1123038/Th...he_personal_letters_of_Konstantin_Tischendorf
p. 83-84

Results of his researches : He has come into possession of [=ich bin in den Besitzgelangt von] 43 parchment folia of the Greek Old Testament which are some of the very oldest preserved in Europe. He believes they are from the mid-fourth century,and they are remarkable not only for their age but also other reasons. He also possesses 24 palimpsest folia with Arabic writing of the 12th century and Greek of the 8-9th century ; further, 4 similar palimpsest folia ; and finally, amongst other less significant things, 4 mutilated folia of a Greek New Testament of the 7-8th century. He has reported this to the head court preacher v. Ammon and expects to receive more money. He must cut his trip short : he wants to go to the patriarch in Constantinople in order to obtain the rest of the folia (beside the 43 he has) which remained at Sinai [=um noch den von jenen 43 Blättern auf dem Sinai verbliebenen Rest zu erhalten] ; thus he has suspended making a public announcement of his find. That his trip to Sinai was of interest to him in thousands of other ways his brother will certainly understand.

This is one:

Arabic hagiographic palimpsest with Greek Old Testament undertext (MS Add. 1879.5)
Dr. Christopher Wright
https://cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-ADD-01879-00005/1

This fragment consists of a small scrap of parchment from an Arabic hagiographic palimpsest with Greek Old Testament undertext. The upper and lower texts are written in the same orientation, rather than at right-angles as is usually the case in palimpsests.

While the fragment is too small for much information to be discerned from it, the manuscript from which it came has been identified. Other, much more substantial portions of it are now Sinai, Monastery of St Catherine, MS NF ar. perg. 66 Leipzig, Universitätsbibliothek, MS gr. 2 (Rescriptus Tischendorf/Codex Scythopolitanus) and St Petersburg, Rossijskaja Nacional'naja biblioteka, MS gr. 26, comprising 6, 22 and 6 folios respectively. From these it can be established that the original Greek text, found also in the Leipzig and St Petersburg fragments, is that of the Old Testament, and can be dated stylistically to the 7th or 8th century. The leaves of the Sinai fragment were reused in palimpsest from a different original manuscript, written in Christian Palestinian Aramaic.
….
The Leipzig, St Petersburg and Cambridge fragments were all acquired in the mid-19th century by Constantin von Tischendorf, on two different trips to the Middle East. However, while he visited St Sabas on both occasions and acquired manuscripts there, including palimpsests, the presence of another fragment of the manuscript in the Monastery of St Catherine on Mount Sinai, which he also visited during these journeys, indicates that this palimpsest had entered the library of that institution by the time he encountered it. Tischendorf evidently had the various parts of the manuscript in his possession, including this fragment, treated with a chemical reagent to make the Greek text more visible, which have left the ink blurred and discoloured.

Steven Avery · May 4, 2023

1833 - “draw the Imperial Russian Government” into the interests of this”

Kyrillos was corrupt - use Soskice quote from Faked

The letter of Kallinikos charges Tischendorf with theft.
Something funny about sinaiticus
Book1 chap 30

Kallinikos - “by permission of the librarian”

=========

James Snapp (originally):

"according to Simonides, is how its pages turned up there in a basket in 1844"

My correction to James:

“ - the basket story was a total fabrication. We know from Uspensky that the ms was whole. And the basket was not referenced by Simonides (which is what your quote says). It was created by Tischendorf in 1859, 15 years after the first theft. “

==========

“the basket story” refers to the total lie from Tisch that he saved the 43 leaves in a basket from fire.

You flunk Context 101 again.

=========

Here was the conversation from 6 years back.
James changed his text in the blog as he had made a major error (he also changed a typo I pointed out.)
You confuse a statement of James as if it was mine. (Typical)
His blog otherwise is a good read, we agree that the “SAVED from FIRE” is nonsense. You should deal with that, instead of playing games.
James Snapp found some excellent material, but did not even know all the details, such as:

Steven Avery · Jul 31, 2023

Janet Martin Soskice (b.1951)
https://divinity.duke.edu/faculty/janet-martin-soskice
janet.soskice@duke.edu

Janet Soskice - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

And see below

Janet Soskice
https://www.jesus.cam.ac.uk/people/janet-soskice

wrote in 2009,

The Sisters of Sinai (2009)
Janet Soskice
https://books.google.com/books?id=RU_nrKh5QKgC&pg=PA111

but seemed to have the 2011 info from Featherstone

Steven Avery · Jul 31, 2023

Steven Avery · Jul 31, 2023

The Sisters of Sinai
Soskice
https://books.google.com/books?id=RU_nrKh5QKgC&pg=PA111
P. 111

Many elements of von Tischendorf’s account failed to persuade even their first audience. To believe von Tischendorf (whose personal maxim was “God helps those who help themselves”), we have to suppose that the monks at St. Catherines, having preserved intact for more than a thousand years a venerable manuscript, were about to burn it for tinder at just the moment von Tischendorf arrived. But fourth-century vellum smoulders rather than burns, and the monks possessed many hundreds of decrepit printed works on paper, which would have made more satisfactory fuel.7 But even if the monks had decided to burn, or smoulder, an ancient manuscript, why choose one that was well preserved, clear, nearly complete and written, not in an obscure language like Ethiopic, Syriac or Coptic, which none of the monks could read, but in Greek, which all of them understood?

Admittedly Archbishop-Elect Cyril, with whom von Tischendorf was dealing, was notoriously corrupt. He had disposed of* valuable items belonging to the monastery to others before von Tischendorf-— and it may be that there was an understanding between them. But Cyril always insisted that he parted with the manuscript as a loan. In a,summary of the affair written in Cyrils own hand sometime between 1867 and 1869 he repeats this, and notes that after being copied for printing, it was: to be returned to the monastery as its inalienable possession. From that time until the present day the aforesaid manuscript has not been returned to the Holy Monastery. On the other hand, neither did the Community of Sinai ever contemplate nor did it deliberate in common upon any idea of offering or donating it to the Russian Imperial Government. Quite to the contrary, many (monks) were

Steven Avery · Jan 31, 2024

And I think there is new info on an 1844 palimpsest theft.

Pure Bible Forum
palimpsest theft from St. Catherine's in 1844 by Tischendorf - fragments in New Finds
https://www.purebibleforum.com/inde...om-st-catherines-in-1844-by-tischendorf.3047/

Steven Avery · Feb 22, 2024

Short summary to Christopher de Hamel on twitter

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1734671092600451268

Mirrored on Facebook

Steven Avery

Nope, unlikely, the whole thing is probably a myth, caused by accepting the later Tischendorf story, although there were wicker baskets used for holding manuscripts at times. I have a lot of the...

www.facebook.com

Feb 19
CH
"In 1844, Tischendorf had found a group of disbound fragments of the manuscript in the ancient monastery on Mount Sinai"

Nope. This was part of an elaborate cover story created 15 years later. The 43 leaves included 5 intact quires and 3 special colophon leaves contiguous.

The history of the 1844 Tisch theft: Porfiry Uspensky saw the ms. as one unit in 1845, with NT. The letter to his brother Julius that 43 leaves "came into his possession"! No monastery corroboration. The intact quires taken. Additional thefts. Sufficient to connect the dots!

Also the cover story was created 15 years later, 1859, when Tisch needed an explanation for the 1844 theft leaves in Leipzig.
T was going public with the larger stash to St. Petersburg, clearly from the same source.

So Tisch came up with a creative fabrication of history!
==============

Steven Avery · Aug 17, 2024

Outline of short paper - CARM post

=======

Featherstone

Kevin McGrane

Nikolaos Fyssas

James Donaldson

David W. Daniels -
shows five intact quires
Colophons strategic
Cyril corrupt

Kallinikos on 1844 theft

Janice Soskice

Tischendorf - torn abd tattered - saved fire story, etc

Uspensky

Theft info

William George Thorpe

==============

Accept Tisch -
Deuel, Schneller et al
Christopher Hamel

Wallace
White

Snapp -refutes

Steven Avery · Aug 17, 2024

The 1844 Abstraction of 43 ‘Sinaiticus’ Leaves from St. Catherine’s Monastery - Rescue or Theft?

Tischendorf story - Appendix One - Testaments of Time
Footnote with more examples from Tisch

1859 - added saved from fire
became the canonical, vulgate account

Problems in the story noted
(Most only doubted saved from fire)

After 1,000 years, the very day he arrives!
No monastery confirmation.
Tischendorf kept locale hidden.
Even after 1859, public acknowledgement was slow.

David Daniels
Full intact quires, etc

Alternative - simple theft

Reasons for theft

Significance

Steven Avery · Aug 17, 2024

Testaments Of Time: Search For Lost Manuscripts And Records
https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.533642/page/n251/mode/1up
p. 277-280
p. 279-280

None of the tomes and loose leaves Tischendorf had so far examined was of major interest for Biblical research. There was nothing to speak of that might help to trace the New Testament further back to early Christianity. And then, as in any true romance, the unforeseen came to pass. Tischendorf, on a browsing tour of the main library, happened to glance at a basket in the middle of the hall. It was filled with old parchments, and as Tischendorf made haste to examine them, Kyrillos, who by chance was present, remarked that two heaps of similar material in a like state of decay had already been committed to the flames.1 The present lot was marked for the same fate. Tischendorf was not dissuaded from taking a closer look. Before him were beautifully inscribed parchment pages of a four-column, uncial manuscript. It was a copy of the Greek Old Testament—the Septuagint— which, judging by the writing style, seemed to Tischendorf to antedate any he had ever seen: ‘The oldest Greek manuscripts in European libraries had been examined by me, and studied thoroughly, for the purpose of laying the groundwork of a new Greek palaeography. Some, among them part of the Vatican Bible, I had copied with my own hand. No eye could have been more familiar with ancient Greek written characters. Yet I had seen nothing that could be judged as of greater antiquity than these Sinaitic pages.”2

There was no doubt that this manuscript ranked in age, and hence in its importance to scholarship, with those Biblical pearls of Europe—the uncial codices of Rome, Paris, London, and Cam- bridge. He counted 129 large parchment pages. All were from the Old Testament, though from only a part of it. Since Tischendorf was chiefly interested in the Greek New Testament, he may have felt a brief disappointment. But this did not diminish the magnitude of his discovery, which might well lead to more, perhaps even additional fragments of the Septuagint. There was no hint that a New Testament was attached to the codex, though indications pointed to a larger manuscript. And parts of it had already gone up in flames.

In view of the end intended for the basketful, Tischendorf had no difficulty in obtaining permission to keep forty-three sheets. Regrettably, he had not yet learned to assume the detachment of the skilled negotiator. His delight with the sudden find—some of which was now his to keep—was clearly reflected in his face. What a reward for the drudgery of deciphering faded palimpsests for months upon months; for compiling lists of virtually every shred of ancient Biblical manuscripts in European libraries, and following after them in tiresome trips across the continent; for living in cheap hotel rooms instead of getting married and settling down in his own home; for pleading for funds and cajoling wily officials, stuffy archivists, evasive ecclesiastics, and corrupt middlemen! How could a twenty-nine-year-old scholar who had just made what some have called the manuscript discovery of the century hide his emotions?

The monks realized the value of the scraps they had con- signed to fire—some of which they had in ignorant generosity just handed over to a foreigner. Now nothing Tischendorf could say moved the prior to let him have the remaining eighty-six pages, even though, as Tischendorf noted, the old gentleman did not quite know what it was he was guarding. However, Tischendorf was permitted to examine the remaining pages, and he drew up a list of their contents and copied one page with at least three columns of Isaiah and also the first column of Jeremiah. He entreated Kyrillos to take good care of the precious pages withheld from him and to be on the lookout for any similar material that might turn up. Tischendorf also hinted that he might return to the monastery. Various projects already buzzed in his head. How might he gain possession of the pages that at the last minute had eluded him? Could he enlist outside support? What about the Russian Czar, who as patron of the Greek Orthodox Church and benefactor of Christian institutions in the Near East, was held in great reverence by the Sinaitic monks? Out of necessity, the palaeographer was on his way to becoming a crafty politician. About one thing he made up his mind: no one should know the origin of the Septuagint manuscript pages he was taking to Europe. All he would disclose was that they had been found “in or around the Egyptian desert.” This was not a lie, though he was later to be accused of having lied. Indeed it was the truth . . . only, according to the time-honored precept of Talleyrand diplomacy, while he was telling the truth, and nothing but the truth, it was not the whole truth.

Steven Avery · Aug 18, 2024

The Discovery of the Codex Sinaiticus as reported in the personal letters of Konstantin Tischendorf
Jeffrey Michael Featherstone
https://www.academia.edu/1123038/Th...he_personal_letters_of_Konstantin_Tischendorf

p. 83-84
Results of his researches : He has come into possession of [=ich bin in den Besitzgelangt von] 43 parchment folia of the Greek Old Testament which are some of the very oldest preserved in Europe. He believes they are from the mid-fourth century,and they are remarkable not only for their age but also other reasons. He also possesses 24 palimpsest folia with Arabic writing of the 12th century and Greek of the 8-9th century ; further, 4 similar palimpsest folia ; and finally, amongst other less significant things, 4 mutilated folia of a Greek New Testament of the 7-8th century. He has reported this to the head court preacher v. Ammon and expects to receive more money. He must cut his trip short : he wants to go to the patriarch in Constantinople in order to obtain the rest of the folia (beside the 43 he has) which remained at Sinai [=um noch den von jenen 43 Blättern auf dem Sinai verbliebenen Rest zu erhalten] ; thus he has suspended making a public announcement of his find. That his trip to Sinai was of interest to him in thousands of other ways his brother will certainly understand.

Steven Avery · Sep 15, 2024

CARM

Codex Sinaiticus and Constantine Simonides timeline

You seem to very excited about the Tischendorf 1844 thefts from St. Catherine’s! =========== Travels in the East German in 1846, English in 1847 “Upon reaching the Greek monastery of the Sinaïtes at Cairo [i.e. Juvania Metochion], the whole of the brotherhood was in the chapel. […] [Page 30]...

forums.carm.org

You seem to very excited about the Tischendorf 1844 thefts from St. Catherine’s!

===========

Travels in the East
German in 1846, English in 1847

“Upon reaching the Greek monastery of the Sinaïtes at Cairo [i.e. Juvania Metochion], the whole of the brotherhood was in the chapel. […] [Page 30] […] Upon asking at length to see the manuscripts, they told me that they possessed none at all, but that I should find many good ones [i.e. manuscripts] upon [Germ., "auf" = "on"] Mount Sinai [i.e. St. Catherine's Monastery!].”

==============

By the time he wrote this Tischendorf had stolen:

the CFA - five full quires and three strategic leaves (from two sections)

And from the Featherstone correspondence

He also possesses
24 palimpsest folia with Arabic writing of the 12th century and Greek of the 8-9th century ; further,
4 similar palimpsest folia ; and finally, amongst
other less significant things,
4 mutilated folia of a Greek New Testament of the 7-8th century

=============

Hiding the source of all these thefts.

We may be able to get some leads on the “less significant things”.

We can also try to identify each of the above.

the 1844 Leipzig CFA theft by Tischendorf - Julius, Kallinikos, intact quires, 1859 saved from fire story, Uspensky 1845, additional thefts

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Der Jahrhundertfund

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Janet Soskice - Wikipedia

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Codex Sinaiticus and Constantine Simonides timeline