there must be another explanation for the colour and staining anomalies of the 1844 and 1859 Sinaiticus sections

Steven Avery

Administrator
Here is a summary of the basic effort to say "there must be another explanation" for the 1844 colour and stain anomaly.

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Continuing from:
PBF
https://www.purebibleforum.com/index.php/threads/a.525/post-1044

Elijah Hixson
Thanks for the reply, but it is not 'quite obvious' that the differences of the colour standards would have no effect on the perceived colours of the parchments.
David Daniels places a big deal of emphasis on trusting "the scientists with the color bars", but if those colour bars are demonstrably different, then "trusting the scientists with the color bars" is a house built on sand. You can say that it's not, that it's different, however you want to put it, but at the end of the day, you're relying on two sets of images that demonstrably look different in one area where they shouldn't (the colour standards) if they were taken/processed identically, and you're saying "see, they were taken/processed identically but they're different!" Well, no. They were not taken/processed identically, even if the website says they were. If they were, then the colour standards would match. When anybody points that out, you just say "well that doesn't matter because it doesn't apply" and shift to "but people said they were white."

As to the purple dye, you say "well that doesn't matter because it's not a lot of pages." Or "it's not different enough". Well, I wasn't comparing a block of text to a block of text. I was showing how storage conditions can change the way a manuscript looks. You don't need several pages to do that, you just need one page that was stored in a different way/place/etc. than the others (more on that here:
http://libraryblogs.is.ed.ac.uk/new.../03/09/window-to-a-sixth-century-scriptorium/


Window to a Sixth-Century Scriptorium

LIBRARYBLOGS.IS.ED.AC.UK

Then one more from Elijah.

Elijah Hixson
In summary, my argument is twofold:

1. Pages of the same manuscript can be the same but look different if the photos were taken and/or processed differently.

2. Pages of the same manuscript can legitimately be different in cases where part of the manuscript has a different storage/preservation history than another part.

We can demonstrate that #1 has happened in the case of Sinaiticus.

Therefore:
•It *could* be the case that the Leipzig leaves actually are a different colour then the BL leaves in real life. That is absolutely possible due to the fact that they have been kept in different institutions for a century and a half.

•It could also be the case that the leaves in Leipzig are identical in colour to the leaves at the BL. That is absolutely possible due to the differences in the colour standards in the photos.

•It could also be the case that both things are at work—that the BL leaves are very slightly darker than the Leipzig leaves, and the perceived difference is colour is exacerbated by the differences in the way the photos were taken/processed.
 
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Steven Avery

Administrator
there must be another explanation for the colour and staining anomalies of the 1844 and 1859 Sinaiticus sections

Let's discuss the summary first.

Elijah Hixson
In summary, my argument is twofold:

1. Pages of the same manuscript can be the same but look different if the photos were taken and/or processed differently.

2. Pages of the same manuscript can legitimately be different in cases where part of the manuscript has a different storage/preservation history than another part.

We can demonstrate that #1 has happened in the case of Sinaiticus.

Therefore:
•It *could* be the case that the Leipzig leaves actually are a different colour then the BL leaves in real life. That is absolutely possible due to the fact that they have been kept in different institutions for a century and a half.

•It could also be the case that the leaves in Leipzig are identical in colour to the leaves at the BL. That is absolutely possible due to the differences in the colour standards in the photos.

•It could also be the case that both things are at work—that the BL leaves are very slightly darker than the Leipzig leaves due to differences in their storage conditions since the mid 1800s, and that the perceived difference is colour is exacerbated by the differences in the way the photos were taken/processed.

> Elijah Hixson
> "1. Pages of the same manuscript can be the same but look different if the photos were taken and/or processed differen
tly."

Definitely true, but the processing was quite skilled, and even the British Library acknowledges the whiteness of the Leipzig pages. In addition, those 1844 Leipzig pages lack the staining and smearing that is common on the 1859 leaves.

If our scholars spent a little time actually going through the leaves on the CSP spot, this would be more easily understood. We have a thread that identifies all the CFA 1844 pages.

navigating the Codex Sinaiticus Project (CSP) pictures and data - where is the CFA

Also they should read about the specific accusations of staining to give he appearance of age.
This is part of the historical imperative.


Kallinikos exposes Tischendorf shenanigans - the historical imperative and impossible knowledge
https://www.purebibleforum.com/index.php/threads/a.107

Plus the whiteness of the 1844 matches various historical narratives, such as the comments of Uspensky from his 1845 visit, the comment of Dobschutz, and especially the historical narrative that says that deliberate colouring occurred in the 1850s.

Plus, we know the leaves were the same "white parchment" in 1844, when Tischendorf stole the five quires plus a bit more.

Beyond the colour and staining differences,both sections are in "phenomenally good condition", (Helen Shenton, BL) which makes no sense for the historical narrative that claims ongoing use, travel and handling century after century.


> Elijah Hixson
> 2. Pages of the same manuscript can legitimately be different in cases where part of the manuscript has a different storage/preservation history than another part.


Here you would have to posit a scenario where either:

1) the 1844 sections in Germany were made white and stains were removed
2) the 1859 section in Russia was made yellow and stained.

No such scenario has even been theorized.

The difference here is too great. The only explanation that makes sense is
3) that the 1844 and the 1859 represent the manuscript sections just as they were deposited.


> Elijah
> We can demonstrate that #1 has happened in the case of Sinaiticus.

No, you can only demonstrate very minor differences in measurement that have minimal relevance to the massive differences, colour and staining, between 1844 and 1859.

>Elijah
Therefore:
•It *could* be the case that the Leipzig leaves actually are a different colour then the BL leaves in real life. That is absolutely possible due to the fact that they have been kept in different institutions for a century and a half.

The differences match the historical narrative that the manuscript was coloured and they were different at the time they were deposited in Russian and Germany. There has been no sensible explanation given for why the 1844 would have turned white, and lost staining, or, on the other hand, why the 1859 became a stained yellow.


> Elijah Hixson
> •It could also be the case that the leaves in Leipzig are identical in colour to the leaves at the BL. That is absolutely possible due to the differences in the colour standards in the photos.


However, the British Library has acknowledged the large colour difference. Basically, that makes this theory inoperative.

>Elijah Hixson
•It could also be the case that both things are at work—that the BL leaves are very slightly darker than the Leipzig leaves due to differences in their storage conditions since the mid 1800s, and that the perceived difference is colour is exacerbated by the differences in the way the photos were taken/processed.


Combining two non-explanations makes for one hybrid non-explanation.

(The admin closed the thread, so I place the response here. Some of the earlier stuff like the purple ms are not really worth effort at the moment.)

Steven
 
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Steven Avery

Administrator
The basic fallacy is:

Appeal to Possibility
Description: When a conclusion is assumed not because it is probably true or it has not been demonstrated to be impossible, but because it is possible that it is true, no matter how improbable.

The theories of Elijah have difficulties that range from very improbable to essentially impossible.

Elijah does not care, since the historical reconstruction that does fit all the evidences, that the major section was coloured in the 1850s, is too dicomfiting.
 
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