Bodmer “Miscellaneous” or “Composite” Codex?

As Peter mentions in the previous blogpost, Brice Jones has published an article in JGRChJ 8 (2011) on ‘The Bodmer ‘Miscellaneous’ Codex and the Crosby-Schøyen Codex MS 193: A New Proposal.’ Congratulations to him for the successful publication!

I have actually had some correspondence with Jones about these codices, but was not quite aware then that he would eventually write an article on the subject (by then he was preparing a presentation for a graduate seminar at Yale). Anyway, he asked me at one point, in reference to my 2005 NTS article on the subject,”Papyrus 72 and the Bodmer Miscellaneous Codex,” NTS 51 (2005): 137-54, whether it was necessary to call this Bodmer Codex (which among other writings contains P72, with 1-2 Peter and Jude) a ‘miscellaneous’ codex, since there appear to be several different viable themes of this codex and not just one, and whether we should not stick with Turner’s initial judgment of the Bodmer Codex as a “composite” codex.

I replied:

It is very important that you read a later study which is focused on the question your raise, i.e., about a possible theme and “miscellaneous” vs. “composite”.... I wrote that later study together with Tobias Nicklas, didn’t I send you a reference to that? Anyway, my NTS article is mainly focused around the question how the codex was made up of several earlier collections - so that in itself speaks against one pervasive theme (which I point out). On the other hand, it is clear to me that the separate parts were produced in a proto-orthodox environment (if I may use the term “proto-orthodox”), in which Christology apparently is important. This does not mean that Christology is a theme - did I say that? There are liturgical connections between earlier parts of the collection, by the way. But, please read my other essay on the Bodmer Misc. Codex.

No, I don’t believe we should call it a composite. In the later essay we suggest that it is something in between. But read it an[d] come back.

Nevertheless, Jones suggests in his now published article that I have argued “for a general christological theme” of this codex (p. 12).

So, in this blogpost I will try to clarify and develop my standpoint, which I briefly tried to convey in that reply cited above. I realize that I have not been “black or white” on this particular issue, especially not in my NTS article, and perhaps consciously so, since I find this codex and its make up to be both fascinating, but at the same time a bit mysterious.

First, as I wrote in my NTS article:

The final collector may have had one particular theme in mind, but more probably this person somehow found a common denominator in the texts, and, therefore, Martin’s original proposal of an apologetic collection does not have to be dismissed as being too general a characterization. In fact, several characteristics typical of incipient orthodoxy are prominent in the texts, especially in the area of Christology.

And in the conclusion of the same article:

Several scholars have suggested that there were certain theological reasons for the composition, and, indeed, the texts of the codex betray the influence of incipient orthodoxy, but to single out one specific theme is problematic, since the codex is made up of several earlier collections.

I hope it is clear by now that I have not argued for *one single theme* uniting these writings and motivating that they were collected together. I did say, as Jones points out in his article, that a collector may have seen a “common denominator” in the texts. I think it is clear, however, that “one particular theme” is not the same thing as *a final collector* seeing in these texts (brought together from earlier collections) “a common denominator.”

There are, I suggest, some features that unite more or less all the texts in the collection – they are not just like any random collection of writings. So is “composite” a suitable term? And, perhaps more significant, are the two general categories “composite” and “miscellany” clear and adequate to represent what we find in extant multi-text MSS?

As I replied to Jones, I have suggested, in a subsequent essay, which I have co-written with Tobias Nicklas in German (which Jones refers to in footnote 15), that the Bodmer codex is something in between “composite” and “miscellany” (as these terms are usually defined). I am a bit surprised that this suggestion is not discussed or mentioned in Jones’ recent article.

In any case, Jones refers in his article to E. G. Turner’s discussion of “composite codices” (pp. 14-15). In his famous The Typology of the Codex Turner states:

Lying behind the title ‘composite’ given to these two codices [including the Bodmer codex in consideration] that scribes did not care to waste writing material and would wish to fill any free pages left over at the end of a codex. Even if the matter chosen as filling was too long, in a quire of multiple gatherings additional gatherings could be added if required. (Typology, 81).

So, is this the kind of sole (pragmatic) motivation lying behind the collection of writings brought together in the Bodmer codex under consideration? “– I mustn’t waste any writing material when copying this work I want to copy (and/or collect).” I think not.

Turner then, by the way, goes on to problematize the notion of “composite codices” as he compares them with some papyrus rolls that are heterogenous in content. For example he refers to BM Pap. 133+134. The first part of this roll contains nine columns of a speech of Hyperides. After a blank space of about 30 cm. a second scribe copied the Third Letter of Demosthenes. Turner then considers the difference between such rolls, and composite codices containing heterogeneous material as the Bodmer codex concluding that one should probably see in the latter “a growing recognition of the comprehensive character of a codex” (p. 82).

Interestingly, in the same monastic library, to which this Bodmer codex belonged, there were in fact a number of classical texts, most often not bound together with theological or liturgical texts, but, significantly, there is at least one exception to this rule (I just quickly browsed the inventory). One codex contains Cicero’s in Cantilinam (in Latin); Psalmus Responsorius (in Latin); A Greek liturgical text; Alcestis (in Latin). Should the Bodmer Misc. Codex be classified in the same category as such a collection of diverse material found in this codex?, i.e., a composite codex? I think not.

Let me now cite a most useful recent dissertation by Eva Nyström (Uppsala University), “Containing Multitudes: Codex Upsaliensis Graecus 8 in Perspective” from her second chapter titled “Composite Books and Miscellanies”:

What expectations do modern readers generally have of books and the contents of books? When we go to the bookstore and browse, we usually find inside the covers one novel, or one biography, or a manual over one kind of technical equipment; the book is probably written by one author or maybe by more than one author but collaboratively, as in the collective novel. But there are other models: a book can hold the collected works by one and the same author, or a choice of those works (or just part of one work—when the work in its entirety is too long to fit into just one volume). It can be a collection of essays by different authors but over a common theme. It could cover, say, Polish poetry from the interwar period. Whenever there are more than one text in the book, we can easily find a common denominator [sic!] for the text collection. What we do not expect to find is a book which contains one text on computer programming, followed by one text on effective bargaining, followed by George Orwell’s Animal Farm, followed by an enumeration of household remedies against migraine or ulceritis. I might, as a reader, be interested in all of these things, but they do not belong in the same book.

There was a time, however, when a book could cover subjects as diverse as those mentioned above. (p 38)

[...]

The coherent miscellany is but one variety of many in the area of multitext books, and if we wish to assess how these books reflect on the reading habits and transmission of texts, we must see to the whole field. We do need to take into account these other appearances of multitext books: the school exercises, the re-use of manuscripts, and the later additions of new text(s) to a scroll or codex. It has to do with the expectancy of the reader (and of the scribe): what you have seen in other places, namely in composite books, seems less farfetched when you are up to create a “miscellany proper,” i.e. an intentional copying of different authors and texts into the same container. What is crucial is the function of the book. (p. 41)

Note the focus here on the reader’s expectation and function.

Further Nyström points out the need to be aware of the possible different stages behind the production of a book making the issue even more complex (something which I attempted in my NTS article):

The reason why it is so important to establish the structure or stratigraphy of multitext books is the large variation in how handwritten books were created, and also the fact that codices are not stable entities. They can be—and often are—rebound, and concomitant changes in the structure can take place: parts of the original book may be lost or deliberately left out, other parts may be added, the internal order of the quires may be confused, or new texts may be added on blank pages long after the primary text or text collection was created. To analyze the text(s) in such a manuscript without awareness of the “archaeology” is a precarious undertaking. It is problematical to draw any conclusions as to how texts belong together. Likewise one cannot unconditionally assume that facts of origin and date in one part of the manuscript are transferable to other parts: this has to be established for each part individually. (p. 43)

Nyström also refers to the terminological confusion of these very terms, “composite” vs. “miscellany” (and others):

Many of the terminological discrepancies originate in different ways of dealing with this complexity. An obvious example is the term miscellany or miscellaneous codex which seems to have been given as many definitions as there are scholars in this area. Should this term cover all kinds of multitext books, both the structurally homogeneous and the composite codices? Should it designate only the contentually heterogeneous or should we include other possible text combinations as well: different texts by the same author (corpora), different kinds of texts which have a common use (e.g. liturgical text collections)? Would collections of excerpts qualify, or must the texts be complete? I have tried to avoid this problem by using the overall term “multitext book” for the whole field, regardless of structural differences and regardless of how similar or diverse the texts seem.

Some prefer to use the term miscellany in contrast to the composite, so that the miscellany would always be monomerous or at least homogenetic, i.e. produced in the same circle and approximately at the same time.

I wholly agree with Nyström that there appears to be significant confusion about these terms. If we, however, use “miscellany” in contrast to “composite” as I did in my NTS article, I maintain that the Bodmer codex under consideration is something more than a composite, and that it was produced in basically the same proto-Orthodox Christian circle. In another NTS article by Barbara Aland on the same codex, “Welche Rolle spielen Textkritik und Textgeschichte für das Verständnis des Neuen Testaments? Frühe Leserperspektiven,” (NTS 52 [2006]: 303-318), Aland, actually goes further than I did, as she comments on the codex and the reception of its collected texts (again note the focus on the reader’s/user’s perspective) concluding:

Fazit: Wir fassen in dem Sammelcodex des 3./4. Jh ein Kapitel aus der frühen Rezeptionsgeschichte der gesammelten Texte. Wenn wir die Signale der Texte und ihrer Zusammenstellung beachten, weisen sie uns auf die Absicht des Sammlers hin. Er hat die Texte im Sinne einer produktiven Rezeption gelesen und durch seine sinnschöpfende Zusammenstellung bestimmte theologische und ethische Aussagen an seine Adressaten vermittelt: Abweisung der Häresie, Preis des Gottes und Erlösers Christus, Trost für die Leidenden in seiner Nachfolge. Historisch gewinnen wir damit eine neue ‘Quelle’ für das Christusverständnis des 3./4. Jahrhunderts. Textkritisch gewinnen wir das Verständnis für einen frühen Schreiber. Wir können davon ausgehen, dass er an den besprochenen Stellen die Gottheit Christi bewusst betonen wollte. (p. 310)

I have not been as bold as Aland about the motivation and identification of the final collector (I did propose the scribe of P72 as one possible candidate), but I do maintain that the Bodmer codex under consideration is definitely something more than a composite as Turner defines the term; as I conclude in the subsequent essay co-written with Tobias Nicklas, Theologische Linien im Codex Bodmer Miscellani?, in Tobias Nicklas and Thomas J. Kraus (eds.), New Testament Manuscripts: Their Texts and their World (Boston: Brill, 2006), 161-88, here freely translated from German:

If you compare the Bodmer Misc. Codex with other “Sammelcodices” – particularly with those from the same extensive finding [probably a Pachomian library] – then it occupies a middle position between codices which individual texts have been brought together rather consciously, united by one specific [leitenden] theme, and those [individual texts] which display no connection. (p. 185)