Where do the typically Christian shortforms for words such as ‘Jesus’, ‘Christ’, ‘God’, and ‘Lord’ come from? What is their origin? In a recent essay I argued that their origin lies in a necessary Christian response to Greek Jewish manuscripts in which the Tetragrammaton was dealt with in a special way. And the nomina sacra of the group of words listed above are a coherent and unified response to that Jewish practice, prompted by the fact that the early church saw Jesus in the Jewish Scriptures, and that from the beginning Jesus could be referred to by any of these terms.
Though a unified response, I still argue for a logical beginning in the contraction of the word κυριος. In the essay I suggest that the form κ̅ϲ goes back to the numeral 26, which provides a nice link to the numerical value of the Tetragrammaton.
Since writing that essay, I found a number of publications I could have used in support, and one that came out at the same time my piece was published.
First is that the link
between nomina sacra and numerals had been suggested for the variant of the
number of the beast in Revelation 13:18 by Pete Williams (yes, my boss) back in
2007 (bibliography see below).
Secondly, in 2021 Jesse Hoover showed how the reading 616 had been used within the Donatist church. The number 616 can be represented by χι̅ϲ, which was then interpreted as a combination of the nomina sacra for Christ and for Jesus (basically the same point Williams made, but then 1,400 years earlier).
So my suggestion that κ̅ϲ and 26 are related would make sense within the reception history of the nomina sacra.
There is a ‘thirdly’ here, though. Around the same time my essay was published, HTR published an article by Alexander Kulik. I don’t think we have met or have been otherwise in contact, both pieces are conceived independent of one another (and come from different angles as well). But his study makes an elaborate and thorough case for the plausibility of connecting the nomen sacrum κ̅ϲ with 26, much better than I could have done. You will have to read the full essay by yourself, but I think that Kulik’s piece strengthens the case to regard κυριος as the origin considerably.
Of course, Larry Hurtado had seen the similarity in shape between numerals and nomina sacra, and this led him to seeking the origin of the phenomenon in ι̅η as the initial form of a nomen sacrum for Jesus, with 18 traced back through Barnabas. Though Hurtado was on the right track, I think there is more mileage in κυριος and 26 and it is pleasing to see that some real progress may have been made.
Bibliography
Hoover, Jesse. "The Apocalyptic Number 616 and the Donatist Church." The Journal of Ecclesiastical History 72, no. 4 (2021): 709–25.
Jongkind, Dirk. "On the Origin of the Nomina Sacra, Yet Again." In Die Bibel zum Sprechen bringen: Festschrift zu Ehren von Holger Strutwolf, edited by Marie-Luise Lakmann, Gregory S. Paulson Paulson and Jan Graefe. ANTF 61 (De Gruyter, 2025), 105–18.
Kulik, Alexander. "Counting on God’s Name: The Numerology of Nomina Sacra." Harvard Theological Review 118, no. 3 (2025): 425–63.
Williams, P.J.
"P115 and the Number of the Beast." Tyndale Bulletin 58, no. 1
(2007): 151–53.
Is the Tetragrammaton an abbreviation?
ReplyDeleteSort of. It's the consonants in Hebrew letters for the name of God. So it's abbreviated to the Greeks, but not really to the Hebrews, since all Hebrew letters are consonants. Mostly it's a graphically unique representation of Kurios in the Greek manuscripts, where Kurios translates Yahweh, sort of like modern English translations using LORD in all caps.
DeleteSo it's not so much replacing an abbreviation with another abbreviation, but more like creating a Christian version of a way to represent the occurrences of covenant name of God. At least I think that's Dirk's hypothesis.
Dirk, do you think this explains the overline in the NS?
ReplyDeleteYes
DeleteThe overline is also explained via Barnabas ref, as argued by Larry H.
DeleteDoes any ECF or ancient commentor mention the Nomina Sacra at all? They are replete within the Christian Biblical manuscripts, and even in the writings of the ECF (earliest evidence I believe being in P. Oxy. 405 with Irenaeus' Against Heresies), but as far as I'm aware, they remain unnoted by the ECF and others, despite their usage in Christian art and iconography. Happy to be corrected on this.
ReplyDeleteEp. Barn. 9.7-9 has an interesting reading of Genesis 14.14 (connected with 17.23) [although not actually LXX so I'm not sure what Ps-Barn. was reading] which at least presumes "Jesus" was expressed as IH (i.e. 18). It is not a nomen sacrum (not a contraction, and no discussion of overline), but it is interesting in terms of the numerical association (isopsephy).
DeleteEp.Barn. 9.8: 'he signifies Jesus in the two letters' (Δηλοῖ οὖν τὸν μὲν Ἰησοῦν ἐν τοῖς δυσὶν γράμμασιν) is somewhat parallel to Test. Sol. 11.6 which refers to Emmanouel as 'conjured up by means of three letters' (which may suggest knowledge of the three letter NS: IHS).
DeleteI don’t think that ιη’s not being a contraction in Barnabas precludes it from being a nomen sacrum in princople. For one thing, the non-contracted form ι̅η̅ does occur in the MSS, and also quite early. For another, we have no clue if Barnabas or its earliest copies originally used abbreviations with overlines to render the numerals in this passage or not. Sinaiticus renders them plene, for what it may be worth.
DeleteThanks, Peter. I was aware of the Barnabas connection with IH (I believe it was talked about (first?) in the late and great Larry Hurtado's book "The Earliest Christian Artifacts"); we do however still seem to be lacking any sort of commentary for what, a good 13 centuries or longer, of anyone talking about the NS within Christian manuscripts of not only the Bible but their own works as well? I just find it bizarre that a practice universally adopted seems to lack any sort of commentary about it. Guess it was just so common place, there really didn't need to be a mention of it anywhere! :)
DeleteCrispin Fletcher-Louis argues that it is very significant that 1 Cor 8.6 with its Christological Monotheis/reworked shema has 26 words, Jesus Monotheism (Cascade, 2015), 39-49.
ReplyDeleteWould the view that the text reworks the Shema imply Binitarianism and not Trinitarianism?
DeleteWhoever introduced nomina sacra introduced a fruitful source of textual error and did us no favour.
ReplyDeleteLikely not their intention :D Are we certain the practice of NS doesn't go back to say, the Apostle Paul? His letters were influential and were sent to very important cities with copyists, so is it possible that the NS are a practice of Paul's he employed in his letters, which was then adopted by the early ecclesia at large? Don't think we have any early copy of any NT book/letter where the NS weren't used (obviously presuming that those MS which show no NS (P52 for instance) likely used them in the lacunae), hence is it possible that it is an early practice of Paul's employed by other authors? Just some out-loud thoughts :)
DeleteI think so. 1 Cor 12:3 and 2 Cor 4:5 are the only places in Paul's letters where the grammatical case of "Jesus" cannot be inferred from the context. In both verses the textual variants indicate that people had no idea what the grammatical case should be. This suggest that Paul wrote ΙΗ (with the overbar), which could be any grammatical case. Is there any other explanation?
DeleteFascinating. I am interesting in the development of the unity of the Christian Bible in C2. It's a really interesting idea that NS could be about the name of Jesus in OT.
ReplyDeleteThe text "Since Traube's 1907 monograph on the subject, and his coining of the term nomina sacra,..." may not be accurate. Martin Rule, in The Athenaeum, Jan. 2, 1904, No. 3975, page 18, col. 1: "Making allowances for the nomina sacra, and the four or five other words usually abbreviated in the age of Gregory...."
ReplyDeleteNice!
ReplyDeleteStephen's comment, that is.
DeleteThough I am not very familiar with the evidence other than Qumran manuscripts, I wonder about some possible diversity within ancient Jewish scribal practice and, if so, how that might factor into early Christian scribal practice. While the Temple apparently was widely venerated, the temple priests, when Sadducees, perhaps were somewhat less universally appreciated. Despite the lack of the name Essenes or Ossenes in NT (but 'osey hatorah, observers of Torah, might be a relevant etymology to compare with ep.James) and despite some shade on remaining Pharisees (who included formerly Paul and mildly Josephus?), some members of those two groups, both reportedly believing in afterlife, would seem relatively more probable as potential converts than Sadducees. Would those groups, and scribes, vary in scribal practice? And vary in which names or name replacements were in practice pronounced?
ReplyDelete