Codex Ravianus (also called Berolinensis) is a manuscript rewritten from

Complutensian Polyglot Bible The Complutensian Polyglot Bible is the name given to the first printed polyglot of the entire Bible. The edition was initiated and financed by Cardinal Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros (1436–1517) and published by Complutense University in A ...

. Formerly it was listed as a Greek manuscript of the

New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christ ...

, but it was removed from the list in 1908. The manuscript is a famous instance of the

Comma Johanneum The Johannine Comma ( la, Comma Johanneum) is an interpolated phrase ( comma) in verses of the First Epistle of John. The text (with the comma in italics and enclosed by square brackets) in the King James Bible reads: It became a touchpoint ...

Description

The codex contains a complete text of the

, in two volumes, on 292 + 205

parchment Parchment is a writing material made from specially prepared untanned skins of animals—primarily sheep, calves, and goats. It has been used as a writing medium for over two millennia. Vellum is a finer quality parchment made from the skins o ...

leaves (size ). The leaves are arranged in

quarto Quarto (abbreviated Qto, 4to or 4º) is the format of a book or pamphlet produced from full sheets printed with eight pages of text, four to a side, then folded twice to produce four leaves. The leaves are then trimmed along the folds to produc ...

. It contains a spurious biblical passage, the

1 John The First Epistle of John is the first of the Johannine epistles of the New Testament, and the fourth of the catholic epistles. There is no scholarly consensus as to the authorship of the Johannine works. The author of the First Epistle is te ...

5:7. Although it was rewritten from the Complutensian text, there are some textual divergences between them: Matthew 2:13; 15:22; 17:2; 23:8; 1 John 5:10; Jude 22, which all stem from the errors of the pen of the Ravianus's scribe.Johann David Michaelis, Herbert Marsh
''Introduction to the New Testament''
F. and C. Rivington, 1802, vol. 2, p. 771. The codex was used as an argument in the 18th century that Complutensian was rewritten from the Codex Ravianus, even with imitation of its letters, but scholars like La Croze, Griesbach, and Michaelis proved that errors of Ravianus are nothing more than errors of the pen. It lost its weight as an independent authority.

History

The manuscript is a transcript from the

Complutensian Polyglot The Complutensian Polyglot Bible is the name given to the first printed polyglot of the entire Bible. The edition was initiated and financed by Cardinal Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros (1436–1517) and published by Complutense University in Alca ...

, printed in 1514. It copies even typographical errors of it, and the letters are similar. Some variant readings were inserted from the margin of Stephanus's edition.

Bruce M. Metzger Bruce Manning Metzger (February 9, 1914 – February 13, 2007) was an American biblical scholar, Bible translator and textual critic who was a longtime professor at Princeton Theological Seminary and Bible editor who served on the board of the ...

Bart D. Ehrman Bart Denton Ehrman (born 1955) is an American New Testament scholar focusing on textual criticism of the New Testament, the historical Jesus, and the origins and development of early Christianity. He has written and edited 30 books, includin ...

''The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption and Restoration''
(Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 147. According to

C. R. Gregory C. or c. may refer to: * Century, sometimes abbreviated as ''c.'' or ''C.'', a period of 100 years * Cent (currency), abbreviated ''c.'' or ''¢'', a monetary unit that equals of the basic unit of many currencies * Caius or Gaius, abbreviated as ...

it once belonged to Christian Rave, from

Uppsala Uppsala (, or all ending in , ; archaically spelled ''Upsala'') is the county seat of Uppsala County and the List of urban areas in Sweden by population, fourth-largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Malmö. It had 177,074 inha ...

, or his brother Johannes Rave. It took the name of Ravianus from the name Rave.

Johann Jakob Wettstein Johann Jakob Wettstein (also Wetstein; 5 March 1693 – 23 March 1754) was a Swiss theologian, best known as a New Testament critic. Biography Youth and study Johann Jakob Wettstein was born in Basel. Among his tutors in theology was Samuel Wer ...

added it into the list of the Greek New Testament manuscripts, and designated it

siglum Scribal abbreviations or sigla (singular: siglum) are abbreviations used by ancient and medieval scribes writing in various languages, including Latin, Greek, Old English and Old Norse. In modern manuscript editing (substantive and mechanica ...

110. The text was published by Treschow, while it was examined and described by Griesbach, Georg Gottlieb Pappelbaum (in 1796), and Gregory (in 1900). In 1908 Gregory removed it from the list of the Greek New Testament manuscripts. It is no longer listed, because it is only a facsimile of the Complutensis Polyglot. The manuscript is currently housed in the

Berlin State Library The Berlin State Library (german: Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin; officially abbreviated as ''SBB'', colloquially ''Stabi'') is a universal library in Berlin, Germany and a property of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation. It is one of the la ...

(Gr. fol. 1 & 2).

References

{{Reflist, 2 16th-century manuscripts