Changes

Finally, as mentioned in the note, every copy of John ever found which contains the end of the book includes the last chapter, including the oldest copy of John in existence, P66 (the very last page of P66 is missing, but the second to last page still exists, and it contains 21 all the way up to verse 9). P66 dates from somewhere in the middle of the second century, making it within one generation of the original. This is the OLDEST nearly complete copy of ANY book in the NT, with only about 40 - 60 years between the original and this copy, and although the speed with which it was copied created huge numbers of copy errors, giving it less weight on the details, the sheer age of the document means it carries a huge amount of weight as to the general layout and content of the original. With only 40-60 years between it and the original, it also stands alone as the shortest distance between an original and a nearly complete existing copy of ANY ancient document, secular or biblical, in existence today (in fact, nearly all of the top ten are biblical manuscripts, with p75 coming in second, p46 possibly third - depending on which scholar you believe, etc - you have to go down the list to several hundred years between an original and an existing copy before you encounter the first ancient secular manuscript on the list). In short, P66 settles the issue. If it doesn't prove that chapter 21 is original, then no textual evidence on any topic, dealing with any manuscript, in any field, secular or biblical, means ANYTHING, as no other manuscript that I am aware of even comes close to this one.--[[User:MBack|Michael Back]] 15:10, 17 March 2010 (EDT)

Finally, as mentioned in the note, every copy of John ever found which contains the end of the book includes the last chapter, including the oldest copy of John in existence, P66 (the very last page of P66 is missing, but the second to last page still exists, and it contains 21 all the way up to verse 9). P66 dates from somewhere in the middle of the second century, making it within one generation of the original. This is the OLDEST nearly complete copy of ANY book in the NT, with only about 40 - 60 years between the original and this copy, and although the speed with which it was copied created huge numbers of copy errors, giving it less weight on the details, the sheer age of the document means it carries a huge amount of weight as to the general layout and content of the original. With only 40-60 years between it and the original, it also stands alone as the shortest distance between an original and a nearly complete existing copy of ANY ancient document, secular or biblical, in existence today (in fact, nearly all of the top ten are biblical manuscripts, with p75 coming in second, p46 possibly third - depending on which scholar you believe, etc - you have to go down the list to several hundred years between an original and an existing copy before you encounter the first ancient secular manuscript on the list). In short, P66 settles the issue. If it doesn't prove that chapter 21 is original, then no textual evidence on any topic, dealing with any manuscript, in any field, secular or biblical, means ANYTHING, as no other manuscript that I am aware of even comes close to this one.--[[User:MBack|Michael Back]] 15:10, 17 March 2010 (EDT)