0:00:05 > 0:00:07Egypt.
0:00:07 > 0:00:09The setting for a unique and historic quest.
0:00:11 > 0:00:14The quest to find ancient scriptures in support of the largest
0:00:14 > 0:00:19religion in the world: Christianity.
0:00:22 > 0:00:27At stake, the faith of millions with the Bible at its heart.
0:00:27 > 0:00:30But there are deep divisions between those who consider the Bible
0:00:30 > 0:00:33to be the absolute word of God
0:00:33 > 0:00:36and those who take a less literal view of its teachings.
0:00:42 > 0:00:47200 years ago, for the first time, the historical story of Jesus
0:00:47 > 0:00:54and the reliability of New Testament gospels came under attack.
0:00:54 > 0:00:58What historians discovered was that the texts on which
0:00:58 > 0:01:00Christianity were based were not reliable.
0:01:00 > 0:01:03They weren't historically authentic.
0:01:03 > 0:01:05And that meant what price the word of God?
0:01:08 > 0:01:11Defenders of the faith believed the answer lay in Egypt,
0:01:11 > 0:01:14a dynamic hub of early Christianity,
0:01:14 > 0:01:19and a potential source of ancient biblical manuscripts.
0:01:19 > 0:01:23I'm Jeff Rose, an archaeologist and historian,
0:01:23 > 0:01:27and I am fascinated by Egypt and its biblical treasures.
0:01:27 > 0:01:30I'm following in the footsteps of the Bible hunters,
0:01:30 > 0:01:33men and women searching for ancient manuscripts in support
0:01:33 > 0:01:36of the Jesus story in the New Testament.
0:01:39 > 0:01:42They rediscovered the oldest bibles in the world.
0:01:43 > 0:01:47But what they uncovered wasn't exactly what they expected to find.
0:01:49 > 0:01:52The Bible hunters' quest would challenge how the world saw
0:01:52 > 0:01:56the Bible and whether it truly was the word of God.
0:02:08 > 0:02:12The story of the Bible hunters begins in Germany in the early 1830s.
0:02:17 > 0:02:20German historians and theologians were heading for the country's
0:02:20 > 0:02:23great university cities of Leipzig and Tubingen.
0:02:30 > 0:02:33They were centres of a dispute about one of the key foundations
0:02:33 > 0:02:36of the Christian faith.
0:02:36 > 0:02:39European scholars were locked in a heated debate
0:02:39 > 0:02:43about the reliability and the authority of the Bible.
0:02:43 > 0:02:47For centuries, devout Christians had believed that the Bible was
0:02:47 > 0:02:48the unchangeable word of God.
0:02:50 > 0:02:54The Bible consists of the Old Testament, traditionally ascribed to
0:02:54 > 0:03:00Moses, and the New Testament, with its 27 books, including the four
0:03:00 > 0:03:04gospels recounting the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
0:03:08 > 0:03:12Suddenly, these sacred scriptures were being challenged.
0:03:14 > 0:03:17This begins with the Old Testament,
0:03:17 > 0:03:19so first of all you have people using the word myth to
0:03:19 > 0:03:24describe things like Genesis and the creation and the flood
0:03:24 > 0:03:28and then, slightly later, you have David Fredrick Strauss.
0:03:29 > 0:03:32David Strauss boldly published a book that doubted
0:03:32 > 0:03:34the truth of the New Testament.
0:03:36 > 0:03:39He was the first scholar to argue that the miracle stories
0:03:39 > 0:03:42attributed to Jesus - Christ walking on water
0:03:42 > 0:03:45or the feeding of the 5,000 - were mythical.
0:03:46 > 0:03:50It's absolutely predictable that what Strauss wrote would have caused
0:03:50 > 0:03:54outrage but Strauss himself seemed genuinely surprised that people were
0:03:54 > 0:03:58so angry and he just didn't have the guts to go through with these ideas.
0:03:58 > 0:04:03He himself became a kind of outcast and tried writing much more
0:04:03 > 0:04:07conservative texts to recover his reputation but the public in both
0:04:07 > 0:04:11Germany and Britain were genuinely outraged by what he'd written.
0:04:16 > 0:04:19Devout Christians dismissed Strauss' attack
0:04:19 > 0:04:22on the miracle stories as heretical.
0:04:22 > 0:04:25It was more difficult to counter the claim made by scholars
0:04:25 > 0:04:28like Strauss that the Bible text itself was unreliable.
0:04:30 > 0:04:34In the early days of the Bible, of course, there were no printing
0:04:34 > 0:04:38presses, so the biblical text was transmitted by human beings
0:04:38 > 0:04:42writing out the text and copying it again, and again,
0:04:42 > 0:04:43and again and again.
0:04:43 > 0:04:47And that inevitably leads to errors creeping into the process.
0:04:51 > 0:04:53Therefore, Strauss and others claimed,
0:04:53 > 0:04:57the Bible text couldn't be the exact and unchanged word of God.
0:05:00 > 0:05:04What critical historians discovered was that the texts on which
0:05:04 > 0:05:06Christianity were based were not reliable.
0:05:06 > 0:05:09They weren't historically authentic.
0:05:09 > 0:05:11And that meant what price the word of God?
0:05:11 > 0:05:14If you can't trust the texts in which these things
0:05:14 > 0:05:17are transmitted, you can't trust your own religious foundations.
0:05:17 > 0:05:21This was dynamite for the majority of 19th-century Christians.
0:05:21 > 0:05:25Scholars had the audacity to challenge the very word of God.
0:05:27 > 0:05:31Constantin Tischendorf, an ambitious Bible scholar in the German
0:05:31 > 0:05:35city of Leipzig, was alarmed by the challenge to the faith.
0:05:35 > 0:05:37He was an expert in Ancient Greek,
0:05:37 > 0:05:40the language in which the original Bible text was written.
0:05:42 > 0:05:44When the first printed Bibles were made,
0:05:44 > 0:05:48the oldest available manuscripts in Greek were from the 12th century,
0:05:48 > 0:05:51over a thousand years after the life of Jesus.
0:05:53 > 0:05:56Tischendorf would search for the earliest Bible texts to
0:05:56 > 0:06:00show that the Bible had a solid historic foundation.
0:06:00 > 0:06:03For the Christian faith, the stakes could not be higher.
0:06:05 > 0:06:10Nothing in theology is as important as the careful study of the oldest
0:06:10 > 0:06:13manuscripts of the New Testament to prove their genuineness.
0:06:15 > 0:06:19I will reconstruct if possible the exact text of the Bible
0:06:19 > 0:06:21as it came from the pen of the sacred writer.
0:06:26 > 0:06:30Tischendorf left Leipzig on an epic journey across Europe.
0:06:32 > 0:06:35Tischendorf the Bible expert had become a Bible hunter.
0:06:39 > 0:06:45In 1844, he finally reached the port of Alexandria, the Gateway to Egypt.
0:06:47 > 0:06:52Egypt in the first centuries of Christianity is a great Christian
0:06:52 > 0:06:55centre and it's this reputation that leads scholars like Tischendorf
0:06:55 > 0:06:59to believe that if we are going to find those early manuscripts
0:06:59 > 0:07:03of the New Testament anywhere, we're most likely to find them in Egypt.
0:07:04 > 0:07:07How happy I was when we anchored.
0:07:07 > 0:07:11But what intense noise I was greeted by when I set foot onshore.
0:07:21 > 0:07:24But Tischendorf didn't linger long.
0:07:24 > 0:07:28He travelled 140 miles south to see the pyramids of Giza.
0:07:34 > 0:07:37By the early nineteenth century Egypt is drawing explorers
0:07:37 > 0:07:41from all of the European states. They see these huge
0:07:41 > 0:07:45monuments above the surface and connect them to events in history.
0:07:47 > 0:07:50So the pyramids themselves are said to have been built by Abraham
0:07:50 > 0:07:53or are said to be the granaries that Joseph built in Egypt.
0:07:53 > 0:07:57Some people argue that the Sphinx has the face of Noah.
0:07:58 > 0:08:02What these pyramids must have witnessed over the millennia......
0:08:02 > 0:08:04The Pharaohs.
0:08:04 > 0:08:06Joseph and his brothers.
0:08:06 > 0:08:10Here I was, in awe of this ancient mystery.
0:08:24 > 0:08:28Tischendorf spent a day at Giza then headed west
0:08:28 > 0:08:31to a cluster of Christian monasteries several days'
0:08:31 > 0:08:34journey into the Nitric desert near Beheira.
0:08:38 > 0:08:40Egypt had some of the oldest
0:08:40 > 0:08:46monasteries in the world, known for their ancient libraries.
0:08:46 > 0:08:50Tischendorf knew that the English collector, Lord Robert Curzon,
0:08:50 > 0:08:54had visited the very same monastery six years earlier.
0:08:54 > 0:08:58Curzon bought dozens of rare Christian manuscripts from the monks.
0:08:58 > 0:09:01Perhaps there were more to be found.
0:09:01 > 0:09:05The world of the Bible hunters was quite small and news travelled fast.
0:09:05 > 0:09:08Tischendorf came here in the footsteps of Curzon
0:09:08 > 0:09:11but by then the monks were spoiled by Lord Curzon's gold,
0:09:11 > 0:09:14with which poor Tischendorf couldn't compete.
0:09:16 > 0:09:21Tischendorf found no Greek Bible texts in his first expedition.
0:09:21 > 0:09:23But he wasn't about to give up.
0:09:29 > 0:09:33Tischendorf now turned his attention to the bustling bazaars of Cairo.
0:09:37 > 0:09:40For weeks, he scoured the book stalls
0:09:40 > 0:09:42and libraries for biblical manuscripts.
0:09:46 > 0:09:49Again, nothing of interest showed up.
0:09:51 > 0:09:56Tischendorf had one last avenue to explore - the Greek Orthodox church.
0:09:56 > 0:09:59They run a monastery at the foot of mount Sinai with
0:09:59 > 0:10:01an unexplored library.
0:10:01 > 0:10:04But to gain access to its secrets,
0:10:04 > 0:10:09he would need a letter of introduction from the Greek Orthodox community here in Cairo.
0:10:09 > 0:10:13Tischendorf got his letter of introduction.
0:10:13 > 0:10:17But St Catherine's was almost 300 miles from Cairo, across the desert.
0:10:21 > 0:10:26To get there, the Bible hunter from Germany needed reliable guides and camels.
0:10:33 > 0:10:37The fundamentals of camel shopping haven't changed much in 170 years.
0:10:40 > 0:10:43There are hundreds if not thousands of camels here
0:10:43 > 0:10:46and I have no idea how to tell what makes a good one from a bad one.
0:10:48 > 0:10:51I am trying to get some answers here on what makes a good camel.
0:10:51 > 0:10:54And they say you've just got to know.
0:10:54 > 0:10:56You've got to be born into it, so...
0:10:56 > 0:10:57These are the experts.
0:11:02 > 0:11:03So whenever I go buying camels,
0:11:03 > 0:11:09the first thing to do is look underneath, to make it look like I know what I'm doing.
0:11:09 > 0:11:11CAMEL GRUNTS
0:11:12 > 0:11:16Do we have any mints for this guy? Some breath mints?
0:11:21 > 0:11:24After lengthy negotiations, Tischendorf hired a group
0:11:24 > 0:11:28of Bedouins and their camels for his two-week trek to St Catherine's.
0:11:37 > 0:11:40His safety and survival in the desert would depend on them.
0:11:52 > 0:11:55He was a very long way from well-ordered Germany.
0:11:55 > 0:11:59No trains, no roads, just desert. And the unforgiving sun.
0:12:14 > 0:12:18Tischendorf was hugely impressed by the Bedouin's survival skills.
0:12:21 > 0:12:22So am I.
0:12:22 > 0:12:25They live in some of the most hostile terrains on Earth.
0:12:25 > 0:12:27And they are so hospitable.
0:12:35 > 0:12:38Normally you don't want to see that much dust coming off your food.
0:12:38 > 0:12:39We'll give it a try.
0:12:43 > 0:12:46We want to give it you taste the breads.
0:12:46 > 0:12:48Here we go. Moment of truth.
0:12:48 > 0:12:51Yeah, bread, tea.
0:12:51 > 0:12:53That's really good.
0:12:54 > 0:12:58- This is wonderful.- Yeah. - It's cooked to perfection.
0:13:07 > 0:13:11In May 1844, Tischendorf reached St Catherine's in a valley
0:13:11 > 0:13:13below historic Mount Sinai.
0:13:17 > 0:13:20Here, according to biblical tradition,
0:13:20 > 0:13:23Moses received the Ten Commandments.
0:13:24 > 0:13:27It's a remarkable monastery with a history stretching back
0:13:27 > 0:13:2915 centuries.
0:13:42 > 0:13:43GUIDE SPEAKS OWN LANGUAGE
0:13:45 > 0:13:48Back then, St Catherine's was more of a fortress than
0:13:48 > 0:13:51a monastery, with 40-foot-high walls
0:13:51 > 0:13:54and no entrance other than that wooden structure there.
0:13:55 > 0:13:58To gain access, you'd have to get hauled up in a basket.
0:13:58 > 0:14:00So when Tischendorf arrived,
0:14:00 > 0:14:04they refused to let him in until he showed his letters of recommendation.
0:14:04 > 0:14:08Luckily for him, he'd done his homework and the monks hauled him up.
0:14:23 > 0:14:27Inside, I meet St Catherine's librarian, Father Justin,
0:14:27 > 0:14:33the first non-Greek to join the community in its 1,500 year history.
0:14:33 > 0:14:36It's beautiful to see the swallows flying, especially at night.
0:14:36 > 0:14:39Born in El Paso, Texas, Father Justin discovered
0:14:39 > 0:14:42Greek Orthodoxy while he was at college.
0:14:42 > 0:14:44It had plaster on the walls.
0:14:44 > 0:14:47It was all removed when they strengthened the walls.
0:14:47 > 0:14:51He's lived here for 17 years.
0:14:51 > 0:14:54We can trace a Christian presence here to the late third
0:14:54 > 0:14:56and beginning of the fourth century
0:14:56 > 0:14:59but the great basilica that you see below us in the high
0:14:59 > 0:15:02surrounding walls were all built at the command of the emperor Justinian
0:15:02 > 0:15:07in the sixth century, and then you have structures added since then.
0:15:08 > 0:15:12Tischendorf hoped that this ancient monastery held
0:15:12 > 0:15:14some of the biblical treasures he so desired.
0:15:16 > 0:15:19Sinai has a very dry and stable climate
0:15:19 > 0:15:22and it's never been destroyed and never been abandoned
0:15:22 > 0:15:27in all of its history and so the monastery naturally has
0:15:27 > 0:15:32built up an astonishing library and an astonishing collection of icons.
0:15:33 > 0:15:36Today, all the books and manuscripts are catalogued.
0:15:36 > 0:15:38Back in the mid-19th century,
0:15:38 > 0:15:42the collection was spread all over the many rooms of the monastery.
0:15:43 > 0:15:48Tischendorf needed cooperative monks to supply him with manuscripts.
0:15:48 > 0:15:49But none of the documents they showed him
0:15:49 > 0:15:51were old enough for his purpose.
0:15:53 > 0:15:56Finally, his luck took a turn.
0:16:02 > 0:16:06Dr Kent Clarke is an expert on Tischendorf's mission.
0:16:07 > 0:16:11He's looking just at some of the books that are here, some of the ancient manuscripts
0:16:11 > 0:16:17and he actually finds a set of what he seems to think are very old
0:16:17 > 0:16:22leafs or folios out of an ancient manuscript and they're just sitting in a basket.
0:16:25 > 0:16:29"The librarian told me that two heaps of papers like this,
0:16:29 > 0:16:33"mouldered by time, had already been consigned to the flames.
0:16:33 > 0:16:37"Imagine my surprise to find amid this heap of papers
0:16:37 > 0:16:44"a considerable number of sheets of a copy of the Old Testament in Greek."
0:16:44 > 0:16:47Tischendorf realised he had at last found something very important.
0:16:49 > 0:16:53"Parts of Isaiah, Jeremiah, the so-called Minor Prophets,
0:16:53 > 0:16:57"Chronicles, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs,
0:16:57 > 0:17:02"which seemed to me to be some of the most ancient I had ever seen."
0:17:02 > 0:17:04Tischendorf had struck gold.
0:17:04 > 0:17:06If his analysis was correct,
0:17:06 > 0:17:11he had in his possession one of the oldest Christian texts in the world.
0:17:11 > 0:17:13It was exactly what he had been looking for.
0:17:16 > 0:17:20Tischendorf saw more than 100 of these rare papers
0:17:20 > 0:17:22and the monks let him take 43 leaves away to Germany.
0:17:29 > 0:17:32Comparison with other ancient handwriting styles dates
0:17:32 > 0:17:34the documents to the mid-4th century.
0:17:35 > 0:17:39Afraid that the other Bible hunters might come upon the cache,
0:17:39 > 0:17:42he was careful to cover his tracks.
0:17:42 > 0:17:45When Tischendorf published his account of his journey,
0:17:45 > 0:17:48he deliberately omitted where he had found the codex.
0:17:48 > 0:17:51That was because he suspected there was an additional
0:17:51 > 0:17:54New Testament section hidden somewhere in Saint Catherine's.
0:17:54 > 0:17:56The last thing he wanted was for his rival Bible hunters to
0:17:56 > 0:17:58catch wind of the find and beat him to it.
0:18:00 > 0:18:04Tischendorf spent 15 years planning and scheming to get
0:18:04 > 0:18:07hold of further manuscript leaves from St Catherine's.
0:18:11 > 0:18:12To strengthen his cause,
0:18:12 > 0:18:16he enlisted the help of the Russian Orthodox Church and even
0:18:16 > 0:18:20the Tsar of Russia, who had power and influence over the monastery.
0:18:26 > 0:18:30Tischendorf returned to St Catherine's in 1859.
0:18:41 > 0:18:43After a 2,000 mile journey,
0:18:43 > 0:18:46Tischendorf raked over everything the monks could show him.
0:18:46 > 0:18:48All to no avail.
0:18:49 > 0:18:54Even the leaves he had seen before had vanished.
0:18:54 > 0:18:58Years of planning and careful negotiation appeared to have
0:18:58 > 0:18:59been in vain.
0:18:59 > 0:19:02Tischendorf had nearly resigned himself to defeat,
0:19:02 > 0:19:05to leave St Catherine's empty handed,
0:19:05 > 0:19:09until one evening he was having tea with the steward of the monastery.
0:19:11 > 0:19:14One evening he's coming back and he's walking with one of the monks.
0:19:14 > 0:19:19They just had a walk around the grounds and on the way back,
0:19:19 > 0:19:25the monk explains to him that um, "I have Greek Septuagint manuscripts as well."
0:19:25 > 0:19:28The monk took Tischendorf to his chamber, and handed him
0:19:28 > 0:19:34an ancient codex, a collection of manuscripts in book form.
0:19:34 > 0:19:38Tischendorf realises that's... "There it is - that's what I found on my first journey, the folios."
0:19:38 > 0:19:43So he recognises this is the New Testament extension of his originals?
0:19:43 > 0:19:47That's right and it's a big Bible in between bound covers
0:19:47 > 0:19:51with beautiful very, very thin velum, a beautiful uncial scribal hand and
0:19:51 > 0:19:55again he is blown away by the fact that he's never seen anything this
0:19:55 > 0:19:59ancient and he's never seen anything this beautiful, he's just in awe.
0:20:06 > 0:20:09Tischendorf had made one of the greatest
0:20:09 > 0:20:13discoveries in 2,000 years of Christian history.
0:20:13 > 0:20:17It was one of the earliest bibles and had a complete New Testament.
0:20:17 > 0:20:20This discovery would make him famous around the world.
0:20:25 > 0:20:29It became known as the Codex Sinaiticus, the book from Sinai.
0:20:29 > 0:20:34It was dated to around 350 AD.
0:20:34 > 0:20:39"I held in my hand the most precious biblical treasure in existence.
0:20:39 > 0:20:45"I cannot recall all the emotions I felt in that exciting moment."
0:20:45 > 0:20:48Tischendorf published the Codex Sinaiticus back in Europe.
0:20:50 > 0:20:52The original codex ended up in the Russian capital,
0:20:52 > 0:20:56St Petersburg, where it went on display in the Imperial Library.
0:21:00 > 0:21:02After the Russian Revolution, the Soviet government
0:21:02 > 0:21:06was in desperate need of hard currency and sold the Codex
0:21:06 > 0:21:11to Britain for the equivalent of £5.5 million in today's money.
0:21:11 > 0:21:13Half was paid by the British government,
0:21:13 > 0:21:16the other half through public donations,
0:21:16 > 0:21:20so great was the public desire to acquire this precious Bible.
0:21:22 > 0:21:27'It is most appropriate that the most important manuscript
0:21:27 > 0:21:30'of the most important book in the world, the Bible,
0:21:30 > 0:21:33'should find a permanent home in the British Museum.'
0:21:43 > 0:21:46To find out more, I travel to London.
0:21:46 > 0:21:51At the British Library, I meet curator Dr Scot McKendrick.
0:21:54 > 0:21:58Well, the Codex Sinaiticus is arguably the most important
0:21:58 > 0:22:01manuscript in the entire British Library's collection.
0:22:01 > 0:22:04It really is as important as that.
0:22:04 > 0:22:08I mean, it's arguably one of the most important books
0:22:08 > 0:22:09in the world.
0:22:12 > 0:22:16The Codex Sinaiticus contained much of the Old Testament
0:22:16 > 0:22:18and the 27 books of the New Testament,
0:22:18 > 0:22:21reassuringly familiar to 19th-century Bible readers.
0:22:23 > 0:22:28But on closer inspection, the Codex revealed some disturbing features.
0:22:28 > 0:22:31Christians believed that the Bible was the unchanged
0:22:31 > 0:22:33and unchangeable word of God.
0:22:34 > 0:22:38Yet this earliest Bible was full of edits and corrections.
0:22:38 > 0:22:43Virtually every page has corrections on it.
0:22:43 > 0:22:49There are nearly 35,000 corrections in the entire manuscript.
0:22:49 > 0:22:52Some of these are more obvious than others.
0:22:52 > 0:22:54Now what are they?
0:22:54 > 0:23:00As part of making this manuscript you have three, possibly four,
0:23:00 > 0:23:02scribes who are involved in that exercise.
0:23:02 > 0:23:06And one of them is a sort of chief editor, we think
0:23:06 > 0:23:10and he's one of the most interventionist correctors.
0:23:11 > 0:23:15The second phase is several centuries later.
0:23:15 > 0:23:19In the seventh century, you have a series of correctors
0:23:19 > 0:23:21who actually change the character of the text,
0:23:21 > 0:23:23often quite dramatically.
0:23:23 > 0:23:26Most of the thousands of edits are tiny,
0:23:26 > 0:23:30though ANY change can be regarded as significant.
0:23:30 > 0:23:33And when one edit concerns words uttered by Jesus,
0:23:33 > 0:23:37as he was dying on the cross, it's enormously challenging.
0:23:37 > 0:23:43"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."
0:23:43 > 0:23:46Oddly, this was marked as doubtful by one of the correctors
0:23:46 > 0:23:50of the Sinaiticus but reinstated by a later corrector.
0:23:53 > 0:23:58There are 35,000 edits in the Codex Sinaiticus, which suggests
0:23:58 > 0:24:02that the scribes were unsure about the integrity of the biblical text.
0:24:02 > 0:24:05But the anomalies of the codex didn't end there.
0:24:09 > 0:24:13The most intriguing - and to some, troubling - feature of the
0:24:13 > 0:24:17Sinaiticus is the ending of the Gospel of Mark, which describes what
0:24:17 > 0:24:22happens after Jesus is crucified and his body is put into a tomb.
0:24:22 > 0:24:27So in Codex Sinaiticus, Mark's Gospel, which is our earliest gospel
0:24:27 > 0:24:31ends at verse eight of Chapter 16.
0:24:31 > 0:24:35So Chapter 16 tells us about the discovery of the empty tomb,
0:24:35 > 0:24:38the women go to the tomb, they discover it to be empty,
0:24:38 > 0:24:41they meet a mysterious angelic figure who tells them
0:24:41 > 0:24:45that Jesus has risen from the dead and then he tells them
0:24:45 > 0:24:49to go and proclaim that message to the disciples and to Peter.
0:24:49 > 0:24:55But the women are afraid and they tell nothing to anyone.
0:24:56 > 0:25:00So that's the way that the gospel ends in Sinaiticus.
0:25:02 > 0:25:05The ending of Mark recounted in 19th-century bibles
0:25:05 > 0:25:08like the King James Bible is simply not there.
0:25:11 > 0:25:14"Then they went out and ran away from the tomb,
0:25:14 > 0:25:15"trembling with amazement.
0:25:15 > 0:25:19"They said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid."
0:25:19 > 0:25:21And that's the ending of the Gospel of Mark
0:25:21 > 0:25:24in the Codex Sinaiticus.
0:25:24 > 0:25:28In this, the King James Bible, there is an additional 12 verses
0:25:28 > 0:25:31where Jesus then appears to his disciples,
0:25:31 > 0:25:35providing proof of the resurrection and proof of his divinity.
0:25:35 > 0:25:39The question was, why did the long ending
0:25:39 > 0:25:43not appear in the Sinaiticus, the oldest known edition of the Bible.
0:25:44 > 0:25:47It appears that sometime after the fourth century,
0:25:47 > 0:25:50a longer ending of Mark, including the resurrection appearances,
0:25:50 > 0:25:53had been inserted into the official Bible text.
0:25:55 > 0:25:58The arrival of Sinaiticus was an absolute
0:25:58 > 0:26:01bombshell in Victorian society
0:26:01 > 0:26:03and in the world, not just of theology,
0:26:03 > 0:26:05but across the whole community.
0:26:05 > 0:26:09For the first time it could be demonstrated without any doubt
0:26:09 > 0:26:13to the scholarly mind that the end of Mark, as people have known it
0:26:13 > 0:26:18for hundreds of years, was not the end of Mark as he had written it.
0:26:18 > 0:26:24That meant that there was a real doubt about all of the gospels.
0:26:25 > 0:26:29If what Tischendorf and some of these other people were
0:26:29 > 0:26:37saying was true, then this meant that God had allowed the Bible to become corrupted.
0:26:37 > 0:26:38What this meant for a Protestant,
0:26:38 > 0:26:42who believed that their self depended on a reading, and a
0:26:42 > 0:26:48reaction to the word of God, was "How is myself based on a falsehood?"
0:26:48 > 0:26:51It was absolutely threatening.
0:26:56 > 0:26:59At the age of 59, 15 years after discovering
0:26:59 > 0:27:02Sinaiticus, Tischendorf died following a stroke.
0:27:05 > 0:27:06Until the end,
0:27:06 > 0:27:10he remained robust about the short ending of Mark in the Sinaiticus,
0:27:10 > 0:27:13delighted that this more reliable Bible text had been found.
0:27:15 > 0:27:19But the questions raised by his discoveries about the original
0:27:19 > 0:27:23Bible text and its transmission over the centuries wouldn't go away.
0:27:30 > 0:27:34Tischendorf's achievements inspired a new generation of Bible
0:27:34 > 0:27:35hunters to head for Egypt.
0:27:39 > 0:27:41It included a pair of intrepid twin sisters
0:27:41 > 0:27:43from the West Coast of Scotland.
0:27:47 > 0:27:52Agnes and Margaret Smith were born in 1843.
0:27:52 > 0:27:55Raised as staunch Presbyterians, their widowed father gave them
0:27:55 > 0:27:59the best education available.
0:27:59 > 0:28:02Recognising that they had a gift for foreign languages,
0:28:02 > 0:28:05their father made a pact with them - every time they learned
0:28:05 > 0:28:09a foreign tongue, he'd take them to the country where it was spoken.
0:28:09 > 0:28:14With this incentive, they earned themselves trips to France, Spain, Italy and Germany.
0:28:14 > 0:28:16And all that before they turned 21.
0:28:19 > 0:28:22When their father died, he left the Smith sisters a huge
0:28:22 > 0:28:25inheritance that made them independent for life.
0:28:28 > 0:28:33Over the next 20 years, the twins spent considerable time travelling.
0:28:33 > 0:28:36They visited the Middle East and Europe
0:28:36 > 0:28:38before settling down in England.
0:28:45 > 0:28:49In the 1880s, they moved to the university city of Cambridge,
0:28:49 > 0:28:53smack in the middle of a religious uproar about the Bible.
0:28:55 > 0:28:58By the 1880s, this raging debate had completely engulfed Cambridge,
0:28:58 > 0:29:02one of the great centres of learning.
0:29:02 > 0:29:05The debate was fuelled by public consternation over
0:29:05 > 0:29:09the publication in 1881 of a revised version of the New Testament.
0:29:11 > 0:29:16The Greek text used as the basis of the translation has been wholly
0:29:16 > 0:29:21overhauled to reflect the discovery of Sinaiticus,
0:29:21 > 0:29:26to eliminate as many errors, as many slips, in the original translation, as possible.
0:29:31 > 0:29:36This is a publishing sensation. A million copies of the revised
0:29:36 > 0:29:39edition are sold on the day of its appearance.
0:29:39 > 0:29:43But sensation turns into misgiving
0:29:43 > 0:29:47and in some quarters into shock as people notice that
0:29:47 > 0:29:51many of the readings which had been particularly dear to their
0:29:51 > 0:29:56Christian faith have been quite literally relegated to the margins.
0:29:57 > 0:30:02The Revised Version of the Bible had 30,000 changes compared to the
0:30:02 > 0:30:04commonly used King James Bible.
0:30:04 > 0:30:08The Jesus saying "Father forgive them for they know not what they do"
0:30:08 > 0:30:12was given a marginal note explaining that some manuscripts omit these words.
0:30:15 > 0:30:19For most Christians, the text of the Bible
0:30:19 > 0:30:23and the word of God had always meant one and the same thing.
0:30:25 > 0:30:29Therefore the appearance of a radically revised text
0:30:29 > 0:30:35and of a radically revised translation was bound to shake that belief.
0:30:35 > 0:30:39Why should the public accept that this is the final revision?
0:30:39 > 0:30:43If further manuscripts, earlier manuscripts,
0:30:43 > 0:30:46rival manuscripts of the New Testament are discovered, will
0:30:46 > 0:30:50the text on which this translation is based have to change again?
0:30:50 > 0:30:55So this is a Bible which is meant to end the debate
0:30:55 > 0:31:00about what the word of God is but in some ways it merely begins it.
0:31:00 > 0:31:04'Almighty God who forgives all who truly repent, have mercy upon you,
0:31:04 > 0:31:08'pardon and deliver you from all your sins...'
0:31:09 > 0:31:13From 1881 onwards, new biblical discoveries were likely to
0:31:13 > 0:31:16feature in any new edition of the Bible.
0:31:17 > 0:31:21It was at this crucial moment in Christian history that the
0:31:21 > 0:31:24Smith sisters entered the fray.
0:31:24 > 0:31:28The twins were making plans to travel to Egypt - as tourists
0:31:28 > 0:31:30and first-time Bible hunters.
0:31:32 > 0:31:35In Cambridge, I meet their biographer, Janet Soskice.
0:31:38 > 0:31:42They decided to fulfil this long-lived dream of going to
0:31:42 > 0:31:44St Catherine's Monastery - footsteps of Moses.
0:31:44 > 0:31:48Sinai, from their point of view, was again the Bible lands,
0:31:48 > 0:31:51it was where Moses was addressed by God from the burning bush,
0:31:51 > 0:31:54where Moses was given the Law,
0:31:54 > 0:31:57so I think they initially wanted to be in the footsteps of Moses.
0:31:57 > 0:32:01But then they learned that there were fabulous manuscripts there
0:32:01 > 0:32:02and that enchanted them as well.
0:32:04 > 0:32:08The Cambridge scholar, Professor Rendel Harris, had told the
0:32:08 > 0:32:12twins about a mysterious manuscript that he had seen at the monastery.
0:32:14 > 0:32:18And he told Agnes that in a dark closet, underneath
0:32:18 > 0:32:23the Archbishop's rooms, was an old chest full of manuscripts
0:32:23 > 0:32:25he'd not fully had time to examine.
0:32:25 > 0:32:27And he thought those might contain some of the very earliest
0:32:27 > 0:32:31manuscripts in Syriac which is more or less Aramaic, the same language
0:32:31 > 0:32:36spoken by Jesus and the Disciples - that hadn't been examined.
0:32:36 > 0:32:39Rendell Harris's tip-off inspired the twins.
0:32:39 > 0:32:41Agnes even took lessons in Syriac.
0:32:44 > 0:32:48"We both looked forward to our journey with the brightest expectations.
0:32:48 > 0:32:52"For several weeks I constantly dreamt of the dark closet
0:32:52 > 0:32:58"so vividly described in which lay the mysterious two chests full of manuscripts."
0:33:00 > 0:33:02For Victorian women travelling on their own,
0:33:02 > 0:33:06the trip was full of hazards and danger.
0:33:06 > 0:33:09Before leaving Cairo for St Catherine's,
0:33:09 > 0:33:13Maggie and Agnes went shopping to prepare for the trip.
0:33:13 > 0:33:15You had really to take everything with you.
0:33:15 > 0:33:19They took all their water, they took corn and feed,
0:33:19 > 0:33:22they took ducks and chickens and turkeys,
0:33:22 > 0:33:27they took wine, they took silver, they took tablecloths.
0:33:27 > 0:33:31You had to take all your provisions for staying there and your coming back.
0:33:34 > 0:33:40Not to forget the most important of items in a British household, the teapot.
0:33:40 > 0:33:44This whole market - finally I've found somewhere that sells kitchen equipment.
0:33:46 > 0:33:49As-salam alaykum.
0:33:49 > 0:33:52I am going to be going to the desert and I just need a few things,
0:33:52 > 0:33:58so some pots, a pan and maybe something to make some coffee.
0:33:59 > 0:34:02Yeah, that's perfect.
0:34:02 > 0:34:05- Nice to meet you.- Really nice meeting you.
0:34:05 > 0:34:08Nice to meet you. I hope I see you in future.
0:34:08 > 0:34:11- In Sha' Allah.- In Sha' Allah.
0:34:14 > 0:34:17The Smith sisters followed the same route that Tischendorf had
0:34:17 > 0:34:20first taken more than 50 years earlier.
0:34:20 > 0:34:23But they carried a valuable new gadget -
0:34:23 > 0:34:26a camera and hundreds of glass plates for photographs.
0:34:34 > 0:34:37So it was a major feat to reach the monastery
0:34:37 > 0:34:41and they'd been warned, "The monks are not going to let you in because
0:34:41 > 0:34:45"you're Protestants, you're women - how are you going to succeed?"
0:34:45 > 0:34:49But they were confident that they would and that confidence
0:34:49 > 0:34:52impressed the monks that they had come such great distance
0:34:52 > 0:34:55out of love for the manuscripts and love for the scriptures
0:34:55 > 0:34:59and because they could speak modern Greek, they impressed the monks.
0:35:07 > 0:35:13DEVOTIONAL SINGING
0:35:21 > 0:35:25Maggie and Agnes were invited to attend the traditional service
0:35:25 > 0:35:29which has been celebrated here since the beginning of Christianity.
0:35:29 > 0:35:34DEVOTIONAL SINGING
0:35:37 > 0:35:40And after going to a service which lasted from a Presbyterian
0:35:40 > 0:35:44point of view far, far too long with far, far too many Kyrie Eleisons
0:35:44 > 0:35:46they were asked, "What would you like to see?"
0:35:46 > 0:35:49And Agnes said, "All your oldest manuscripts in Syriac."
0:35:56 > 0:36:00Since the tip-off by the Cambridge scholar Rendel Harris, Agnes's
0:36:00 > 0:36:03knowledge of Syriac had improved enough for her to understand
0:36:03 > 0:36:06the basics of the Syriac language.
0:36:10 > 0:36:15She was shown down and they brought out of this dark closet this chest,
0:36:15 > 0:36:18brought a number of volumes up to light,
0:36:18 > 0:36:20and her eyes quickly fell on this book.
0:36:20 > 0:36:25She was looking at it. It was very unpromising but it was in Syriac.
0:36:27 > 0:36:30The book was an ancient codex that hadn't been opened for many years.
0:36:33 > 0:36:36When the twins first found the codex, the pages had fused
0:36:36 > 0:36:38together and they couldn't read it.
0:36:38 > 0:36:42Ever so resourceful, Maggie and Agnes used steam from their teapot
0:36:42 > 0:36:44to unstick the pages and tease open the codex.
0:36:47 > 0:36:48Written in bold letters,
0:36:48 > 0:36:52the codex contained an unspectacular Christian text.
0:36:52 > 0:36:53But underneath it,
0:36:53 > 0:36:57Agnes made out some faint writing that could be extremely interesting.
0:37:01 > 0:37:05Peering at it, she could see at the top of the pages
0:37:05 > 0:37:08"According to Luke, According to Matthew."
0:37:08 > 0:37:12And she knew from this that it was a palimpsest.
0:37:12 > 0:37:14"I had never before seen a palimpsest,
0:37:14 > 0:37:19"but my father had often related to us how the old monks, when velum
0:37:19 > 0:37:23"became scarce and paper was not yet invented, scraped away the writing
0:37:23 > 0:37:30"from the pages of their books and wrote something new on top of it."
0:37:30 > 0:37:35A palimpsest is a text that has been overwritten by a more recent text.
0:37:38 > 0:37:41Today, scientists can bring out the under-text with
0:37:41 > 0:37:44the help of multispectral imaging.
0:37:46 > 0:37:49A technique not available in the 1890s.
0:37:53 > 0:37:56The twins suspected that the underlying Bible text
0:37:56 > 0:38:00contained the four gospels and that it was extremely old.
0:38:06 > 0:38:09To transcribe the under-text of the palimpsest correctly,
0:38:09 > 0:38:13they would need the help of more experienced Syriac readers.
0:38:18 > 0:38:21Armed with photographs of the palimpsest,
0:38:21 > 0:38:24Maggie and Agnes returned to Britain.
0:38:26 > 0:38:28The Smith sisters are pioneers.
0:38:28 > 0:38:32Not just because they have discovered a new biblical text,
0:38:32 > 0:38:35but because they're studying it in radically new ways,
0:38:35 > 0:38:39and one of those radically new ways involves photography.
0:38:39 > 0:38:42What had previously perhaps been a rather impressionistic
0:38:42 > 0:38:46argument about what you THOUGHT the text said can now be
0:38:46 > 0:38:49strengthened by the objective evidence of the photograph.
0:38:52 > 0:38:56The photographic evidence persuaded two Syriac language experts
0:38:56 > 0:38:59from Cambridge to join forces with the Smith sisters.
0:39:02 > 0:39:05Within a year, the twins were back at St Catherine's, together
0:39:05 > 0:39:07with the experts and their wives.
0:39:10 > 0:39:12Everyone was sworn to secrecy.
0:39:15 > 0:39:17They were worried about the Germans.
0:39:17 > 0:39:19You know, the perennial German threat.
0:39:19 > 0:39:24Germans were at the time the world leaders in the study
0:39:24 > 0:39:26of ancient manuscripts.
0:39:26 > 0:39:31And it was felt that once a clue got out, the Germans might get there,
0:39:31 > 0:39:33and pip them at the post, as it were.
0:39:36 > 0:39:43In their tents, Agnes and the two Syriac experts struggled hard to decipher the hidden writing.
0:39:43 > 0:39:44But the twins had come prepared.
0:39:47 > 0:39:50Maggie and Agnes knew the Codex was a palimpsest.
0:39:50 > 0:39:53So they acquired an experimental chemical called
0:39:53 > 0:39:56hydro-sulphite of ammonia, to bring out the under-text.
0:39:59 > 0:40:02When Agnes applied the chemical, it did the trick
0:40:02 > 0:40:03and brought out the hidden text.
0:40:06 > 0:40:08After 40 days of intense work,
0:40:08 > 0:40:10the transcription was completed.
0:40:13 > 0:40:15They had indeed found a complete set
0:40:15 > 0:40:17of the four Gospels of the New Testament.
0:40:22 > 0:40:24The twins returned to Britain,
0:40:24 > 0:40:28where news of their discovery was already getting newspaper attention.
0:40:31 > 0:40:36'Twin sister explorers turn new light on the four Gospels.'
0:40:38 > 0:40:42Experts dated the Codex, now known as the Syriacus,
0:40:42 > 0:40:44back to the late 4th century AD...
0:40:46 > 0:40:49..the same century that Tischendorf's Codex Sinaiticus,
0:40:49 > 0:40:52the world's oldest complete Bible, was compiled.
0:40:55 > 0:40:57But like the Codex Sinaiticus,
0:40:57 > 0:41:00the Syriacus also included some features
0:41:00 > 0:41:03that were deeply unsettling for the faithful.
0:41:03 > 0:41:05Like Tischendorf's Sinaiticus,
0:41:05 > 0:41:09the Codex Syriacus also had the short ending of Mark.
0:41:11 > 0:41:15There's no mention of Jesus' appearances to his disciples
0:41:15 > 0:41:16after the crucifixion.
0:41:20 > 0:41:22When the Codex Syriacus is discovered,
0:41:22 > 0:41:25it has after the short ending the words,
0:41:25 > 0:41:27"This is the ending."
0:41:27 > 0:41:31Right? And then, "Here begins the Gospel of Luke."
0:41:31 > 0:41:33After that, there can be no debate.
0:41:33 > 0:41:36It shows that the short ending was authentic.
0:41:36 > 0:41:40The ending of Mark is profound... troubling.
0:41:40 > 0:41:42The threat is there's no resurrection.
0:41:42 > 0:41:45There's no good news! It ends, "For they were terrified."
0:41:45 > 0:41:47It's the opposite of good news,
0:41:47 > 0:41:49they didn't tell anybody anything about it!
0:41:49 > 0:41:54This was a very frightening ending for the Victorian Christians.
0:41:54 > 0:41:57Evidently the long ending with the resurrection appearances
0:41:57 > 0:42:00was only added to the Gospel of Mark later,
0:42:00 > 0:42:02centuries after the death of Jesus.
0:42:06 > 0:42:09Even after Maggie and Agnes had discovered the Codex Syriacus,
0:42:09 > 0:42:13the questions surrounding the ending of Mark wouldn't go away.
0:42:13 > 0:42:16The central event of Christianity, the resurrection,
0:42:16 > 0:42:18had been called into question.
0:42:18 > 0:42:20Perhaps new discoveries by Bible hunters
0:42:20 > 0:42:22could provide further clues.
0:42:24 > 0:42:26Maggie and Agnes, for their part,
0:42:26 > 0:42:28didn't regard the short ending of Mark as a problem
0:42:28 > 0:42:32because the resurrection appearances are included in the other Gospels
0:42:32 > 0:42:34and in the Epistles of Paul.
0:42:37 > 0:42:39And here we see their portraits.
0:42:39 > 0:42:41We have on our left, Agnes.
0:42:41 > 0:42:44And on our right, Margaret. Wearing their academic gowns...
0:42:44 > 0:42:47The Smith sisters went on to gain academic honours.
0:42:49 > 0:42:51They were trail blazers in a city
0:42:51 > 0:42:54where most colleges still excluded women from academic life.
0:42:54 > 0:42:58..the Isle of Skye is an old travelling trunk of Agnes's...
0:42:58 > 0:43:00At the end of their lives,
0:43:00 > 0:43:02the twins bequeathed much of their fortune
0:43:02 > 0:43:04to Westminster College in Cambridge.
0:43:04 > 0:43:08Here, one of their travel chests takes pride of place.
0:43:15 > 0:43:17Back in Egypt,
0:43:17 > 0:43:19following the Smith sisters' discovery of the Syriacus,
0:43:19 > 0:43:22the hunt for new biblical manuscripts intensified.
0:43:24 > 0:43:27By the turn of the century, the manuscript trade had shifted
0:43:27 > 0:43:31from the desert monasteries to the antiquity shops here in Cairo.
0:43:31 > 0:43:34By then, everybody wanted a piece of the action -
0:43:34 > 0:43:38the Germans, the Italians, the French, the British...
0:43:38 > 0:43:40Until a new contender came on the scene -
0:43:40 > 0:43:42American millionaires.
0:43:49 > 0:43:52In 1906, Charles Lang Freer, an American businessman,
0:43:52 > 0:43:54was on his first trip to Cairo.
0:43:58 > 0:44:00He came to buy ancient ceramics.
0:44:06 > 0:44:08But his trip would be a turning point
0:44:08 > 0:44:11in the story of Bible hunting in Egypt.
0:44:20 > 0:44:24Freer's story began in the American capital, Washington DC.
0:44:27 > 0:44:29It involved the American government,
0:44:29 > 0:44:31even the president of the United States...
0:44:34 > 0:44:37..and of course, Charles Lang Freer himself.
0:44:38 > 0:44:40Freer was an accountant,
0:44:40 > 0:44:42who made his fortune in railroad box cars.
0:44:42 > 0:44:45But for him, that was just a means to an end.
0:44:45 > 0:44:48His true passion was collecting fine art.
0:44:54 > 0:44:56Freer's magnificent collection
0:44:56 > 0:45:00centred around the art of America and East Asia.
0:45:01 > 0:45:05Freer was a man who believed in the therapeutic nature of art -
0:45:05 > 0:45:09art as a healer, art as a redemption.
0:45:09 > 0:45:11But he also believes, very strongly,
0:45:11 > 0:45:14that there are beauties
0:45:14 > 0:45:16that transcend different cultures.
0:45:20 > 0:45:23'My great desire has been to unite modern work
0:45:23 > 0:45:27'with masterpieces of certain periods of high civilisation.'
0:45:32 > 0:45:34Today, The Freer Gallery, with his collection,
0:45:34 > 0:45:36is one of the centrepieces
0:45:36 > 0:45:39of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington.
0:45:46 > 0:45:48In 1902, Freer first considered
0:45:48 > 0:45:51offering his art collection to the Smithsonian,
0:45:51 > 0:45:53as a gift to the American people.
0:45:54 > 0:45:58But the Smithsonian, a largely scientific institution, hesitated.
0:46:01 > 0:46:02Freer wouldn't give up easily.
0:46:05 > 0:46:08Freer was so intent to donate his collection to the Smithsonian,
0:46:08 > 0:46:12he enlisted the aid of the US President himself to make it happen.
0:46:12 > 0:46:15I think that says a lot about his character, his philanthropy,
0:46:15 > 0:46:18and most of all his determination.
0:46:18 > 0:46:23It isn't actually until 1905-1906,
0:46:23 > 0:46:27that there's the intervention of President Roosevelt,
0:46:27 > 0:46:29in fact encouraged by his wife.
0:46:29 > 0:46:31And it's Roosevelt
0:46:31 > 0:46:33who persuades the Smithsonian
0:46:33 > 0:46:36and above all Congress to accept this gift.
0:46:37 > 0:46:41With the deal struck, Freer would continue to expand his collection.
0:46:42 > 0:46:47In Washington, I meet up again with Bible expert, Dr Kent Clarke,
0:46:47 > 0:46:50who I last saw at St Catherine's in Egypt.
0:46:51 > 0:46:54This becomes his concentrated years of collecting
0:46:54 > 0:46:56and so as part of that process,
0:46:56 > 0:46:59he makes five independent trips to the Far East
0:46:59 > 0:47:02and basically world travels.
0:47:02 > 0:47:05So the first time that he reaches Egypt is in 1906.
0:47:10 > 0:47:14Freer's first port of call were the bazaars of Cairo.
0:47:14 > 0:47:17His mission was to buy rare Egyptian ceramics.
0:47:17 > 0:47:20Today, the Egyptian antiquities market
0:47:20 > 0:47:23is subject to stringent legal controls.
0:47:23 > 0:47:26At the time, regulation was more relaxed.
0:47:28 > 0:47:31The old market here was Freer's hunting ground.
0:47:31 > 0:47:33He'd spend his time in and out of shops,
0:47:33 > 0:47:35looking to buy antique pottery,
0:47:35 > 0:47:38until he was tipped off about something far more intriguing.
0:47:42 > 0:47:45Freer was introduced to a local dealer, Ali Arabi,
0:47:45 > 0:47:48who invited the American to Giza just outside Cairo.
0:47:50 > 0:47:53Here Freer visited the Mena House Hotel.
0:47:53 > 0:47:57Next to the pyramids, it was a magnet for well-heeled Western travellers.
0:47:59 > 0:48:02Inside the hotel, Ali Arabi had his shop.
0:48:05 > 0:48:08Freer was invited to see some ancient biblical manuscripts.
0:48:09 > 0:48:12Other buyers were already interested in acquiring them,
0:48:12 > 0:48:14including several European Bible hunters.
0:48:20 > 0:48:24There's some cloak and dagger involved in this story,
0:48:24 > 0:48:28because perhaps a German has seen the manuscripts before, almost certainly.
0:48:28 > 0:48:31The famous Grenfell and Hunt, the Englishmen, have seen the manuscript before
0:48:31 > 0:48:35and for some reason neither has bought it.
0:48:35 > 0:48:37The price seems to be too high.
0:48:37 > 0:48:41When Freer saw the manuscripts, he was dumbfounded.
0:48:41 > 0:48:46They included an ancient Greek codex with the four New Testament gospels,
0:48:46 > 0:48:48Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
0:48:48 > 0:48:52According to Freer, he was swept off his feet.
0:48:52 > 0:48:55Now, normally, Freer was a really cautious collector,
0:48:55 > 0:48:58but on that day he acted totally out of character.
0:48:58 > 0:49:00He'd seen the manuscript in the morning
0:49:00 > 0:49:03and without verifying with any other specialists,
0:49:03 > 0:49:07by that afternoon he shelled out a huge amount of money for it.
0:49:07 > 0:49:09SHIP'S HORN
0:49:14 > 0:49:16Freer took his codex to America.
0:49:19 > 0:49:24The gospels and other manuscripts had cost him 7,750,
0:49:24 > 0:49:28but it seemed money well spent as the discovery hit the headlines.
0:49:30 > 0:49:32The newspaper clipping here just shows you
0:49:32 > 0:49:35the popular sensationalisation of these manuscripts.
0:49:35 > 0:49:37These were significant finds.
0:49:37 > 0:49:40- He's even got the Pith Helmet. - And at the top you can read,
0:49:40 > 0:49:43"bartering for the precious biblical manuscripts,
0:49:43 > 0:49:45"Charles Lang Freer
0:49:45 > 0:49:47tells the story of his great finds in Egypt's sands."
0:49:47 > 0:49:50I mean, this really is the Indiana Jones of the day.
0:49:53 > 0:49:56The codex was extraordinary.
0:49:56 > 0:49:59Written on parchment and bound between wooden covers,
0:49:59 > 0:50:01it would eventually be determined
0:50:01 > 0:50:05to be the third oldest gospel collection in the world,
0:50:05 > 0:50:08dated around the 5th century AD.
0:50:09 > 0:50:12And there was something unique about this gospel collection
0:50:12 > 0:50:14known as the Washington Codex,
0:50:14 > 0:50:16the ending of the Gospel of Mark.
0:50:17 > 0:50:22The principal element only found in this manuscript
0:50:22 > 0:50:24is what's known as the Freer Logion.
0:50:27 > 0:50:31This is actually a passage at the very end of Mark
0:50:31 > 0:50:33that appears in no other manuscript
0:50:33 > 0:50:37out of thousands of Greek copies of the Bible.
0:50:38 > 0:50:40Unlike the Sinaiticus and Syriacus,
0:50:40 > 0:50:43the Washington Codex has the long ending of Mark
0:50:43 > 0:50:46with the resurrection appearances.
0:50:46 > 0:50:49But inserted into this long ending
0:50:49 > 0:50:52is a whole new passage... the Freer Logion.
0:50:53 > 0:50:58So this is a paragraph in which Christ appears to the Disciples.
0:50:59 > 0:51:05And he berates them for not believing in him and his resurrection.
0:51:05 > 0:51:10And they say, "Excuse us, but we're misled by Satan."
0:51:10 > 0:51:14And he says, "Actually, Satan's days are over,
0:51:14 > 0:51:16"but there are horrors still to come."
0:51:16 > 0:51:20The Jesus saying declaring the end of Satan
0:51:20 > 0:51:23had been mentioned by the early church fathers,
0:51:23 > 0:51:24but for the first time
0:51:24 > 0:51:27the passage was confirmed as part of a biblical text,
0:51:27 > 0:51:30fresh evidence of various attempts to provide
0:51:30 > 0:51:33a more "suitable" ending for the Gospel of Mark.
0:51:34 > 0:51:38Freer brings this gospel manuscript home and, lo and behold,
0:51:38 > 0:51:41here in a Greek manuscript of the gospels,
0:51:41 > 0:51:44from the 5th century maybe,
0:51:44 > 0:51:46er...you have it there. So it was phenomenal.
0:51:46 > 0:51:49People... It hit newspaper headlines around the world.
0:51:51 > 0:51:54Realising how important his purchase was,
0:51:54 > 0:51:56Freer was keen to retrace his steps.
0:51:58 > 0:52:01In 1908, he makes a second trip to Egypt.
0:52:01 > 0:52:03The primary purpose of him coming
0:52:03 > 0:52:05is to find out the provenance
0:52:05 > 0:52:08of where the Freer manuscripts were discovered,
0:52:08 > 0:52:10because there's pretty strong speculation
0:52:10 > 0:52:13that there'll be more materials that can be found there.
0:52:13 > 0:52:15And so in discussions with Arabi,
0:52:15 > 0:52:19Freer recognises that Arabi is trying to protect the so-called "digger,"
0:52:19 > 0:52:22the person who found the manuscripts. He's never named,
0:52:22 > 0:52:25he's only ever called the "digger" in the correspondence right from beginning to end,
0:52:25 > 0:52:28so we never know the name.
0:52:30 > 0:52:33Eventually, Arabi suggested the gospels had been found
0:52:33 > 0:52:37at an abandoned desert site at the Fayoum Oasis south of Cairo.
0:52:39 > 0:52:42But in public, Freer promoted the view that the manuscript
0:52:42 > 0:52:47came from the famous White Monastery near Sohag, 200 miles further south.
0:52:49 > 0:52:53It was a ploy to throw rival Bible hunters off the scent.
0:52:53 > 0:52:55Freer was loving the adventure.
0:52:56 > 0:52:59"I am enjoying the quest greatly.
0:52:59 > 0:53:02"Poker and all other games are nothing.
0:53:02 > 0:53:04"It's real living, real experience,
0:53:04 > 0:53:08"and beats winning a big contract for box cars out of sight!"
0:53:11 > 0:53:12Freer spent huge amounts
0:53:12 > 0:53:16to investigate the Fayoum Oasis location suggested by Ali Arabi.
0:53:20 > 0:53:21Freer's search lead to the ruins
0:53:21 > 0:53:25of an abandoned site here on the edge of this ancient lake.
0:53:25 > 0:53:27His team excavated all around the site,
0:53:27 > 0:53:31but failed to locate any old biblical manuscripts.
0:53:31 > 0:53:33The trail...had gone cold.
0:53:42 > 0:53:45In America, the Washington Codex
0:53:45 > 0:53:48had become a key part of the Freer Gallery collection.
0:53:53 > 0:53:56Excitement continued to surround the discovery.
0:53:57 > 0:53:59The unique ending of Mark
0:53:59 > 0:54:02isn't the only feature that stands out in the Washington Codex.
0:54:02 > 0:54:05Forensic analysis gives us a rare glimpse
0:54:05 > 0:54:07into how the Bible was understood,
0:54:07 > 0:54:09its status in everyday Christian life.
0:54:11 > 0:54:14Emily Jacobson is the Paper Conservator
0:54:14 > 0:54:16for the Freer and Sackler Galleries.
0:54:16 > 0:54:20There are pages that have wax splatters on them,
0:54:20 > 0:54:24- possibly from the text being read with a candle.- Can I see?- Sure.
0:54:28 > 0:54:31As we move to this opening,
0:54:31 > 0:54:35you can actually see these wax drops.
0:54:35 > 0:54:37So if you can imagine...
0:54:37 > 0:54:41- A monk with his candle.- Exactly, reading by candle light.- Wow!
0:54:43 > 0:54:46In the front page of each of the four gospels,
0:54:46 > 0:54:50the opening page of each of them, there are curious spots,
0:54:50 > 0:54:54only on the front page not in the rest of the gospels.
0:54:54 > 0:54:56They are tallow, they're drippings from candles.
0:54:56 > 0:54:58And so this gospel Codex early on
0:54:58 > 0:55:01became the prize possession of some monastery or group
0:55:01 > 0:55:05that was probably kept in a vault or someplace in the dark and then brought out.
0:55:05 > 0:55:09And perhaps when visiting dignitaries like bishops or someone
0:55:09 > 0:55:11would come they would show them their prize possession.
0:55:11 > 0:55:14And the bishop would be most interested in seeing
0:55:14 > 0:55:17the holy gospels associated with the Apostles.
0:55:19 > 0:55:24Clearly, this biblical text had taken on iconic status.
0:55:24 > 0:55:26And something else seems to have happened
0:55:26 > 0:55:28200 years after the codex was written.
0:55:30 > 0:55:32Specialists have suggested
0:55:32 > 0:55:37that in the 7th century the way it was bound was changed,
0:55:37 > 0:55:41and it was painted with these figures on the exterior.
0:55:42 > 0:55:47So possibly it was put on the altar upright,
0:55:47 > 0:55:53so that you would see not the contents....not the written word,
0:55:53 > 0:55:55but the writers.
0:55:55 > 0:56:00So it's no longer functional, it's now an object to be worshipped.
0:56:00 > 0:56:02Yes. It's the symbol of a gospel.
0:56:04 > 0:56:06PRIEST CHANTS
0:56:11 > 0:56:14It was a key moment in the development of Christianity.
0:56:18 > 0:56:22Rather than be locked away... a biblical codex was revered.
0:56:23 > 0:56:25It suggested that the Bible text
0:56:25 > 0:56:29had taken on a sacred and divine character of its own.
0:56:29 > 0:56:31PRIEST CHANTS
0:56:31 > 0:56:34Freer's discovery marked the highlight
0:56:34 > 0:56:36of 60 years of Bible hunting.
0:56:41 > 0:56:44With the discovery of Sinaiticus and the discovery of Syriacus,
0:56:44 > 0:56:46and the Washington Codex,
0:56:46 > 0:56:49where does that put our understanding of early Christianity?
0:56:49 > 0:56:52Well, it shows that with regard to the New Testament writings,
0:56:52 > 0:56:54it shows that the copiers and readers
0:56:54 > 0:56:59accidentally and deliberately in some cases altered what they were copying.
0:56:59 > 0:57:02In some cases through deliberate attempts to sort of try to improve
0:57:02 > 0:57:03the text or make it more readable.
0:57:03 > 0:57:07How do you think that's changed the face of Christianity as a result?
0:57:07 > 0:57:11If you demand a verbally inherent Bible with no problems,
0:57:11 > 0:57:12you have problems.
0:57:12 > 0:57:15If, on the other hand, your Christian faith says,
0:57:15 > 0:57:18"I don't need an inherent Bible, all I need is a Bible
0:57:18 > 0:57:22that basically puts me in touch with the core teachings
0:57:22 > 0:57:24of the Christian faith," you're OK.
0:57:24 > 0:57:27If you demand a perfect set of circumstances, you're in trouble.
0:57:31 > 0:57:33For nearly 2,000 years,
0:57:33 > 0:57:37the Bible had been a source of certainty for the faithful.
0:57:37 > 0:57:39The discoveries of the Bible hunters
0:57:39 > 0:57:44began a controversial reassessment of Christianity's sacred scripture,
0:57:44 > 0:57:46hailed by some, dismissed by others.
0:57:49 > 0:57:54But by the early 1900s, the focus of the Bible hunters was shifting.
0:57:54 > 0:57:58Discoveries elsewhere were changing the nature of the debate.
0:57:58 > 0:57:59In the sands of the Egyptian desert,
0:57:59 > 0:58:01archaeologists had unearthed scriptures
0:58:01 > 0:58:04that no humans had set eyes upon in 1,500 years!
0:58:06 > 0:58:09Lost gospels that never made it into the official Bible.
0:58:13 > 0:58:16Lost Christianities branded as heretical.
0:58:16 > 0:58:20The controversy over the Bible as the word of God
0:58:20 > 0:58:22was only just beginning.
0:58:37 > 0:58:40Go on, boy! Good, boy/girl.
0:58:40 > 0:58:42HE LAUGHS