Papyrus 4

Description

It is one of the earliest manuscripts (along with P ⁷⁵) of the Gospel of Luke and contains extensive sections of its first six chapters. It is currently housed in the Bibliothèque nationale de France (Suppl. Gr. 1120) in Paris.

It contains texts of Luke: 1:58-59; 1:62-2:1; 2:6-7; 3:8-4:2; 4:29-32, 34-35; 5:3-8; 5:30-6:16

The Greek text-type of this codex is a representative of the Alexandrian. Aland placed it in Category I. There is agreement with P ⁷⁵ in 93%.

In Luke 6:2 — οὐκ ἔξεστιν (not lawful) for οὐκ ἔξεστιν ποιεῖν (not lawful to do); the reading is supported only by Codex Vaticanus Graecus 1209, (Codex Bezae), Codex Nitriensis, 700, lat, cop^sa, cop^bo, arm, geo;

P ⁴ was used as stuffing for the binding of "a codex of Philo, written in the later third century and found in a jar which had been walled up in a house at Coptos [in 250]."

Philip Comfort and David Barret in their book Text of the Earliest NT Greek Manuscripts argue that P ⁴ came from the same codex as P ⁶⁴⁺⁶⁷, the Magdalen papyrus, and date the texts to 150-175. Willker tentatively agrees stating 'The [3rd century] dating given is that of NA. Some date it into the 2nd CE (e.g. Roberts and Comfort). This is quite probable considering the use as binding material for a 3rd CE codex'. Comfort and Barret also show that P ⁴ and P ⁶⁴⁺⁶⁷ have affinities with a number of late 2nd century papyri. Roberts (1979), Skeat (1997), Willker and Stanton also date the text to the late 2nd century, leading Gregory to conclude that '[t]here is good reason to believe that P ⁴ ... may have been written late in the 2nd century...'. Most recently Charlesworth has concluded 'that P ⁶⁴⁺⁶⁷ and P ⁴, though written by the same scribe, are not from the same ... codex.'