Jesus Christ performed many miracles (Picture: Hamburg State and University Library/Getty)
The earliest surviving copy describing one of Jesus’s miracles has just been discovered.
Researchers from German and Belgium have identified a fragment of papyrus, a material used to write on before paper, which reveals the lesser-known story of the ‘vivification of the sparrows’, where five-year-old Jesus is said to have turned clay pigeons into live birds.
The 2,000 year-old papyrus text was discovered in an ancient Egyptian manuscript, but the clumsiness of the handwriting made the researchers believe that it was probably written as part of a school exercise in the 4th or 5th Century.
However, the original story is thought to have been written in around the 2nd Century, as part of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas (IGT), a book that talks about Christ’s childhood.
But until now, the papyrus was unnoticed at the Hamburg State and University Library in Germany.
At first researchers thought the scripture was an everyday item like a shopping list, since the handwriting was so clumsy.
Head of Christ, painted in the 15th Century (Picture: The Print Collector/Getty)
Papyrologist Dr Lajos Berkes said: ‘It was thought to be part of an everyday document, such as a private letter or a shopping list, because the handwriting seems so clumsy.
‘We first noticed the word Jesus in the text. Then, by comparing it with numerous other digitised papyri, we deciphered it letter by letter and quickly realised that it could not be an everyday document.’
It was through this analysis that they realised this text is the earliest known copy of Jesus Christ performing a miracle as a child.
‘The fragment is of extraordinary interest for research,’ he said.
‘On the one hand, because we were able to date it to the 4th to 5th century, making it the earliest known copy. On the other hand, because we were able to gain new insights into the transmission of the text.’
The researchers analysed the fragment which measures four inches by two inches and contained 13 Greek lines. The full results of the study will be published in the journal of Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik.
The text is about the second miracle of Jesus (Picture: Hamburg State and University Library)
Dr Gabriel Nocchi Macedo, from the University of Liège, said: ‘Our findings on this late antique Greek copy of the work confirm the current assessment that the Infancy Gospel according to Thomas was originally written in Greek.’
The Infancy Gospel of Thomas was not included in the Bible over questions who wrote it, but it was widespread during the medieval period and circulated among the early Christian communities.
The text on the ancient papyrus describes the miracle of vivification of the sparrows, also called Jesus’s ‘second miracle’. In this miracle a young Jesus moulded 12 sparrows from clay. At first, Joseph, Jesus’s legal father told him off for creating the sparrows on the Sabbath. But when Jesus clapped his hands, the clay figures came to life and flew away.
Before the new record, the earliest version of the Gospel of Thomas was thought to have come from an 11th Century codex.