Father Justin, the librarian at St. Catherine’s Monastery, Mt. Sinai, Egypt, is the only American ever to live at the world’s oldest monastery. Founded in the middle of the sixth century by Emperor Justinian, the monastery has been continuously inhabited since. Mohammed even hid there before he had much of a following. With the discovery of the New Finds manuscripts in1975, St. Catherine’s now has the second largest collection of ancient manuscripts in the world, just after the Vatican’s. Before the New Finds were discovered, the monastery library housed 3300 manuscripts; now there are 4500 manuscripts and tens of thousands of fragments. The most important leaves that were found were from Codex Sinaiticus—a dozen complete leaves and about two dozen fragments.
The son of Baptist missionaries, Father Justin grew up in El Paso and earned his bachelor’s degree at the University of Texas. He has been a monk at St. Catherine’s monastery since the mid-90s, and has been the librarian for the past two years. You may have seen his picture on the cover of a recent issue of Biblical Archeology Review or in any number of newspapers around the world.
I was privileged to visit St. Catherine’s in September 2002 to examine some of the New Finds manuscripts when Father Justin was the assistant to the librarian. During the week I was there, new digital photographic equipment from Switzerland was installed. It was Father Justin’s duty to photograph the manuscripts.
Since Father Justin became the librarian, there has been a collaboration among the four institutes that possess portions of Codex Sinaiticus: the British Library, London; University of Leipzig; the National Library in St. Petersburg, Russia; and St. Catherine’s. These four institutes are working together to publish exquisite digital photographs of the famous codex, some of which will be on-line beginning next month. The last images of the New Testament (nearly a century old) have been digitally photographed and can be seen at the website of the Center for the Study of New Testament manuscripts, www.csntm.org.
Father Justin was in Dallas this past week. When I was informed that he was in town, I was asked if I would like to have him speak in one of my classes at Dallas Seminary. That’s like asking Darrell Bock if he likes basketball! Through last-minute arrangements, we were able to get Father Justin to the school where he was ready to give a PowerPoint presentation on the manuscripts at Mt. Sinai, focusing especially on Sinaiticus. But he also made some thought-provoking remarks about the symbiotic relationship between the monks of St. Catherine’s and the local bedouin. For over a millennium, the two groups have lived in harmony, even though each group holds tenaciously to its beliefs. In this enclave at the base of Mt. Sinai, where three of the planet’s religions look for inspiration, a microcosm of the world is acted out. Perhaps it’s not only the biblical manuscripts there that can teach us about what it means to be a follower of Christ.
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