The Constantine Codex

by Paul L Maier

  She threw her arms about him.

  Eventually Jon’s mind was clear enough to relate the full story to all present, including a detail from the Boston police who had stood in the background until the medical procedures were completed. The Hub’s finest sprang into action at once. They radioed colleagues at Logan to arrest Osman al-Ghazali but learned that he was long gone. They had only slightly better luck with Waste Management, Inc., of Somerville, which supposedly handled refuse from Cambridge. The dispatcher there wanted to get the details from Jon, particularly the time and place of the garbage pickup, so the police officer handed the phone to Jon, and he was able to respond with reasonable clarity.

  “And exactly what is it that you’re looking for?” the man asked.

  “A valuable codex… that’s an ancient book of manuscript pages sewn together.”

  “Oh. Sorry. That’d be impossible to retrieve, Professor, because Harvard tries to show the world how to recycle-green’s their favorite color, not crimson-but you know that. So your book is probably being recycled, even as we speak.”

  A stab of despair hit Jon as he handed the phone back to the officer. Both his hands turned into fists, and if Osman al-Ghazali had been within range, he personally would have throttled the traitor for manuscript murder. “It’s destroyed,” he told the women. “This precious, precious treasure is now being recycled, if you can believe it! Into what? Maybe toilet paper…”

  Obviously in despair, Shannon and Marylou appeared to search for appropriate words but found none.

  The phone rang. It was the dispatcher again, and he wanted to talk to Jon.

  “I had it wrong, Professor,” he said. “Turns out that the recycling plant is shut down for repairs, so as of a couple days ago, they’re trucking all waste to the North Andover landfill so that it doesn’t pile up.”

  “That’s wonderful news!” Jon said.

  “Well, I’m not sure why… I really hate to tell you this, but our chances of actually finding that thing in the landfill are next to impossible. A needle in a haystack would be easier.”

  “Please, please,” Jon said, “I really beg of you. You must try to save one of the most important documents in the history of Western civilization.”

  “We’ll do our best, Professor, but I’m afraid… Well, we’ll really try.”

  They wanted to keep Jon at Mass General that night, but he would have none of it. His wits had now returned and fury was burning through his brain, yet he was still rational enough to let Shannon take the wheel on the drive back to Weston.

  Early the next morning, Waste Management phoned again. “It was truck number 68, Professor Weber, that picked up the waste from Harvard Yard about noon yesterday. Driver was Jim Peabody-a good reliable fellow from Bar Harbor, Maine. That’s pronounced ‘Bah Habah’ up there!”

  Ordinarily, Jon would have told him to skip such peripheral details, but now he savored every syllable.

  “Anyway, Jim dumped his waste at the landfill in North Andover-oh, it’s about twenty miles from Harvard Square-and I’ll tell you what we’ve done. We’ve cordoned off the area in the landfill where our trucks discharged yesterday, and we’re dumping elsewhere while we try to find that big book you told us about.”

  “Thank you. Thank you ever so much,” Jon said.

  “Again, though, I hate to tell you, it’s going to be a downright miracle if we find it. And even if we do, three thousand pounds of pressure probably crushed that Kotex thing…”

  “That’s ‘codex,’” Jon advised.

  “Fine. Codex. But it was probably crushed into pulp.”

  Jon winced. The statement was true enough. “Just try, please, try . I’ll be driving out to the landfill to help you look.”

  “Well, I don’t think… Hold it, on the other hand, it’d be helpful to know exactly what we’re looking for.”

  “I’ll be there at eleven, with photographs of the codex.”

  For the next two hours, he and Shannon called the secretaries of all departments with offices at or near Harvard Yard with a question that must have seemed quite ridiculous: “What sort of waste did your department discard yesterday?” Of course, there was a quick follow-up to explain the context of that inane query. Clearly grasping at straws, Jon was trying to see if some marker might not be found within all the tons of waste.

  But there seemed to be nothing at all unusual. Most of the waste mentioned consisted of cardboard mailers for books sent to professors by publishers in hopes of adoption, interdepartmental communications, intradepartmental memos, book catalogs, advertisements, and the like-nothing with real value as a marker.

  One slight glimmer of hope came from the economics department. The secretary there reported that they had discarded about three years’ worth of unclaimed examination blue books the previous day. But could they serve as a marker? Doubtful.

  By late morning, Jon, Shannon, and Marylou had raced up Highway 193 to the North Andover landfill, where they were obliged to put on yellow hard hats. Jon passed out photographs of the codex to the dozen or so in the search party that Waste Management was kind enough to supply, all armed with picks to try to pry apart the great, caked slabs of waste. With enormous good fortune, the huge bulldozer that further compacted the slabs of waste by traveling back and forth over them had not yet accomplished that task, or the search would have been fruitless even to attempt. The dozer and all Waste Management trucks were discharging at least a hundred yards away from the zone management had marked off. Jim Peabody, the driver of truck number 68, had shown them approximately where he had dumped his load-to the best of his recall-and was now one of the search party.

  But it seemed to be a futile effort. Slab after slab was picked apart, only to disgorge everything from orange peels to coffee grounds to flattened tufts of used Kleenex. By midafternoon, despair started setting in. Jon, returning to Plan B, wondered if the world would have to be satisfied with mere copies of the codex. After all, they did have copies of its every word, so that was at least something.

  Yet another part of his mind was telling him, It is humanly possible to examine every last piece of garbage in this sector. Yes, it could take weeks. Yes, it would be enormously expensive. But it can be done.

  He was ready to draw up a formal request that exactly this be done when he noticed a thin vein of light blue in one of the untouched slabs. Well, the Department of Economics was near his office, so why not let that vein be the blue-book marker he was seeking. Gently he picked into that slab, and it generously fell apart for him. They were blue books indeed. Student names were written on them, of course, and the department listed on each cover was “Econ.”

  Another vein of cardboard framed them off, then a vein of Styrofoam packing. Jon pried the packing material apart and found… the codex. Mercifully, it had been wedged between sheets of protective Styrofoam. In worshipful awe, Jon meticulously disengaged it from its whitish shroud and opened it with tender care. Only a few pages had been detached from their sewn binding by the compacting pressure, but they were still there, nestled underneath the ancient leather cover now embedded with flakes of Styrofoam. The thin board inside had been cracked, but with no apparent damage to the pages of vellum. Only the coverless last page of Revelation had been torn and damaged, though not beyond hope of restoration.

  Jon knelt down on the heap of garbage in the North Andover landfill and gave thanks to God.

  As miraculous as it was to find the codex in the landfill, Jon thought an even greater wonder was the fact that-with a considerable number now in the know-there had been no real leaks to the media about their astonishing manuscript discovery. Now, however, it was time-high time-to tell the world.

  The Ecumenical Patriarch and his party flew in from Istanbul for another visit to New York, where he would have the privilege of making the initial public announcement. His venue would be the Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Cathedral in Manhattan. Several weeks earlier, Jon had sent out invitations to the most significant religious bod
ies and media outlets across the world “to attend a press conference in New York at which a significant biblical manuscript discovery will be announced.” He intentionally underplayed the language in his letter for purposes of security, although by now he was developing something of a track record for issuing bland invitations that led to extraordinary announcements.

  Kevin Sullivan arrived from Rome with seven cardinals in tow, including Augustin Buchbinder, the Vatican secretary of state. Kevin confided to Jon that Pope Benedict XVI would have loved to come himself, but in Christian concern, he did not want to risk upstaging the Ecumenical Patriarch. Nevertheless, he could not contain his joy that the codex had been found again and implored divine blessing on its reception.

  Many of the major religious bodies in America and beyond were allowed four representatives each-including Jews and Muslims-but no political leaders were invited, intentionally so. Seats along one side of the cathedral were reserved for the newspaper and magazine media, as well as the radio and television networks. When Anderson Cooper of CNN arrived, he looked at the forest of TV cameras and commented, “Well, they’re all here-even Kol Israel and Al Jazeera-though I haven’t come across Radio Nepal, yet.”

  Before arriving at the cathedral, Jon had put in a busy early morning, making good on his you’ll-be-the-first-to-know promises by putting in calls to all the curious crucial experts who had aided them. All now readily understood the reason for his previous silence.

  At 10:06 a.m. on announcement day, the dean of Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Cathedral stood before a thicket of microphones and said, “We welcome you all in the name of the Lord, distinguished ladies and gentlemen. It is my great honor to introduce to you His All Holiness Bartholomew II, Archbishop Patriarch of Constantinople, New Rome and Ecumenical Patriarch.”

  Bartholomew stood to enthusiastic applause that he tried to terminate by holding up his arms. At last he succeeded. His clear baritone resonated across the cathedral as he gave the Trinitarian invocation in Greek: “ Eis to onoma tou Patros, kai tou Huios, kai tou Hagiou Pneumatos. Amen! But since some of you may not know Greek, I shall continue in English.”

  Ripples of laughter erupted. The audience was now his.

  “For centuries, the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Constantinople-many of you may know the city as Istanbul-possessed a literary treasure of immense significance for Christians everywhere. It is a magnificent New Testament manuscript codex, written in Greek uncial lettering that dates from the early fourth century-that is, the AD 300s-and is thus a document even earlier than the great Codex Sinaiticus in the British Library, which, up to now, has been the most important of the earliest versions of the Bible. But more. This newly discovered codex is also one of the fifty copies of the Holy Scriptures that the Emperor Constantine commissioned Eusebius, the church historian, to prepare for distribution across Constantinople and elsewhere. Scholars have long searched for one of these codices, but without success. Now, I am privileged to announce, the lost has been found.”

  Vast waves of applause splashed across the sanctuary and even some unliturgical whistling and cheering.

  Bartholomew continued. “This precious document we have officially named the Codex Constantinianus, but you may simply call it the Constantine Codex. It lies before you on the pedestal to my left, and it is open to the Resurrection account in the last chapter of the Gospel according to St. Mark, chapter 16. After this conference, you may view it briefly in an inspection line, but kindly do not try to touch it in any way. Guards will assist you in this request.

  “The codex was discovered by Professor Jonathan and Mrs. Shannon Weber of Harvard University and the Institute of Christian Origins. I am deeply embarrassed to report that the codex was not recovered from our library or archives, but from a room at our patriarchate devoted to manuscript repair and storage. The entire Christian world is in your debt, Professor and Mrs. Weber. Dr. Weber will now provide some extraordinary additional information regarding the codex.”

  As Jon walked to the microphone, nothing less than a standing ovation greeted him, and a raucous one at that, complete with cheers and whistling-in a cathedral, no less. He’d wanted Shannon to have this honor-after all, she had really discovered the codex-but she had demurred. “You’re much better at public speaking than I,” she’d said, needlessly buttering him up.

  When silence finally fell, Jon looked to the patriarch and began. “Thank you, Your All Holiness. Without your magnificent cooperation, none of this would be possible. I must now tell you, distinguished ladies and gentlemen, of two additional discoveries in the text of the Constantine Codex that some will greet with shock, others with disbelief, and still others with exuberant joy. I would remind the press that all this material will be available in press releases in the narthex after our conference. These have been translated into the ten most widely used languages in the world, identified by an appropriate sign over each stack.

  “The first discovery lies before you. If you file by the codex, you will notice that there is more text regarding the resurrection of Jesus at the close of Mark 16 than the traditional last verse you find in all your Bibles. And here, please, understand that the text we do find after chapter 16, verse 8, in your Bibles was added later. The Constantine Codex, however, preserves the original ending that Mark actually wrote. It not only accords perfectly with the other Resurrection accounts in the Gospels, but also helps explain their variations.”

  Stunned shock seemed to vacuum all life out of the cathedral, until a veritable explosion of response replaced that void. Shouting, laughing, and cascades of applause reechoed across the cavernous expanse of the cathedral from the sector where the churchmen were sitting. They knew well enough that the broken ending of Mark’s Gospel was one of the greatest problems in New Testament scholarship. Non-Christians, in fact, used it as one of their prime arguments against the Resurrection. But at last, Jon was happy to announce, the problem was solved.

  When quiet returned, Jon reported the other “surprise” in the discovery of Second Acts. The vast assembly sat in stunned silence as he sketched its contents: Paul’s trial before Nero, his trip to Spain and subsequent journeys, and finally his martyrdom at Rome. This time the mood of the audience was one of profound awe rather than the raucous elation over Mark’s Gospel. Clearly they were equally thrilled, but totally unprepared for the profound implications of a missing book of the Bible being found. But then a din of discussion seemed to well up from each pew, as church leaders and scholars started putting the pieces together and understanding, for the first time, why Luke ended the book of Acts as abruptly as he did in chapter

  28.

  It was time for Jon to finish his prepared statement. “Translations of the new material in Mark 16 and Second Acts will also be available in the narthex after our conference. These may be freely copied and used anywhere-with only one exception: they may not be appended to any new editions of the New Testament or the Holy Bible by any publisher. The Institute of Christian Origins holds the international copyrights for all the new material and will prosecute any publisher anywhere trying to add Mark 16 and Second Acts to any projected new version of the Bible or the New Testament.

  “I’m now open for your questions. In each case, please wait until a page brings you a microphone and first identify yourselves as you start speaking.”

  Representatives of the press and the media were seated in the front of the sanctuary on the opposite side of the aisle from the religious leaders. Jon recognized a man in the fifth row.

  “David van Biema, Time. I’m intrigued by your last statement, Professor Weber. Why that restriction? Why couldn’t the new material be published in future Bibles? Is there some question about its authenticity?”

  “No, David, not at all. In fact, there’s a separate handout in the narthex showing all our test results to date, and they’re all positive. The reason we can’t permit the inclusion of this material in future Bibles at this time is because that would require opening the canon of Holy
Scripture, and we simply cannot arrogate to ourselves so solemn a responsibility. Only an ecumenical council of the entire church could make such a decision.”

  “Do you think that could happen? Will happen?”

  Yes, Jon wanted to say, but he held his tongue and simply replied, “Again, the church will have to decide.” He looked toward another reporter. “Yes?”

  “Mark Galli, Christianity Today. But wouldn’t that be very difficult, Professor Weber? Most Christians assume that the canon of Scripture is closed. I can almost hear fundamentalists using Deuteronomy 4:2: ‘You shall not add to the word which I command you, nor take from it; that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God.’”

  “Indeed, but that passage, as you know, refers to Mosaic law rather than the whole canon of Scripture itself. But you’re right, Mark: opening the Canon could prove terribly difficult and provoke the darkest suspicions, however unjustified, among some of the faithful… Yes?”

  “Hang Wha Sing, Taipei Telegraph. What means Canon, and how books get into ‘Canon’?”

  “Yes, sorry. I should have defined that earlier. Canon comes from the Greek word kanown, which means ‘rule’ or ‘standard.’ It’s the authoritative list of books that belong either in the Old or New Testament. The early church included in the Canon only those books that were written by eyewitnesses or those who had immediate contact with eyewitnesses, and that were widely used in worship, and that were consistent with the other teachings of Christianity. The new material in the Constantine Codex more than satisfies all three criteria… Yes?”

  “But the Canon is still closed!” the tall figure nearly shouted. “Oh-Jimmy Lee Curtis, Southern Baptist Messenger.”

  “ Is it really closed, Mr. Curtis? One of our great Greek textual scholars, the now-sainted Professor Bruce Metzger of Princeton, has an interesting passage in his book The Canon of the New Testament that speaks to this very point.” Jon had the book at his lectern and read aloud: “One may also speculate what the Church should do if a hitherto unknown document were to turn up that, on unimpeachable external and internal grounds, could be proven to have been written, let us say, by the apostle Paul… Though from a theoretical point of view the way is open for the possible addition of another book or epistle to the New Testament canon, it is problematic that any would, let us say, meet the standards, either ancient or modern, of accreditation.” ^ 1