The letter is the oldest known Christian documentary evidence from the Roman province of Egypt, providing fascinating details about some of the earliest adherents to the religion.
Centuries ago, one of the first Christians in the Roman Empire to live in the province of Egypt wrote a letter to an acquaintance on papyrus—a kind of thick form of paper used in ancient times.
"The significance of this papyrus lies in the fact that it is the oldest authentic handwriting of a Christian, an original from 1800 years ago," Huebner told."We have, of course, the letters of the apostle Paul from the first century A.D. and other writings from church fathers of the second century, but here we don't have the originals, just later copies. This Basel letter is the first handwriting of a Christian.
"The use of this abbreviation—known as a"nomen sacrum" in this context—leaves no doubt about the Christian beliefs of the letter writer," Huebner said in a statement."It is an exclusively Christian formula that we are familiar with from New Testament manuscripts. [Furthermore,] Paulus was an extremely rare name at that time and we may deduce that the parents mentioned in the letter were Christians and had named their son after the apostle as early as 200 A.D.
"The persons named in the Basel letter—Arrianus, Paulus, and Herakleides—also show up in other papyri from the Heroninus archive, and from one of these documents we learn than Herakleides was a high priest of his city and member of the city council in 239 A.D.," she said."That can only mean that the Basel letter was written well before 239 A.D., since Arrianus says in this letter that Herakleides was just nominated to the city council.
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