WARNING: THIS POST IS A JOKE FOR APRIL FOOLS DAY!
Since Youssef Nader, Luke Farritor, and Julian Schilliger won the Vesuvius
Challenge, we've seen more and more of the carbonized scrolls from Herculaneum identified and read. The Herculaneum Papyri have a firm terminus ante quem of A.D. 79—the date of the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius.
Read more about it here.
The news is out that the civil case between Hobby Lobby and Dirk Obbink has been decided. The ruling is a “default judgment” in favor of Hobby Lobby for an incredible $7,085,100 plus interest. (A default judgment means that the defendant never showed up to court.) Keep in mind, this is a civil case not a criminal case. Over at the Art Crime blog, Lynda Albertson gives this list of transactions between Hobby Lobby and Obbink.
Over at the Text & Canon Institute, Elijah purple-is-my-favorite-color Hixson has a new article on lessons from the “First-Century Mark” (aka P137) saga. Readers will probably remember that Hixson was the first to publicly connect the dots on this right here on this blog in what is now our second most read post ever.
Two reports have recently come out detailing the latest turn in the story of Dirk Obbink and First-Century Mark. According to Die Zeit and Christianity Today, Obbink is living in a houseboat south of Oxford where he has been avoiding the authorities. From CT:
 |
| Obbink with the famed pool table. (source) |
Obbink was arrested in 2020 and then sued in 2021. Shortly after that, court records show, he moved to a houseboat named the James Brindley and started hiding from the private investigators attempting to serve him summons.
A neighbor signed an affidavit that she saw Obbink on the boat a little before 4:30 p.m. on Saturday, September 11, and the summons had been removed from the houseboat door.
“The main cabin door was open,” the affidavit says. “Mr. Obbink would have had to remove the envelop to open the door.”
The British woman helpfully photographed Obbink for the investigators, who presented it to the US federal court as evidence and asked for a default judgment.
Obbink is also facing criminal charges in England. The investigation is ongoing.
Given that Obbink hasn’t responded , the federal court has “certified a default judgment” against him. Apparently that means he now owes Hobby Lobby $7m. Perhaps most striking is that there are still some 80 papyri unaccounted for! Someone should check that houseboat.
Courthouse News Service reports today that Hobby Lobby is suing Dirk Obbink for $7 million for fraud and breach of contract. The complaint details seven private sale agreements between February 2010 and February 2013 for “fragments along with other ancient objects” for approximately $7,095,100. To date, the complaint says, 32 papyri have been identified as stolen from EES and sold directly to Hobby Lobby.
It also clarifies that Hobby Lobby came into possession of all the sale items except those in the seventh lot, purchased in February 2013 for $760,000. This last sale “contained four (4) papyrus pieces of New Testament Gospels identified as Matthew 3:7–10, 11–12; Mark 1:8–9, 16–18; Luke 13: 25–27, 28; and John 8:26–28, 33–35.” The second of those should look familiar as P.Oxy. 5345, aka “First-Century Mark.” So, we now know that Hobby Lobby did pay for these fragments. Scott Carroll’s infamous Tweet was in December of 2011 and Dan Wallace announced a first-century Mark fragment in February 2012—all before Hobby Lobby bought it. We know from Mike Holmes, that negotiations for its sale started in “early 2012.”
The complaint goes on to tell us that “On or about December 2017, Obbink informed Hobby Lobby that he had ‘mistakenly’ sold the Gospel Fragments in Purchase #7 and that they were, in fact, owned by his employer, the EES.” The fragment was published not long after, in May of 2018. Surely Obbink had finished editing it for his employer well before then. He did refund Hobby Lobby $10k of the $760k while pleading for more time to pay the rest—which never came.
A number of questions arise from this new wrinkle. The complaint says that $760,000 was the cost of the four Gospel fragments in lot 7, but the entire lot contained that and “other antiquities,” all totaling $1.81m. It does not specify what those other antiquities are or whether Hobby Lobby initially asked for a refund for those as well. The complaint is also mum about the specifics of the other fragments and antiquities sold.
A last point: if you split $760k four ways, that could mean that “First-Century Mark” sold for around $200k. That actually seems low to me, but what do I know.
It’s safe to say we have not heard the end of this sordid saga.
HT: Hixson
6/4/21 Update: Brent Nongbri has blogged about this here. He’s followed this closer than anybody so read the whole thing. This bit in particular jumped out: “Remember that between the Museum of the Bible and the American collector Andrew Stimer, who is said to have bought 6 stolen EES fragments from a business partner of Prof. Obbink, a total of 40 pieces have been returned to the EES. Now, the EES has said that 120 papyri are missing from its collection. That means 80 Oxyrhynchus papyri remain missing.”
Ariel Sabar has produced an engaging and informative overview of the tragic story of Dirk Obbink and the stolen Egyptian Exploration Society papyri. Naturally, we must all leave Obbink’s guilt to criminal investigations and proceedings. Sabar’s article, however, introduces those outside the EES and Museum of the Bible contexts to the main characters in this drama and the timeline which framed the events.
Since October, he [Obbink] has been suspended from duties following the biggest scandal that has ever hit, and is ever likely to hit, the University of Oxford’s classics department.We get some sense of how much these items might have been selling for.
The Greens, advised by Carroll, were buying biblical artefacts, such as Torahs and early papyrus manuscripts of the New Testament, at a dizzying pace: $70m was spent on 55,000 objects between 2009 and 2012, Carroll claimed later. The market in a hitherto arcane area of collecting sky-rocketed. “Fortunes were made. At least two vendors who had been making €1-2m a year were suddenly making €100-200m a year,” said one longtime collector.
The prices of the items [on the MOTB sale contracts] were redacted, but an expert told me he thought they could have been sold for $200,000 each.
No price is mentioned [in the Christie’s brochure for the Sappho papyrus], but a collector familiar with the field estimates a likely figure of around $800,000.$200k seems low for a “first-century” NT fragment, but I’m hardly knowledgeable in this area. In any case, it appears that Obbink was not only making enough money to buy his “castle” in Waco, but also to upgrade his home in Oxford.
 |
| Panelists (photo credit) |
 |
| Scott Carroll, Dirk Obbink, and Jerry Pattengale |
As you are aware, I seldom post to blogs, so forgive my intrusion.At this point, the one key person we have not heard from is Dirk Obbink himself. We’ll wait to see what he says.
- Despite what one might think of DO and what he has done (and that is yet to be untangled), it doesn’t feel right to me for someone to use his fall as an opportunity for self-promotion.
- The CT editor knew that I hadn’t spoken with the author, JP, for over 7 years (and not because of a binding non-disclosure). You would hope to think that the editor would have vetted many of the things said as only one person’s recollection was critically tied to the piece even though there was another person in the room. It was regrettably filled with misrepresentations, misrecollections, and exaggerations. The mixed narrative doubtless left the uninformed reader confused. I personally hold CT responsible for this.
- The basic elements of my recollection of those initial interactions have not changed since 2011. DO showed me the MK 1 papyrus on the pool table in his office. He said it had been dated to the late 1st or early 2nd c and he then went into some paleographic detail why he believed it must date to the late 1st c. It was in this conversation that he offered it for consideration for HL to buy (w/o mentioning a price). I said I would mention it to them which I did. I seem to remember mentioning it to them on occasion, but they never asked me about it or mentioned it to me. With my departure in June of 2012, I never signed a non-disclosure agreement.
- These are my recollections based on my brief conversation about the Mk 1 papyrus with DW. I mentioned it to DW briefly in passing. I told him that the dating was based on the opinion of a renowned Oxford scholar. He mentioned a debate, which I knew nothing of, and asked if he could mention it. I said it wasn’t owned by HL so I couldn’t speak for them. I told him he would have to use his own discretion. It wasn’t my debate and how could I possible tell DW (who I did not know) to do something like that? And for what benefit to HL or DO? I did not have pictures of the papyrus. I do not think there could have been any way possible for DW to have seen Mk 1 before debate.
- I wondered over the past 7 years why none of these people who knew the truth (non-disclosures aside) could step-up and verify what they knew. Why was the author of the CT article walking around with a scrap of paper in his wallet for 7 years like a memento verifying what happened without mentioning it to me or anyone else? The EES asked over a year ago (loosely paraphrased) ‘Who are we to believe the eminent DO or this nobody SC?’ No one could speak to the truth; afraid of DO and afraid of HL. Truth is never bound by non-disclosures. A year after the publication of Mk 1 and 7 years after the initial offering the CT articles feels more like a cover-up than an exposé. When people see that something is wrong and they don’t speak out against it, they become part of the problem and perpetuate it.
- I am sure much more will come out on this and related topics. I would hope to think that everyone will be the better for it. My best.
 |
| “INV” |
 |
| “PAP” |
Dear Bart, Roberta, Brent, Jill, and Elijah,I’ll try to keep my thoughts as brief as possible.
I am sending you this note because (1) we are all members of the SBL panel scheduled to discuss P.Oxy. 5345, otherwise known as “1st c. Mark” (FCM), at the SBL Annual Meeting in November, and (2) earlier this year I acquired some additional information regarding this document—information that I feel obligated to communicate to you, in your capacity as fellow panelists.
You will recall that in the aftermath of the publication of P.Oxy. 5345 in mid-2018, one of the lingering questions centered around the role of the Green Collection (owned by Hobby Lobby Stores) in the matter. Given that the Egyptian Exploration Society (EES) repeatedly (and rightly) affirmed that the fragment has never been for sale, why did representatives of the Green Collection seem to think that the Collection had acquired the fragment?
The answer is relatively straightforward: Prof. Dirk Obbink sold it and three other allegedly early Gospel fragments to the Green Collection, the result of negotiations that began in early 2012 and continued into early 2013, when a purchase agreement was executed.
Accompanying this email is a file containing two items. The first is a redacted copy of the purchase agreement between Prof. Dirk Obbink and Hobby Lobby stores, which documents the sale of four Gospel fragments—one each of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, each allegedly dated “Circa 0100 AD.” The second item is a photograph of a list written by Prof. Obbink himself (and in the photograph held down by his fingers) that specifies the contents of these four fragments: Matthew 3.7-10, 11-12; Mark 1.8-9, 16-18; Luke 13.25-7, 28, and John 8.26-8, 33-5. The two items together document the fact of the sale and the identity of the items sold.
In the agreement Obbink clearly asserted (in item 1) that he was the owner of the property described therein. The fragments in question, however, were and remain the property of EES. This is certainly the case in regard to the Mark and Luke fragments, which were published in The Oxyrhynchus Papyri, vol. 83 (2018) as P.Oxy 5345 and P.Oxy 5346, respectively. It is almost certainly the case in regard to the Matthew and John fragments: an EES representative has confirmed to me that EES also possesses fragments of Matt 3.7-10, 11-12 and John 8.26-28, 33-35.
It is worth noting that the Green Collection, though having received title to the fragments (see point 10 of the purchase agreement), never took physical possession of the fragments. Instead, in accordance with other terms of the agreement (see points 10.1-10.2) the fragments were left in Obbink’s custody for research and publication (the intended venue of initial publication being specified in 10.3).
It seemed advisable to consult with the EES about the FCM matter before sharing the information mentioned above more widely, so earlier this month I met in London with representatives of the EES and discussed with them its significance and implications. I am now sharing it with you. You, in turn, are free to share with others or post in your blog (a) the information contained in this letter, and (b) the accompanying document.
Please let me know if you have any questions.
Best wishes,
Mike
"The four fragments listed in the photograph do fit with catalogued EES texts because the combinations of surviving verses on the front and back of the fragments are distinctive. The Mark and Luke must be the texts published recently as P.Oxy. LXXXIII 5345 and 5346. The Matthew and John fragments are currently being prepared for publication."
"We are grateful to Professor Holmes for sharing with us in advance the newly revealed contract and photograph, and we are working with him to clarify whether the four texts in the photographed list, or any other EES papyri, were sold or offered for sale to Hobby Lobby or its agents, and if so, when and by whom. This may take some time, and unless and until new evidence emerges, there is no more we can say."
 |
| Image source |
In any event, the close association between Pattengale, Carroll, and Professor Obbink (as well as the Green Collection and Oxford) has long been known, and Professor Obbink appears to still be on the Museum of the Bible payroll. What was news to me was Carroll’s suggestion that Oxford was a source of the mummy masks that he was purchasing (his usual practice in describing provenance in these more recent videos is to say the material comes from “families” looking to sell things).
Scott Carroll has also suggested that Professor Obbink offered at least one artifact from the Egypt Exploration Society’s collection for sale (the Oxyrhynchus papyrus P.Oxy 83.5345, a fragment of the Gospel According to Mark). Professor Obbink and the Egypt Exploration Society have both denied Carroll’s claims in regard to that papyrus. Now we would seem to be in a similar situation with regard to the Green Collection mummy masks, in that all we really have connecting the Green Collection masks to Oxford is the word of Scott Carroll. And once again, it is the Green Collection and the Museum of the Bible that could shed light on these questions by offering some transparency in their acquisition records for these artifacts.You can read the full post with what Brent has been able to piece together from videos and online matter.
It’s not every day that the subject of our humble blog makes the cover of international magazines. But the December cover story of National Geographic is a well-written and apparently well-researched article on just that though. Okay, it’s not mostly about the textual criticism per se, but it is about attempts to discover and acquire new manuscripts of the Bible. And our own Peter Head gets quoted! Some of the pictures are fantastic as you would expect from NatGeo.The Institute for New Testament Textual Research in Münster, Germany, has sought to reduce the labor challenges by classifying biblical documents according to key passages, but such a system amounts to triage that wholly ignores numerous texts.If we take “numerous texts” to mean numerous places in the text then this is a simple and accurate description. Calling it “triage” isn’t quite fair in my opinion, since it does seem to work pretty well in telling us which manuscripts are similar enough to leave out of an apparatus. But it does make the point that it’s not the ideal way to evaluate a manuscript’s text as a whole. Dan Wallace says he hopes OCR will make this approach unnecessary in the future. That would be great.
Many of Ehrman’s assertions are debatable (literally so: he and Wallace have squared off in three public debates), but some scholars agree that Christian scribes deliberately corrupted certain passages over time. The question is one of degree.Update: I should add that I haven’t seen the print magazine which apparently has additional material alongside the main article.
“Broadly, I support what Ehrman is saying about this,” says Peter Head, an Oxford scholar who studies Greek New Testament manuscripts. “But the manuscripts suggest a controlled fluidity. Variants emerge, but you can sort of figure out when and why. Now, it’s in the earlier period that we don’t have enough data. That’s the problem.”
The “earlier period” that Head refers to begins with the birth of Christianity in the first century A.D. and concludes in the early fourth century. And while it’s true that more than 5,500 Greek New Testament manuscripts have been found, close to 95 percent of those copies come from the ninth to the 16th centuries. Only about 125 date back to the second or third centuries, and none to the first.
Of most interest to me is the end of the article which explains payments to one particular individual associated with the Oxyrhynchus collection. Press suggests that the unnamed “Domestic Individual” is Dirk Obbink, and that certainly makes the most sense. It’s not actually news that he was paid by them (see here), but now I guess we know how much. According to the tax filing, it was $225,311 in 2016/2017. (Who says textual criticism doesn’t pay?)Besides funding institutions, the Museum of the Bible also reports grants to individuals — most of which are non-itemized scholarships. One grant, however, is itemized in some detail: in 2016–2017, the museum awarded $225,311 to an unnamed individual as a “research grant for Early Christian Lives, Proteus/Ancient Lives, and Imaging Papyri projects as well as establishing a research center.” All of these projects involve the Oxyrhynchus papyri, the largest group of papyrus documents from the ancient world. They consist of fragments of several hundred thousand texts from an ancient garbage dump at the site of Oxyrhynchus (modern Al Bahnasa) in Egypt. Most of the papyri were found in excavations at the site in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, conducted on behalf of the Egypt Exploration Society (EES) in the U.K. The Museum of the Bible purchased several Oxyrhynchus papyri that had been gifted to American institutions in the early 20th century and later deaccessioned. However, most of the papyri from the site are still owned by the EES and housed at the University of Oxford.
The unnamed individual who received the grant from the Museum of the Bible is presumably Dirk Obbink, an American-born papyrologist currently at the University of Oxford. Obbink is the principal investigator for all of the projects named on the Form 990. Obbink’s relationship with the museum has been public for years, though the exact nature of it has never been clear. Obbink is listed as Papyrus Series editor for the museum’s publications with the prominent Dutch academic publisher Brill, and has been paid by the museum as a consultant, but in comments to Megan Gannon of Live Science in 2015, Obbink suggested that the Greens had more direct control over his work. Unlike many other collaborations, this arrangement was never made public — there is no press release on the Museum of the Bible website. It was also unusual in that the grant was made to an individual rather than an institution. (In a statement to Hyperallergic, the EES declared that “the EES has not, and has never had, any arrangement of any kind with the Museum of the Bible.”)
This funding arrangement may shed some light on the issue of the rumored “First Century Mark.” Starting in 2012, rumors circulated among biblical scholars of a fragment of the New Testament Gospel of Mark dating to the first century CE. This rumored First Century Mark would be significant as the earliest known version of the text, and one dating shortly after the book would have been written (it is generally dated by scholars sometime in the middle decades of the first century CE). It was thought that the Green family owned or was trying to purchase this fragment, but no firm evidence was ever put forward about this. Last month, the EES posted a note about a recently published Oxyrhynchus papyrus, confirming that this was in fact the rumored First Century Mark — except that it dated to the late second or early third century, and was owned not by the Museum of the Bible but by the EES. The publication of the fragment was edited by Dirk Obbink. The Museum of the Bible’s funding of Obbink’s Oxyrhynchus projects might have some bearing on puzzling aspects of the case, such as why it was believed that the fragment was owned by the Museum of the Bible. (If in fact the Green family is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars funding Oxyrhynchus-related research, then they may have a proprietary attitude toward that research even if they do not own the fragments themselves.)
I haven’t been able to post updates to the saga of the Early Mark Fragment as often as I wanted. Peter Gurry and I have been busy making last-minute edits to a project we’ve been working on for over two years, but we have finally submitted it to IVP, so I have a bit more time now.
