(CE:519a)
CHESTER BEATTY COPTIC PAPYRI. Second in importance only to the Beatty Greek biblical papyri (see CHESTER BEATTY BIBLICAL PAPYRI) is the large group of Coptic papyri acquired by A. Chester Beatty, some of which contain the text of lost books of the Manichaean religion (see MANICHAEISM). Large sections of these have been published, including the homilies, by H. J. Polotsky (1934), and the Psalter, part 2, by C. R. C. Allberry (1938). Other Manichaean codices were acquired by the Berlin Papyrus Collection.
Another important codex comprises portions of a fourth-century copy of the book of Joshua in Sahidic; part of the same codex was
separately acquired by the Bodmer Library of Geneva. The Beatty portion was edited and translated by A. F. Shore (1963). A papyrus
copy of the Apocalypse of Elijah in Sahidic (Beatty Papyrus 2018), dating from the end of the fourth or beginning of the fifth century,
was edited and translated by Albert Pietersma in 1981.
BRUCE M. METZGER
