Hidden New Testament Text Discovered (PICTURES)  

Using UV light

Scientists, using ultraviolet photography, have discovered an old version of a chapter in the New Testament that was hidden under a different version of the text for over 1,500 years. Historian Grigory Kessel of the Austrian Academy of Sciences revealed that the hidden text lay beneath three layers of words written in palimpsest, an ancient technique that often leaves traces of the original text.

The text discovered concerns a version of the 12th chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, which was originally part of the Old Syriac translations of the Bible 1,500 years ago.

This particular manuscript will help researchers to understand the early stages of the development of the writing of the Bible and will reveal some differences from modern translations of the texts.

For example, the original Greek version of Matthew 12:1 which is the most widely used today, states:

At that time Jesus was passing through sown fields. His disciples were hungry and began to grind the ears and eat the seeds.

The Syriac translation, however, is a little different, as it states that the disciples ” began to take the seeds out of the ears of corn, rub them in their hands, and eat them .”