Sayings of Jesus (Papyri Oxyrhynchus 654, 1 and 655) 1

Sayings of Jesus on three Greek papyri of the 3rd century AD found at Oxyrhynchus in Egypt by B. P. Grenfell and A. S. Hunt (published 1897, 1904): Papyrus 654 (chapter 1, with its prologue naming Thomas), Papyrus 1 (chapter 2) and Papyrus 655 (chapter 3). When M. R. James translated them in 1924 they were thought to be extracts from a lost gospel, perhaps the Gospel according to the Hebrews; since the discovery of the complete Coptic Gospel of Thomas at Nag Hammadi in 1945 they have been known to be pieces of an earlier Greek form of that gospel (the prologue and sayings 1-7, 26-33 with part of 77, and 36-40 in the Coptic numbering), with some differences of wording. This is James's translation; each saying is a verse, in his order. The papyri are torn, so the text is full of gaps: parentheses are the restorations James judged practically certain, '(…)' a gap, and '…' a gap he marked with dots; the scholars' longer restorations are not given. Not part of any church's canon.