Once More, Praying to Jesus

In a previous post, we looked at some compelling biblical evidence from the book of Acts for the legitimacy of praying to Jesus. In this post, I would like to consider another piece of evidence for praying to Jesus, this time from the Gospel of John.

In John 14:14, Jesus tells his disciples that they can ask him for anything:

If you ask me⁵ anything in my name, I will do it. (John 14:14; ESV)

Since Jesus says, "ask me anything," it sounds an awful lot like he is encouraging his followers to pray directly to him. In context, Jesus is speaking not only to those disciples who were with him, but also to later disciples such as us, who have no other means for asking than prayer. It therefore seems that we have a solid biblical argument from this verse for praying to Jesus, since Jesus himself encouraged his disciples to do this.

This is a strong argument; however, it only works if the word "me" is in this verse. And whenever a biblical argument hinges upon a single word, we do well to be sure it is really there. While every solid English translation I checked does include the word "me" in this verse, the skeptic in me noticed that a few translations had a footnote above the word "me."

In the ESV, for example, there is the following footnote:

⁵ Some manuscripts omit me

So wait a minute, does this verse include "me" or doesn't it? And which manuscripts are the ESV translators referring to? To gain confidence that the word "me" is truly in this verse, we must delve into the world of New Testament textual criticism.

Delving into Manuscripts: Papyrus 66

In the critical edition of the Greek New Testament known as the Nestle-Aland Novum Testamentum Greace (NA28), there are footnotes for each verse indicating where there is divergence among the biblical manuscripts. The NA28 is the Greek text used in seminaries and is the basis for most of our modern English translations of the New Testament.

There are many squiggles for this verse that we will not get into; important for our purpose is the sigla ° above the the fourth word in John 14:14, which is the word με (me):

John 14:14 (NA28)
⸋ἐάν τι αἰτήσητέ  °με ἐν τῷ ὀνόματί μου  ⸀ἐγὼ ποιήσω.⸌

Notes
° A D K L Q Ψ 1241. 1424. ℓ 844 pm it vg^mss co |

In the NA28, the symbol ° means:

° The word following in the text is omitted by the witnesses cited.

So, this note means the word με in this verse is found in all manuscripts except for A, D, K L, Q, Ψ, 1241, and 1424. It is also missing from a later lectionary called ℓ 844 and some later Latin translations, but those do not concern us. (For those interested, a handy chart listing the manuscripts corresponding to these letters can be found here. See also the Appendix at the bottom of this post for more info.)

Notably, all of the manuscripts in this note which omit the word με are from the fifth century or later. By contrast, our earliest and best manuscripts for the Gospel of John do have the word με, which is great news. For textual critics, one guiding principle is that the earlier the manuscript, the more reliable it is.

To take just one example, one of the earliest and best preserved manuscripts of John is 𝔓⁶⁶ (Papyrus 66). This manuscript is dated to the early third century and is currently kept in Cologny Switzerland as part of the Bodmer Papyri collection. I have included a picture from one of the leaves of this manuscript below, which contains the part of John 14 relevant to our study:

The transcription of the above leaf by scholars is below, which helpfully keeps the locations of all the words in the same positions. I have highlighted verse 14, which starts midway through the fourth line from the top.

The highlighted verse reads woodenly as follows:

εαν τι αιτησηται μαι εν το ονοματι μου τουτο εγω ποιησω

if anything you ask me in the name of me, this I will do

(John 14:14; 𝔓⁶⁶)

I have underlined the word for "me" in both the Greek and the English. Interestingly, in 𝔓⁶⁶ the word "me" is actually spelled μαι rather than με. This kind of variation in Greek spelling was quite common; it would be like writing "color" versus "colour" in English today.

That the NA28 includes the word με in the main text of John 14:14 indicates the textual critics' high confidence that this word is original. As we have seen, one of the factors supporting this decision is the fact that early and well-preserved manuscripts like 𝔓⁶⁶ include it.

Another guiding principle of textual criticism is lectio difficilior potior, which is Latin for "the difficult reading is to be preferred." Since scribes would tend to smooth things over as they copied, if we find a reading in an earlier manuscript that is awkward or surprising, this can be another indicator that it is original.

With the word "me" in John 14:14, we have just such a difficult reading. The fact that Jesus is telling his disciples to ask him for anything is quite surprising indeed, as it appears to elevate him to a divine status similar to the Father, to whom Jesus also said the disciples should pray (see John 15:16; 16:23–24). Later scribes might therefore have left this word out, thinking it must have been a mistake because it is so surprising!

Conclusio

In summary, then, the fact that only manuscripts from the fifth century or later omit "me" in John 14:14, while all of our earliest and best manuscripts such as 𝔓⁶⁶ include it, is a very strong reason for seeing this word as authentic. This authenticity is evidenced by the fact that the textual critics of the NA28 chose to include it in the official text. Therefore, we have solid grounds for seeing Jesus's exhortation to his disciples in John 14:14 to pray to him as authentic.

And, therefore, Jesus's words in John 14:14 are yet another piece of biblical evidence for the legitimacy of praying to Jesus.

Thanks for sticking with me, shirelings. And as always, thanks for reading!

Appendix: List of Uncials Omitting με in John 14:14

Here is the list of Greek manuscripts that omit the word με from John 14:14. They are all uncials, meaning that they are written in all capital Greek letters (lowercase Greek manuscripts called miniscules were not common until much later).

The date of the manuscript is in Roman numerals after the manuscript letter and number. For example, the first line below is uncial number 2, deemed A for Alexandrinus, and has V which means it is dated to the fifth century. Following this is the location where the manuscript is currently being held (e.g. London), as well as which verses are contained in the manuscript (e.g. Matt 1:1-25; John 6:50-8:50, and 2 Cor 4:14-12:6). As you can see, the manuscripts which omit the word με in John 14:14 are only found in the fifth century (i.e. V) or later.

*A 02 V London, Brit. Libr., Royal 1 D. VIII eapr (vac Mt 1,1–25,6; J 6,50–8,52; 2C 4,14–12,6)

*D 05 V Cambridge, Univ. Libr., Nn. 2. 41 ea (vac Mt 1,1–20; 6,20–9,2; 27,2–12; J 1,16–3,26; Act 8,29–10,14; 21,2–10.16–18; 22,10–20.29-fin.; Jc-Jd [Mt 3,7–16; Mc 16,15–20; J 18,14–20,13 suppl.])

*K 017 IX Paris, Bibl. Nat., Gr. 63 e

*L 019 VIII Paris, Bibl. Nat., Gr. 62 e (vac Mt 4,22–5,14; 28,17-fin.; Mc 10,16–30; 15,2–20; J 21,15-fin.)

*Q 026 V Wolfenbüttel, Herzog-August-Bibl., Codd. Weißenburg. 64 L 4,34–5,4; 6,10–26; 12,6–43; 15,14–31; 17,34–18,15; 18,34–19,11; 19,47–20,17; 20,34–21,8; 22,27–46; 23,30–49; J 12,3–20; 14,3–22

*Ψ 044 IX/X Athos, Lavra, B’ 52 eap (vac Mt; Mc 1,1–9,5; H 8,11–9,19)

*1241 XII Sinai, Katharinen-Kl., Gr. 260 eap (vac Mt 8,14–13,3; Act 17,10–18; [1C 2,10-fin.;  2C 13,3-fin.; G; E 2,15-fin.; Ph; Kol; H 11,3-fin.;  Jc-Jd suppl. vel alia manu])

[*]1424 IX/X Chicago/Ill., Jesuit-Krauss-McCormick Libr., Gruber Ms. 152 *eK apKR (vac Mt 1,23–2,16)

Some of these manuscripts are quite late (ca. 1100), and so they have less weight. On the other hand, our earliest manuscripts of John, such as 𝔓⁶⁶  (ca. 200) and 𝔓⁷⁵ (ca. 175-225), do include the word με in John 14:14; a strong indicator of its originality.