The short answerWhat is this leaf?

This is the one surviving leaf of Papyrus 9 — among the earliest copies we have of the First Letter of John, written in the third century and recovered from the rubbish mounds of Oxyrhynchus in Egypt. On its two sides you can read one of the most beloved sentences in all of Scripture in nearly its oldest form: Ο ΘΣ ΑΓΑΠΗ ΕΣΤΙΝ — “God is love” — together with “no one has ever seen God” and the promise that God “remains in us” when we love one another.

The leaf is torn on every side, so only part of each line survives. This page shows you exactly which letters are real ink on the papyrus and which are supplied by scholars from the known text of 1 John — so you can read your replica precisely, and meet the very human scribe who copied it.

The featureA very human scribe — and a line about Christ

Copied by an untrained hand. Papyrus 9 is famous among scholars for how carelessly it is written — a crude, irregular hand full of everyday misspellings. On this leaf the scribe writes “loved” as ΤΑΠΡΙΣΕΝ instead of ΗΓΑΠΗΣΕΝ, spells “ever” ΠΟΠΟΤΕ and “has” ΕΧΙ, and even repeats a couple of stray letters. Far from a polished Bible, this is a real, ordinary copy from the ancient church — and that is exactly what makes it moving to hold.

“The love which Christ has.” In verse 16, where almost every other manuscript reads “the love which God has for us,” this leaf plainly writes Ο ΧΡΣ — “the love which Christ has.” It is one of P9’s distinctive readings, and you can see the overlined sacred name for yourself in the transcription below.

Line by lineThe Greek exactly as it sits on the leaf

Transcribed from the INTF transcription (NTVMR, 𝔓9 folio 1) and shown in the majuscule capitals the scribe used, with the original line breaks. Sacred names keep their overline. The photograph sits beside each side so you can compare the letters directly.

Front — 1 John 4:11–12 (“if we love one another, God remains in us”)

1Ο ΘΣ ΤΑΠΡΙΣΕΝ Η[ΜΑΣ ΚΑΙ ΗΜΕΙΣ]1 John 4:11

2ΟΦΙΛΟΜΕΝ ΑΛΛΗ[ΛΟΥΣ ΑΓΑΠΑΝ]

3ΟΥΔΕΙΣ ΠΟΠΟΤΕ Τ[ΕΘΕΑΤΑΙ]4:12

4ΤΟΝ ΕΙΝ ΕΑΝ ΑΓΑΠ[ΩΜΕΝ ΑΛΛΗ]

5ΛΟΥΣ Ο ΘΣ Ε ΗΜΙΝ [ΜΕΝΕΙ ΚΑΙ Η Α]

6[ΓΑΠΗ] ΑΥΤΟΥ Τ[ΕΤΕΛΕΙΩΜΕΝΗ]

Back — 1 John 4:14–17 (“God is love”)

1[ΑΠΕΣΤΑΛΚΕΝ Τ]Ο[Ν ΥΙΟΝ ΣΩΤΗ]1 John 4:14

2[ΡΑ ΤΟΥ ΚΟΣΜ]ΟΥ [ΟΣ ΕΑΝ ΟΜΟΛΟ]4:15

3[ΓΗΣΗ ΟΤΙ] [Ι]Σ ΕΣΤΙΝ Ο [Υ]Σ ΤΟΥ

4[ΘΥ] [Ο] [ΘΣ] [ΕΝ] ΑΥΤΩ ΜΕΝΕΙ ΚΑΙ

5[ΑΥΤΟΣ ΕΝ ΑΥ]ΤΩ ΕΣΤΙΝ ΚΑΙ ΗΜΕΙΣ

6[ΕΓΝΩΚΑΜΕ]Ν ΚΑΙ ΠΕΠΙΣΤΕΥΚΑ4:16

7[ΜΕΝ ΤΗΝ] ΑΓΑΠΗΝ ΗΝ ΕΧΙ Ο ΧΡΣ

8[ΕΝ ΗΜΙΝ Ο] [Θ]Σ ΑΓΑΠΗ ΕΣΤΙΝ ΚΑ[Ι]

9[Ο ΜΕΝΩΝ Ε]Ν ΤΗ ΑΓΑΠΗ ΕΝ ΤΩ

10[ΘΩ] [ΜΕΝΕΙ ΚΑΙ Ο] [Θ]Σ ΕΝ ΑΥΤΩ Μ[ΕΝΕΙ]

11[ΕΝ ΤΟΥΤΩ ΤΕΤΕΛ]ΕΙ[ΩΤΑΙ Η ΑΓΑΠΗ]4:17

Word by wordRead it, sound it out, and see the meaning

The whole leaf, word by word: the Greek on the leaf, a transliteration to sound it out, and a word-for-word English gloss, with the smooth translation after each passage. Sacred names carry the scribe’s overline; their meaning is in the gloss. Words in a gold box appear (at least partly) on the fragment; grey words in [brackets] are supplied.

God loved us, so we ought to love — 1 John 4:11

No one has ever seen God — 1 John 4:12

The Father sent the Son, Savior of the world — 1 John 4:14

Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God — 1 John 4:15

We have known the love — the love that Christ has — 1 John 4:16

God is love — 1 John 4:16

In this, love is perfected — 1 John 4:17

Reading the detailsTextual notes

A careless, everyday hand. The first editors and every scholar since have noted how roughly P9 is written. That roughness is on full display here: ΤΑΠΡΙΣΕΝ for ΗΓΑΠΗΣΕΝ (“loved”) in verse 11, and a stray ΤΟΝ ΕΙΝ in verse 12 where the text should run straight from “seen” to “if” — the pen simply slipped. We have transcribed exactly what stands on the leaf.

Spelled by ear. Like many everyday copies of the period, P9 is full of itacisms — vowels that had come to sound alike: ΟΦΙΛΟΜΕΝ for ΟΦΕΙΛΟΜΕΝ (“we ought”), ΠΟΠΟΤΕ for ΠΩΠΟΤΕ (“ever”), ΕΧΙ for ΕΧΕΙ (“has”), and Ε for ΕΝ (“in”).

“The love which Christ has” (4:16). P9 reads ΗΝ ΕΧΙ Ο ΧΡΣ — “which Christ has” — a distinctive substitution of Christ for God (the reading of nearly all other witnesses). A few verses earlier, in 4:15, the leaf also reads “he in him” where the common text has “he in God.”

Sacred names. The nomina sacra are contracted and overlined: ΘΣ/ΘΥ/ΘΩ (God), ΙΣ (Jesus), ΥΣ (Son), and ΧΡΣ (Christ). Where a sacred name sits at a torn edge, only its final letter may survive; we place the bar on the surviving letter and grey out the rest.

The manuscriptAt a glance

Why it mattersAn ordinary copy of an extraordinary line

The letters of John were treasured in the early church for their plain insistence that God’s own nature is love. Papyrus 9 is one of the earliest surviving copies of 1 John — and it carries “God is love” not in a grand parchment Bible but in a rough, hurriedly written page that an ordinary Christian in third-century Egypt could actually own.

That is much of its power. The mistakes are not an embarrassment; they are a fingerprint. To hold this leaf is to sit beside a real scribe — untrained, imperfect, and copying out by hand the words “God is love” so that others could read them too.

ReferencesSources

• Transcription (surviving text): INTF transcription of 𝔓9, New Testament Virtual Manuscript Room, doc. ID 10009, folio 1 (1 John 4).
• Manuscript images: Houghton Library, Harvard University (P. Oxy. 402, inv. 3736); photographs from the Manuscript Shop listing.
• Editio princeps: B. P. Grenfell & A. S. Hunt, The Oxyrhynchus Papyri, Part III (London, 1903), no. 402.
• Text & significance: Nestle–Aland, Novum Testamentum Graece; K. Aland & B. Aland, The Text of the New Testament.
• Word-for-word glosses follow standard tagged Greek New Testament data (STEP Bible, Tyndale House; Berean Interlinear).
• Smooth translation: World English Bible (public domain), ebible.org.