Interview with Dr. Timothy Mitchell
In anticipation of the KEDS Spring Research Seminar, we spoke with Dr. Timothy Mitchell about his forthcoming presentation.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and describe your main area of work or research?
My name is Timothy Mitchell, I am an American living in Kyiv, Ukraine, and I teach at Kyiv Theological Seminary. I earned my PhD from The University of Birmingham, in England. My dissertation research was in the area of New Testament textual criticism. I have also published a few articles on the topics of ancient publication and composition practices in the time of the New Testament and early Church.
What will your session focus on?
My session will focus on the Christian use of a nomen sacrum known as the staurogram. Nomina Sacra, which is Latin for “sacred names”, is a term scholars give to abbreviations that scribes made for certain words in the manuscript copies of the Christian scriptures. These words were usually associated with the names for God and Jesus. The staurogram was a nomen sacrum that superimposed the Greek letter tau over the rho in the words for cross and crucify. This unique combination of letters made a simple pictogram of Jesus on the cross. This nomen sacrum is used in three early Greek Gospel manuscripts, P45, P66, and P75. Scholars debate whether Christians first adopted the staurogram earlier, some time in the second century, or later after the time of Constantine in the fourth century. Some scholars, such as Brent Nongbri, have argued that the presence of the staurogram in these three manuscripts indicates that they date to the fourth century rather than the second or third centuries. I will be looking at a passage in the Epistle of Barnabas, 12.1-3, which interprets Moses’s outstretched arms during the battle against Amalek (Exodus 17:8-13) as a prefiguring of Jesus’s crucifixion. I will argue that this is evidence that the veneration of cruciform imagery was already present within the Christian imagination by the beginning of the second century (the generally accepted date of the Epistle of Barnabas). That means that Christians were likely already using cruciform imagery in their manuscripts by the end of the second century.
What first sparked your interest in this topic or area of study?
I was first introduced to the staurogram several years ago when I read Larry Hurtado’s book “Early Christian Artifacts.” In this book he discusses many of the features found in Christian manuscripts such as nomina sacra and the staurogram. I began thinking about the origin of the staurogram after reading Brent Nongbri’s article which argued for a fourth century dating for P.Bodmer II, also known as P66, an early Greek manuscript of John’s Gospel. In this article Nongbri argues that the presence of the staurogram in P66 is evidence for a fourth century date.
Why do you think this topic matters to the church, the academy, or the wider world today?
I think that this research in particular matters because it helps us understand the Christian imagination of the second century. If Christians were venerating symbols of the cross, then this has further implications of how scholars date Christian artifacts such as manuscripts, that contain cruciform images like the staurogram. The dating of early Christian artifacts has implication in other areas of scholarly research and even in the realm of Christian apologetics.
What question, idea, or problem has most shaped your work in this area so far?
The question (its really two questions in one) that most shaped my research in this area was this; “how did the early Christians view cross and other cruciform images and are these attitudes reflected in their writings?”
How has your research or practice changed the way you think, teach, or minister?
This research has helped me see that there was a lot of diverse thinking in the early Church, yet, at the same time, many elements of Christianity have remained the same for centuries. This makes me feel a strong connection with the Christians of the earliest centuries and gives me a sense of rootedness.
What is the one insight from your work that you hope others will find helpful or challenging?
I hope that others will be encouraged and invigorated by our rich Christian heritage. There is much that we can learn about early Christian faith and practice from the early copies of the scriptures that have been preserved. I hope this motivates others to study these manuscripts as well.
Thank you for your time, Dr. Mitchell! You can sign up for Dr. Mitchell’s presentation on Monday, 23rd March 2026, via Eventbrite.
You can read more about Dr. Mitchell’s work by clicking here.
