Researching Carsten Thiede

Born in West Berlin, Thiede studied Comparative Literature and History there before procuring a German National Scholarship Foundation Research Fellow position at Queen's College at Oxford University in 1976, where he attained a Blue for volleyball, which he had played in the German Volleyball Premier League.

In 1978, he became a Senior Lecturer in Comparative Literature at Geneva, where he drew inspiration from his fellow "comparativist", George Steiner. Drawn to the subject of early Christianity because of his background as a linguist and his expertise in medieval Latin philology, the study of the origins of Christianity came to form his life's work.

For a number of years into the early '90s Thiede worked with various broadcasting companies, including BBC Radio and ERF, and as an editor at the Brockhaus publishing company. Thiede was best known for his interpretation of some of the Greek Dead Sea Scrolls fragments, including the identification of the small 7Q5 papyrus fragment (illustration) as a fragment of the Gospel of Mark. He supported O’Callaghan’s controversial claims that several papyrus fragments from Qumran Cave 7 are actually Christian New Testament texts from pre AD 70.

In December 1994, Thiede redated the Magdalen papyrus together with former deputy editor of The Sunday Telegraph and current editor of The Spectator, Matthew d'Ancona, which bears a fragment in Greek of the Gospel of Matthew, to the latter part of the 1st century on palaeographical grounds; this too provoked much debate and was highly publicised, most notably with a front-page headline in The Times. By attempting to make his material more accessible to the general public he was often accused of being a popular science writer.

Carsten Thiede initially wrote an article in the academically peer reviewed Zeutschrift fr Papyrologue in regards to his dating of the papyrus to the last third of the first century. He improved upon his research and published the results in his book titled “Eyewitness to Jesus” in 1996. Thiede was able to date the Magdalen papyrus containing a portion of Matthews Gospel to 66 CE using more advanced papyrological techniques and comparative analysis with a document dated to 66CE (P. Oxy 246 II)

In The Quest for the True Cross, also co-written with d'Ancona, Thiede argued that the Titulus Crucis could in fact be part of Jesus' cross, based on his palaeographic study of the writing, though it is considered to be a medieval forgery by many scholars. Thiede is particularly noted for his research into early Christianity, notably Peter and Paul.

For the last seven years of his life, Thiede also worked for the Israel Antiquities Authority repairing damage to the Dead Sea Scrolls and excavating the biblical location of Emmaus. A devout Anglican who was ordained priest in 2000, he was also Chaplain to Her Majesty's Forces in spite of being a German citizen. He died in Paderborn suddenly at the age of 52 from a heart attack.