Needless to say, there are many different ways of reading the biblical text, and in a modern context they can all be classified under two main headings, depending on the point of departure: one approach starts out from the standpoint of faith, the other does not. The latter corresponds to the secular approach of the various academic disciplines, such as philological, historical and literary studies, and is not concerned with any ideas of inspiration. The former represents the religious approach and in the early Church it was the starting point for virtually all exegetical undertakings in both Judaism and Christianity. A fundamental difference between these two approaches, secular and religious, lies in the fact that for the secular approach only one interpretation at a time can be correct (though of course there will often be many rival claimants, all incompatible with one another); by contrast, with the religious approach, it is not a matter of an interpretation being right or wrong, but whether it is meaningful, and since several different interpretations of a single passage may be thought meaningful, the text according to this approach can be described as polyvalent, whereas according to the other approach the text is univalent.
The approach of both Jewish and Christian exegetes in antiquity was thus an essentially holistic one which made certain basic assumptions: being regarded as the Word of God, the text is understood to be inspired in some way or other, and so its message is for all times. The message may often be cryptic, and so in need of interpretation. The books of the Bible are considered to form a unitary corpus, as a result of which a passage in one book can be interpreted or explained with the help of something in a different book. These basic assumptions underlie all the different ways in which the Syriac exegetes approach the biblical text.
Some Standard Terminology: ‘factual’ and ‘spiritual’
Throughout Syriac writing on exegesis a basic distinction is drawn between ‘factual’ exegesis and ‘spiritual’ exegesis (pushoqo su‘ronoyo and pushoqo ruḥonoyo). Thus Ephrem, in his Commentary on Genesis, provides two separate commentaries on Genesis 49 (the Blessings of Jacob), the first su‘rono’it, the second ruḥono’it. Exactly the same division is found in some of Dionysius bar Salibi’s commentaries some 800 years later, but in his case he provides these two levels of commentary throughout a book. There are a few alternative terms found in authors of the seventh century onwards; thus, besides su‘ronoyo/su‘ronoit, tash‘itonoyo, ‘historical’, is found in Dadisho ‘ (7th cent.), Theodore bar Koni (late 8th cent.) and Isho‘dad of Merv (9th cent.), while Mushe bar Kipho (d. 903) uses gushmono’it. Corresponding to ruḥonoyo one finds in these later writers pele’tonoyo, literally ‘in parable fashion’, but often translated as ‘allegorical’.1 Occasionally a third category is introduced: thus Dadisho‘ (7th cent.) introduces an intermediary term, mtargmonoyo, best rendered as ‘homiletic’, while Jacob of Edessa (d. 708) has a term for something even more exalted than ruḥono’it, namely met‘alyono’it.
In modern scholarship these two basic approaches are sometimes crudely and unhelpfully designated as ‘Antiochene’ and ‘Alexandrian’, with the implication that in the Church of the East, due to its reliance on Theodore of Mopsuestia, exegesis is ‘Antiochene’, whereas the Syrian Orthodox tradition is more ‘Alexandrian’. This, like so many other generalizations, is misleading, above all when applied to Syriac authors earlier than Diodore and Theodore.2 The Syriac exegetes were well aware that different approaches were required for different audiences: this is well brought out by Dadisho‘3 who associates pushoqo tash‘itonoyo with Theodore, pushoqo mtargmnoyo with Basil and John Chrysostom, while pushoqo ruḥonoyo is aimed at iḥidoye, ‘solitaries’. Although Theodore wrote a polemical work ‘Against the Allegorists’, which survives in part in Syriac translation,4 it seems that even he considered a spiritual interpretation more useful for monks. In fact, what Theodore was polemicizing against was the use of pushoqo pel’etonoyo5 to the exclusion of the literal sense, an approach which he associates with Philo and Origen who, he implies, are following the practice of the pagan exegesis of Greek myths, where the aim was to try to get rid of the literal meaning. Theodore of Mopsuestia’s polemic is picked up at the end of the eighth century by Theodore bar Koni who has a section entitled ‘What is the difference between historical interpretation (tash‘itonoyo) and allegorical (pel’etonoyo), and who invented the latter?’ He opens as follows:6
There is a considerable and no small difference between historical and allegorical interpretation in that the latter conveys wicked blasphemy and falsehood, whereas the former (conveys) truth and (right) confession. The erring Origen was the inventor of the device of allegory: he turned the narratives of the Scriptures upside down and cut them off from their natural true meaning, delivering them over to fanciful error, with the result that he was forced into a position of not thinking that there was either creation or a Creator. They do not interpret Paradise as it (really) is, nor Adam and Eve: they do not interpret a single created thing as it (really) is, for they say that a ‘horse’ anywhere is only to be taken as referring to the wicked, based on the reference to ‘the chariots of Pharaoh’ [Exodus 15:4].
Theodore bar Koni continues with a whole number of other examples, and ends up pointing out that they are doing exactly the same thing as the pagan interpreters of Greek myths. Isho‘dad of Merv provides a similar polemic in the Preface of his Commentary on the Psalms.7 Nevertheless, in the very next section, he begins by saying:8
One should know that, while David wrote his prophecy tash‘itono’it, and not pel’etono’it, he is seen as though he was uttering his prophecy pel’etono’it.
What follows is picked up almost word for word by Mushe bar Kipho in the opening lines of chapter 27 of the Preface to his Commentary on the Psalms, ‘On the ways Scripture speaks about God’, a topic which will be discussed below.
As Mushe bar Kipho was later to point out, the two approaches are complementary, and not in conflict: it is the sole reliance on the one or the other that is wrong. Thus in the Preface to his Commentary on the Psalms,9 he says that, unlike those who say that the interpretation should only be gushmono’it wsu‘rono’it, ‘we say that just as the books of the Old Testament are interpreted gushmono’it wsu‘rono’it, so it is also right that they should be interpreted ruḥono’it wpel’etono’it’, adding a little later (p. 123) that this is especially the case in the Psalms.
Questions of Biblical Text
Most Syriac commentators show an awareness, not only of the different Syriac biblical versions and their origin, but also of the Greek versions, in particular the Septuagint and its origins. They were aware that the Peshitta Old Testament was translated from Hebrew, and some commentators occasionally quote ‘the Hebrew’ (‘ebroyo),10 though exactly what was meant by this is unclear. According to Jacob of Edessa the translation took place in the time of King Abgar, thus a century earlier than the estimate of modern scholarship.11 The West Syriac tradition witnessed further translations of Old Testament books in the sixth and seventh centuries, all from Greek: the fragments of a sixth-century translation of Genesis, Exodus and Isaiah, sometimes attributed to the initiative of Philoxenus, the famous Syro-hexapla, covering the whole Old Testament, made c. 615, at the same time as the Harklean New Testament, followed less than a century later by Jacob of Edessa’s revision of certain books (Pentateuch, I–II Samuel, Isaiah, Daniel and Wisdom). Use of the Syrohexapla by East Syriac commentators is first found in the ninth century, in Isho‘dad, though earlier in that century Patriarch Timothy I (d. 823) had a copy made from a manuscript in the Monastery of Mar Mattai.12
Knowledge of the Septuagint and the later Greek versions came through Syriac translations of three main sources, Eusebius’ Ecclesiastical History VI.16–17, Epiphanius’ Treatise on Weights and Measures,13 and on occasion Pseudo-Justin’s Exhortation to the Greeks.14 Epiphanius’ account of the different Greek versions features in summary form at the opening of Isho‘dad’s Commentary on Genesis (pp. 1–3), but at much greater length in Mushe bar Kipho’s Commentary on the Hexaemeron (chapter 44) and (in less detail) in that on the Psalms (chapter 28).
When Greek Commentaries started to be translated into Syriac, a problem would arise every now and then, when the Peshitta text of a verse differed from that of the Septuagint. The earlier practice was to substitute the Peshitta for the lemma, rather than translate the Greek; this, however, left a discordance between the lemma (= Peshitta) and the comment (on the LXX). Later practice was to translate the Greek of the lemma and so restore harmony between lemma and comment; at the same time the reader might be provided with a note concerning the differences between the two versions, Syriac and Greek. This, of course, gave rise to the question: which had the greater authority, Greek or Syriac. Largely because the New Testament was written in Greek and quoted from the Septuagint, it was generally agreed from the late fifth century onwards that the Greek had the greater authority in both Testaments. This was explicitly argued by Philoxenos,15 while East Syriac commentators simply followed Theodore (who in fact had a low opinion of the Peshitta Old Testament).
Syriac commentators were well aware that the various Syriac versions of the New Testament were all translated from Greek. It was above all the theological controversies which drew attention to the fact that the Peshitta did not always represent key passages accurately;16 the person who saw to it that action was taken and the matter remedied was Philoxenus, who commissioned a revised translation of the whole New Testament for reasons he explains:17 the original translators of the Peshitta New Testament had given scope for ‘Nestorian’ interpretations as a result of their loose translation, whether willfully or unwittingly they erred in many matters, not only in passages which teach about the Economy in the flesh, but also in other things […]. Because of this we have also now taken the trouble of having the holy books of the New Testament translated anew from Greek into Syriac.18
What in fact Polycarp, who undertook the work, produced in 507/8 was evidently much more a revision of the Peshitta, rather than a completely new translation. Apart from quotations this revision is unfortunately lost in its original form, though much of it seems to have been incorporated into the more philologically-oriented revision just over a century later by Thomas of Harqel, which does survive19 and even features in some Gospel Lectionaries. Unlike the situation with the Syrohexapla, Isho‘dad does not appear to make us of the Harklean in his commentaries on the New Testament books.
Most commentators are aware of variant readings, whether these are in a different version, or in the text (usually Peshitta) upon which they are commenting. Thus already in the Commentary on the Diatessaron, attributed to Ephrem, notice is taken every now and then of readings in the yawnoyo, which can be identified as the Old Syriac. Normally variant readings are adduced for practical reasons: they provide a better sense, or offer an alternative understanding, and not as part of a critical assessment of the original meaning.
Prefaces20
In Late Antiquity the medical and especially the philosophical schools produced commentaries which were provided with prefaces, and in these prefaces sets of initial questions were asked, such as what is the aim (Greek skopos, Syriac nisho) of the work, to whom is it addressed, or what is its use (Greek chresimon, Syriac ḥšaḥto, also yutrono), etc. From the sixth century onwards such prefaces start to appear in Syriac commentaries, asking the same kind of questions. Mushe bar Kipho’s learned Commentary on the Hexaemeron provides an exceptionally long preface, consisting of 50 chapters. These start off with a large number of theological questions, before asking what prophecy is, and how it is known that Moses was a prophet. Often the answer is given by means of a series of statements beginning ‘we say’, or if a different view is given first, ‘but we say’. Only after three short chapters concerning the ordering of the books of the Pentateuch, does Mushe go on to describe at considerable length (chapter 44) the different Greek and Syriac versions, after which he asks which translation is the best (it is here that he cites Philoxenos on the superiority of the Septuagint).21 Another longer chapter (47), already mentioned, argues that it is right to interpret the Old Testament both gushmono’it and ruḥono’it, with a series of examples aimed against those (‘certain heretics’) who claim that it is not right to interpret the Old Testament in a spiritual and allegorical manner.22 Dionysius bar Ṣalibi’s Introduction to his Commentary on the Gospel has 44 sections, variously entitled kephalaion, rišo and bṣoto. No. 42 lists the ‘7 kephalaia prefaced to a book’, following the tradition of secular commentaries; these are listed as follows: [1] ‘Aim (nišo): the aim of the Gospel is that it should trade (nettagar) Life in God for human beings; in word: faith in the Trinity, in deed: virtuous conduct. [2] Benefit (ḥošaḥto): benefit for the salvation of the soul. [3] Order (ṭekso): the order of its reading is after the Law and the Prophets, because in it all that was typified (etṭapas) in the Scriptures was fulfilled. [4] Reason for its title (‘elto d-rušmeh): ‘Gospel’, that is Good News. [5] Division into chapters (pulogo dal-kepala’e): it is divided into knowledge of the one God who is three Persons (qnume), to the performance of virtuous conduct, to knowledge of the heavenly powers and those who rejoice at sinners who repent, to the commandments, to the recollection of Judgement, to the reward of good things. [6] Whose is the book? (dmanu itaw ktobo): Christ’s, who was proclaimed through two Apostles and through two Evangelists (msabrone). [7] Under what subject does it fall? (tḥet aydo ṣbuto nopel): under theoria, or theology (lit: speech about the Godhead, mmallut alohuto), and under actions, or holy conduct’.
Language About God23
The problem of anthropomorphic language used of God was met in a variety of different ways by both Jewish and Christian commentators in Antiquity. Ephrem, like John Chrysostom a generation later, spoke of the ‘condescension’ (metnaḥtonuto) of God in allowing himself to be clothed in human language as a means of disclosing to human beings something of his hidden being: lbeš šmohe, ‘he put on terms’, that is to say, metaphors. For the most part the terms, or names, that God ‘puts on’ are š’ile, ‘borrowed’, that is, metaphorical; only a few, like Father, Sovereign, are ḥatite, ‘exact’. Ephrem warns:
If someone concentrates their attention solely
on the metaphors used of God’s majesty,
that person abuses and misrepresents His majesty
and thus goes astray by means of those very metaphors
with which God had clothed Himself for that person’s benefit,
and so he is ungrateful to that Grace
which had stooped down low to the level of his childishness.
(Hymns on Paradise 11:6)
God’s need to meet human ‘childishness’ in the process of his self-revelation is referred to again in another madrosho which deals with the subject of language about God:
We should realize that, if He had not put on these terms
it would not have been possible for Him
to speak with us human beings: by means of what belongs to us
He has drawn close to us; He has clothed Himself in our language,
so that He might clothe us in His mode of life.
He asked for our form, and put this on,
and then, like a father with his children,
He spoke with our childish state.
It is our terms that He has put on—though He did not literally do so;
He then took them off—without actually doing so:
when wearing them, He was at the same time stripped of them.
He puts on one when it is beneficial, then strips it off for another.
The fact that He strips off and puts on all sorts of metaphors
tells us that the metaphor does not apply to His true Being:
because that Being is hidden, He has depicted it by means of what is visible.
(Madrosho 31:2–3 of the cycle On Faith).
Ephrem goes on to compare God’s mode of teaching human beings to that of human beings teaching a parrot to speak, using a mirror. This idea of divine pedagogy was to prove especially popular in the later East Syriac tradition.
At the turn of the seventh to eighth century Jacob of Edessa likewise deals with the problem of how the biblical text speaks of God, picking up Ephrem’s stress on human ‘childishness’. Nearly a century later and in the East Syriac tradition, Theodore bar Koni approaches the matter in a different manner, while retaining the theme of divine pedagogy. He asks ‘What are the customary ways in which the Book of Psalms, along with the remaining books (of the Old Testament), speak?’ His answer is as follows:24
David is not alone in employing literary usages, for so do the other Prophets as well. This has occurred because they composed their discourse in a riddling (
ܐܘܚܕܬܢܐܝܬ ) fashion. For this reason there are many examples in them of personification that are alien to the actual facts. For he speaks about God in a corporeal way, attributing to Him eyes, ears, sitting down, standing up, a front and a back, a face and a countenance, sleep and waking up, a throne, weapons, travelling and flying; that He is angry, mocks, laughs, and becomes wrathful. Through these he teaches about (God’s) actions, whether doing good, or causing harm, taking as his starting point things that are familiar to us. He also speaks about other things, making objects that are dumb as though they were sentient, for example ‘The mountains danced like gazelles and the hills like lambs’ [Ps. 114.4].
The Right Approach to the Biblical Text
Several writers stress that it is important to approach the Bible in the right spirit. Comparing the biblical text to an abundantly flowing fountain, Ephrem wrote:
Your fountain, Lord, is hidden
from the person who does not thirst for You;
Your treasury seems empty
to the person who rejects You.
Love is the treasurer
to Your heavenly treasure-store.
(Hymns on Faith, 32:3)
Jacob Serugh puts the matter even more directly:
Approach Scripture with love—and you will see its beauty.
If you don’t approach it with love, it will not allow you to see its face:
if you read it without love, you will not get any profit,
for love is the gate through which a person enters its true understanding.
(Ed. Bedjan, IV, p. 282)
Writing at the end of the eighth century Theodore bar Koni expresses himself more prosaically:25
Although instruction and the soul’s constant study (hergo; sc. of the Scriptures) add to theoria, yet if it is not done for the purpose of religious knowledge and a virtuous life, such labour turns out to be useless.
Scholarly Tools
The chapter and verse numbers so familiar to-day for referencing are in fact late-comers in the transmission of the biblical text, the former going back to the Middle Ages, and the latter to the sixteenth century. A great variety of different systems of chapter numbering are to be found in manuscripts of the Greek Bible, and examples of these are already to be found in the earliest manuscripts such as the codex Sinaiticus of the fourth/fifth century. In Syriac biblical manuscripts a division of the text of each book into numbered ṣḥaḥe begins to appear in manuscripts, both Eastern and Western, from about the eighth century onwards. This system of reference, whose origins are unclear, proved to be remarkably stable,26 and is duly recorded in the bilingual Antioch Bible, as well as in the British and Foreign Bible Society’s edition of the New Testament. The system of ṣḥaḥe is confined to the Peshitta: Syrohexapla and Harklean manuscripts take over a Greek system of kephalaia.
Prior to the introduction of the ṣḥaḥe system, the use of an initial table of contents is already to be found in Ephrem’s Commentary on Genesis and Exodus, while in early biblical manuscripts headings might be introduced at specific points in red: thus in the famous 7a1 in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana one finds headings such as
For the Gospels the ‘Ammonian’ section numbers combined with the Canon Tables allowed the reader to discover where a passage in one Gospel had a counterpart in the other Gospels. This neat system was not only taken over into Syriac (evidently in the early fifth century), but it was also refined in the process. In a number of early manuscripts, such as the so-called Rabbula Gospels (dated 586) the Canon Tables are accompanied with elaborate decoration and illustration.
Among resources available to the Syriac commentators, three might be singled out here.
(1) A certain amount of basic critical information on Acts and the Epistles in the New Testament had been put together in Greek by a certain Euthalius whose identity and date (perhaps late 4th century) remain uncertain.28 Euthalius had a particular interest in quotations and so, amongst other things he provided information about Paul’s quotations from pagan literature. His work was translated into Syriac early enough for it to have been known to both the East and West Syriac tradition, and in the early sixth century the translation was revised, perhaps in connection with the Philoxenian revision of the text of the New Testament.
(2) Ancient commentators showed a great interest in the etymology and significance of personal and place names, something which of course often required a certain knowledge of Hebrew. Lists of names and their alleged etymologies were probably already known to the Alexandrian Jewish author, Philo, in the first century AD; in later centuries these lists tended to proliferate and several collections survive, some of which were rendered into Syriac.29 It is likely that most references in Syriac commentators to etymologies of names will have been based on such onomastica.
(3) ‘Masora’ is the modern name given (on the basis of Hebrew) by scholars to collections of philological and grammatical notes on individual words or phrases; in Syriac these are entitled kurose dashmohe, ‘Booklets of names’. The need for them will have arisen when the spoken Syriac of the time had so far departed from Classical Syriac that help was need in reading correctly. Manuscripts containing these collections (dating from the end of the ninth century onwards) are normally vocalized, providing at the same time indication of qushoyo and rukoko. Only one East Syriac manuscript of this type survives; this was written in Harran in 899 and covers only the Old Testament;30 West Syriac manuscripts are more plentiful and several include the New Testament books (and even some translations of authoritative Greek authors). At the end of the more extensive manuscripts are a few short writings by Jacob of Edessa, such as his Letter on orthography, and another on points (nuqze). The West Syriac tradition is associated with the Monastery of Qarqaphto (‘the skull’), near Resh‘aina.31
Two Brief Case Studies
(1) The interpretation of Genesis 1:2—wind/spirit or (Holy) Spirit?
A random comparison of different modern translations of the Bible will discover that translators render ruaḥ Elohim, active over the primordial water in Genesis 1:2, in basically two different ways: it is either taken as referring to the Spirit of God, or to ‘a mighty wind’. Ancient interpreters were similarly divided in the way they understood the verse. Since their views were influenced by the biblical text they were using, it will be helpful to set out the relevant texts:
Hebrew
LXX καὶ πνεῦμα θεοῦ ἐπεφέρετο ἐπάνω τοῦ ὕδατος
Peshitta
Syrohexapla
Eusebius of Emesa, in his Commentary on Genesis 1:2 observes that the Septuagint’s epephereto does not represent at all well the sense of the underlying Hebrew verb, which he says has the sense of ‘to foster’ (thalpein), like a bird, or to stir into fecundity the water’. He goes on to ask ‘Does the text speak of the Holy Spirit or of the wind?’ Noting that the passive verb of the Septuagint is not appropriate for the action of the Holy Spirit, he opts for the sense of the Hebrew (and Syriac) verb, and concludes that the Holy Spirit is meant.33 Ephrem, in his Commentary, took the opposite view and held that ‘although some take ruḥeh daloho as the Holy Spirit, the faithful do not’ (for reasons he goes on to specify). This was ignored by the author of the sixth-century Life of Ephrem, who identifies Ephrem as the person who had illuminated Basil of Caesarea on the meaning of the passage. In Basil’s own Commentary on the Hexaemeron, to which the author of the Life refers, Basil in fact simply speaks of a ‘Syrian’ who had drawn his attention to the sense of the Hebrew verb; the true identity of the Syrian, namely Eusebius of Emesa, was pointed out by L. van Rompay.34
The discordance between the claim of the Life of Ephrem and Ephrem’s own Commentary was noted by Isho‘ bar Nun, who sharply dismissed the identification as being due to ignorance.35 Opinions were, in fact, much divided between the two interpretations of the ruḥeh daloho in Gen. 1:2. East Syriac commentators not surprisingly followed Theodore’s view, that it was not the Holy Spirit, while West Syriac authors mostly opted for the view of Basil’s ‘Syrian’ (i.e. Eusebius of Emesa); there were, however, some exceptions, most notably Jacob of Serugh who (as so often) followed Ephrem on this point, though perhaps he also was recalling his education at the Persian School in Edessa, where Theodore’s exegesis will have been promoted. Subsequently both Jacob of Edessa and Mushe bar Kipho opted for the identification with the Holy Spirit. The controversy even reached the wording of a prayer to be found in the Maronite and an early Syriac baptismal service preserved in two manuscripts: in one of these manuscripts all reference to the Holy Spirit ‘hovering over the waters at the establishment of creation’ has been deliberately cut out.36
(2) Psalm headings
The original translator of the Peshitta Psalms evidently did not include the Hebrew Psalm headings, and the present Syriac headings, different in the East and West manuscript traditions, are secondary; in both traditions they originate in a desire to find the precise historical context of each psalm. The headings in the East Syriac tradition mostly go back to Theodore of Mopsuestia’s Commentary on the Psalms. Theodore, unlike many other Fathers, held that all the psalms were written by David, but that they sometimes referred prophetically to very much later events; in such cases Theodore would simply state that a psalm concerns (for example) ‘the (Jewish) People in Babylon’ (thus Pss. 141–2), or that is has been uttered men parṣopa d-N ‘from the person of so-and-so’, that is to say, ‘in the voice of N’. Although Theodore was very sparing in seeing New Testament prophecies, quite a number are allocated by him to the Maccabees: thus David is said to have spoken Psalm 143 ‘as from their person’ (
The West Syriac tradition provides completely different Psalm headings and is usually happy to attribute a number of Psalms to certain authors other than David, as indicated in Psalm headings in the LXX (and Hebrew). While they frequently specify a particular historical setting, they usually also point to a spiritual interpretation as well. The earliest witness is the Psalm Commentary by Daniel of Salaḥ, many of whose titles are very similar to those in the seventh-century Ambrosian manuscript of the Peshitta (7a1). In the later West Syriac manuscript tradition there is a good deal of variation (unlike in the East Syriac tradition); a late form of this can be found in Samuel Lee’s edition (1823) of the Peshitta Old Testament, reprinted in the United Bible Society’s edition. An edition of the West Syriac Psalm headings is in preparation by D. G. K. Taylor.
The Main Types of Biblical Commentary
Biblical commentary can take on many different forms in Syriac. All the earliest Syriac running commentaries on the biblical text are confined to single books; the earliest of these is Ephrem’s pushoqo of Genesis (followed by what is described as a turgomo on Exodus). Only fragments of Philoxenos’ pushoqo on Matthew and Luke survive, while from later in the sixth century comes Daniel of Salah’s pushoqo of the Psalms. Although sometimes described as a ‘commentary’ on the Hexaemeron, or Six Days of Creation, the actual title of Jacob of Edessa’s work is ‘Volume of mimre on the establishment of creation (tuqon beryoto)’; while it follows the sequence of Genesis 1, it takes the form of compendium of scientific knowledge about the natural world. It is not until the eighth and ninth centuries that commentaries on all the books of the Bible begin to appear, first of all in the East Syriac tradition. It is uncertain whether to so-called Diyarbakir Commentary once extended beyond Genesis and Exodus 1–9:32, but its successors, the Anonymous Commentary and that of Isho‘dad of Merv in the ninth century, cover both Old and New Testaments. Isho‘dad’s Commentary brings together a great variety of earlier traditions, and for the first time makes use of the Syrohexapla, as noted earlier. In his commentaries on the early chapters of Genesis (the Hexaemeron and Paradise), the Psalms, and most of the books of the New Testament, Mushe bar Kipho likewise brought together views of earlier commentators (including East Syriac), and this is also the case with the subsequent biblical commentaries by Dionysius bar Salibi and Bar ‘Ebroyo, although the latter’s commentary is considerably briefer and much more philological in character.
Quite a number of Greek commentaries were available to Syriac commentators through translations; for these, see the Appendix.
Besides commentaries that correspond in form to what one expects a commentary to look like today, mentioned above, it should be remembered that many other forms of commentary can be found in Syriac literature; these can be summarily categorised as follows:
(1)–(3) Homilies (mimre): these will deal with specific biblical passages, and can take on at least three different forms:
(1) the re-telling of the biblical passage in an imaginative and expanded form, with little or no specifically homiletic material. Examples in verse are Ephrem’s poems on the Repentance of Nineveh and on the Sinful Woman of Luke 7, and a number of anonymous poems (sometimes wrongly attributed to Ephrem), such as the two mimre on Genesis 22. In prose, the Life of Joseph, wrongly attributed to Basil.
(2) mimre in prose or verse similar to (1) but with an overt, and often strong, homiletic character. Verse examples can be found in many of the mimre by Narsai and Jacob of Serugh where they follow the sequence of the biblical text; notable examples are their respective mimre on Creation, while from a much later period comes Emmanuel bar Shahhare’s verse Commentary on the Hexaemeron. In prose, John of Apamea’s collection of short works on the Beatitudes (Matthew 5).
(3) mimre in prose or verse which focus on a biblical passage but deal with it in a general way. This would apply to many other mimre by Jacob and by Narsai, while as prose examples one might cite Aphrahat’s Demonstration 5 (on Daniel’s vision in Dan. 7), and the anonymous discourse on Melkizedek.39
(4) Exegetical catenae: two important West Syriac catenae covering most books of the Bible are known. One (in British Library, Add. 12,168, of 8th/9th cent.) is largely based on Greek authors, while the other, known as the Catena Severi, completed by the monk Severus in the vicinity of Edessa in 861, has as its basis excerpts from Ephrem, Jacob of Edessa, and (for the New Testament) John Chrysostom; this was supplemented a little later by Shem‘un of Ḥesna d-Manṣur (Vatican Syr. 103), who added further excepts from both Syriac and Greek authors.40
(5) Question and Answer: this was a very popular genre in Late Antiquity, and many examples of it dealing with a variety of topics can be found in Syriac.41 Exegetical Questions and Answers are best represented by Isho‘ bar Nun’s extensive series covering both Old and New Testament, following the model provided in Greek by Theodoret; very often these are closely related in content to the standard East Syriac commentaries, where indeed one often finds specific comments prefaced by ‘it is asked’.
(6) Letters. These serve as the vehicle for many of Jacob of Edessa’s comments on specific passages; these are usually presented as responses to particular questions posed by his correspondent, and so are close in character to ‘(5)’. Several Letters by Patriarch Severus of Antioch also take on this character.
(7) Scholia on particular passages. This is another genre favoured in particular by Jacob.42 Theodore bar Koni’s ktobo d-eskulyon43 is in fact a large-scale compendium of theological knowledge.
(8) Gannat Bussame. This East Syriac commentary on the Lectionary (of the church of Kokhe, Seleucia-Ctesiphon) is ascribed to the otherwise unknown ‘Interpreter of the Turks’; its date is uncertain, and both 13th and 10th century have been proposed. It contains excerpts from several little- or unknown authors. So far only the part for the Sundays of Advent has been published.44
(9) Salvation history retold in an embellished form: Cave of Treasures (6th century)45 and the Book of the Bee, by Shleimun of Bosra (13th century).
By Way of Conclusion
The polemic against allegorical interpretation which the East Syriac tradition inherited from Theodore of Mopsuestia has sometimes led to the totally false impression that the East Syriac exegetical tradition was ‘historical’ and the West Syriac one ‘allegorical’ or ‘spiritual’. As has been noted above, Theodore’s polemic was not aimed at allegorical interpretation itself, but at its exclusive use, in the way that pagan allegorists allegorised away the literal meaning of the Greek myths. Though a few Christian exegetes may have been guilty of such an approach, it does not apply to any of the Syriac commentators; in reality, both traditions make use of both approaches. A short passage from Ephrem’s Commentary on Genesis, and the ways in which it was followed up by later commentators, will help to illustrate this double approach.
Ephrem’s essentially ‘factual’ Commentary is an admirable example of a ‘close reading’ of the biblical text, above all in the sections on the opening chapters of Genesis: great attention is paid, not only to the details of what is said, but also to what is not said, or implied. Genesis 22, entitled ‘the testing of Abraham’ in the Milan Peshitta (7a1), has evoked a huge variety of different interpretations. Ephrem’s Commentary on the chapter is quite short, but it proved to be the starting point for many subsequent developments.46 Right at the beginning he notes the absence of any mention of Isaac’s mother, a matter that requires an explanation, and he duly offers one. On reaching verse 13 he first quotes the text and then comments:
C.Gen XX.3: ‘Then Abraham saw a ram in the tree [b’ilono = Targum; Pesh. bsawkto], took it, and offered it as a whole offering instead of his son’. That there was not a ram there (previously), Isaac’s question about the lamb testifies; and that there was not a tree there, the (pieces of) wood on Isaac’s shoulders certify. The mountain burst forth with the tree, and the tree with the ram, so that in the ram that hung on the tree, and had become the sacrifice instead of Abraham’s son, there might be depicted the day of Him47 who was to be hung like a ram upon the wood, and tasted death on behalf of the whole world.48
Such was Ephrem’s answer to the question ‘where did they come from’; he also takes the opportunity to provide the link with a passage in the Gospel of John, whose reference was not entirely clear. The East Syriac Diyarbakir Commentary begins with a Christological reference, but then goes on to give two different views about the origin of the ram. Though Ephrem is not named, it is clearly his view which is rejected. Isho‘dad expands on this, first of all referring to the Hebrew and Greek term for the tree, but at the same time giving it a specifically Christian interpretation. He then goes on to discuss the origin of the ram, in the course of which he quotes Ephrem’s explanation, but rejects it, in part for a Christological concern:
On Gen. 22:13.49 The tree on which the ram was hung. Hebrew and Greek: ‘Behold, a single ram held in the plant Sabeq by its horns’ [= LXX]. Sabeq: wood of forgiveness [cf. root šbq], that is, the Cross that absolves, and through Him who was crucified debts are remitted, etc. Now it was hung by its horns, with its feet extended, and it marked out the type of the Cross.50 Some (say) ‘that ram was a new creation’, but that is not true. Others (say) ‘the ram was from somewhere else, or it was a mountain (ram)’. Mor Ephrem (says) ‘that there was no ram there, Isaac’s question about the lamb testifies; and that there was no tree there, the (pieces of) wood on Isaac’s shoulder certify. The mountain burst forth with the tree, and the tree with the ram’. The tradition of the Schools (says) that ‘an angel took it from the sheep of Abraham and placed it in that tree’. First, so that the offering which he made from his own (possessions) might be especially acceptable; secondly, so that it might be known that, just as it was a natural sheep, and not from that tree, or from somewhere else, so too Christ in His humanity was created from human nature, and not from any other nature.51
It is significant that, apart from Isho‘dad’s final point, typological exegesis, such as is frequently found in connection with this verse in liturgical poetry, is completely absent.
Appendix: Syriac translations of Greek Commentaries52
Athanasius (d. 373). Both his long and short Commentary on the Psalms were translated into Syriac and have been edited by R. W. Thomson.53 His Letter to Marcellinus, on reading the Psalms was prefaced to the Syrohexapla text of the Psalms.54
Basil of Caesarea (d. 378). His Commentary on the Hexaemeron was translated into Syriac in the earlier part of the fifth century (and thence into Armenian); this too has been edited by R. W. Thomson.55
Cyril of Alexandria (d. 444). The extensive set of 156 Homilies on Luke, forming a commentary, survive (incomplete) in Syriac translation, edited by R. Payne Smith;56 many single homilies were later incorporated into Homiliaries.
Eusebius of Emesa (d. before 359), Comm. on the Octateuch. Eusebius originated from Edessa and had a Greek education, studying in Antioch, Caesarea (Palestine) and Alexandria; he became bishop of Emesa (Homs) c.341. Though he wrote in Greek, all that survives, apart from fragments in Catenae, is in Latin or Armenian translation, the former consisting of homilies, the latter commentaries on books of the first half of the Old Testament, the longest (and most accessible) of which is his Commentary on Genesis;57 in this he displays an interest in textual matters and several times quotes the reading of ‘the Syriac’ and (less frequently) ‘the Hebrew’.58 It is very likely that a Syriac translation once existed, since many excerpts, quoted anonymously by Isho‘dad, have been identified.
Gregory of Nyssa (d. c.395). Although the Syriac translation of Gregory’s Commentary on the Song of Songs (in Vatican Syr. 106) has not been published, it has been the subject of an important study by C. van den Eynde,59 who also edits the supplement which completes Gregory’s unfinished Commentary by a certain Symmachus, together with part of a sixth-century Syriac translation of the LXX text; a further fragment of the latter has subsequently been edited.60
John Chrysostom (d. 407). Of John’s extensive collection of homiletic commentaries on the Old and New Testament, many of which were translated into Syriac, only Homilies 1–43 on John have so far been published.61
Theodore of Mopsuestia (d. 428). The only complete commentary to survive in Syriac is that on John.62 For the Old Testament there are fragments for Genesis, Psalms and Qohelet.63
Selected Bibliography
Brock, Sebastian P. “The resolution of the Philoxenian/Harclean problem,” in Epp, Eldon J., ed. New Testament Textual Criticism: Essays in Honour of B.M. Metzger (Oxford: Clarendon, 1981).
Brock, Sebastian P. A Brief Outline of Syriac Literature (Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2011).
Brock, Sebastian P., and Van Rompay, Lucas. Catalogue of the Syriac Manuscripts and Fragments in the Library of Deir al-Surian, Wadi al-Natrun (Egypt) (Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 227; Louvain: Peeters, 2014).
Chabot, J. B., ed. S. Cyrilli Alexandrini Commentarii in Lucam I. (CSCO 70; Louvain: Secrétariat du CorpusSCO, 1961).
Clarke, Ernest C. The Selected Questions of Isho bar Nun on the Pentateuch. (StPB 5; Leiden: Brill, 1962).
De Halleux, André, ed. Philoxène de Mabbog. Commentaire du Prologue johannique (Ms. Br. Mus. Add. 14, 534) (CSCO 380; Louvain: Peeters, 1977).
Dean, James E., ed. Epiphanius’ Treatise on Weights and Measures. The Syriac Version (Chicago: Chicago Press, 1935).
Griffith, Sidney H. “Theodore bar Koni’s Scholion: a Nestorian Summa contra gentiles from the first Abbasid century,” in Garsoian, Nina, Mathews, Thomas, and Thomson, R. W., eds. East of Byzantium: Syria and Armenia in the Formative Period (Washington DC: Dumbarton Oaks Pub Service, 1982), 53–72.
Jansma, T. “Théodore de Mopsueste, Interprétation du livre de la Genèse. Fragments de la version syriaque (BM Add. 17,189, f.17–21)”, Le Muséon 75 (1962): 63–92.
Loopstra, Jonathan, ed. An East Syrian Manuscript of the Syriac ‘Masora’ dated to 899CE (Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2014).
Morrison, C. E. “When copyists become authors: the headings in the Codex Ambrosianus (B.21 INF),” in A. Fideli et al., eds. Gli studi di storiografia (Orientalia Anbrosiana 6; Milan: Centro Ambrosiano, 2019).
Petit, Françoise, Van Rompay, Lucas, and Weitenberg, Joseph, eds. Eusèbe d’Émèse, Commentaire de la Genèse (Traditio Exegetica Graeca 15; Louvain: Peeters, 2011).
Sachau, Eduard. Theodori Mopsuesteni fragmenta syriaca (Leipzig: Sumptibus Guilelmi Engelmann, 1869).
Saebø, Magne, ed. Hebrew Bible/Old Testament: The History of its Interpretation. vol. 1 and 2 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996–2000).
Scher, Addai, ed. Theodore bar Koni, Liber Scholiorum. I (CSCO 55; Louvain: Peeters, (1910) 1960).
Smith, Robert Payne. S. Cyrilli Alexandriae Archiepiscopi. Commentarii in Lucae Evangelium (Oxford: Typographeo Academico, 1858).
Thomson, Robert W. Athanasiana Syriaca. Part IV, Expositio in Psalmos (CSCO 386–387; Louvain: Secrétariat du CorpusSCO, 1977).
Van Rompay, Lucas, ed. Théodore de Mopsueste. Fragments syriaques du Commentaire des Psaumes (CSCO 435–436; Louvain: Peeters, 1982).
Van Rompey, Lucas. “L’informateur syrien de Basil de Césarée. À propos de Genèse 1,2,” Orientalia Christiana Periodica 58 (1992): 245–251.
Watt, J. W., ed. Philoxenus of Mabbug: Fragments of the Commentary on Matthew and Luke (CSCO 392; Louvain: Secrétariat du CorpusSCO, 1978).
Excellent surveys of the material can be found for the Old Testament in Lucas van Rompay’s contributions to Magne Saebø, ed., Hebrew Bible/Old Testament: The History of its Interpretation, vol. 1 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996), 612–641, and vol 2. (2000), 559–577; also Bruno Chiesa, Filologia storica della Bibbia ebraica, I (Brescia: Paideia, 2000), 109–132. And for the New Testament, see J. C. McCullough, “Early Syriac Commentaries on the New Testament,” The Near East School of Theology, Theological Review 5/1 (1982): 14–33, and 5/2: 79–126.
The adverb pel’etono’it already occurs in Philoxenus. See J. W. Watt, ed., Philoxenus of Mabbug: Fragments of the Commentary on Matthew and Luke (CSCO 392; Louvain: Secrétariat du CorpusSCO, 1978), 6 (the Church as Bride pel’etono’it from the side of Christ).
‘Antiochene’ properly refers to the exegetical approach of Diodore and Theodore, well described by Christoph Schäublin, Untersuchungen zu Methode und Herkunft der antiochenischen Exegese (Cologne/Bonn: Hanstein, 1974).
René Draguet, ed., Commentaire du Livre d’Abba Isaïe par Dadišo Qaṭraya (CSCO 326; Louvain: Peeters, 1972), 155–156.
Lucas van Rompay, ed., Théodore de Mopsueste. Fragments syriaques du Commentaire des Psaumes (CSCO 435–436; Louvain: Peeters, 1982). Van Rompay’s edition is based on a late nineteenth-century manuscript; subsequently at least part of that manuscript’s Vorlage has turned up as Princeton ms Syr. 7, of the sixth, or maybe even late fifth, century.
This precise term is found in the subscription to the work and is probably a later substitution for pushoqo d-pel’oto, the term found (8) in the treatise itself.
Addai Scher, ed., Theodore bar Koni, Liber Scholiorum, I (CSCO 55; Louvain: Peeters, [1910] 1960), 356.
Ceslaus van den Eynde, ed., Commentaire d’Išo’dad de Merv sur l’Ancien Testament. VI, Psaumes (CSCO 433; Louvain: Peeters, 1981), 11–15, 12.
Page 15. The ensuing passage is quoted almost verbatim by Mushe bar Kipho in chapter 29 of his Psalms Commentary. The author of the Diyarbakir Commentary (Lucas van Rompay, ed. [CSCO 483; Louvain: Peeters, 1986], 130) states that the biblical text not only benefits the (Jewish) People, but also—through types (ṭupse)—the (gentile) Peoples.
Gustav Diettrich, Eine jakobitische Einleitung in den Psalter (Giessen: Ricker, 1901), 119–121. The identity of the author only became known subsequently, cf. Jacques-Marie Vosté, “L’Introduction de Moïse bar Kepha aux Psaumes de David,” RB 38 (1929): 214–228.
Thus especially in the Diyarbekir Commentary, where ‘ebroyo is quoted 21 times.
Theodore bar Koni (I, 279–282) cites some as saying that the Syriac translation goes back to the time of Hiram(!), while others say the Apostles made it.
Letter 47 in Martin Heimgartner, Die Briefe 42–58 des ostsyrischen Patriarchen Timotheos I (CSCO 644–545; Louvain: Peeters, 2012); English translation in Sebastian P. Brock, A Brief Outline of Syriac Literature (Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2011), 240–246.
A photographic edition of the Syriac translation was edited by James E. Dean, Epiphanius’ Treatise on Weights and Measures. The Syriac Version (Chicago: Chicago Press, 1935).
For these see Abraham Wasserstein and David J. Wasserstein, “Among the Christians of the Orient,” in The Legend of the Septuagint: From Classical Antiquity to Today (Cambridge: University Press, 2006), 132–173, esp. 136–139.
As reported by Mushe bar Kipho, Comm. on the Hexaemeron, 173 (Der Hexaemeronkommentar des Moses bar Kephar, Lorenz Schlimme, ed., Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1977) Comm. on Psalms, Preface, end of ch. 28; likewise Bar ‘Ebroyo, Auṣar Roze 1–5.
Whether this was also the case with the Peshitta revision of the Old Syriac Gospels, undertaken c. 400, is unclear.
See further Sebastian P. Brock, “The resolution of the Philoxenian/Harclean problem,” in Eldon J. Epp, ed., New Testament Textual Criticism: Essays in Honour of B. M. Metzger (Oxford: Clarendon, 1981), 325–343.
André de Halleux, ed., Philoxène de Mabbog. Commentaire du Prologue johannique (Ms. Br. Mus. Add. 14, 534) (CSCO 380; Louvain: Peeters, 1977), 53.
Best for the Gospels, while for Acts only a single manuscript survives.
For the genre in Syriac, see Eva Riad, Studies in the Syriac Preface (Acta Iniversitatis Upsaliensis, Studia Semitica Upsaliensia 11; Uppsala, 1988). Among the authors she discusses is Theodore bar Koni (157–172).
He quotes Philoxenus as saying that the Peshitta was translated ‘into our Aramaic language’ by Aquila and Symmachus; this surprising claim would seem to go back to an early confusion between Aquila and Onkelos, the traditional author of the standard Targum of the Pentateuch.
Ch. 44 features in a shorter form as ch. 28 in the Preface to his Commentary on the Psalms, and the opening of ch. 47 reappears as the opening of ch. 29 of that on the Psalms.
For the Patristic background, see Bernard Pouderon and Anna Usacheva, eds., Dire Dieu. Les principes théologiques de l’écriture sur Dieu en patristique (Paris: Beauchesne Editions, 2017).
Scher, Theodore bar Koni, Liber Scholiorum, I, 354. He follows Theodore in admitting that the Scriptures sometimes spoke ‘uḥdono’it (van Rompay, Théodore de Mopsueste, Fragments syriaques, 4; ‘métaphoriquement’, translation, 5), and that such passages should be treated as the equivalent of similes, ‘like a …’.
Scher, Theodore bar Koni, Liber Scholiorum, I, 3. Theoria here has more or less the sense of ‘proper exegesis’. He goes on to quote Romans 10:9.
In some books, such as Isaiah, a few manuscripts provide a slightly different system of ṣḥaḥe. For groups of Old Testament books and for the New Testament these ṣḥaḥe were also given cumulative numbers.
The various types of headings are classified by C. E. Morrison, “When copyists become authors: the headings in the Codex Ambrosianus (B.21 INF),” in A. Fideli et al., eds., Gli studi di storiografia (Orientalia Anbrosiana 6; Milan: Centro Ambrosiano, 2019), 377–400.
See Louis C. Willard, A Critical Study of the Euthalian Apparatus (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2009); he discusses the two Syriac witnesses on 102–105. For the fragmentary East Syriac witness, see Sebastian P. Brock, “The Syriac Euthalian material and the Philoxenian version of the New Testament,” Zeitschrift für die neutestamentliche Wissenschaft 70 (1979): 120–130.
These have been edited by Franz X. Wutz, Onomastica Sacra: Untersuchungen zum Liber interpretationis nominum hebraicorum des hl. hieronuymus (Texte und Untersuchungen 41/1–2; Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs’sche Buchhandlung 1914–1915), 792–841.
There is a photographic edition: Jonathan Loopstra, ed., An East Syrian Manuscript of the Syriac ‘Masora’ dated to 899CE (Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2014).
Gorgias Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Syriac Heritage, s.v. “shmohe manuscripts”, 276–279.
This is probably the original translation of the Syrohexapla, witnessed by Isho‘dad (van den Eynde Comm. Genesis, ed., 17), whereas the lectionary pericope (in a manuscript of 1569) printed by W. Baars, New Syro-Hexaplaric Texts (Leiden: Brill, 1968), 45, has
Francoise Petit, Lucas van Rompay and Joseph Weitenberg, eds., Eusèbe d’Émèse, Commentaire de la Genèse (Traditio Exegetica Graeca 15; Louvain: Peeters, 2011), 32–33 and (for a Greek fragment) 262.
Lucas van Rompey, “L’informateur syrien de Basil de Césarée. À propos de Genèse 1,2,” Orientalia Christiana Periodica 58 (1992): 245–251.
Ernest C. Clarke, The Selected Questions of Isho bar Nun on the Pentateuch (Leiden: Brill, 1962), 23; Isho‘ bar Nun suggested Aphrahat instead. The discrepancy was also noted by Mushe bar Kipho in his Commentary.
For details, see Sebastian P. Brock, “The ruaḥ elohim of Gen. 1,2 and its reception history in the Syriac tradition,” in Jean-Marie Auwers and André Wénin, eds., Lectures et relectures de la Bible (Louvain: Peeters, 1999), 327–349, esp. 346–347. The article is reprinted in Sebastian P. Brock, Fire from Heaven: Studies in Syriac Theology and Liturgy (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006), chapter 14.
For these Psalms, see van Rompay, Théodore de Mopsueste, Fragments syriaques [n.4], 61–64.
Willem Bloemendaal, The Headings of the Psalms in the East Syrian Church (Leiden: Brill, 1960), 89–90; cf. also H. F. van Rooy, The East Syriac Psalm Headings (Piscataway: Gorgias Press, 2013), 162–164.
François Graffin, ed., “Homélies anonymes du VIe siècle: dissertation sur le Grand-Prêtre, homélies sur la pécheresse I, II, III,” Patrologia Orientalis 41 (1984): 4.
Vatican Syr. 103 was used by Petrus Benedictus in the eighteenth-century Rome edition of works attributed to Ephrem. Many of Patriarch Severus’ comments on biblical passages in his Homilies and Letters ended up in Greek Catenae: for these, see the collection of materials in Françoise Petit and Lucas van Rompay, La Chaîne sur l’Exode, I. Fragments de Sévère d’Antioche (Louvain: Peeters, 1999); and Sévère d’Antioche, Fragments tirés des chaînes sur les derniers livres de l’Octateuque et sur les Règnes (Louvain: Peeters, 2006).
R. B. ter Haar Romeny, “Question and Answer collections in Syriac literature,” in A. Volgers and C. Zamagni, eds., Erotapokriseis: Early Christian Question and Answer Literature in Context (Louvain: Peeters, 2004), 145–163.
A selection was edited, with English translation, by G. Phillips, Scholia on Passages of the Old Testament by Mar Jacob, Bishop of Edessa (London: Williams and Norgate, 1864).
According to S. H. Griffith this should be taken as a singular (scholion; rather than a plural, scholiōn); see his “Theodore bar Koni’s Scholion: a Nestorian Summa contra gentiles from the first Abbasid century,” in Nina Garsoian, Thomas Mathews and R. W. Thomson, eds., East of Byzantium: Syria and Armenia in the Formative Period (Washington DC: Dumbarton Oaks Pub Service, 1982), 53–72.
Gerrit J. Reinink, Gannat Bussame, I. Die Adventssontage (CSCO 501–502; Louvain: Peeters, 1988).
Su‑Min Ri, ed., La Caverne des Trésors: Les deux recensions syriaques (CSCO 486; Louvain: Peeters, 1987); cf. S. Minov, “Date and provenance of the Syriac Cave of Treasures,” Hugoye 20/1 (2017): 129–229.
See, for example, the case of two remarkable mimre on Gen. 22, edited with English translation in Sebastian P. Brock, “Twoy Syraic Verse Himilies on the Binding of Isaac” Le Muséon 99 (1986): 61–129.
John 8:56.
Cf. Hebrews 2:9.
J-M. Vosté and C. van den Eynde, eds., Commentair d’Išo‘dad de Merv sur l’Ancien Testament, I. Genèse (CSCO 126; Louvain: Durbecq, 1950), 175.
This probably depends on a lost Syriac translation of Eusebius of Emesa’s Commentary on Genesis: see the Catena fragment in Petit, van Rompay and Weitenberg, Eusèbe d’Émèse, Commentaire de la Genèse, 320–321.
The section on Ephrem (but without the quotation) and the School is virtually identical with Isho‘ bar Nun’s Question XXIX, ed. with English translation by Ernest G. Clarke, transl., The Selected Questions of Isho bar Nun on the Pentateuch (StPB; Leiden: Brill, 1962), 32 and f.15rv of the photographic edition (of Cambridge, Add. 2017). Isho‘ bar Nun died in 828, having been Catholicos of the Church of the East since 823.
Limited to those which have been published.
Robert W. Thomson, Athanasiana Syriaca. Part IV, Expositio in Psalmos (CSCO 386–387; Louvain: Secrétariat du CorpusSCO, 1977).
In the Milan Syrohexapla manuscript, ff.2v–5r. A separate fragment was published by Thomson, Athanasiana Syriaca, 189 (Deir al-Syrian Syriac Fragment 43 probably belongs to the same manuscript).
R. W. Thomson, The Syriac Version of the Hexaemeron by Basil of Caesarea (CSCO 550–551; Leuven, 1995). The Syriac translation was subsequently translated into Armenian.
Robert Payne Smith, S. Cyrilli Alexandriae Archiepiscopi, Commentarii in Lucae Evangelium (Oxford: Typographeo Academico, 1858) with a separate English translation, Robert Payne Smith, transl., A Commentary upon the Gospel according to St Luke, by St Cyril of Alexandria. First Translatet into English from an Acient Syraic Version (Oxford: University Press, 1859). For some further fragments of the manuscript (BL, Add. 14,552) were edited by W. Wright, ed., Fragments of Homilies of Cyril of Alexandria on the Gospel of Luke edited from a Nitrian Manuscript (London: Gilbert and Rivington, 1874); to the same manuscript belongs Fragment 4 in S. P. Brock and L. van Rompay, Catalogue of the Syriac Manuscripts and Fragments in the Library of Deir al-Surian, Wadi al-Natrun (Egypt) (Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 227; Louvain: Peeters, 2014), 351, 372–373, and 607–610 (images). Homilies 1–80 were re-edited by J. B. Chabot, ed., S. Cyrilli Alexandrini Commentarii in Lucam, I (CSCO 70; Louvain: Secrétariat du CorpusSCO, 1961).
French translation in Petit, van Rompay and Weitenberg, Eusèbe d’Émèse, Commentaire de la Genèse.
For this aspect, see R. B. ter Haar Romeny, A Syrian in Greek Dress. The Use of Greek, Hebrew and Syriac Biblical Texts in Eusebius of Emesa’s Commentary on Genesis (Traditio Exegetica Graeca 6; Louvain: Peeters, 1997).
Ceslas van den Eynde, La version syriaque du commentaire de Grégoire de Nysse sur le Cantique des cantiques: ses origines ses témoins, son influence (Bibliothèque du Muséon 10; Louvain: Bureaux du Muséon, 1939).
Sebastian P. Brock, “Mingana syr. 628: a folio from a revision of the Song of Songs,” Journal of Semitic Studies 40 (1995): 39–56; for the Sinai manuscript to which this belongs, see P. Géhin, Les manuscrits syriaques de parchemin du Sinaï et leurs ‘membra disjecta’ (CSCO 665; Louvain: Peeters, 2017), 59–60.
With English translation, by Jeff W. Childers, transl., The Syriac Version of John Chrysostom’s Commentary on John, I. Memre 1–43 (CSCO 651–652; Louvain: Peeters, 2013).
Ed. with Latin translation by Jaques M. Vosté, Theodori Mopsuesteni commentarius in Evangelium Ioannis Apostoli (CSCO 115; Louvain: Secrétariat du CorpusSCO, 1940).
Genesis: Eduard Sachau, Theodori Mopsuesteni fragmenta syriaca (Leipzig: Sumptibus Guilelmi Engelmann, 1869), 1–34, supplemented by R. Tonneau, “Théodore de Mopsuesete, Interprétation du livre de la Genèse, Vat. Syr. 120,” Le Muséon 66 (1953): 45–64 and T. Jansma, “Théodore de Mopsueste, Interprétation du livre de la Genèse. Fragments de la version syriaque (BM Add. 17,189, f.17–21)”, Le Muséon 75 (1962): 63–92; possibly Deir al-Surian Syriac Fragments 26 and 110 may belong. Psalms: van Rompay, ed., Théodore de Mopsueste. Fragments syriaques du Commentaire des Psaumes. Qohelet: ed. W. Strothmann, Das syrische Fragment des Ecclesiastes-Kommentars von Theodor von Mopsuestia (GOFS 28; Wiesbaden, 1988).