Transcript Slide 1
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Prepared by Mgr. Ignace Sadek & Fr. Jean Younes
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1. The Aramaic
The Aramaic is a group of Semitic languages with a 3,000 year history.
It is a family of related Semitic languages constituting a group of dialects mutually intelligible.
At one time it has been the language of administration of empires “Lingua Franca” which was a cosmopolite language.
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2. Aramaic and Bible
Aramaic was the original language of some sections of the Biblical books.
Ezra, Daniel, Jeremiah and Genesis.
It has been the language of the first Gospel of Matthew, which disappeared.
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3. Aramaic and Talmud
Aramaic is especially the main language of the Talmud. a) Talmud
It is the collection of writings constituting the Jewish civil and religious laws. It consists of two parts, the Mishnah and the Gemara.
b) The Mishnah
The Mishnah is the codification of the oral Jewish Traditions
c) The Gemera
The Gemara is the commentary of the oral traditions or Mishnah 5
4. Aramaic in the time of Jesus
In Palestine, during the time of Jesus there were three Aramaic dialects, slightly different, the dialect of Judea, the dialect of Samaria and the dialect of Galilee
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. During Jesus lifetime, in the first century, four languages were used by different classes of people 6
1.Greek was international language of trade and of learned people and was widely understood in the urban spheres.
2.Latin was spoken in the Roman army and the Roman administration.
3.Aramaic was the spoken language of the common people.
4.Hebrew was used especially for worship.
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5. Syriac Origin
After the conquest of Syria and Mesopotamia by Alexander the Great in the Fourth Century BC, Syriac and other Aramaic dialects became written languages in reaction to Hellenism.
In 132 BC, Syriac became the official language of a great region around Edessa, which became as cradle of the Syriac language.
Classical Syriac started as the local Aramaic dialect in the early First Century AD in Edessa, Syriac started as the local Aramaic dialect of the City Edessa, then it had been adopted as the literary language of Aramaic-speaking Christians all 8 over Mesopotamia and the Middle East.
The major prestige of Edessa is due to the honor enjoyed by Edessa for claiming to posses the “Abjar Letter” which is a letter supposed to be written by Jesus to the King of Edessa named Abjar the black. This letter had been translated into Greek around 300 AD by Eusebius bishop of Caesarea who died in 340 AD.
During the time of the Apostles, in Antioch the greatest city of that time (500,000 inhabitants), people used to talk Syriac and Greek. This explains the Origin of the Patriarchate language of the Maronites, Orthodox) language of the the Syrian Syriac church and the (Melhite and Orthodox) (Catholic Patriarchate the Greek.
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6. Eastern and Western Syriac
In 489, Syriac-speaking Christians fled to Persia to escape persecution and growing animosity with Greek-speaking Christians. The qualifications of the Persian Church as “Nestorian” heretics by the West, led to a bitter division in the Syriac-speaking world. Thus Syriac developed distinct Western and Eastern varieties.
Although remaining a simple language with a high level of comprehension between the varieties, the two employ distinctive variations in pronunciation and writing system and to a lesser degree in vocabulary. The dividing line is the Euphrates, East and West.
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Western Syriac is the official language of the Syrian Orthodox Church, the Syrian Catholic Church, the Maronite Church, the Malankara Syrian Orthodox Church, the syro Malankara Catholic Church, the Mar Thoma Church.
The Eastern Syriac is liturgical language of the Assyrian Church of the East, including the Chaldean Syrian Church, the Chaldean Catholic Church and the Syro-Malabar Church.
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6. Syriac Literature Through History
Syriac Literature can conveniently be divided up into three distinctive periods. A) First Period
The first Period, the Golden Age of Syriac Literature goes up from the Third Century to the Seventh Century. It produced the most creative writers with the appearance of three great writers in the Fourth century, Aphrahat and Ephrem, and Jacob of Nisibis.
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a) Aphrahat
Aphrahat is “Demonstrations” the author of twenty three covering a variety of religious topics.
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b) St. Ephrem
He was born around the year 306 in the city of Nisibis (the modern Turkish town of Nusaybin, on the border with Syria). He was baptized as a youth and ordained deacon.
He credited as the founder is of the school of Nisibis which became the learning center of the church of the East. At the fall of Nisibis, Sanhurfa) Ephrem settled in Edessa (Modern in 363 and helped the School of Edessa flourish. He died on June 9, 373 after contacting the plague as he ministered to its victims.
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A later Syriac writer, Jacob of Serugh wrote that Ephrem rehearsed all female choirs to sing his hymns set to Syriac folk in the forum of Edessa.
Ephrem wrote a wide variety of hymns, poems and homilies in Verse, as well as prose biblical and commentaries.
Over four hundred hymns, composed by Ephrem still exist. He wrote sermons in poetry.
Historians credit Ephrem with having written over three million lines. He was called the “Harp of the Holy Spirit “. He has been called the most significant of all of the fathers of the Syriac-speaking church tradition.
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c) Jacob of Nisibis
He lived between 270 and 350 AD. He was the first Bishop of Nisibis and was appointed there in 308 St. Ephrem grew up under his leadership of the community. Jacob of Nisibis is recorded as signatory of the First Council of Nicea in 325.
Jacob appointed Ephrem as a teacher (Malphono).
Nisibis was besieged three times, 338, 346 and 350. St. Ephrem credits Bishop Jacob as defending the city with his prayers before he died in 350.
Jacob of Nisibis is considered as one of the greatest doctors of the Syriac Church.
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d) Fifth and Sixth centuries
The Fifth and Sixth centuries still belong to the golden age but with a lesser level. Along the notable poet and writers of this period, both Jacob of Serugh who died in 521 AD and Narsai were associated with the famous School of Edessa ( Today Urfa) which after its closure by the emperor Zeno in 489, moved to Nisibis. Theodore of Mopsuestia who died in 428 also belongs to this period.
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B) Second Period
This period goes from 700 to 1300 AD. It was essentially one of consolidation and compilation.
This period saw the birth of an encyclopedic type of literature, witnessing, right at its close, the appearance of the greatest af all Syriac polymaths person (a great and diversify ). His name was Gregory learned Abu’l Faraj, better known as Barhebracus (Ibn El Ibri) who died in 1286. He wrote on every aspect of human knowledge of his time, and it is not for nothing that he has been compared to his Western contemporary Thomas Aquinas who died slightly earlier in 1274.
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C) Third Period
The third period goes from 1300 until the present time.
The opening of this third period was a bleak one for all Christian communities in the Middle East, but the lamp of Syriac learning and literature never died out entirely, and there has been a continuous stream of writers, right up to the present day, who have employed classical Syriac as their main literary language.
The Maronite Patriarchate has been always, even during the darkest years of its history, the herald of progress and the leader in all the branches of the Eastern culture.
The library of Bkerke, the winter residence of the Maronite Patriarch, witnesses of the rich contribution of the Maronites in the consolidation of the knowledge and literature of the Middle East throughout the centuries.
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Let us mention a few examples of so many very precious manuscripts kept carefully in the Patriarchal Library: 1.The Entire Holy Book in Syriac language 2.The history of the Maronite written by the Patriarch Estphane Doueihi in Syriac language 3.Books written by the Patriarch Boulos Masaad in Syriac language
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The Syrian Catholic Patriarchate in Charfeh, Lebanon , continues to be the center of rallying place for the great teachers (Malphoneh) of Syriac Literature .
On the other hand, the University of Kaslik of the Maronite Lebanese Order is actually the Beacon of a new scope in the Syriac Literature especially with the brilliant effort of Malphono Youhanon Yeshouh from the order of the Lebanese Apostles (MLM).
The University of kaslik published in 1992 its First Encyclopedia Volume.
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Father Hanna Yashouh had published in this regard a very interesting series of books and booklets destined for the education of Syriac students, seminarians as well as academic candidates in both Universities of Kaslik and Lebanese University.
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This is a short list of his precious and rich work: 1- Grammar of the Syriac language in three volumes: A- The entrance to the Syriac language volume 1 B- Grammar Syriac volume 2 C- Through the text of Mass volume 3 2- Books translated from Mar Ephrem (Christmas Hymns and Epiphany Hymns) 3- Books under produce from Mar Ephrem
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The
(CERO) Recherches
the “
Center Orientales” d’etudes et de
of Antelias, Lebanon, under the guidance of Fr. Maroun Atallah, from the Antoine Order, had organized since 1993 an annual series of Colloquia on different topics, under the title of “Patrimoine Syriaque” Finally, a Jesuit priest, Fr. Louis Costaz published in 1963 a multi-language Syriac Dictionary and in 1972 a “Grammaire Syriaque” in Beirut, Lebanon.
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8. Syriac Scripts
A) Estrangelo
The earliest Syriac inscriptions of the First and Second Centuries AD, even early Fifth century AD has taken on a more formalized character, known as “Estangelo” (probably from Greek “rounded”, “Strongulos” which means it is used by Chaldeans and Assyrians).
B) Serto
A new script is known as “scratch character”, “Sero” (Literally, it means called by the European as “Jacobite”).
It became the normal script employed by the Maronites and the Syrian Church Catholic and Orthodox).
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C) Carshouni
With the problems created by the Islam about the Arabic language of the Coran and the Syriac languages, Arabic language was written with the Syriac alphabet or letters. This kind of script was called “Carshouni” 26
9. Syriac translation
Many people will be aware that a knowledge of Greek philosophy reached the medieval West by way of Arabic, traveling through Muslim Spain. What is not so widely realized is that Greek philosophy, medicine and science did not reach the Arab world directly but normally by way of Syriac. Syriac translations of the works of Aristotle and others go back to the early Sixth Century, but it was chiefly through the work of Syriac Christians working at Baghdad, the Abbasid capital, in the Ninth Century that this process of transmission actually took place.
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Among the most famous translators was Hunain Ibn Ishaq of these (died 873) who gave an interesting account of how he went about his work: having collected together the best and oldest Greek manuscripts he could find, he translated from Greek into Syriac and only then from Syriac into Arabic. Thus it comes about that a knowledge of Syriac is essential as a background to the study of Aristotelian philosophy among Arabs.
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Thanks to the work of these translators both Arabic and Syriac preserve a number of Greek philosophical and medical works which would otherwise have been entirely lost, seeing that no Greek manuscripts of them survive.
Among such works, which came down to us only in Syriac, are Nicholas of Damascus “Compendium” Aristotelian philosophy, Alexander of Aphrodisias on the Universe, a dialogue on the soul between Socrates and Erostrophos.
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Conclusion
The Maronites have played an important role in the history of Syriac scholarship in Europe ever since the establishment in Rome of a Maronite College in 1584. In the Seventeenth Century it was a Maronite, Gabriel Sionita, who was largely responsible for the Syriac text in the great paris Polyglot Bible. In the Eighteenth Century, the Assemani family produced a notable succession of Syriac scholars, chief among who was Joseph Simon Assemani who died in 1768. his “Bibliotheca Orientalis”, a survey of Syriac literature based on the riches of the Vatican Library (Rome 1719-28 ), is still a basic resource for Syriac studies.
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TABLE 3
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Our Father…
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The End
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