Sources for the history of the School of Nisibis
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
Sources for the history of the School of Nisibis
（Translated texts for historians, v. 50）
Liverpool University Press, 2008
- : pbk
- Other Title
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Sources for the study of the School of Nisibis
Sources for the study of Nisibis
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Note
Translated from the Syriac
Includes bibliographical references (p. [196]-202) and indexes
Description and Table of Contents
Description
The Aramaic-speaking Christian community of late antique and early Islamic period Mesopotamia developed a school culture that persisted for several centuries. Not unlike the Rabbinic academies, the East-Syrian schools were innovative as centres of learning where study was formally institutionalized, in contrast to the informal study circles of the past. This school culture played an important role in the early translation of Greek philosophical texts into Arabic in the 'Abbasid period. The most influential and prominent of these schools was the School of Nisibis, and this volume provides an annotated translation of the major sources for the School. A polemical document composed by Simeon of Bet Arsham, a theological enemy of the School, describes the foundation of the School as a significant step in the supposed spread of 'Nestorianism' throughout the Sasanian Empire. The more extensive East-Syrian Cause of the Foundation of the Schools offers a history of learning from God's creation of the world to the time of the text's composition at the School of Nisibis in the late sixth century CE, recasting patriarchal, Israelite, 'pagan' and Christian history as a long series of schools. The last two chapters of the Ecclesiastical History describe the lives of the two most important head exegetes at the School. These sources have never been translated into English and this is the first time that any of them has received close historical, linguistic and thematic analysis.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
Introduction
The School of Nisibis
Identifying Barhdbeshbba
On the Manuscripts, Translation, Notes and Terms
The Transliteration of the Syriac Alphabet in this Volume
Texts
Simeon of Bet Arsham, 'Letter' on the 'Nestorianization' of Persia
Introduction
Translation and Notes
Barhadbeshabba, Ecclesiastical History
Introduction
Translation and Notes
Chapter Thirty One: 'The Life of Narsai'
Chapter Thirty Two: 'The Life of Abraham of Bet Rabban'
Barhadbeshabba, The Cause of the Foundation of the Schools
Introduction
Translation and Notes
Mingana Fragment of the Cause
Translation and Notes
Portion of the Memra on the Holy Fathers by Rabban Surin
Translation and Notes
Appendix I: On the Manuscript Tradition of the Cause of the Foundation of the Schools
Appendix 11: The Tree of Porphyry in the Cause of the Foundation of the Schools
Appendix Ill: The Literary Dependence of the Cause of the Foundation of the Schools on the Ecclesiastical History
Brief Glossary of Selected Terms
Maps
Bibliography
Index of Biblical References
Index of Proper Names
Subject Index
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