This volume tells the story of the Arabic translations of the Church Fathers. By tracing the history of major translation centres, such as Palestine, Sinai, and Antioch, it describes how Middle Eastern Christians translated into Arabic, preserved, and engaged with their Patristic heritage. In addition to well-known authors, such as Gregory of Nazianzus, Ephrem the Syrian, and Dionysius the Areopagite, the volume presents a Patristic treatise written in Greek but preserved only in Arabic: the
Noetic Paradise. Finally, by reconstructing a lost Arabic Dionysian paraphrase used by the Muslim theologian al-Ghazali, the volume explores Patristic influences on Islamic thought.
Alexander Treiger, Ph.D. (2008, Yale University) is Professor of Religious Studies at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He is editor of the series “Arabic Christianity: Texts and Studies” (Brill). He has published extensively on translations from Greek into Arabic, Arabic Christianity, and Islamic philosophy and theology.
Preface List of Figures Abbreviations
Part1 Christian Graeco-Arabica
1
The Fathers in Arabic 1 A Brief History of the Arabic Translations of the Church Fathers
2 Arabic Christian and Islamic Reception(s) of the Arabic Translations of the Church Fathers
3 Two Issues of Interest
4 Avenues for Future Research
2
Greek Christian Literature in Arabic Translations 1 Biblical Translations
2 Hagiography
3 Patristic and Byzantine Literature
4 Liturgy and Hymnography
3
Christian Graeco-Arabica: A History of Arabic Patristic Translations 1 Christian Graeco-Arabica: An Overview
2 Palestinian Translations
3 Antiochene Translations
4 Guidelines for Philological Analysis
5 Agenda for Future Research
Part2 Translations in Palestine and Sinai
4
The Earliest Dated Christian Arabic Translation: Ammonius’ Report on the Martyrdom of the Monks of Sinai and Raithu 1 The Arabic version of Ammonius’
Report in Relation to the Syriac Version
2 Conclusions
5
Syro-Arabic Translations in Palestine: John of Apamea’s Letter on Stillness 1
MS Sinai ar. 549: An Important Monastic Anthology
2 John of Apamea’s
Letter on Stillness in Arabic
Part3 Translations in Byzantine Antioch
6
The Beginnings of the Graeco-Syro-Arabic Translation Movement in Antioch 1 The Syriac Translation of the
Life of St. Symeon the Stylite the Younger 2 Antiochene Translations after the Byzantine re-Conquest: The Disciples of the Patriarch Christopher
3 Yūḥannā the Catholicos
7
An Eleventh-Century Arabic Manuscript of Ephrem’s Homilies 1
MS Sinai ar. 312 and
Membra Disiecta: Description, Date, and Copyist
2 Quire Analysis
3 Additional Observations
4 Final Remarks
8
Greek into Arabic in Byzantine Antioch: ʿAbdallāh ibn al-Faḍl’s Book of the Garden 1 ʿAbdallāh ibn al-Faḍl al-Anṭākī as a Translator
2 ʿAbdallāh ibn al-Faḍl’s
Book of the Garden (
Kitāb al-Rawḍa)
3 Edition and Translation of
Kitāb al-Rawḍa, Chapter56
Part4 Dionysius in Damascus
9
New Evidence on the Arabic Translations of Dionysius the Areopagite 1 Notes on the State of the Art
2 New Evidence
3 Authorship, Time, Milieu: Analysis of the Colophons of
MS Sinai ar. 268
4 An Inventory of the Arabic Versions of Dionysius
10
The Arabic Translation of Mystical Theology, Chapter1 1 Technical Terminology
2 Translation Technique
3 Comparison with the Syriac Versions
4 Cases of Interpretation and Misinterpretation
5 Edition and Translation of
MT, chapter1
Part5 Lost in Greek, Found in Arabic
11
The Noetic Paradise 1 Translation
Part6 Patristic Themes in Islamic Thought
12
From Dionysius to al-Ġazālī: Patristic Influences on Arabic Neoplatonism 1 The Ninth-Century Arabic Dionysian Paraphrase
2 The
Ǧūd-Qudra Identification
3 The Triad ‘Goodness-Power-Knowledge/Wisdom’
4 Al-Ġazālī’s Debt to ‘Interpositional Neoplatonism’
5 Conclusion and Avenues for Future Research
Bibliography Index of Manuscripts Index of Names and Subjects
All interested in the Arabic Christian communities in the Middle East, Greek and Syriac Patristics, history of the Middle East, Church history, and Christian-Muslim relations.