Manuscript Studies

This study provides background on wisdom forms, the key Qumran sectarian texts, and wisdom studies related to the Dead Sea Scrolls. 4QInstruction includes poetic discourses, hymnic material, and short wisdom sayings and admonitions. A major focus is placed on the admonitions, which are discussed in terms of their structure, wisdom forms, and setting. The admonitions are expressed in biblical wisdom forms, showing a familiarity with and acceptance of traditional Hebrew wisdom, including a focus on traditional themes. Yet, when read from the sectarian perspective, 4QInstruction reinforces the guidelines and theology of the key Dead Sea Scroll documents.

In the west centuries ago manuscripts were replaced by printed books, and relegated to mostly secular libraries as a result of religious and political upheavals. In the Christian Orient such changes were slower and remain less advanced. Manuscripts have not entirely vanished from regular use, and Christian communities retain ownership of significant collections of their historic manuscripts. The vital connection between manuscripts and religious culture endures, even if attenuated by persecution, diaspora, technology, and other aspects of modernity. This essay provides an historical survey of these issues in both Europe and the Christian Orient (limited here to the Middle East, the Caucasus, and Ethiopia/Eritrea).

In this book Yusuf al-Bakhzani has performed the marvelous task of combing through dozens of different historical sources and studies, many of them published in Arabic in the Middle East and little-known, if at all, to Western scholars, and culled references to Syriac books, manuscripts, and libraries—both East Syrian and West—throughout the Middle East, from the Middle Ages to the present; Syriac manuscripts in India also receive attention.

This book is a reproduction of Philoxenos Dolabani’s handwritten catalogue of the Syriac, Karshuni, and Arabic manuscripts located in St. Mark’s Syrian Orthodox Monastery in Jerusalem, one of the most important Christian manuscript collections in the Middle East.

This book is a reproduction of Philoxenos Dolabani’s handwritten catalog of the manuscripts contained at Dayr al-Za‘faran. Dolabani was one of the greatest scholars of Syriac in the twentieth century and he made the catalogue while still a monk. This work, two volumes combined under one cover, is an important resource for all interested in Syriac and Christian Arabic.

This book is a collection of a number of small catalogues and hand-lists of manuscripts held in the possession of Syrian Orthodox churches, monasteries, and even individuals throughout the Middle East. The eminent scholar and bishop, Philoxenos Dolabani, carried out the enormous task of cataloguing and describing these little-known and difficult-to-access collections.

The full title of this work indicates the scope of its contents: A Catalogue of the Arabic, Persian and Hindustany Manuscripts of the Libraries of the King of Oudh, Compiled by Order of the Government of India. This first volume was the only part of the project completed by editor Aloys Sprenger, and it contains the Persian and Hindustani poetry. This catalogue includes biographies of Persian and Urdu poets, a chapter of works of Persian poets, and a brief chapter on the work of Hindustani poets, which concludes the works.

Hatch presents in this volume seventy-one Greek and Syriac miniatures which he describes and reproduces in beautiful images. These belong to the Byzantine period, most of which were painted in the Second Golden Age. Eight belong to the thirteenth century, but the rest are the works of artists who lived in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. All are religious in character, some being scenes and others portraits. The present volume presents Hatch’s images from 1931 after applying computer digital enhancements to them. The result is lucid.

This unique manuscript of the East Syrian Syriac ‘Masora’ is essential for any study of early Syriac vocalization, accentuation, and punctuation. This volume presents a facsimile reproduction of this ‘masoretic’ manuscript. An introduction and comprehensive scriptural indices will be included in a forthcoming volume.

This book is one of the most important sources for the canon law of the East-Syrian Church. In Canon I of the council held in the year 1318, this collection was proclaimed the authoritative canon law and has since retained its status as the binding legal collection of the East Syrian Church. This second edition reproduces the original manuscript in color.

This splendid collection from the Khedivial Library contains Arabic calligraphy produced from the first century until AH 1240 (AD 1825).

A list of 159 manuscripts in the Royal Asiatic Society's collections is presented in this volume; each entry is equipped with title, translation, description of the book and of its contents, script, donor, and date.

This volume gathers six essays from papers presented at the 3rd Annual Lawrence J. Schoenberg Symposium on November 19-20, 2010. The essays explore both the technology of inscribed musical expression in the Middle Ages—especially in regard to notation—and the role that modern digital technologies play in facilitating the study of music manuscripts today. As the manuscript evidence shows, medieval music as written text was both expressive and prescriptive in shaping music-making practices, performance, and reception.

This volume provides a facsimile of one of the oldest manuscripts of the standard Syriac translation of the Bible, Codex Ambrosianus (7a1), with an new Introduction by Emidio Vergani.

This comprehensive text provides a guide to the traditional marginalia to the Hebrew text of the Old Testament.

The main reference for dating Syriac manuscripts and the standard in the field. This Album conveniently brings together two hundred facsimiles, each representing a page of a dated Syriac manuscript.

The Psalm Headings remain one of the most difficult and puzzling pieces of the Hebrew Bible. The present study looks at how these titles were treated in the East Syriac traditions. This volume gives a history of research and presents a new critical edition based on previously unpublished manuscripts. The Psalm headings in the East Syriac tradition reflect the exegesis of the Antiochene school, especially Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia. The headings contain a summary of Theodore's exegesis which had an important influence on the work of Syriac interpreters such as Ishodad of Merv and Bar Hebraeus.

This book presents a detailed analysis of the Aramaic mnemonics, those short witty sentences written in Aramaic as memory aids in the margins of one of the oldest extant biblical Hebrew manuscripts, the Leningrad Codex (1008 CE). The material is presented in clear, user-friendly charts. Each mnemonic is set alongside the Hebrew verses it represents. This book demonstrates the ingenuity of the Masoretes in their grand endeavor to preserve the text of the Hebrew Bible precisely in the form that it had reached them.

Eleven papers from the First Birmingham Colloquium on the Textual Criticism of the New Testament, examining aspects of the Textus Receptus, the ‘Pre-Johannine Text’ of the Gospel, the ratings system in the United Bible Societies’ Greek New Testament and the application of probability theory to textual transmission, as well as surveys of non-continuous papyrus witnesses to the New Testament and the Dura-Europos Gospel Harmony, alongside studies of variation in the form of the Beatitudes and the location of Emmaus.

At the request of Diodorus, bishop of Tyre, Epiphanius of Salamis produced this exegetical treatise on the gemstones in the High Priest's breastplate. The oldest Christian work on gemstones, the the author deals with the stones according to their appearance and their medical benefit as well as their attribution to the twelve tribes based on Christian exegesis. Only extracts of this work are preserved in Greek. This volume provides the important – but hereto unconsidered – Armenian text with a German translation and commentarial annotations, as well as an English introduction.

The Syriac writers of Qatar themselves produced some of the best and most sophisticated writing to be found in all Syriac literature of the seventh century, but they have not received the scholarly attention that they deserve in the last half century. This volume seeks to redress this underdevelopment by setting the standard for further research in the sub-field of Beth Qatraye studies.

A collection of ten original papers on the New Testament text, first presented in 2013, which reflect the diversity of current research. Examples of ancient engagement with the Bible include Origen, Eusebius of Caesarea and Augustine along with early translations.

This unique manuscript of the East Syrian Syriac ‘Masora’ is essential for any study of early Syriac vocalization, accentuation, and punctuation. In Volume 1, Gorgias Press has published a facsimile reproduction of this unique ‘masoretic’ manuscript. This volume (Volume 2) includes an introduction and comprehensive lists of all scriptural sample texts and marginal notes in this compilation.

The Syriac writers of Qatar themselves produced some of the best and most sophisticated writing to be found in all Syriac literature of the seventh century, but they have not received the scholarly attention that they deserve in the last half century. This volume seeks to redress this underdevelopment by setting the standard for further research in the sub-field of Beth Qatraye studies.

Lectionary studies were almost abandoned after the mid-twentieth century, and the recent revival of interest in the Greek Lectionary has concentrated exclusively on the Gospel Lectionary. Gibson reintroduces the value of the Apostolos yet incorporates modern methodology in order to build upon the work of recent Lectionary scholarship, analysing New Testament and liturgical textual traditions together, both compilation and continuous text. Through this process, it is shown that the Apostolos witness is not usually copied to another and that consequently there is no ‘Lectionary text’ of Acts and Paul. Instead, Apostolos copies reflect textual variation in the evolving Byzantine tradition. This study concentrates on the Apostolos in its scribal, monastic, liturgical, and theological context as well as in light of other manuscript traditions.