Arabic Bible

The study of the Samaritan version of Saadya Gaon’s translation of the Pentateuch (the tafsīr), mainly based on MS London BL OR7562, shows that a Saadyan version in Arabic Characters was adopted by the Samaritans and adapted to the Samaritan Hebrew Pentateuch. The transmission of this version in MS London BL OR7562 continued after the early Samaritan Arabic translation of the Pentateuch and perhaps also its later revision had already been created, since many of their translations were preserved in MS BL OR7562, mixed with its Saadyan basic text. As MS London BL OR7562 also contains numerous words and phrases paralleled only in Christian Arabic translations of the Pentateuch and Saadyan adaptations, mainly related to the Peshitta tradition, it is reasonable to assume that these were the sources of this Samaritan Saadyan version and possibly also of the other Samaritan Arabic translations. The Samaritan version of Saadya’s translation of the Pentateuch also reveals some parallels to tenth- and eleventh-century Karaite translations and it contains prominent Aramaic and Islamic vocabulary, unfamiliar in other versions of Saadya’s tafsīr.

The book  Ten Commandments عَشْرَة  كَلِمات  التوْراة  ( called Abtida Calamna) by Rabbi Saadia Gaon is now transcribed for the first time from Judeo-Arabic to Arabic.
This paper shall be included in the next edition of Torah in Arabic, The Official Commentary of the Pentatuch by Rabbi Saadia Gaon.
Published by Yomtov Hakohen- Project Saadia Gaon

This doctoral dissertation was written under the supervision of Professor Sabine Schmidtke and Professor Walid A. Saleh and defended in January 2017 at the Free University in Berlin, Germany. It is now freely available via 'Dissertation Online at the Freie Universität Berlin' as a PDF (https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/handle/fub188/1332). For table of contents and abstract, please see the attachment.

""Inhaltsverzeichnis

Miscellanea Orientalia Christiana

Von den Herausgebern

SYRIACA

Yulia Furman
Der erste Schöpfungstag und die „ersten Naturen“ in der „Geschichte der zeitlichen Welt“ von Johannes bar Penkaye

Evgeny Barsky, Maksim Kalinin
„Werdet nicht wie die Kinder“: Adam im dritten Band von Isaak dem Syrer

Grigory Kessel
Isaak von Ninive. Zwei Traktate aus der neugefundenen Sammlung

Yury Arzhanov
Aristotelische Naturphilosophie in der syrischen Schule

Nikolai Seleznyov
Sieben Kanones und neun Zeichen: Der doktrinäre Teil des liturgischen Poems „Deutung der Geheimnisse“ von Johannes bar Zoʿbi

Mikhail Tolstoluzhenko
„Hier ist die Stiftshütte des Gottes des Jakobus“: Spitznamen als Argument in der interkonfessionellen Polemik

CAUCASIANA

Igor Dorfmann-Lazarev
Rückkehr zur Geburtshöhle: das Gedächtnis der erstgeschaffenen Menschheit in der armenischen „Schrift über die Kindheit des Herrn“ und in den verwandten Quellen

Tamara Pataridze
Gibt es Übersetzungen aus der syrischen in die georgische Sprache?

Dmitri Korobeinikov
Am Vorabend von Manzikert: Ein armenisches Kolophon aus dem Jahr 1067

COPTICA & AETHIOPICA

Anton Voytenko
Eine koptische Legende über Eudoxia als eine „alternative Geschichte“ der Regierung von Konstantin dem Großen

Dmitri Bumazhnov
Unbekannte christliche Parallelen zum Gespräch Jesu mit einem Schädel

Alexey Gudkov
Der äthiopische Buchschreiber (anhand der Miniaturmalerei von 14.–18. Jh. und der Feldforschungen vom Ende des 20.–Anfang des 21. Jh.)

TURCICA

Anton Pritula
Syroturcica: Ein zweisprachiges Strophengedicht aus der Mongolenzeit

ARABICA

Alexander Treiger
Die Christologie des „Briefes von den Christen Zyperns“

Nikolai Seleznyov
„Passio secundum Ibn al-Akfānī“: Die Lehre der christlichen Konfessionen über die Kreuzesleiden in der traditionellen arabisch-islamischen Religionswissenschaft

Konstantin Pantschenko
Gedenken an die Vergangenheit: Der antiochenische Patriarch Makarius III. az-Zaʿīm als Historiker

Dmitry Morozov
Eine neue Arbeit zur Frühgeschichte der Bibeltexte in der arabischen Sprache

Unsere Autoren
"

Table of Contents :: Editorial :: SYRIACA :: Yulia Furman, The first day of the Creation and "the first natures" in the History of the Temporal World of John bar Penkaye :: Evgeny Barsky, Maksim Kalinin, "Do not be like children": Adam in the Third volume of Isaac the Syrian :: Grigory Kessel, Two treatises from the newly discovered collection of Isaac of Nineveh :: Yury Arzhanov, Physica of Aristotle in the Syriac school :: Nikolai Seleznyov, Seven canons and nine signs: Doctrinal part of the liturgical poem of John bar Zo'bi Explanation of the Mysteries :: Mikhail Tolstoluzhenko, "Here is the tabernacle of God of Jacob": the nickname as argument in the inter-denominational polemics :: CAUCASIANA :: Igor Dorfmann-Lazarev, Return to the Cave of the Nativity: the memory of the first created humanity in the Armenian "Writing about the Childhood of the Lord" and the related sources :: Tamara Pataridze, Do the translations from Syriac into Georgian exist? :: Dimitri Korobeinikov, Before Mantzikert: An Armenian Colophon of 1067 :: COPTICA et AETHIOPICA :: Anton Voytenko, The Coptic legend on Eudoxia as an "alternative history" of the reign of Constantine the Great :: Dmitrij Bumazhnov, Unknown Christian parallels to the Muslim legend on the dialog between Jesus and the skull :: Alexey Gudkov, The Ethiopian Scribe (with reference to the miniature painting of the 14th-18th century and the field research from the late 20th-early 21st century) :: TURCICA :: Anton Pritula, Syroturcica: Bilingual poem from the Mongol time :: ARABICA :: Alexander Treiger, The Christology of the Letter from the People of Cyprus :: Nikolai Seleznyov, Passio secundum Ibn al-Akfani: the doctrine of Christ’s Passions on the Cross in the traditional Muslim religious studies :: Constantin Panchenko, To recall the past: Patriarch Macarius of Antioch as historian :: Dmitry Morozov, A new book on the early history of the text of the Arabic Bible. [Review of Sidney H. Griffith, The Bible in Arabic: The Scriptures of the "People of the Book" in the Language of Islam]."

The New Finds of 1975 at St. Catherine’s at Sinai uncovered a family of three codices which are interesting both historically and textually. This study provides new information by demonstrating that several other manuscripts were originally part of these three codices. A close analysis of the codicological features of these manuscripts is provided and then the family relationships between them and other Arabic versions of the Gospels is investigated. The rubrics and lectionary headings reveal that this family preserve a pre-Byzantine/pre- Islamic liturgy from Jerusalem, situating the origin of this family in a Palestinian setting. The translation appears to be from the Greek but with Syriac influence and is translated in a literal but not systematic way and belongs to the category of Middle Arabic, evidenced through other Christian Arabic texts preserved at Sinai. A study of the text of John 1–10 is undertaken using the data from Text und Textwert and it is shown that the family agrees with many non- Byzantine variants with an Alexandrian flavour. The most unique variants are discussed in greater depth.

Cornelius Van Alan Van Dyck (1818-1895) was one of the most prominent American missionaries sent by the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) to their mission in Ottoman Syria in the nineteenth century. In studies on Syria’s cultural awakening in the second half of the nineteenth century, the nahḍa, Van Dyck, or al-ḥakīm (the wise) as he was often called, is well remembered as a polymath, who contributed modern textbooks on different subjects to Syria’s new educational institutions. Above all he is known for completing the translation of the Bible into Arabic with its first edition published in 1865. Van Dyck’s remarkable achievements often overshadow the fact that he actually began as a missionary doctor in Syria, preaching the Gospel while curing the people’s diseases. This article will focus on his first thirty years in Syria, which can be marked as a period of transformation and change in his life. Van Dyck slowly distanced himself from the Syria Mission by embracing more liberal views and discovering his love for science and the Arabic language. ...

A study of Matth. 28 in twenty-five Arabic gospelbooks from the collection of the Sinai monastery reveals a series of eight different translations, some of them having been revised. 1) The group of Sinai ar. 74, the oldest one, seems to be translated from a “mixed” Greek text. 2) Sinai ar. 75, perhaps related to the first group, mixes Greek and Syriac elements. 3) Sinai ar. 71 is a free translation of a Greek text close to the Koridethi text. 4) Sinai ar. 70, translated from Syriac, looks closer to the Peshitto. 5) The group of Sinai ar. 106, the official version of the Melkite Church between the XIth and the XIIIth cent., goes back to a Vetus Syra type of text, but is revised on the Byzantine text, as is clear from the comparison with Sinai ar. 80. 6) Sinai ar. 76 mixes Greek and Syriac elements. 7) Sinai ar. 112 might be a Vetus Syra type of text translated into Arabic and almost complete. 8) Finally, two manuscripts related to the “Alexandrine Vulgate” are also studied, and one of them (Sinai ar. 101) might belong to an early phase of that version. The paper concludes to the large variety of the textual traditions preserved in Arabic, and the possible value of some of them for the textual criticism of the Gospels.

Recent studies grouping Arabic Gospel manuscripts into families by Valentin (2003) and Kashouh (2012) have excluded lectionaries. This restriction in scope is understandable but it means that the use of these translations in Arabic Christian worship remains to be explored. A full study of all the surviving Arabic Gospel lectionaries is clearly desirable. This study seeks to provide a small step in that direction by grouping the Arabic Gospel lectionaries currently held at St. Catherine's monastery at Sinai into their own families according to their types and textual affinities. Twelve distinct families are distinguished and in many instances their sources from families of continuous-text Arabic Gospel manuscripts are identified.

In Muslim polemical writings on the Bible written in Arabic, scriptural quotations frequently appear in Arabic transcription of the original Hebrew. This phenomenon also occurs in the Persian refutations of Christianity by the 11th/17th-century Shīʿī scholar Sayyed Aḥmad ʿAlavī. The adduced biblical materials, however, vary significantly depending on the particular manuscript or recension. Nevertheless, they reflect the common repertoire of scriptural verses invoked by Muslim authors. In contrast to Henry Corbin, who argued on the basis of the Hebrew verses transcribed in Arabic characters that ʿAlavī was a Hebraist and directly acquainted with the Jewish Scriptures, it is suggested here that the Shīʿī scholar relied instead on lists of biblical “testimonies” to Muḥammad. Although ʿAlavī’s literary sources are as yet unknown due to a lack of research, there is evidence from the manuscripts dating from ʿAlavī’s lifetime that he copied the transcribed Bible quotations from earlier Muslim writings.

The article examines the methods of rendering personal names and place names in the Samaritan version of Saadya Gaon's translation of the Pentateuch in MS BL OR7562. The examination is based on examples from Genesis 11 to Exodus 1, which are part of the first hand stage in the manuscript. The renderings are compared to those found in various manuscripts and printed editions of Saadya Gaon's translation of the Pentateuch in Hebrew and Arabic script, in the Samaritan Arabic translation of the Pentateuch, given in two different versions, the old one and its later revision, in Shehadeh's edition, and in pre-Saadyan Arabic translations.

This volume consists of an edition of the Arabic translation and commentary on the book of Job by one of the preeminent litterateurs of the Karaite “Golden Age” (10th–11th centuries), Yefet ben ʿEli ha-Levi. Yefet’s complete translation and commentary on Job, published for the first time, provides fascinating insight into the history and development of exegetical thought on this book, both among the Karaites as well as the Rabbanites. In preparing this edition, all extant twenty-five manuscripts have been consulted, most of them from the Firkovitch Collection. Their length varies from 1 to 340 folios and in total they contain ca. 2,850 folios.

The Samaritan Aramaic Targum presents an extremely literal translation of the Samaritan Pentateuch, but the measure of literalness varies between different manuscripts. Further textual differences between these manuscripts can be related to different Hebrew Vorlagen, or to different interpretations of one and thesame HebrewVorlage. It can thus be concluded that the Samaritan Targum tradition does not represent a single Aramaic translation of SP, but rather consists of several translations, based on different Hebrew Vorlagen. The Samaritan Targum
and also the Samaritan Arabic translation are therefore important witnesses for the textual history of SP, relating to the written transmission of SP in the period before the 12th century CE, for which no Hebrew manuscripts are extant, and also to the Samaritan vocalization. This evidence demonstrates that the textual variety found in the Hebrew
manuscripts of SP was already present in the transmission of SP between the 1st and the 11th century CE.

This volume consists of an edition, translated into English and with an extensive introduction, of the Arabic translation and commentary on the book of Esther by one of the preeminent litterateurs of the Karaite “Golden Age” (10th–11th centuries), Yefet ben ‘Eli ha-Levi. Yefet’s text represents the first completely extant, devoted commentary on Esther and, consequently, provides fascinating insight into the history and development of exegetical thought on this book, both among the Karaites as well as the Rabbanites. Various facets of Yefet’s exegesis which we explore in our introduction … read moreinclude his rationalistic method, compilatory tendency, relationship to the doctrines of the Islamic Mu‘tazila, and his influence both by and upon other Jewish exegetes (Karaite and Rabbanite). We also assess Yefet’s Arabic translation technique and include a survey of all extant Karaite commentaries on Esther, both in Arabic as well as Hebrew.

Saʿīd b. Ḥasan al-Iskandarī is among the earliest known Jewish converts to Islam who composed refutations of their former religion. He reports that he accepted Islam in Shaʿbān 697/May 1298 in Alexandria and later moved from Egypt to Syria. In Damascus, Saʿīd b. Ḥasan compiled a collection of biblical and pseudo-biblical “testimonies” in Arabic translation, allegedly predicting the advent of the Prophet Muḥammad. These “testimonies” include extensive Hebrew scriptural material transcribed in Arabic script. It is proposed here that Saʿīd b. Ḥasan’s collection is preserved in two recensions. The first version of 720/1320 was later revised by the author and this revision is preserved in the later recension dating from 732/1331. (...)

The Bible is the only book ever to be granted ‘World Heritage’ status by the UNESCO. Its cultural impact on the European Middle Ages has been massive, and has been studied from many perspectives by theologians, historians, literary scholars and others. Still, much remains to do, especially in fields where biblical influences may not be as immediately obvious as elsewhere. This regards, for instance, the role of biblical models for the formation of identity and difference, for perceptions of ethnicity and ‘otherness’. How was Christianity as a ‘universal’ religion related to particular communities and identities, and to other religions? The present project seeks to follow this line of research in important respects and from an innovative perspective by studying the transcultural setting of the Iberian Peninsula in the 8th to 12th centuries. Historical approaches to the ‘Book of books’ from a transcultural perspective have so far been rather neglected. What was the relationship of the Bible to other holy or sacred scriptures, for instance the Muslim Qur’ān and the Jewish Tanach and Talmud? How did it influence perceptions of other religious cultures, and their interaction with Christians, in terms of liturgy, historiography, and polemics?

In the 10th/11th century,Arabic became both the vernacular and literary language of the Samaritan community, along with the two languages of the liturgy: Samaritan Hebrew and Samaritan Aramaic; Samaritan Neo Hebrew was also employed at this time mainly for the composition of religious poems. Together with the introduction of the Arabic language, the Samaritans started to use the Arabic script, along with the Samaritan
Hebrew formal and cursive scripts. In comparison with the use of the Arabic script, the Samaritan Hebrew script served mostly for more sacred texts or was employed in order to mark certain textual passages with a higher degree of sacredness. Allography of Arabic in Samaritan Hebrew letters is attested in Samaritan manuscripts since the beginning of the 13th century, although it was introduced most probably at an earlier date. This allography is employed mainly for the Arabic translation of the Samaritan Torah, for the Arabic translations of prayers, and for Samaritan Hebrew or Samaritan Aramaic quotes in Arabic texts. The replacement of Arabic by Modern Israeli Hebrew as the primary vernacular among the Samaritans living in the State of Israel led to a
revival of Samaritan Hebrew allography for Arabic texts in the 20th century, mainly in festival poems in Arabic language, which are performed at certain occasions, although not all congregants are still familiar with the Arabic language and script. A close analysis demonstrates that Samaritan Hebrew allography of Arabic is the result of an intense contact between two scribal cultures, both of which were well established amongst the Samaritans. The allographic use of the Samaritan Hebrew script for writing Arabic texts originally did not aim to make these texts more accessible to Samaritan readers, but rather was employed to mark Arabic texts as belonging to the realm of the
sacred.

The verbal exchange between Noah and his people in the Qur’an. The verbal exchange between Noah and his people in the Qur’an will be discussed. Within the story of Noah one can see two often opposite worldviews: monotheism and polytheism. The talk will explore this verbal exchange compared to principles associated with dialogue theory (constructive exchange; turn taking, etc.)