A Christian Perspective

Before getting into today's post, I want to clarify somethings from the last post that were not completely clear. There are not two B manuscripts but a B and a B. I know that this is confusing, but it is the nomenclature that we have inherited from previous scholars. The dates in the first table are the dates when these manuscripts were apparently copied. The writings of Aphrahat, as with the writings of nearly every other ancient author, do not exist in a autograph, or original of the manuscript, penned by the author, but exist only as copies (and sometimes copies of copies) made by later scribes. Finally, I would like to explain the term textual tradition. When scribes copy a document, sometimes they will make errors, corrections, additions, or deletions in their copy. Another scribe copying the same original will make different changes in their own copy. When enough changes occur that a copy, and further copies made from it, can be uniquely identified from other copies based solely upon the contents of the differences, this unique copy and all others derived from it are classed as a textual tradition. So, the B and B manuscripts were ultimately derived from the same ancestor document while A was derived from a different ancestor. However, both of these ancestors were ultimately derived from the autograph. I became interested in Aphrahat when I was taking a course on Christian Spiritualiy and read that Aphrahat, a Church Father I had never heard of, wrote the first treatise on Prayer that was not a commentary on the Lord's Prayer.

Now, on to the biography...The earliest title or name documented for Aphrahat is located in manuscript A where a copyist or reader referred to him as “this Persian Sage.” At the end of manuscript B, the copyist attributes the demonstrations to “Mar Jacob, the Persian Sage.” The copyist in manuscript C writes that the “Sage Aphraates is Jacob, the bishop of Mar Mattai.” By the fifth-century, the Demonstrations had been translated into Armenian where they were incorrectly ascribed to Jacob the Bishop of Nisibis. By the eighth-century, Georgius, the Bishop of the Arabs, was unable to identify the author. Apparently, a tradition continued somewhere in the east for the name Aphrahat appears in many sources in the centuries from the 10th to the 14th centuries and there is little room to dispute that the author of the twenty-three demonstrations was named Aphrahat and took the ecclesiastical name of Jacob.

The belief that Aphrahat was Persian is held by the majority of scholars. As mentioned, Aphrahat is often referred to as “The Persian Sage.” However, and more importantly, the contents of several of the demonstrations allude to his presence within Persia. Demonstration V speaks of the coming conflicts between Rome and Persia. Aphrahat discusses the persecutions of Christians by the Persian Empire in Demonstration XXI and mentions the persecutions at the end of Demonstration XXIII. In addition, Aphrahat provides dates in Seleucid reckoning and also, as is typical in the ancient world, in Demonstrations XIV, XXII, and XXIII, in terms of the reign of the ruling king, in this case Shapur II, the king of Persia. However, the ethnicity of Aphrahat is one of the most intense arguments in the study of Aphrahat and perhaps one of the most significant for the study of his spirituality. There are only two sides to the dispute: that Aphrahat was Jewish or that Aphrahat was Gentile. The arguments by scholars that support the idea that Aphrahat was a Gentile, are based upon three statements by Aphrahat:







Most scholars argue that these passages indicate Aphrahat was a converted pagan. Other scholars argue that these statements might have been uttered by a convert from Judaism. Of these scholars, Lehto also points out that Aphrahat “routinely refers to various Old Testament figures as ‘our father[s]’.” He also provide the most convincing argument for either side when he supplies a proper analysis and translation of a key passage used by those claiming a non-Jewish ethnicity:



Lehto points out that this interpretation not only argues against non-Jewish ethnicity, in addition the statement actually argues for Jewish ethnicity. Aphrahat also used Hebrew month names and possibly used the Hebrew Book of Enoch in Demonstration XIV. These points and the general approach of Aphrahat to scripture and argumentation as outlined by other scholars, concern in the demonstrations for the Law as noted by Lehto, and the generally accepted idea of the Semitic nature of the Christianity of the Demonstrations, lead me to the conclusion that Aphrahat was most likely a Jewish convert to Christianity.

Writers in antiquity have sometimes attributed the title of Bishop to Aphrahat and sometimes more specifically, Bishop of Saint Matthew. Scholars in more recent times have also noted that Aphrahat writes as one in a position of authority. It is also clear from Demonstration XIV that Aphrahat holds a position of some authority in the Church. Some scholars maintain that the historical record is correct and call Aphrahat the Bishop of Saint Matthew, presumably near Mosul, some are more conservative and label Aphrahat a Bishop, and others are even more conservative and call Aphrahat “of high ecclesiastical rank,” but none would question that Aphrahat held some position of authority in the Church.

Demonstration VI was written to the Bnai and Bnat Qyama or “Sons and Daughters of the Covenant.” Then, in Demonstration VIII Aphrahat clearly established that Ihidaya, the “Celibate” or “Single One,” is synonymous with Qyama. From other references that Aphrahat made throughout the Demonstrations, scholars have come to universally accept that Aphrahat associated himself with the Qyama. What is known is that the Qyama were ascetics, to call them monks would be misleading because it was a form of asceticism unique to the Syrian Church and which lasted only until Egyptian coenobitic monasticism (communal monasteries) reached the Syrian Church less than a century later. The Qyama lived among the local population in small groups, and for the Qyama, celibacy was, if not a requirement, a desired way of life, and Aphrahat’s life, as an ascetic, undoubtedly influenced his spirituality and interpretation of scripture.

Summing up what I have presented, Aphrahat was likely a convert from Judaism and a Bishop in the Christian Church. He probably lived near Mosul, but at the least lived within the Persian Empire somewhere in modern Iraq or Iran. Also important for examining his works, Aphrahat was likely an ascetic and member of the Sons and Daughters of the Covenant and also a Celibate or Single One.

Next time I will discuss some of the political and social influences during the time in Aphrahat's life when he wrote the demonstrations.