This is the first English translation of the commentary by fourth century AD theologian Ephrem the Syrian on the Diatessaron, a Gospel woven from the text of the four Gospels, which predates our earliest evidence of the official Syriac translation of the New Testament.

A gospel harmony composed c. 172 C.E., the Diatessaron is one of the earliest witnesses to the gospels. Regarded as the first version of the gospels in Latin, Syriac, and Armenian, the Diatessaron was used by Encratites, Judaic-Christians, and “Great Church” Christians alike. This study is the first comprehensive treatment of the Diatessaron in more than a century. After sketching the second-century setting and Tatian's biography, it describes virtually every Diatessaronic witness and provides a scholar-by-scholar summary of research from 546 to the present. Criteria for reconstructing Diatessaronic readings are developed, and numerous examples offer the reader first-hand experience with the witnesses. It contains the first Bibliography of research on the Diatessaron (600+ titles) and the first “Catalogue of Manuscripts of Diatessaronic Witnesses and Related Works” ever published.

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First Published in 1982. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This book introduces twelve key Christians from the second and third centuries, a formative period for the Church. These figures are: Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tatian, Theophilus of Antioch, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Perpetua, Origen, Hippolytus, Cyprian, Gregory Thaumaturgos and Eusebius. Each chapter is self-contained and requires no preliminary knowledge of the figure under discussion, making this an ideal book for laity and for undergraduates studying Christian origins or Patristics.

This book is concerned with a gospel commentary usually attributed to Ephrem, the great theologian-poet of fourth century Syriac-speaking Christianity. The gospels were known to Ephrem and to his church, primarily, in the form of Tatian's harmony of the gospels or Diatessaron. The focus of this book is that section of Ephrem's Commentary on the Diatessaron which treats the Sermon on the Mount. It also studies Ephrem's portrayal of four gospel characters within his Diatessaron Commentary, and explores the connections between his understanding of the Lord's Sermon teaching and his treatment of these characters. The establishing of such connections highlights the centrality of a number of themes in Ephrem's commentary on the Sermon. The profile of these Sermon themes and of the four gospel characters within Ephrem's writings as a whole is examined.

In this volume is a translation of a collection of hymns of Christ, composed by Ephrem the Syrian (c. 306-373), the most famous and prolific of the Fathers of the Syriac-speaking Church.

This accessible selection of the most important and significant of the remarkable and often bizarre apocryphal stories surrounding the life of Jesus and the Early Church has established a reputation as an invaluable introduction to the genre of Christian apocryphal literature. J. K. Elliott clearly explains the scholarly importance of the genre and introduces each section of texts with reference to biblical texts and later church history. Stories found in this selection include Jesus' birth in a cave, his childhood escapades, his secret sayings, and his descent to the underworld; the torments in Hell; Saint Paul baptizing a lion; the death of Pontius Pilate and Saint Peter being crucified upside down. These all come from early Christian legends which did not get into the Bible, yet have had a profound influence on art, literature, and theology from the second century through the Middle Ages and even modern times. Some of the stories included here, especially those involving the Virgin Mary, have affected matters of doctrine; others have influenced the church's teaching on the after life, whilst from the apocryphal Acts there are some of the best examples of accounts of the lives of Christianity's earliest saints.

The French philosopher Gilles Deleuze was one of the most innovative and revolutionary thinkers of the twentieth century. Author of more than twenty books on literature, music, and the visual arts, Deleuze published the first volume of his two-volume study of film, Cinema 1: The Movement-Image, in 1983 and the second volume, Cinema 2: The Time-Image, in 1985. Since their publication, these books have had a profound impact on the study of film and philosophy. Film, media, and cultural studies scholars still grapple today with how they can most productively incorporate Deleuze's thought. The first new collection of critical studies on Deleuze's cinema writings in nearly a decade, Afterimages of Gilles Deleuze's Film Philosophy provides original essays that evaluate the continuing significance of Deleuze's film theories, accounting systematically for the ways in which they have influenced the investigation of contemporary visual culture and offering new directions for research. Contributors: Raymond Bellour, Centre Nationale de Recherches Scientifiques; Ronald Bogue, U of Georgia; Giuliana Bruno, Harvard U; Ian Buchanan, Cardiff U; James K. Chandler, U of Chicago; Tom Conley, Harvard U; Amy Herzog, CUNY; András Bálint Kovács, Eötvös Loránd U; Patricia MacCormack, Anglia Ruskin U; Timothy Murray, Cornell U; Dorothea Olkowski, U of Colorado; John Rajchman, Columbia U; Marie-Claire Ropars-Wuilleumier, U Paris VIII; Garrett Stewart, U of Iowa; Damian Sutton, Glasgow School of Art; Melinda Szaloky, UC Santa Barbara.

This volume combines some of the leading voices on the composition and collection of early Christian gospels in order to analyze Tatian's Diatessaron. The rapid rise and sudden suppression of the Diatessaron has raised numerous questions about the nature and intent of this second-century composition. It has been claimed as both a vindication of the fourfold gospel's early canonical status and as an argument for the canon's on-going fluidity; it has been touted as both a premiere witness to the earliest recoverable gospel text and as an early corrupting influence on that text. Collectively, these essays provide the greatest advance in Diatessaronic scholarship in a quarter of a century. The contributors explore numerous questions: did Tatian intend to supplement or supplant the fourfold gospel? How many were his sources and how free was he with their text? How do we identify a Diatessaronic witness? Is it legitimate to use Tatian's Diatessaron as a source in New Testament textual criticism? Is a reconstruction of the Diatessaron still possible? These queries in turn contribute to the question of what the Diatessaron signifies with respect to the broader context of gospel writing, and what this can tell us about how the writing, rewriting and reception of gospel material functioned in the first and second centuries and beyond.