A significant new study of Rabbula and Christianity in Edessa

This volume makes available for the first time both the Syriac text and an English translation of every available original composition by Rabbula, the controversial bishop of Edessa (ca. 411–435 CE). It includes a new edition of the Life of Rabbula and other biographical traditions about him, including his conversion from paganism to Christianity. The texts collected in the volume are a valuable source for studying the reception history of biblical themes. In addition, the corpus offers insights into the beginnings of ecclesiastical legislation in the East, charitable work, pilgrimage, ascetic ideals, and church administration. Horn and Phenix examine Rabbula’s contribution to the Christological controversies of the fifth and sixth centuries, including his influence on Cyril of Alexandria in his debate with Theodoret of Cyrrhus and Theodore of Mopsuestia.

Features

• A critical study of the theological, cultural, and historical development of Syriac Christianity


• Thorough historical, theological, and socio-cultural analysis provided for each text


• A previously unidentified Christian Palestinian Aramaic fragment

Robert R. Phenix Jr. the author of The Sermons on Joseph of Balai of Qenneshrin: Rhetoric and Interpretation in Fifth-century Syriac Literature (Mohr Siebeck, 2008) and co-editor of Children in Late Ancient Christianity (Mohr Siebeck, 2009).

Cornelia B. Horn is the author of Asceticism and Christological Controversy in Fifth-Century Palestine: The Career of Peter the Iberian (Oxford University Press, 2006), coauthor of John Rufus: The Lives of Peter the Iberian, Theodosius of Jerusalem, and the Monk Romanus (Society of Biblical Literature, 2008) and 'Let the Little Children Come to Me': Childhood and Children in Early Christianity (Catholic University of America Press, 2009), and editor or coeditor of several other volumes.