The Acts of the Edessan Martyrs Guria and Shmona, and Habib and the Story of their Deliverance of Euphemia 9781463214418

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T H E ACTS OF T H E EDESSAN MARTYRS GURIA A N D S H M O N A , A N D H A B I B AND T H E STORY O F T H E I R DELIVERANCE OF E U P H E M I A

The Acts of the Edessan Martyrs Guria and Shmona, and Habib and the Story of their Deliverance of Euphemia

FRANCIS CRAWFORD BURKITT

GORGIAS PRESS

2007

First Gorgias Press Edition, 2007

The special contents of this edition are copyright © 2007 by Gorgias Press LLC

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This edition is a facsimile reprint of the original edition published as Euphemia and the Goth by Williams & Norgate, London, 1913.

ISBN 978-1-59333-872-5

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CONTENTS. Page

INTRODUCTION

i

Historicity of the Martyrdoms Objections stated The Martyrs themselves historical Theophilus Comparison of Shmona &> Gttria with Sharbel . . . . Interpolations in the Text Unconventional picture of the Persecution in Edessa . . The Tortures Alleged Anachronisms Method of Compilation The Paganism of the pagans in Sharbel and in the Diocletian Martyrdoms

5 10 12 13 16 18 21 22 23 26

Date of the Martyrdoms Days of the month . . • Days of the week and the years The contemporary Emperors and Bishops Certain of the dates spurious

29 30 31 33

Place of the Martyrdoms Authorities Gates of Edessa identified Rahmani's List of Churches and Convents Joshua Stylites' account of the Siege in 503 Beth Alah Kikla and the Shrine Plan of Edessa

35 36 38 40 42 46

Euphemia and the Goth Arguments against the Syriac origin of the tale examined. Characteristic passages compared

48 51

XII

CONTENTS. Page

Date and character of the tale The Goths at Edessa Are the Confessors "Dioscuri"? A rationalistic explanation The fate of the Confessors' Coffin

57 61 62 66

On the Syriac T e x t Euphemia Shmona and Guria Habbib

7° 78 85

TRANSLATIONS Shmona and Guria Habbib Euphemia and the Goth

90 112 129

Appendix I : The Merchant of Harran „ I I : On the date of the capture of Jerusalem by Saladin

154 160

NOTES To Shmona and Guria To Habbib To Euphemia

163 172 183

Index

186

SYRIAC T E X T S Shmona and Guria Habbib

^

Euphemia

Xtt

The Merchant of Ilarran

^v

ERRATA. p. 531 10 M promites p. 73, 1. 15 „ thans p. 73, 1. 28 „ chaneed

p. v^ 0 20

read

OCilOoaiA

for

„ „

promises thanks chanced

QOjJ.J»Or) for Guria, Shmona, and Habbib, by the N. Gate of the city. [N°. 8a is the Church mentioned by Bar Hebraeus, n°. 8& is our Shrine]. 9. Ch. of Cyriacus, NE. of the Confessors. 0. Ch. of James of the times of Julian in the village of .jLevwi* [ = "Garamoosh" [Badger 1 325), the Armenian village three hours from Urfa]. 1. Churches of SS. Cosmas and Damian: (a) Cosmas in the S. quarter, outside in the plain; [t>) Damian above, at the top of the bare cliff near the city. The Saints themselves are buried in these Churches. 2. In the hill many monasteries, incl. B.V.M., the "Orientals", and two of S. Barbara. 3. Monastery of Kubbe, at the foot of the hill, south of the Ch. of Cosmas. 4. Monastery of the Exedra, on the top of the hill, and others. 5. Ch. of James

in the midst of the hills,

where there had been a great altar of the pagans which is standing to this day in the monastery

INTRODUCTION.

4°

itself. [This is evidently the Der Ja c kub (Surp Hagop), where

Sachau

found

the

ancient

inscription

of

xnxaaxficvi. ri'AücSn.'i means "of the Mausoleums"; possibly James, A b b o t of Naphshätha, to

whom

Jacob of Serug wrote a letter, was the actual founder of the Convent (see Wright CBM

525«)].

It will be seen from the above that the shrines of SS. Cosmas and Damian on the

(11 ab) are outside the walls

South, i.e. outside the Harran Gate. This is

an additional reason for identifying this Gate with the Gate of Beth Shemesh where Bishop Nonnus built the Lepers' Hospital in which was the Shrine of SS. Cosmas and Damian. I venture to suggest that Rahmani's Shrine of S. Cosmas is now Job's Well (Bir Ayyilb), which according to Badger

1 326 is a Healing Spring for skin

diseases, and S. Damian may be "Sheikh Maksud". Some remains of the Church of S. Sergius appear still to survive in front of the Bey's Gate. " Vor Bek Kapusu", says

Professor

Sachau (Reise, p. 204), "liegt ein alter

Kirchhof, in dessen Mauer ich antike Baureste bemerkte". The Church was burnt by the Persians in September, 503 , as Joshua Stylites tells us. A s observed above, Joshua's story of this siege of Edessa by the Persians serves as a kind of touchstone for our identifications. The Persian army under Kawad invested Edessa on Wednesday, Sep. 17, A . D . 503. "His camp extended from the churches of S. Cosmas and S. Damian'), past all the gardens and the Church of S. Sergius and the village of Bekin, as far as the church 1) r ^ i i i a a a » v a a o r d s o x c u j k'.toqoo bus»-. this is ambiguous, and may mean two churches or one.

PLACE

OF T H E

MARTYRDOMS.

41

of the Confessors; and its breadth was as far as the Mauvais Pas of SerrTn" (§ 60)'). An attack having failed, the besiegers retreat to Kubbe, i.e. the first village in the direction of Harran. A

week later the attack is

renewed and again fails, so the Persians retire, having burnt S. Sergius's Church, and also the Church of the Confessors (§ 62). This, as the Edessene Chronicle

(LXXXl)

well understands, is the "Northern Basilica", outside the walls, not far from the N. Gate. The passage, surely, is now quite clear, but with Wright's identifications, made before Rahmani's Chronicle was discovered, it is impossible to follow the topography at all. We do not know whether the Church of S. Sergius and the Shrine of the Confessors were restored after the Persians burnt them. A t any rate the famous Coffin ( r d s a a n s a l ^ ) was safe, for "they had brought in the bones of all the martyrs which were around the city" (Josh. § 59), to save them from injury. Indeed the other Shrine of the Confessors in Ramath DauTie (Watchmen's Mound), with its monastery attached, seems to have been designed as a place of refuge for the relics and the monks who dwelt outside in times of peace. In any case, so far as our Acts of Martyrdom and the story of Euphemia is concerned, the Shrine of the Confessors evidently means the Shrine near the N. Gate. In only remains to locate Beth Alah Kikla itself. From what has been said the area of possibility has been greatly narrowed. The Martyrs go out alive through the

1 ) Wright's Josh. Styl., p. 5 1 . r

•. r i S ^ c ^ . ri=>, "sons of the covenant". That these persons were ascetics who abstained at least from marriage, and to a great extent from worldly affairs, is evident; the main question is to what extent and during what periods they were conterminous with the body of baptized Christians. Dr. Wensinck brings forward a number of passages from Aphraates which tend to shew that Kyania means "status" or "rank" rather than "a covenant", though it very often corresponds to the Hebrew rVQ. But when l:yama means "status", I think it is always what Aphraates X 588 &c. calls "the holy status", i.e. the

or rule of life

practised by the saints of God. This is certainly the case in Aphr. IX 105, 107, and also in the two passages of Ephraim where the word is used independently of the Bible. In E S I 47A we are told how the daughters of Cain caused the sons of Seth to forget the status that was set up for them by their fathers, and in E S II 454 A Ephraim asks

"How have the pure

become

numerous in the world, they whose Icyama has despised Fate and Nature ?" Whether we call this a status or a covenant it is the way of life indicated by Job XXXI 1. The "Sons of the kyama"

are those whose way of

life is that of the saints of God, the approved details varying from age to age. I venture to think it always included a promise (as in Philoxenus 6o90), and therefore I have continued to render rO?aio >.!=> in S. & G. § 70 and elsewhere by "Sons of the Covenant". § 3 (Page 1 1 3 , 1 . 7) The city Informers

(ri&Ui.iia.i ns'T.'-ix.).

NOTES TO

r74

These

personages

39«, in Sharbel, They

do not

Sharbel and

are

mentioned

in Habbib

p. 69, in Barsamya,

technical.

the

In Habbib,

term

§§ 3, 13«,

pp. 6 3 , 64, 7 1 .

appear at all in Shmona

and Barsamya

plained

HABBIB.

and Guria.

In

is treated as known

on the other hand, it is ex-

each time that their duty was to collect infor-

mation and bring it to the Governor. T h e Greek versions consistently avoid mentioning these persons, the nearest rendering being

¡cxxoiipyoi in 0~>2 here.

TIVSG

Further we

m a y notice that all the other office-bearers that occur in these A c t s have Graeco-Latin names, such as taresius

and

Commen-

Exceptores.

I infer from these facts: (1) that the name is intended to be descriptive, not technical.

Sharrira

means

one

who is entrusted with

the due performance of something (see esp. Mar

Petition

32 i 4 ): in this case the nature of the duty is expressly stated, viz.

that of confidential Reports to the R o m a n

executive in Edessa. (2) that the Syriac t e x t is here original, and that the Greek

versions

Sharrire

which

leave

did so either

out all mention

because

of these

this detail of heathen

administration seemed uninteresting, or because a word which e t y m o l o g i c a l l y means "true m e n " was misunderstood. (3) that Sharbel the

use of the

Governor's

and

term

Barsamya

in Habbib,

confidential spies or

have

misunderstood

and have turned the reporters

into

public

officials, who arrest Christians ( A S D p. 64J or express opinions

of their own (p. 60, s ). T h e public officials of

Edessa are not Sharrire In the account

of the

but flood

Strategi. of 201 A . D . at Edessa,

NOTES TO HABBIB. given in the Edessene Chronicle, Sharrire

J

75

are mentioned

not as executive officials, but as the persons who place a Report on the flood in the public archives. If, as elsewhere suggested, the account of the trial of Habbib was written up from such official documents as Theophilus that

such

could collect, it is quite conceivable to me documents

might

very

well

include

some

reports from detectives as to the sentiments and temper of the

predominantly

Christian population

of Edessa

during the official Persecution.

§ 3 (Page 113,1. g) Ausonius

or Lysanias.

T h e name of

the Roman Governor who tried Habbib is mentioned in § 3 and in § 5. Cureton's text has oaxlQooW in

both

places, the name occurring each time after the preposition A .

(01 has S7!7 Avuavio'j in § 3 and in § 5 leaves

out the personal name. (52 has irxpx Avcruviy in § 3 and AvTcovlcp in § 5. It had seemed obvious that the reading of (G2 was a mere corruption, and I found out too late that in § 5 the first hand of C o d e x N had oaxiooar^\ , now corrected

to

ooiiooaW.

(£>' (v. Dobschiitz's some way towards

Further, the best MS of

A) reads IT)Tpavtrvlov, which

goes

zixTuviov.

It seems to me now evident that the convergence of the three lines of transmission suggests that the original text called the Governor Ausonius. Prof. v. Dobschiitz (p. X L V I I , note 2) points out as a circumstance

unfavourable

to the historicity of Habbib

that Lysanias is also the persecuting Governor in Sharbel and Barsamya,

and

that

Lysias

is almost the regular

name given to the persecuting Governor in the A c t s of

176

NOTES TO

HABBTB.

Diocletian martyrs, giving no less than eight examples. T h i s explains v e r y well w h y L y s a n i a s should appear in various

later texts

of Habbib, while the fact that the

genuine text appears to give Ausonius, and not L y s a n i a s after all, suggests that this less common name m a y be historically correct. The

Judge

sharper

who tried

Habbib

is much rougher and

than the one w h o tried Shmona and G u r i a : it

is no wonder that t h e y have different names, for t h e y are obviously different persons. Y e t in 5. & G. our Syriac M S calls Mysianus " L y s a n i u s " in § 4 (Page 113, 1. 22f.) Constantine evidently was

dropped

copied.

For

both CO' and

16, 17. and Italy.

A line has

out of the exemplar from which N Italy ( r i ' A ^ r c ' ) N has ri'A'^iri', but

(l*)2 mention

Italy, and this alone makes

sense, as we learn from § 39 that Constantine is just on the

point of setting

out to take possession of R o m e .

T h e name of Maxentius does not seem to have reached Edessa.

In any

case the

words of § 4 presuppose the

state of things before the E d i c t s of Toleration, not that of the later 'persecution' of Licinius. § 8 (Page 114, 1. 27)

Into the courtyard.

Here N has

r i A u i r j , which makes no sense. (01 has y.pvtplwj ( = riioa^rj), and O'r has

XXTCI

TCV

c'lxou ( = rc^xxaa): both guesses. I

have conjectured ri'An.va: see 2 Macc XIII 15 (Syr.). § 19 (Page

119, 1. 15)

The

Emperors'

Festival-Day

(«l^Vwi.i r i ' ^ i r f ) . F r o m the context this is clearly the 1st of Elul, i.e. Sept.

1. T h e decree to arrest H a b b i b is

issued in A u g u s t , H a b b i b is examined as soon as he has

NOTES TO HABBIB.

177

given himself up. But that day was the rd&Jea.i and, no delay being indicated,

Habbib is tried and

sentenced on Sept. 2. Caesar-worship on the first day of the month, and especially on the first day of the month with which the year began, is discussed by C. H. Turner in Studia

Biblica

II, p. 1 1 3 .

The word rc'iuiV is otherwise unknown. On p. 33, note, and on p. 86, I have suggested that it corresponds to the D^Ta in cAboda Zara

I 1. Possibly we should

emend it into ri'iiri' and regard it as a transliteration of Up», i.e. '/j Upa, tifiepst. § 20 (Page 121, 1. 3) "-creaked",

lit. "spoke" (aW.1»)).

This odd phrase occurs again in Sharbel-. in fact, Habbib § 20, short as it is, very well illustrates the whole problem of the literary affiliation of the Edessene Martyrum.

Acta

While Habbib is hanging to be torn with

the iron "comb", they drag or pull him about (^aifiiso): the same word is used of the treatment given to Shmona and Guria (5. Sf G. § 27). He is left hanging a long while (KVcii^Qo rc'icv^): so also Sharbel hangs an long while ( A S D vi 26). He is left hanging, until his shoulderblades creaked ( o i l » ) : so also Sharbel at his execution is put into a vice, until the bones of his joints creaked {ASD

K'oo

4).

It is obvious that such coincidences cannot be accidental and that some literary connexion must subsist between the three documents. The difference between them is this, that whereas in Shmona & Guria Habbib

and in

the terms used for the several tortures always

have some show of reason, in Sharbel

they do not seem 23

178

N O T E S TO

HABB1B.

m e c h a n i c a l l y i m a g i n e d at all. In the p r e s e n t case, there is s o m e point in s a y i n g that a m a n ' s j o i n t s c r e a k e d b y being

over-strained,

b u t none at

all

by

compressing

t h e m in a vice.

§ 35 ( P a g e 1 2 5 , 1. 5f.) The

" Gate

of the Arches".

For

t h e situation of this G a t e , see p. 37 a n d J o s h u a S t y l i t e s § 27. T h e e x a c t m e a n i n g of the n a m e ( r d ^ i L i is uncertain,

but

rd^-iAs)

v e r y likely it w a s d e r i v e d , a s in the

c a s e of the S u n d i a l G a t e , f r o m s o m e a r c h i t e c t u r a l feature. N o n e of the G a t e s of E d e s s a s e e m t o h a v e t a k e n their n a m e in a n c i e n t t i m e s f r o m the p l a c e to which t h e y led. Nothing Abgar,

is k n o w n

or

about

for certain a b o u t

his

cemetery.

c

Abshelama

What

the

bar

Edessene

Chronicle calls " t h e c e m e t e r y of E d e s s a " w a s not built till

3 2 4 (§ x i i l ) . A c c o r d i n g t o the E d e s s e n e tradition a

certain

c

Abshelama succeeded Palut and preceded

samya

as

Bishop

of

Edessa,

but

he

Bar-

is not e l s e w h e r e

called a son of A b g a r . The

name

KD^

is no

doubt a contraction

j u s t a s t.'sarsopc' is a contraction of

of

nCN.

U n f o r t u n a t e l y we d o not k n o w t h e p r o n u n c i a t i o n of t h e name

of the G o d

(5 2 o m i t s the n a m e h e r e alto-

g e t h e r , (5 1 a p p e a r s to h a v e originally h a d 'A(3cn

j co K & c u s u c n a

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