Thoughts on Antiquity, Patristics, putting things online, freedom of speech, information access, and more
John Rostom has written to tell us of other places where we may find words by the modern Copts: Should you be interested in other books and publications by modern Coptic Orthodox writers, besides those authored by the late Pope Shenouda III, you can access and freely download these from another valuable online source known [...]
It’s not very easy for non-specialists to find material by modern Coptic authors in Arabic. Yet it does exist, and much of it is even online. In a series of comments, John Rostom has very kindly let us know about a bunch of links which are simply too useful to be left only as comments. Here [...]
The monster history of the Coptic church, which Wikipedia says is called Ta’rikh Batarikat al-Kanisah al-Misriyah, is online in English, at least as far as 1894. But I know that modern authors have written continuations; and I wonder whether any of these are online. Does anyone know? I have someone who might be interested in translating some [...]
I accidentally stumbled on a mass of English translations of works by the current Coptic Pope, Shenouda III, at Google books. This search brings up a long list. Some have preview; some are full view, and can be downloaded in PDF form. The first one I saw was a hagiography of St. Mark, here. The work [...]
Yesterday I mentioned that the PDF’s of the Encyclopedia of Islam 2nd edition had appeared online. I downloaded them last night, and then went to look at the article on Hunayn ibn Ishaq, the 9th century Christian who translated the Greek scientific works into Arabic. It was rather good; so much so, in fact, that [...]
While looking rather carelessly through the online volumes of the Revue de l’Orient Chretien, whose Syriac contents are listed here, I found myself looking at something interesting and non-Syriac. In ROC 19 (1914), on p.79f. and 302 f. (the article was split into two parts, issued in successive quarters), A. Perier publishes the Arabic text [...]
Anglican Samizdat tells the story of a US church offering to share its building with a Moslem group. This reminded me of a story about the Moslem conquest of Jerusalem, which I find in various places on the web such as here. The gates of the city were now opened. Omar went straight to Al-Masjid-i-Aqsa. [...]
There is a two volume thesis by Hikmat Kashouh, The Arabic version of the gospel: the manuscripts and their families, accessible online at EthOS here (you have to create an account and do a rather silly ‘order’ but the PDF download is free, and the PDF is searchable). This thesis was done in 2008 at the [...]
Some materials by the 4th century bishop made their way into Arabic. Here is what Georg Graf says. German is not a language I find easy, but I have attempted a translation and placed it below. 92. Severianus, Bischof von Gabala (gest. nach 408). 1. Von seinem reichen Homilien schätz ist nichts vollständig in arabischer [...]
I’ve translated from the German the last portion of the Annals of Eutychius, who was Melkite Patriarch of Alexandria, and whose autograph manuscript has been edited in the CSCO. 33. EVENTS IN JERUSALEM AND LOWER EGYPT (820-830 A.D.) [286]. When morning came, the Patriarch Thomas and his companions were brought. The Muslims came and testified [...]