Tag: Eusebius

The perils of translating from old editions

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I’m still working on editing the translation of the Gospel Problems and Solutions by Eusebius of Caesarea.  The fragments of catenas and the like are all printed by Angelo Mai in the early 19th century, or reprinted by him from yet earlier non-critical publication.  In other cases he is printing unpublished material.  This means that I need to check for subsequent publication.

Several extracts come from the Questions of Anastasius of Sinai.  A web search — thank heavens for Google — reveals that an edition appeared in 2006, by Marcel Ricard, in the Brepols Corpus Christianorum Series Graeca, vol. 59.  I need the text of questions 9, 148 and 153, so my translator can compare the text given by Mai with that of a critical text.  Sadly the libraries are all closed when I am at home, so a day off for a day trip to Cambridge will be necessary.

Another extract — not actually from the Gospel Problems is given “from unpublished chronicles by George Hamartolus and Johannes Siculus.”  A search reveals that the chronicle of George Hamartolus or George Monachus was edited badly in 1859 by a chap called Muralt, and reprinted by Migne in PG 110.  No sign of a fresher edition, so I’m not sure I need to do much more.

But “Johannes Siculus”… that could be anyone.  All it means is “John of Sicily”; every third Byzantine was called John, and thousands of them lived in Sicily.  A search in Google on “Johannes Siculus” was rather dispiriting!  Fortunately “John of Sicily” was better.  This led to H. Heinrich, Die Chronik des Johannes Sikeliota, Graz, 1892, edited from a Vienna manuscript. A book of that date ought to be online, but … it’s in German.  Das Reich ist immer offline.

So off to COPAC to search for a copy offline.  Several searches later, I draw a blank.  Even a search by author=Heinrich, date=1892, draws a blank.  But I have played before, and am not dispirited.  I am reasonably sure that a copy exists in the UK.  So I wonder if this dratted thing is hidden in a serial?  Hmm.

Back to Google to look for clues, searching for “Johannes Sikeliota”.  And sure enough I find the book mentioned with an addendum, “In Reihe: Schulprogramm Graz / 1892”.  This gives the author as “Alfred Heinrich”.  Search COPAC for the series; nothing.  Ah, the joy of offline knowledge…

Then I remember that Google book search doesn’t work properly outside the US.  I retry via a US server.  The book at least appears now, albeit clearly not online, here.  I click the “Find in a library” link (to worldcat).  And it turns out to be a thesis, or dissertation, never published.  Boy that site is slow, tho.  It never actually finished displaying.

Does anyone know where I could get a copy?

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Angelo Mai comments on a catena fragment of Eusebius

Posted on by Roger Pearse

In the fragments of Eusebius, Mai added this note.  It was translated for me by the translator, but has no place in the book, so I give it here.

Another delightful thing has happened to me.   While I was translating from Greek into Latin all the passages of Eusebius in the MS of Nicetas’ Catena on Luke, I fortunately observed that the last passage of Eusebius, written on the two final pages of the MS, corresponded word-for-word with Theophania bk 4 chs.8 and 9, as read, in translation from Syriac, in the English edition of the Rev. Samuel Lee, top of p.224 – top of p.229.   The original Greek fragment discovered by us will now have to be placed in our own Greek edition of Theophania, between nos. 5 and 6 on p.121.  Furthermore, as I have already more than once said elsewhere, Nicetas was in the habit of reproducing portions of Theophania in his MS catena, sometimes with the actual title of the work, but sometimes just ascribed to Eusebius by name; hence, before finding out about the English or Syriac editions of the work, we could not ascribe them to the Theophania.  This we have now done, thanks to the English book; just as the English editor will, we think, be pleased in his turn to incorporate our Greek originals, when convenient, into his book.   To avoid repetition here, let us refer our readers to the discussions in the Observations on p.108 and pp 157-9 above, as well as in scattered remarks in the notes.  In any case, it is evident from this that another fragment of ours, cited by Rev. S. Lee in a note on p.224, cannot, as he would wish, be applied to this passage of Theophania.

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More on “Greek without Tears”

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I’ve been in correspondence with Dr Flynn, the author of the package Greek without tears.  This is essentially a keyboard for polytonic Greek, at a pretty cheap price.  My translator used it to enter the Greek text for Eusebius, so I have had to take an interest in it.

The software has been upgraded to work with unicode, and his proprietary font, GrkAcca, now has a unicode version GrkAccaU.  Even better, the new version of Greek without tears contains a conversion utility.  This means that the new code can easily be turned into some standard unicode font.  This will make my Eusebius translation rather easier to print, when it arrives.

I’ve also been going through Angelo Mai’s edition of the fragments of Eusebius Quaestiones, and the notes are actually quite interesting.  I’ve asked the translator if he fancies doing these as well, as I think quotation might be a good idea.

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Editing Eusebius

Posted on by Roger Pearse

I’ve spent the day working on the Word documents that contain the new translation of Eusebius’ Tough Questions on the Gospels.

It’s been about turning the notes into Word footnotes, correcting the margins, fixing issues with the typefaces.

One curious feature is that my translator chose to use the specialised commercial non-unicode font GrkAcca.  This comes with a software package, Greek without tears.  I bought a copy of this, and learn that a new version is imminent.

The main issue to decide, however, is how to organise the collection of 45 fragments that I have had translated.  I’m moving towards the idea of replicating how Migne does things.  So for the quaestiones to Stephanus, you have the big chunk of materials from the catena of Nicetas.  Then you follow it up with the supplementa minora, better known as “other bits I found lying around.”

One problem is that Migne just copied the second edition published by Angelo Mai.  For some unaccountable reason, this did not include some perfectly worthy fragments published in the first edition. 

So I am toying with this structure:

  1. Supplementa – Major fragments, from Nicetas
  2. Supplementa minora – Minor fragments, from Mai’s 2nd edition
  3. Minor fragments, from Mai’s 1st edition
  4. Other fragments

We have fragments of the questions to Stephanus, about the differences at the start of the gospels; but also from the questions to Marinus, about problems at the end.  So I’d first have the fragments from Stephanus, in the above format; then the fragments from Marinus.

I also have Syriac fragments, all from the Stephanus questions.  These I thought I’d put at the end.  Mai also prints some Latin fragments, all from the Marinus questions.  I thought I’d put these after the Syriac.

My hopes of printing translations of the Coptic fragments are fading fast.  They were translated, to a high standard, by Carol Downer and her people; but nothing I can say seems to induce her to let me have more than the latter half.  Ah well…  We’ll have to manage without.

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Back to Eusebius

Posted on by Roger Pearse

The Tough Questions on the Gospel by Eusebius of Caesarea has been sitting on my hard disk for a few weeks now, awaiting some editing.  On Boxing Day I went out and bought a laser printer.  I can’t edit long documents on screen — I need something I can look at!  Today I went out and bought a printer cable — thank you, whoever decided to omit this from the box — and have printed off most of the materials.

Time for pencil and paper and red ink!

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A stray quotation from Eusebius, “Commentary on the Psalms”

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Quite by accident I came across some supposed quotations from the Commentary on the Psalms by Eusebius of Caesarea.   Since this work has never been critically edited, and never been translated into English, I thought it might be interesting to see what he has to say. This first link gives a reference:

” All things whatsoever that it was duty to do on the Sabbath, these {the Church} have transferred to the Lord’s day.”

Source: Eusebius, Commentary on the Psalms, in Migne, Patrologia Graeca, Vol. 23, cols. 1171,1172.

Like all these ‘quotes’ you never know how accurate it is.  But I have looked, and the sentence is indeed found in col. 1171A (the Latin) and 1172A (the Greek).

An expanded version from Johns D. Parker, “The Sabbath transferred”, 1902, pp. 93-94:

He says on the ninety-second Psalm :

“The Word by the new covenant translated and transferred the feast of the Sabbath to the morning light and gave us the true rest, viz., the saving Lord’s Day.”

“On this day, which is the first of light and of the true sun, we assemble, after an interval of six days, and celebrate holy and spiritual Sabbaths, even all nations redeemed by him throughout the world, and do those things according to the spiritual law which were decreed for the priests to do on the Sabbath.”

“And all things whatsoever that it was the duty to do on the Sabbath, these we have transferred to the Lord’s Day as more honorable than the Jewish Sabbath.”

Another link refers to Robert Cox, “The literature of the sabbath question”, Edinburgh (1865) vol. 1, p.360-1, which (blessed be Google) is online here, and I suspect is the source for most of the other material. But he is quoting a certain Moses Stuart:

In another work—his Commentary on the Psalms—there are several passages about the Lord’s Day which were brought to light by the late Moses Stuart, Professor of Sacred Literature in the Theological Seminary of Andover, Massachusetts. They are partly quoted in his work on the Apocalypse (vol. ii. p. 40), and are appended to the American and later English editions of Gurney’s Brief Remarks on the Sabbath (see below, ii. 386).

The Eusebius material is as follows (minus the excitable capitalisation and italicisation that moved even Cox to apologise):

In commenting on Psal. xxi. 30 (xxii. 29 in our English version), Eusebius applies the verse to the celebration of the Lord’s Supper every Sunday.

…on Psal. xlv. 6 (xlvi. 5), he says, “I think that the Psalmist describes the morning assemblies in which we are accustomed to convene throughout the world;”

… on Psal. lviii. 17 (lix. 16), he declares that “By this is prophetically signified the service which is performed very early and every morning of the resurrection-day throughout the whole world.” (Comm., in Montfaucon’s Collectio Nova Patrum, pp. 85, 195, 272.)

But then he discusses a large chunk of the commentary.  This I find is at Migne col. 1169/1170B:

… on Psalm xci. (xcii.), which is entitled, A psalm or song for the sabbath-day. He begins his commentary by stating that the patriarchs had not the legal Jewish sabbath; but still ‘given to the contemplation of divine things, and meditating day and night upon the divine word, they spent holy sabbaths which were acceptable to God.’

Then, observing that the Psalm before him has reference to a sabbath, he refers it to the Lord’s day, and says, that ‘it exhorts to those things which are to be done on resurrection-day.’

Then he says Eusebius quotes the commandment, that it was addressed to the Jews, and that they often violated it. Then Eusebius continues:

Wherefore as they rejected it [the sabbatical command] the Word [Christ], by the New Covenant, Translated and transferred the feast of the sabbath to the morning light, and gave us the symbol of true rest, viz. The Saving Lord’s Day, the first [day] of the light, in which the Saviour of the world, after all his labours among men, obtained the victory over death, and passed the portals of heaven, having achieved a work superior to the six-days’ creation on this day, which is the first [day] of light and of the true Sun, we assemble, after an interval of six days, and celebrate holy and spiritual sabbaths, even all nations redeemed by him throughout the world, And do those things according to the spiritual law, which were decreed for the priests to do on the sabbath; for we make spiritual offerings and sacrifices, which are called sacrifices of praise and rejoicing; we make incense of a good odour to ascend, as it is said, ‘Let my prayer come up before thee as incense.’ Yea, we also present the shewbread, reviving the remembrance of our salvation, the blood of sprinkling, which is of the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sins of the world, and which purifies our souls. . . . Moreover we are diligent to do zealously, on that day, the things enjoined in this Psalm; by word and work making confession to the Lord, and singing in the name of the Most High. In the morning, also, with the first rising of our light, we proclaim the mercy of God toward us; also his truth by night, exhibiting a sober and chaste demeanour; And all things whatsoever that it was duty to do on the sabbath [Jewish seventh day,] these we have transferred to the Lord’s day, as more appriately belonging to it, because it has a precedence and is first in rank and more honourable than the Jewish sabbath. For on that day, in making the world, God said, Let there be light, and there was light; and on the same day, the Sun of righteousness arose upon our souls. Wherefore it is delivered to us [paradodotai, it is handed down by tradition,] that we should meet together on this day ; and it is ordered that we should do those things announced in this Psalm.

Note the reference to “the Sun of righteousness”, Sol Iustitiae, as a title for Christ, doubtless in rivalry to Sol Invictus.

Somewhat later Eusebius mentions the title of the psalm and adds that it is not about the Jewish Sabbath but …

…it signifies the Lord’s Day and the resurrection day, as we have proved in other places.

His final quote is this:

This scripture teaches, [that we are to spend the Lord’s Day,] in leisure for religious exercises (twn theion askisiwn,) and in cessation and vacation from all bodily and mortal works, which the scripture calls sabbath and rest.

These are interesting comments, and go to show that this work must contain interesting sidelights on the practise and thinking of the early church, just as so many of Eusebius’ works do.  Surely it is time that this work was edited properly?

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Fragments of Eusebius in the Mingana collection

Posted on by Roger Pearse

PDF’s are such a blessing.  I’ve been looking at the PDF of volume 1 of the Mingana collection of Syriac manuscripts in Birmingham.  How quickly we take these for granted!  Once, just to consult such a volume, would have meant a day off work, a 60 mile journey, and being robbed blind for copies — if I was even allowed copied.  That was the situation, only five years ago.  Not now!

This will be a dull post, I fear.  Because I ordered some photos of manuscripts in the collection, but no longer remember what was so precious in them!  This post is my journey of discovery.

On p.599 of the PDF (col. 1197 of the book), there is listed the various snippets of Eusebius in various manuscripts.  In July 2008 I went through these, and ordered the following from the Mingana:

Ms. Mingana Syr. 332      Folios 1-9a          Eusebius
Ms. Mingana Syr. 480      Folios 29a-31b       Eusebius
Ms. Mingana Syr. 589      Folios 1-6a          Eusebius

Time to refresh my memory on these!

First I’m opening the Mingana catalogue in Adobe Acrobat and running an OCR on the file to create scannable text.  I only wish Adobe used some decent OCR software.  Come on chaps, talk to Abbyy!

 OK.  On p. 308 of the PDF (col. 616) we find ms. 332.  On ff.6b-7a there are quotations on the genealogy of Jesus, from Ephraim, Eusebius of Caesarea, and Philoxenus.  Wonder why I ordered as far as 9a.

 On p. 432 of the PDF (col. 863) is ms. 480.  Ff. 29a-31b consist of tables to show that there is no contradiction between the two genealogies of Jesus in Matthew and Luke.  The first table is from Severus of Antioch; the others from Ephraim, Eusebius and Philoxenus.  Not sure why I thought this stuff was worthwhile, now.

On p. 562 of the PDF (col. 1125) is ms. 589. 

  • Ff.1b-3b = A short treatise on ecclesiastical chronology dealing with the lunar and solar months. 
  • Ff. 4a-5a : Another short treatise on chronology by Eusebius of Caesarea (called Eusebius of Palestine).
  • Fol. 5 : The months in which the year begins in the calendar of the Jews, the Arabs, the Copts, the Syrians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Persians and the Armenians.
  • Ff. 5b-17b: A medical treatise on the composition of the human body, by Ahud’ immeh Antipater, who mayor may not be the same man as Ahud-‘immeh of Tegrit.
  • and so on.

Fascinating stuff… or not.  This is what so manuscripts consist of, tho; pages of short, dubious-looking texts.

The upshot is that there is unlikely to be much here to impact on my Eusebius project.  Wonder what the “short treatise on chronology is”?  I might toss that over to my translator and ask.

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Eusebius “Quaestiones” Syriac fragments all now translated

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Very pleased indeed to get the last fragment of Eusebius’ Tough questions on the gospels in English.  It has been incredibly hard to find people who (a) know enough Syriac to translate this and (b) will actually do it.  This translator is my fourth attempt!  I had to pay a premium price, and it does hurt, but it was worth it.  He’s now going to look over the fragments done by others, and revise and bring it all into line.  But this is another step forward, and a very welcome one.  I shall be very glad to see the back of the Syriac fragments.

I also have some manuscript fragments, which I need to look up again and pass to him.  More later on this.  Today seems to be a day when *everyone* has written to me.

It’s just as well I’m at home this week, recovering from a vicious virus, or I wouldn’t be able to respond to it all.

Oh, and Origen, Homily 9 on Ezekiel, is now done as well.  Only five to go!

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Isidore of Pelusium did not pirate Eusebius

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Somewhere I read that book 2, letter 212 of Isidore of Pelusium was an unacknowledged copy of part of Eusebius Ad Marinum.  This would make it valuable as a witness to the text of the latter.  But I sent the text to the translator today. He has just informed me that in fact it takes rather a different approach to the same bible difficulty — how is Jesus dead for 3 days — and is not part of the Eusebius text.  We’ll translate it anyway, but I need to go back and find out who said that it was.

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Birmingham Special Collections goes over to the Dark Side (a bit)

Posted on by Roger Pearse

Drat.  The Mingana library in Birmingham have had a mental breakdown of some kind.  They used to sell colour digital images of sub-publication standard for 1GBP (about $1.50) a go.  These were really very good for research purposes, although of course a journal publication would need better quality.

I asked them about copies of the Combefis book (see previous post).  I learn today that they’ve increased the charge to 2.50GBP, plus another 25% for fun; i.e. 3.10GBP, around $5 a go. 

I need 14 pages.  That would have been 14 GBP, which is a lot, when you consider it is merely pressing a shutter 14 times, but I would have paid it.  But there’s no way I would pay nearly 50 GBP for the equivalent of 14 photocopies!

This is really disappointing.  The Birmingham Special Collections people, who own the Mingana library, are people who I watch with interest, because they really do have some innovative ideas.  They’ve led the way in putting Syriac mss online, and making them freely available.  They introduced this system of £1 photographs of manuscripts, which is clearly the way to go.  They allow us to bring our cameras in and photograph, which makes them heroes in my view; we really ought to get all the Mingana mss photographed.  And they are nice, helpful people.  I approve of these guys.

And then they do something like this.

I can only imagine that need for money — a chronic need in all libraries — led some minor official at a meeting to look at this.  Probably they were selling quite a few of the £1 images.  And the same official, with the official lack of imagination, supposed that a 210% increase would generate 210% more money.  Of course it won’t; it will kill the sales dead.

No doubt they looked greedily at the charges demanded by libraries like the Bodleian, not realising that hardly anyone ever buys any of those overpriced images.  You don’t make money by charging the earth and scaring the punters away. 

How we need a public body to regulate these charges!

This may mean that I shall have to abandon the idea of using the Combefis fragment in my Eusebius book.  But if I do, there will be some pretty trenchant words in a footnote, saying who and why, for the benefit of posterity.  First against the wall, of course, will be the Bodleian.

Sad.

In the meantime, let’s see if I can find a library that (a) has a copy and (b) will sell me a reproduction at some reasonable price.

UPDATE: Durham University want £15 a photo — which is sick –, the Bodleian we know about, and the only other copy here in the UK, held in the British Library, well… their website has been redesigned and I can’t find anything.  I wonder if there are any copies in the USA?

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