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Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: INV-JED |
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JACOB OF EDESSA , who ranks with Barhebraeus as the most distinguished for scholarship among Syriac writers,3.was born at 'En-debha in the province of Antioch, probably about A.U. 640. From the trustworthy account of his life by Barhebraeus (Chron. Eccles. i. 289) we learn that he studied first at the famous monastery of Ken-neshre (on the left bank of the Euphrates, opposite Jerabis) and afterwards at Alexandria, which had of course been 3 " In the literature of his country Jacob holds much the same place as Jerome among the Latin fathers " ( Wright
for some time in the hands of the Moslems.' On his return he was appointed bishop of Edessa by his friend Athanasius II. (of Balad), probably in 684,2 but held this office only for three or four years, as the clergy withstood his strict enforcement of the Church canons and he was not supported by Julian, the successor of Athanasius in the patriarchate. Accordingly, having in anger publicly burnt a copy of the canons in front of Julian's residence, Jacob retired to the monastery of Kaisum near Samosata, and from there to the monastery of Eusebhona,3 where for eleven years he taught the Psalms and the reading of the Scriptures in Greek. But towards the close of this period he again encountered opposition, this time from monks " who hated the Greeks," and so proceeded to the great convent of Tell 'Addy or Teleda (? modern Telladi, N.W. of Aleppo), where he spent nine years in revising and emending the Peshitta version of the Old Testament by the help of the various Greek versions. He was finally recalled to the bishopric of Edessa in 708, but died four months later, on the 5th of June. In doctrine Jacob was undoubtedly Monophysite. Of the very large number of his works, which are mostly in prose, not many have as yet been published, but much information may be gathered from Assemani's Bibliotheca Orientalis and Wright
chief
letter to the priest Addai we possess a collection of canons from his pen, given in the form of answers to Addai's questions. These were edited by Lagarde in Reliquiae juris eccl. syriace, pp. 117 sqq. and Lamy in Dissert. pp. 98 sqq. Additional canons were given in Wright's Notulae syriacae. The whole have been translated and expounded by Kayser, Die Canones Jacobs von Edessa (Leipzig
liturgy
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(6) An important historical work by Jacoba Chronicle in continuation of that of Eusebiushas unfortunately perished all except a few leaves. Of these a full account is given in Wright's Catalogue 1062. (7) Jacob's fame among his countrymen rests most of all on his labours as a grammarian. In his letter to George, bishop of Sera gh, on Syriac orthography (published by Phillips in London 1869, and by Martin in Paris the same year) he sets forth the importance of fidelity by scribes in the copying of minutiae of spelling. In his grammar 6 (of which only some fragments remain), while expressing' Merx infers that the fact of Jacob's going to Alexandria as a student tells against the view that the Arabs burned the great library (Hist. artis gramm. apud Syros, p. 35). On this question cf. Krehl in Atli del iv. congr. internaz. degli Orientalisti (Florence, 188o), PP. 433 sqq. 2 Pseudo-Dionysius of Tell-Mahre says 677; but Athanasius was patriarch only 684-687. ' According to Merx (op. cit. p. 43) this may be the celebrated convent of Eusebius near Apamea. Assemani tried hard to prove him orthodox (B.O. i. 470 sqq.) but changed his opinion on reading his biography by Barhebraeus (ib. ii. 337). See especially Lamy, Dissert. de Syrorum fide, pp. 2o6 sqq.' Text at Leipzig
Buch der Erkenntniss der Wahrheit oder der Ursache aller Ursachen) : translation (posthumously) at Strassburg 1893.a The surviving fragments were published by Wright (London, 1871) and by Merx, op. cit. p. 73 sqq. of Syriac text.his sense of the disadvantage under which Syriac labours through its alphabet containing only consonants, he declined to introduce a general system of vowel-signs, lest the change should contribute to the neglect and loss of the older books written without vowels. At the same time he invented, by adaptation of the Greek vowels, such a system of signs as might serve for purposes of grammatical exposition, and elaborated the rules by which certain consonants serve to indicate vowels. He also systematized and extended the use of diacritical points. It is still a moot question how far Jacob is to be regarded as the author of the five vowel-signs derived from Greek which soon after came into use among the Jacobites' In any case he made the most important contribution to Syriac grammar down to the time of Barhebraeus. (8) As a translator Jacob's greatest achievement was his Syriac version of the Homiliae cathedrales of Severus, the monophysite patriarch of Antioch (512-518, 535-536). This important collection is now in part known to us by E. W. Brooks's edition and translation of the 6th book of selected epistles of Severus, according to another Syriac version made by Athanasius of Nisibis in 669. (9) A large number of letters by Jacob to various correspondents have been found in various MSS. Besides those on the canon law to Addai, and on grammar to George of Serugh referred to above, there are others dealing with doctrine, liturgy
Jacob impresses the modern reader mainly as an educator of his countrymen, and particularly of the clergy. His writings lack the fervid rhetoric and graceful style of such authors as Isaac of Antioch, Jacob of Serugh, and Philoxenus of Mabbog. But judged by the standard of his time he shows the qualities of a truly scientific theologian and scholar. (N. M.) End of Article: JACOB OF EDESSA If you wish, you can link directly to this article.
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