The beginnings of the graeco-syro-Arabic melkite translation movement in antioch

Abstract

The present article surveys the early stages of the Graeco-Syro-Arabic Melkite translation movement in Antioch, from the first known translation (the Graeco-Syriac version of the Life of St. Symeon the Stylite the Younger, BHG 1689) dating to 827/8 AD to the Antiochene translators Ibrāhīm the protospatharios, Gregory of Dafnūnā, Chariton of Aršāyā, and Yūhannā Abd al-Masīh (the compiler of the Antiochene Menologion), all of them disciples of the martyred patriarch of Antioch Christopher (d.967). It provides new evidence on each of these translators. Significantly, it re-dates Yūhannā Abd al-Masīh to the early eleventh century.