Author: Rev. Prof. Alexander Treiger (Dalhousie University)
Keywords: patristics, Arab Christianity, manuscripts, saints’ lives, Patriarch Mark III of Alexandria, Abbot George of Damietta
Abstract:
The fourth instalment in the “Unpublished Texts from the Arab Orthodox Tradition” series makes accessible a neglected document from the Orthodox Christian tradition in Arabic: canonical responses of the Chalcedonian Orthodox patriarch Mark III of Alexandria (r. ca. 1180-ca. 1209) to his spiritual son George, the abbot of the monastery of St. Jeremiah near Damietta. The article includes an edition and an English translation of this text. The responses written by the Patriarch Mark remain useful even today to the theological research, due to their documentary value. Thus, in his response-letters one can distinguish some liturgical peculiarities; their outstanding importance is a helpful contribution to the revising of the liturgical tradition of the Orthodox Chalcedonian Church of Alexandria, before being overwhelmed the Byzantine influence.
(English translation by Damian Anfile)
Pages: 154-175