Neglected Apocrypha: the Book of the Rolls

March 29, 2012 by Tony

I mentioned in a recent post that I had been reading a little-known apocryphal text called the Book of the Rolls, also known in the manuscripts under several other names: the Apocalypse of Peter (not to be confused with the second-century Greek/Ethiopic work of the same name nor the Coptic text from Nag Hammadi), the Apocalypse of Simon, Clement, the Testament of Our Lord, or the Testament of Our Savior. The text is extant in Garshuni, Arabic, and Ethiopic and appears to have been written by Arabic Christians in Egypt around 800 CE. It is a huge work and has not been fully translated into a modern language; a complete translation would number about 400 pages. The most extensive translation to date is that of Alphonse Mingana, who published images from Mingana, Syr. 77 and translated much of the text (see “Apocalypse of Peter,” in Woodbrooke Studies, vol. 3, Cambridge 1931, 93–449).

Few scholars have yet worked on this text, but the early discussions indicate that it draws upon several earlier works from a Syriac milieu and new material was grafted onto the original core over the centuries. Much of the more recent sections of the text comprises apocalyptic visions announcing the coming of Mohammed (referred to as “the follower of the Archon,” “the leader of the children of the wolf,” and “the prophet of falsehood”) and the Islamic conquest of Egypt. In one memorable section, a Christian anti-biography of Mohammed is …

New Monograph on the Epistle to the Laodiceans

March 28, 2012 by Tony

Philip Tite, a McGill University graduate and currently an independent scholar in Seattle, has completed a monograph (the first ever?) on the Apocryphal Epistle to the Laodiceans. The book is due out in August from Brill (see the catalog entry HERE). Phil and I met when I was a graduate student at the University of Toronto and he was at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo. I think a study of Laodiceans was in his plans even back then. Congratulations Phil on seeing it to completion.

The Childhood of Jesus for SBL 2012

November 13, 2017 by Tony

I have just been informed that my paper has been accepted for the 2012 Annual Meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature. The session focuses on childhood stories of Jesus. I decided to present on my ongoing efforts to compile critical editions of childhood stories in Syriac. Here is the abstract:

"The Childhood of Jesus in the East Syriac Life of Mary"

The East Syriac Life of Mary, published for the first and only time by E. A. Wallis Budge in 1899, is a combination of a variety of non-canonical texts, including the Protoevangelium of James, the Dormition/Transitus of Mary, sections from the Abgar Legend and the Acts of Pilate, and, in some manuscripts, much of the Infancy Gospel of Thomas. Also included in the text, but not often discussed, is a series of stories of the holy family during their time in Egypt. The source of these tales is unknown. The same stories occur in the more widely published Arabic Infancy Gospel, long believed to be a translation of the Life of Mary, perhaps from an earlier stage in its development. Scholars interested in the childhood of Jesus and the life of Mary would be better served reading the stories in the Syriac Life of Mary than in its Arabic translation. To that end, this paper provides a new edition and translation of the Egyptian childhood tales based on a pool of over fifteen manuscripts. It represents a considerable advance on …

Alphonse Mingana on the Study of the Apocrypha (1931)

March 28, 2012 by Tony

I have been doing some reading on the Book of the Rolls, a sprawling work of around 400 pages extant in Garshuni, Arabic, and Ethiopic. It also goes by the name of the Apocalypse of Peter (not to be confused with the other two texts of that name) or simply Clement. It's a fascinating text, and I may comment on it more later, but right now I just wanted to reproduce some words on the study of the CA offered by Mingana towards the end of his work on the text.

In the third volume of Woodbrooke Studies, Mingana mentions his intention to take a break from work on editing and translating apocryphal texts (p. 356). He then excerpts some comments about the CA by R. A. Lipsius and M. R. James. I'll leave aside the German quotation from Lipsius, but James writes: "There is no question of anyone’s having excluded (the apocryphal Gospels and Acts) from the New testament: they have done that for themselves. Interesting as they are, they do not achieve either of the two principal purposes for which they were written, the instilling of new religion and the conveyance of true history” (The Apocryphal New Testament, p. xi-xii). To this Mingana responds: “Whether the critics of the year, say, 2500, will wholly subscribe to this verdict I cannot say. That it will be slightly modified in favour of some Apocrypha seems to me just possible. Our main task for the …

Secret Mark Symposium Papers At Press

March 22, 2012 by Tony

The proceedings for the York Symposium on the Secret Gospel of Mark have now been submitted to the press. The book is titled Ancient Gospel or Modern Forgery? The Secret Gospel of Mark in Debate and will be published by Cascade Books. Now we need to plan next year's event. Stay tuned. Here is the table of contents for the collection:

1. “Introduction,” by Tony Burke

2. “Secret Mark: Moving on from Stalemate,” by Charles W. Hedrick

3. “Provenience: A Reply to Charles Hedrick,” by Bruce Chilton

4. “Morton Smith and the Secret Gospel of Mark: Exploring the Grounds for Doubt,” by Craig A. Evans

5. “Craig Evans and the Secret Gospel of Mark: Exploring the Grounds for Doubt,” by Scott G. Brown and Allan J. Pantuck

6. “Was Morton Smith the Bernie Madoff of the Academy?” by Hershel Shanks

7. “The Young Streaker in Secret and Canonical Mark,” by Marvin Meyer

8. “Halfway Between Sabbatai Tzevi and Aleister Crowley: Morton Smith’s “Own Concept of What Jesus ‘Must’ Have Been” and, Once Again, the Questions of Evidence and Motive,” by Pierluigi Piovanelli

9. “A Question of Ability: What Did He Know and When Did He Know It? Further Excavations from the Morton Smith Archives,” by Allan J. Pantuck

10. “Clement’s Mysteries and Morton Smith’s Magic,” by Peter Jeffery

11. “Behind the Seven Veils, I: The Gnostic Life Setting of the Mystic Gospel of Mark,” by Scott G. Brown

12. “The Secret Gospel of Mark in Debate: A Scholarly Q and

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