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The Apology of Aristides — A Re-examination

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 August 2011

Robert Lee Wolff
Robert Lee Wolff
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Harvard University
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Extract

The legend of Barlaam and Ioasaph, one of the most popular and influential of medieval romances, entered the western world by way of a Greek version, which fathered, directly or indirectly, translations into almost every European language, and inspired an entire cycle of literary influences. This Greek version was itself descended from a long line of Asiatic redactions, harking back through Georgian and Arabic to Pehlevi and to the Sanskrit prototype (now lost). Thus the Greek version occupies, so to speak, a focal position. It is at once the source of the European, and the culmination of the Asiatic, traditions. Its hero, Prince Ioasaph, can look backward to his earliest incarnation as the Buddha of the Lalita Vistara, and forward to his latest — as a saint of Rome and Byzantium; while many of the tales told him by the monk Barlaam to convert him to Christianity change little on their long journey from some such work as the Pantchatantra, via the Greek Barlaam, to the Exempla of Jacques de Vitry, or the Gesta Romanorum.

Type
Research Article
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 30 , Issue 4 , October 1937 , pp. 233 - 247
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1937

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References

1 This paper is a portion of a longer essay, entitled Barlaam and Ioasaph, The Genesis of the Greek Version.

The Greek, first printed by Boissonade in Graeca, Anecdota, 1832, is now most conveniently available in a volume of the Loeb Classical Library (ed. Woodward, G. R. and Mattingly, H., New York, Macmillan, 1914)Google Scholar. Krumbacher, Karl, Geschichte der Byzantinischen Literatur von Justinian bis zum Ende des Oströmischen Reiches, 2nd ed., München, 1897, pp. 889–91Google Scholar, gives a very full bibliography up to that year. Especially useful for the elucidation of the points made in this paragraph are: Eugen Braunholtz, Die Erste Nichtchristliche Parabel des Barlaam und Josaphat, ihre Herkunft und Verbreitung, Halle, Max Niemeyer, 1884; Sir E. A. Wallis Budge, Baralam and Yewasef, being the Ethiopic version of a Christianized Recension of the Buddha and the Bodhisattva, Cambridge University Press, 1923; Emanuel Cosquin, La Légende de Saints Barlaam et Josaphat, reprinted from Révue des Questions Historiques, October 1880, in Études Folkloriques: Recherches sur les Migrations des Contes Populaires, Paris, Champion, 1922, pp. 27–40Google Scholar; Davids, T. W. Rhys, Buddhist Birth Stories or Jataka Tales, London, Trübner and Co., 1880Google Scholar; Jacobs, Joseph, Barlaam and Josaphat, English Lives of Buddha, London, David Nutt, 1896Google Scholar; and Müller, F. Max, On the Migration of Fables, in Chips from a German Workshop, vol. IV, pp. 138 ff., New York, Scribner, Armstrong and Co., 1876Google Scholar.

The name Ioasaph is derived from the epithet Bodhisattva, the technical title of a man destined to attain the dignity of a buddha. Bodhisattva becomes in Arabic Bodasaph; Arabic B and Y differ only by a single diacritical point; and Bodasaph thus by a misreading becomes Iodasaph in Georgian, and Ioasaph in Greek — later turned by Western Europeans into the more familiar Josaphat or Jehoshaphat.

2 The ascription to John of Damascus is based on late manuscript tradition. Woodward and Mattingly are the last to maintain it, despite the seemingly conclusive refutation (with false conclusions, however) of Hermann Zotenberg, Notice sur le Livre de Barlaam et Josaphat, Paris, Imprimerie Nationale, 1886. Jacobs, op. cit., and Krumbaeher, op. cit., agree with Zotenberg, who advances the theory of an unknown author of about the year 600; and so especially does E. W. A. Kuhn, whose work on the subject (Barlaam und Joasaph, Eine Bibliographisch-literargeschichtliche Studie, in Abhandlungen der Philosophisch-Philologischen Klasse der Königlich Bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, München, vol. 20 (1894), pp. 1–87Google Scholar has until recently been accepted as definitive.

The theory that Euthymius was the author was first advanced by Baron v. Rosen, the Russian Arabist, in Zapiski Vostočnago Otdelenija Imperatorskago Russkago Archaeologičeskago obsčestva, II, 1887, 166–74 (Kuhn, op. cit., p. 9). Rosen based his suggestion upon certain manuscript titles, and called attention to a reference in a Georgian life of Euthymius, which ascribes to him the translation of ‘Balavari’— the Barlaam story. This life, written by Euthymius' relative and successor, Saint George the Hagiorite, is now available in a Latin translation by Father Paul Peeters: Vies des S. S. Jean et Euthyme, in Histoires Monastiques Géorgiennes, extract from Analecta Bollandiana, Vol. XXXVI–XXXVII, Bruxelles, 1923. The Balavar reference appears on p. 15: Balahvarum … ex hiberieo Sermone in Graecum convertit.

Peeters' definitive article, which proves that Euthymius and no other wrote the Greek Barlaam, using a Georgian model, is entitled La Première Traduction Latine de Barlaam et Joasaph et son Original Grec (Analecta Bollandiana, vol. XLIX, 1931, pp. 276–312)Google Scholar. Marr, N. had made a partial edition of the Georgian version — Mudrost' Balavari, 1888Google Scholar, and returned to the subject in Agiographiceski Materiali, vol. XIII of Zapiski Vostocnago otdelenija, 1901, pp. 89–103. He was the first to recognize its importance, and he and Rosen were convinced by the evidence already at hand that Euthymius was the author of the Greek version. To this evidence Peeters adds that of a hitherto unknown Latin translation preserved in a manuscript at Naples, and that of certain other new Georgian sources. With these materials he fashions, in a narrative as interesting as many a detective story, an unshakable case for the authorship of Euthymius.

He accepts the statement of these sources that Euthymius ‘translated’ the story from the Georgian; and proves that his model could have been in no other language. Thus he established the pedigree: Sanskrit — Pehlevi — Arabic — Georgian — Greek.

3 The information in the succeeding paragraphs comes from Blake's, R. P. article on Georgian Theological Literature, in Journal of Theological Studies, vol. XXVI, October 1924, pp. 54 ff.Google Scholar, supplemented by Peeters' Latin translation of the Georgian Vitae.

4 Histoires Monastiques Géorgiennes, p. 15: … (vir) ille venerabilis ingenti suo labore ad ecclesiae nostrae illustrationem et ornamentum universas disciplinas edoctus est: cuius operosam industriam concelebrant et peregrini et propinqui. Atque translatorum ab eo librorum suavitas, quasi aureae fistulae vox canora in universa terra personat, non Hiberiae modo, sed etiam Graeciae. Cf. also ibid., p. 33: Dixit porro (illi) pater Iohannes ‘Fili mi, Hiberorum terra ex gravi librorum inopia laborat, plurimique libri nobis desunt. Atqui video quo beneficio Deus te muneratus sit; proinde conitere ut praemium tibi apud Deum multiplices.’ Ille ut erat prae omnibus oboediens, eius mandato naviter paruit. Itaque (librorum) interpretationi se dedidit, omniumque animos in admirationem coniecit; nam si priscorum illorum interpretationes eximas, nihil umquam tale in lingua nostra prodierat neque opinor denuo proditurum esse.

5 Blake, loc. cit., p. 59.

6 Ibid., p. 55f. ‘A near relative of the most famous Georgian warrior of his day (Tornikios or Č’ordvaneli), whose name was one to conjure with both in Georgia and at Byzantium, son of a noble of high rank, κτήτωρ and higumen of one of the most splendid and wealthy monasteries of the new ascetic ὄμϕαλος on Athos, intimate friend and trusted counsellor of the Greek emperor, it was fitting he should write, and that people should read his productions with interest.'

7 Professor Blake reproduces the following list of works by Euthymius from Kekelidze, History of Georgian Literature (in Georgian), Tiflis, 1923.

1. The Bible. Euthymius revised the Gospels, but his version was rapidly displaced by that of his successor George. He also translated the Apocalypse and Andreas of Caesarea's commentary on it.

2. Apocrypha, (a) The correspondence of Abgar with our Lord; (b) the life of the Virgin attributed to Maximus Confessor; (c) Acta Iohannis Apostolia Prochero scripta; (d) the Clementines; (e) the life of St. Pancratius (Bagrat, Pancras) of Tauromenium; (f) Vita Andreae Apostoli.

3. Exegetics. (a) The Commentary of John Chrysostom on Matthew; (b) the same author on John; (c) Basil on the Psalms; (d) a commentary on the Apostolic writings.

4. Dogmatics and Polemics. Twenty-four Orations of Gregory Nazianzen and some works of Maximus Confessor and John of Damascus.

5. Ascetics. The Dialogues of Gregory the Great; Isaac Syrus; the κλῖμαξ of Johannes Sinaita; Cassian; the Ἠθικά of Basil the Great.

6. Hagiographica. Sixteen lives of saints.

‘Euthymius also paid some attention to liturgical matters, translating a short synaxary and composing a number of hymns. His work in this field, however, was quite overshadowed by that of his successor George. He likewise compiled a short canonical collection, made up of the penitential canons of John the Paster and of Basil the Great, together with the canons of the sixth oecumenical council.’

8 Harris, J. B., The Apology of Aristides, vol. I, no. 1, Texts and Studies, Cambridge 1893, with J. Armitage Robinson.

9 Woodward and Mattingly, op. cit., pp. 396–424.

10 The first published version of the Georgian: N. Marr, ‘Mudrost’ Balavara,’ gruzinskaja versija ‘dushepoleznoi istorija’ o Varlaame i Ioasaphe (Zapiski Vostočnago otdelenija imperatorskago Russkago Archeologičeskago Obščestfva, vol. III, 1888, pp. 223–260) consists of extracts only, and these from a faulty manuscript. Conybeare uses this edition as basis for his article, The Barlaam and Josaphat Legend in the Ancient Georgian and Armenian Literatures (Folklore, June, 1896, p. 101). The first complete Georgian text appeared in 1895 (ed. E. Takai-shvili, Tiflis), and was then translated into Russian in 1898 (I. Djavakhov in Zapiski etc., vol. II, 1897–8, pp. 1–48). I have used Professor R. P. Blake's English translation of this Russian, still in manuscript, but available for reference in the Harvard University Library. The page references, however, are to Djavakhov's Russian.

11 Georgian equivalent of Barlaam.

12 Djavakhov, op. cit., p. 35.

13 From a literary point of view the Apology was made to order for Euthymius, who needed a long speech, defending Christianity and proving the falsity of other religions, written in as elevated a style as his own. Such a work he actually possessed. The Apology of Aristides, addressed throughout to a king, and containing explicit material of exactly the sort left implicit in his Georgian original, answered his needs to perfection, — as is proved by the fact that nobody suspected the neat piece of literary carpentry until Harris discovered the Apology itself.

14 Hennecke, Edgar, Die Apologie des Aristides. Recension und Rekonstruktion des Textes, Leipzig, 1893, pp. 44Google Scholar ff.

15 Armen. p. a. 2140, Hadr. 8. Schoene: Euseb. Chron. Can. p. 166. (So cited by Hennecke.)

16 4, 3, 1. 3. (So cited by Hennecke.)

17 Translated from Hennecke, op. cit., p. 44.

18 Adolf Harnack, Die Überlieferung der Griechischen Apologeten des Zweiten Jahrhunderts in der Alten Kirche und im Mittelalter, vol. I, hefte 1 and 2 of Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der Altchristlichen Literatur, Leipzig, 1882, p. 102.

19 Hennecke, op. cit., p. 45.

20 Op. cit., p. 104.

21 Harris, op. cit., p. 1.

22 Harnack, op. cit., p. 106.

23 For instances of this sort — slavish copyings, and transformations of the true into the untrue — see FatherDelehaye, H., Les Légendes Hagiographiques, Brussels, Bollandistes, 1905Google Scholar, passim.

24 Pp. 45–6.

25 Martyrologium Adonis, ed. Dom. Georgius, Romae 1745, II, p. 514.

26 See the Collection of notices of Aristides in Bolland, Acta Sanctorum, vol. 6, for the month of August, Venice, 1733 (p. 650), under the 31st of August.

27 Harris, op. cit., p. 19.

28 Sancti Aristidis Philosophi Atheniensis Sermones, ed. PP. Mechitaristae Congreg. S. Lazari, Venetiis, 1878.

29 Op. cit., pp. 37 ff.

30 Op. cit., pp. 110–112, note. The translation is by von Himpel.

31 Harris, loc. cit., p. 17.

32 Seeberg, R., Die Apologie des Aristides, untersucht und wiederhergestellt, Erlangen und Leipzig, 1893.

33 Goodspeed, Edgar J., Die Ältesten Apologeten. Göttingen, 1914, p. viiiGoogle Scholar.

34 Ibid., p. 2.

35 J. Rendel Harris: A New Christian Apology, Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, VII, 1923, 355–83; The Quest for Quadratus, ibid., VIII, 1924, 384–97; The Sources of Barlaam and Ioasaph, ibid., IX, 1925, 119–29; and J. Armitage Robinson: The Passion of St. Catherine and the Romance of Barlaam and Ioasaph, Journal of Theological Studies, XXV, 1924, 246–53; and E. Klostermann and E. Seeberg: Die Apologie der heiligen Katharina, Schriften der Königsberger Gelehrtengesellschaft, I, 2, 1924; and especially Father Hippolyte Delehaye's review of all the above in Analecta Bollandiana, vol. 45, 1927, pp. 151–3Google Scholar.

The question of the St. Catherine borrowing is a vexed one, but since Peeters' great article, this too can be cleared up. Suffice it to say here that we can be sure that the author of the Greek Barlaam, now known to be Euthymius, used the Metaphrast (who in turn probably contains early apologetic material); that this fact, incidentally, is additional proof of the tenth century origin of the Barlaam; and that we can not be at all sure — quite the contrary — that he used any earlier apologetic work except that of Aristides.

36 Prächter, K.: Der Roman Barlaam und Joasaph in seinem Verhältnis zu Agapets Königsspiegel, Byzantinische Zeitschrift, II, 1893, 444–60Google Scholar.

37 Instanced passim in Delehaye, op. cit.

38 J. Bidez, Sur diverses citations et notamment sur trois passages de Malalas retrouvés dans un texte Hagiographique, Byzantinische Zeitschrift, vol. 11, 1902, pp. 388–94, where the difficulties involved in determining accurately the provenance of such borrowings are made strikingly clear.

39 Giovanni Mercati: Un' Apologia Antiellenica sotto forma di Martirio, Studi e testi, vol. 5, Rome, 1901, pp. 207–26, especially 218 ff.

40 J. Fuehrer in Mitteilungen des k. d. archaeologischen Instituts, Roem. Abth., vii, 1892, p. 159.

41 This is evinced for example by the following apt quotation from the Vita et Mores Sancti Georgii Hagioritae, the successor of Euthymius (Peeters, Histoires Monastiques Géorgiennes, p. 91 f.): … attamen terra nostra procul a Graecia distabat, atque in ea, quasi lolia quaedam intersita erat maligna suboles ilia Armeniorum, fallax atque versuta: unde non parum detrimenti accepimus. Gens enim nostra innocens et incorrupta erat: illi autem decorum consilium praetendentes, nos quoque ad errorem allicere voluerunt; adeoque libri nonnulli ab iis translati nobis fuerunt. Quae cum ita essent, gentem nostram divina misericordia respexit novumque Chrysostomum suscitavit, sanctum patrem nostrum Euthymium, qui velut decimus tertius apostolus terram nostram a loliis praedictis penitus depurgavit, translatis compluribus libris sanctis.…

42 From his library come also a manuscript of Euclid (Bodleian, D'Orville MSS. XI), Harnack, op. cit., p. 40; and the great Codex Clarkianus, the important manuscript of Plato, removed (a kind word!) from Mount Patmos in the early nineteenth century.

43 Some of the marginalia and corrections in Par. 451 are in the same ink, and a hand contemporary with the original; and two of them are preceded by the word Ἄρεθα. From this we may infer that Arethas himself, in accordance with his custom, made some of the corrections.

The text of 451 includes a gap which at first glance we should like to think had contained the Apology of Aristides. Harnack, however, shows that the gap was almost certainly filled by the Oratio ad Graecos of Tatian.

44 Harnack, p. 28.

45 Harnack suggests that he may have been the Meletius who was also the scribe of a Codex of the Evangelists, dated 1275 (Mosquensis 277), written in the monastery of St. George at Beroea; or still another Meletius who wrote the Athos Synaxary of the year 1303.

46 Published by Harnack, Die Lehre der Zwölf Apostel, vol. II, hefte 1 und 2 of Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der Altchristlichen Literatur, Leipzig, 1886.

47 Harnack, pp. 5–12.

48 See R. P. Blake, Catalogue des Manuscrits Géorgiens de la Bibliothèque de la Laure d'Iviron au Mont Athos — extrait de la Revue de l'Orient Chrétien, 3e série, T. VIII (XXVIII), Nos. 3 et 4 (1931–2), pp. 289–361, which we shall henceforth call part 1; and 3e série, T. IX (xxix), Nos. 1 et 2 (1933–4), pp. 114–159, which we shall henceforth call part 2.

49 Blake, op. cit., part 1, p. 7, ‘Une série des travaux de S. Euthyme ne s'y trouve pas, ni l'Apocalpyse de S. Jean. …’

50 Ms. 1346 of Georgian Society of History and Ethnography, Tiflis, a photograph of which exists in the J. P. Morgan Collection at Harvard University, and a description of which may be found in Žordania: Sio-Mgümis Monasteri, Tiflis, 1896 (in Georgian). (For the above note I am indebted to Professor R. P. Blake.)

51 Part 2, p. 110 ff.

52 ‘St. Jean l'Hagiorite … a écrit ou dicté une notice bio-bibliographique, destinée à authentiquer un des manuscrits qu'il fit calligraphier pour la laure des Ibères (vid. inf. next sentence in text). Il y raconte comment, affligé de la détresse intellectuelle et religieuse dont souffrait la nation géorgienne, faute des livres les plus indispensables, il resolut de préparer son fils Euthyme à combler cette lacune en traduisant du grec en géorgien les Saintes Écritures … et d'autres ouvrages utiles à l'instruction et à l'édification de ses compatriotes. Suit un catalogue des métaphrases qu'Euthyme avait déjà faites.… Ce colophon, que l'on a appelé le ‘testament’ de S. Jean, a été souvent réproduit dans les manuscrits du XIe siècle.…' Paul Peeters — La Première Traduction de Barlaam et Joasaph et son original Grec, Analecta Bollandiana, vol. 49, 1931, pp. 284–5.

53 Blake, no. 10, part 1, p. 51 ff.; testament p. 54–5.

54 Peeters, Histoires Monastiques Géorgiennes, p. 34–5.

55 Peeters, La Première Traduction, etc., p. 285, where he expresses his indebtedness for this notice to Professor Blake.

56 Peeters, Histoires Monastiques Géorgiennes, p. 35. Blake, op. cit., part 1, p. 54.

57 Žordania, Opisanie Rukopisei Tiflisskago Tserkovnago Museja, Ms. 484, fully described.

58 Peeters, La Première Traduction, etc., p. 285.

59 Peeters, Histoires Monastiques Géorgiennes, p. 25—6 and passim.