of ܐܶܠܴܐ conflicting with one another; and the confusion has led to an artificial refinement by which Ellō has been assimilated, by pointing, to the Greek ἀλλὰ, where it means but. It is not, however, necessary to vary the pointing, for the Semitic dialects have evolved the sense except out of the collocation and not; so that, as the Lexicon will show, the Syriac ܐܶܠܴܐ can be rendered either nisi or sed, etiam, tamen: and this will furnish the explanation of the divergence in Matt, and Mark: it lies in a variant translation of an original Aramaic.
So far we are dealing with Matt, and Mark, and their Peshiṭta renderings of εἰ μὴ ῥάβδον μόνον, and μηδὲ ῥάβδον. On looking closer at Ishoʿdad's commentary, we see traces, however, of an Old Syriac rendering: we are told that one may take from one's own house things that are necessary for a journey, viz. staff and shoes. And we notice that a new word is given for both: we have ܚܘܛܪܐ for the staff, and ܛܠܪ̈ܐ for the shoes. ܛܠܪ̈ܐ is the Peshiṭta word in Mark, where the Matthean translation is ܡܣܢ̈ܐ. The suggestion arises that the divergence between Matthew and Mark had been got over in the Old Syriac by a variety of translation, according to which Matthew would say
No shoes (viz. fashionable shoes) nor stick (viz. club),
and Mark would allow
Only a staff and coarse shoes.
When we turn to the Old Syriac, we find for the staff, in Matt. in the Lewis text ܚܘܛܪܐ and in Mark in the same text ܫܒܛܐ; while the sandals are represented in Matt. by the word ܡܣܥܝܢ and in Mark by the direct transliteration ܣܕܠܐ. It seems clear that the translations in Matt. and Mark in the Old Syriac were diverse. If they were intentionally diverse, the variation is made in the interests of a subsequent harmony; if unintentionally, then the first great Harmonist will have to combine them. So we see the importance of this passage in the Synoptic tradition and in the question of its first harmonisation. If the first harmony is made in Greek, there is not much chance that ῥάβδος will be varied; on the other hand both ὑποδήματα and σανδάλια are likely to be found in the resultant text. Let us see what we actually find in the fragments and traditions of Tatian's harmony that have come down to us.
