Page:Commentaries of Ishodad of Merv, volume 1.djvu/40

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xxxii
INTRODUCTION

this point, however, it will be necessary to pay special attention to the Gannat Busamé which is full of quotations from Theodore. The Gannat is a big book: my copy of it runs to about 1300 folio pages, and it quotes both Ishoʿdad directly and the sources from which Ishoʿdad works. As it is the standard commentary of the Nestorians upon their Lectionary, it cannot be neglected by any one who is in search of the favourite author of the Nestorians. This part of the work will seem much more difficult than the detection of passages from Ephrem on the Diatessaron, where we have the advantage of an Armenian text to assist our investigations. It is, however, quite possible that in the course of the work we may be able to define, from one quarter or another, the Theodorean quotations. It is too soon to say what can be done in this way.

Other directions of useful work will also open out before us, especially in connexion with the lost work of Ephrem on the Pauline Epistles, much of which is probably latent in the two fathers to whom we have referred above. But commentaries on the Epistles by Ishoʿdad and Moses Bar Kepha are hard to obtain, and some further search after them might well be made. Bar Ṣalibi will be available here also, in the first stages of the enquiry.

The foregoing considerations will be sufficient to emphasise the importance of the work which Mrs Gibson has done in translating Ishoʿdad. Those who follow her path-finding studies will know how to be grateful for the devoted labour, the quick intelligence, and the penetrating insight which are involved in the translation.

J. RENDEL HARRIS.