APOCRYPHA ARABICA ( Sacred Book )

A P O C R Y P H A  A R A B I C A

EDITED AND TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH by MARGARET DUNLOP GIBSON M.R.A.S. LL.D. (Sr ANDREWS)

1. KITAB AL MAGALL, OR THE BOOK OF THE ROLLS
2. THE STORY OF APHIKIA
3- CYPRIAN AND JUSTA, IN ARABIC
4- CYPRIAN AND JUSTA, IN GREEK

APOCRYPHA ARABICA ( English Translated )

APOCRYPHA ARABICA ( Sacred Book ) ISBN

Dr de Lagarde says of this treatise, in reviewing Prof. Bezold s
book (Mitthcilungen, Vol. III., pp. 50 51), that it is important, even
though it may be worthless in itself, because of the influence it has
exercised. It is the source from which many authors have drawn ;
it runs in Syriac, Arabic and Ethiopic through the churches of Asia
and Africa, and it serves as a leading line of ancient history, as well
as of the philosophy of religion.

Dr Noldeke thinks that the story dates from the sixth century,
which Lagarde doubts. The latter relates that, according to Nicoll
and Tischendorf, there is a letter from Jacques de Vitry, Bishop of
St Jean d Acre, dated A.D. 1219, to Pope Honorius III., telling him

that the Revelations of Peter to Clement will soon be put before him
in one volume*. The Paris MSS. 77 and 78 say that the Apocalypse
of Peter has been found at Nicosia, therefore de Lagarde thinks
that the book has some connection with the history of the first
crusades. The Cambridge MS. makes a similar statement.

Duval (Anciennes Litteratures Chretiennes, pp. 90 96) says that
our tale belongs to the Book ofJubilees, said to have been composed
by St Ephraim ; the author however cannot be Ephraim, but rather
one of his disciples, as the work is not earlier than the sixth century.
It is evidently written by a Christian, who has been hurt by
the conduct of certain Jews in reviling the Mother of our Lord,
and its object is to prove her descent from David, which these
Jews were impudently calling in question. The proper names in the
Sinai MS. have been much spoiled, probably by repeated copyings,
but they are not difficult to identify with those in the books of
Genesis, Judges, and Kings. It would be curious to know where the
names of some of the ladies come from. Several of them are those
given in Kings, but even these are not all correct. The names of
towns are still more difficult to recognize.

There is no date discoverable in our MS., No. 508 in my
catalogue of the Arabic MSS. (Studia Sinaitica, No. III.), the same
from which I have already edited the Anaphora Pilati and the
Recognitions of Clement (Studia Sinaitica, No. V.). The codex
consists of 156 leaves, all paper, with the exception of five, which
are vellum, measuring 20 x 15 centimetres. The hand-writing, as
may be seen from the frontispiece is very like that of Plate XX.
of the Palaeographic Society s Facsimiles of Ancient MSS. Oriental
Series Part II. the date of whose original is A.D. 885. I may there
fore claim that this Sinai MS. is at least older than the four Paris
MSS. 76, 77, 78 and 79, of which No. 76 is dated A.D. 1336-7, and
copied from a MS. of A.D. 1176-7.

We have so little original Christian Arabic literature of the period
before or shortly after the Mohammedan conquests, that we ought to
welcome any light on the ideas, or scriptural and historical know-ledge
of these long-forgotten Arabs, whose lamp was so effectually
extinguished, perhaps because it was burning smokily. We cannot
avoid noticing that they had some heathen notions mingled with
their Christian doctrine ; notably the perpetual service before the
body of Adam, and the idea of carrying it to the centre of the -earth
(Jerusalem) is truly pagan, and yet the latter persists in the Holy
City at the present day. The same may be said of the keeping of
Adam s body in the Ark by Noah, and one cannot help feeling that
the accumulation of patriarchal bodies, as time went on, must have
become somewhat embarrassing. See translation, page 22, line 33.
I believe this treatise to be copied from an older MS. because
of its obvious mistakes, such as........................

Introduction

APHIKIA.

This tale is purely apocryphal, and its very plan is an ana

chronism. The utmost ingenuity cannot reconcile its discordance.

Jesus ben Sira, the author of Ecclesiasticus, lived towards the end

of the second century B.C. and his grandson translated his work

in the days of Ptolemy Euergetes, King of Egypt ; therefore he

could not have been vizier to a monarch who preceded him by

eight centuries. If he were a vizier at all, it must have been

to one of the successors of Antiochus, and a legend true or false, 

may have arisen about his wife, the name of Solomon being

substituted at a later period for that of a Greek king. This

would be all the more likely to happen as Jesus ben Sira wrote

the book of Ecclesiasticus in conscious imitation of the literature

ascribed to Solomon. If this legend has any foundation in fact, it

would account for the extraordinary statement in Ecclus. xlii. 14,

" Better is the wickedness of a man than the goodness of a woman "

(see the lately discovered Hebrew Text (ed. Cowley-Neubauer,

Oxford, 1897), a reflection which he might well make during the

two years of sulkiness here attributed to him. Another solution

of the difficulty may be found in the possibility that Jesus ben

Sira is confused with another. Dr Nestle, of Maulbronn, has

found in the pre- Lutheran Bible, in the Prologue to Ecclesiasticus,

after the words 6 TravrTro? pov I?;O-OLN

" Mein anherr Jesus ein sun

josedech, der do einer ist von den tulmetzschungen der LXX, des

enckeln ist gewest diser Jesus ein sun syrach, dornach als er sich

mer gab zu dem fleiss der letzen [Lection] der schrifft in dem gesetze

und der propheten und ander biicher, die von unsern eltern und vorfarenden

seint gegeben ; dornach wolt er auch schreiben etwas."

These words must have been in the Latin MS. from which the

translation was made.

Isidore of Seville also confuses Jesus b. Sira with Jesus b. Josedek.

Dr Nestle thinks the genealogy was thus : Josedek-Jesus-Sira-Jesus

(see Zeitschrift fur die alttest. Wissenschaft, 1897, p. 123 f.).

The Karshuni text which I now publish is from a Paris paper

MS. Fonds Syriaque 179, and of it alone I have given a translation.

The Arabic text differs from it only slightly as regards the sense,

but too much as regards the words to make a collation desirable.

I have therefore printed them side by side. The Arabic is from

another Paris MS. (Fonds Arabe 50) which is paper, probably of the

beginning of the i6th century. This MS. contains a number of

treatises which clearly prove that the heroine s husband is really

intended both to be the author of Ecclesiasticus, and to have lived

in the time of Solomon, not another individual of the same name.

I subjoin a list of these.

1. L Ecclesiastique.

2. La Sagesse de Salomon.

3. Une Introduction a la Sagesse de Salomon.

4. Les Proverbes.

5. L Ecclesiaste.

6. Le Cantique des Cantiques.

7. L Histoire du roi Salomon et de la fcmmc de Je*sus fils de

Sirach.

L Ecctisiastiqne has a rubric which says

( arabic text )

Moreover L Eccltsiaste has a rubric which says,

( arabic text )

Since this book was printed, I have visited the Coptic Monasteries

in the Nitrian desert. At Deir Abou Macar I saw an Arabic copy

of the story of Aphikia, which I photographed, and on reading

it at home, I find only slight verbal differences from that in the

Paris MS. As the style is rather more diffuse, I suppose it to be

later. A peculiarity of the scribe is his occasionally writing & for ^

( arabic text )

At Deir es-Suriani I also saw a paper Arabic volume which con

tains the Proverbs and the Song of Solomon, the Wisdom of Jesus

ben Sira, and the story of Aphikia. It does not look very ancient,

but it is interesting to find these subjects together.

CYPRIAN AND JUSTA.

I have taken the story of Cyprian and Justa in Arabic from the

Sinai MS. No. 445, a paper codex of the twelfth century.

The Greek is taken from the MS. No. 497 in Gardthausen s

Catalogue, which belongs to the tenth or eleventh century. As my

sister is giving a translation of this story from the Syriac of the

upper script of the Palimpsest of the Four Gospels, in No. X. of the

present series, I did not think it necessary to translate the Arabic

here. Codex 497 is one of a series of ponderous vellum MSS.

containing the lives of the Saints, in two columns of 37 lines ; their

measurements being 31x25 centimetres; the letters are hanging

from the line. I found many blunders on the part of the scribe,

especially itacisms ; the iota subscriptum is never written, but I

have supplied it where necessary. 

One of the most curious mistakes

is

AcrT77piat> for Aa/cijTrjpLov, f. 1 12 v, p. 71, 1. 19. As I first read

this at Sinai, far from any reference library or anything with which to

compare my text, I took it as correct, and it gave me considerable

amusement to think that a Christian Bishop had power to alter

human relationships. It was not till I read Zahn s text afterwards

that I found that Justina was not made the mother of a deacon, but

of a religious community. It will be observed that the facsimile we

give of f. 109 r shews the same peculiarity in the placing of accents

on the first letter of diphthongs which a reviewer in the Guardian of

August 22nd, 1900, considered to be a mistake in Professor Guidi s

transcript from the much older Codex Chisianus.

The first part of the story of Cyprian and Justa has been

exhaustively edited by Dr Zahn, with variants from the two Paris

MSS. 1468 and 1454, as well as from Eudoxia and Symeon

Metaphrastes, and two Latin recensions. I have therefore not

thought it worth while to encumber my book with any collation

of this portion, but the second portion, containing the Martyrdom,

has not been thus treated, so far as I know, and I have therefore

given a collation of it with the account given in the Acta Sanctorum.

Whatever the origin of these legends may be, it is unquestionable

that they have taken a powerful hold of the popular imagination,

and served as fuel to the flame of the loftiest poetical inspiration.

Cyprian the wizard has been transformed by Calderon into El

Mdgico Prodigioso, by Marlowe and Goethe into the immortal Faust.

Whether or not he had power while on earth to make demons do his

bidding, he has contrived after death to summon men of genius for his honour.

In conclusion, I have to thank Professor Seybold of Tubingen,

for kindly looking over my Arabic proof sheets, and for several

valuable suggestions ; my sister, Mrs Lewis, for much help of the

same kind ; Mr J. F. Stenning, M.A. of Wadham College, Oxford,

for taking 24 photographs for me at Sinai, in 1894; and the printers

and readers of the University Press for the patient and intelligent

care they have bestowed upon the work.

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Copyright	C. J. CLAY AND SONS  CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS  WAREHOUSE  AVE MARIA LANE 1990

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