Syriac literature is
literature written in the
Syriac language, the classical
Middle Aramaic language of
Syriac Christianity. The majority of
classical Syriac literature is of a
Christian religious nature.
The earliest Christian literature in Classical Syriac was biblical
translation, the
Peshitta and the
Diatessaron. The 4th century is considered to be
the
golden age of Syriac literature.
The two
giants of this period are Aphrahat, writing
homilies for the church in Persia
, and
Ephrem the Syrian, writing
hymns, poetry and prose for the church just
within the Roman Empire. The
next two centuries, which are in many ways a continuation of the
golden age, sees important Syriac poets and theologians:
Jacob of Serugh,
Narsai,
Philoxenus of
Mabbog,
Babai the Great,
Isaac of Nineveh and
Jacob of Edessa.
The advent and spread of
Islam throughout the
Middle East generally proved to be good
for Syriac culture. The process of hellenization of Syriac, which
was prominent in the sixth and seventh centuries, slowed and
ceased. Syriac entered a
silver age from
around the ninth century. The works of this period were more
encyclopaedic and scholastic, and include the biblical commentators
Ishodad of Merv and
Dionysius bar Salibi. Crowning the silver
age of Syriac literature is the thirteenth-century
polymath Bar-Hebraeus.
The conversion of the
Mongols to
Islam began a period of retreat and hardship for
Syriac culture. However, there has been a continuous stream of
Syriac literature from the fourteenth century through to the
present day. This has included the flourishing of literature from
the various colloquial Neo-Aramaic languages spoken by Christians.
This
Neo-Syriac literature bears a dual tradition: it
continues the traditions of the Syriac literature of the past, and
it incorporates a converging stream of the less homogeneous spoken
language.
The first such flourishing of Neo-Syriac was
the seventeenth century literature of the School of Alqosh
, in northern
Iraq
. This literature led to the establishment of
Chaldean Neo-Aramaic as a
written literary language.
In the nineteenth century, printing presses were established in Urmia
, in northern
Iran
. This led to the establishment of the
'General Urmian' dialect of
Assyrian Neo-Aramaic as the standard in
much Neo-Syriac literature. The comparative ease of modern
publishing methods has encouraged other colloquial Neo-Aramaic
languages, like
Turoyo and
Senaya, to begin to produce literature.
Composition in the classical
Syriac
language still continues, especially among members of the
Syriac Orthodox Church, where
students in the church's monasteries are taught living, spoken
Syriac, or .
References
- W. Wright: A Short History of Syriac Literature, 1894,
1974 (reprint)
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