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The Text of the Anti-Manichaean Writings of Titus of Bostra and Serapion of Thmuis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 October 2011

Robert Pierce Casey
Affiliation:
University of Cincinnati

Extract

In the catalogue of manuscripts at the Monastery of Vatopedi on Mount Athos by Eustratiades and Arcadios there is a curious error in the description of No. 236. The manuscript contains a variety of patristic treatises, letters, and fragments, four of which are thus described:

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1928

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References

1 Catalogue of the Greek Manuscripts in the Library of the Monastery of Vatopedi on Mt. Athos, by Sophronios Eustratiades and Arcadios (Harvard Theological Studies XI), Cambridge, Mass., 1924.

2 Several other anti-manichaean writings are found in this manuscript, including one by John the Grammarian not mentioned by Krumbacher, Geschichte der byzantinischen Literatur, 2nd ed., p. 56.

3 I have used the photographs of the manuscript from the J. Pierpont Morgan Collection of manuscript photographs belonging to the Harvard Library. Unfortunately the negative of folia 59b–;60a, containing the end of Serapion's treatise and the beginning of Titus, book i, was imperfect, and I am unable to remember the exact form of the superscription.

4 H. Canisius, Antiquae Lectiones, vol. V, Ingolstadt, 1608.

5 J. Basnage, Thesaurus monumentorum ecclesiasticorum et historicorum sive Henrici Canisii Lectiones antiquae ad saeculorum ordinem digestae, etc., vol. I, Amsterdam, 1775.

5 References to Lagarde's Greek text are to Titi Bostreni quae ex opere Contra Manichaeos edito in codice Hamburgensi servata sunt graece e recognitione Pauli Antonii de Lagarde, Berlin, 1859. References to his Syriac text are to Titi Bostreni Contra Manichaeos libri quatuor syriace, Berlin, 1859.

7 The following symbols are used for the manuscripts of Serapion and Titus:

H. Hamburg, Stadtbibliothek, Philosophi gr. in-fol. xvi, saec. xvii; H. Omont ‘Mss. grecs des villes hanséatiques,’ Centralblatt für Bibliothekswesen, 1890, p. 361.

G. Genoa, Biblioteca della Missione Urbana, Ms. gr. 37, membr. saec. xi. This manuscript is at present numbered xxxvii (plut. 31. 6. 8), but is given as xxvii in the catalogues of Ehrhard (Centralblatt für Bibliothekswesen, 1893, pp. 204–205) and Bertolotto (Atti della Società Ligure di Storia Patria, vol. XXV, 1892, p. 57), and by Pitra (Analecta Sacra et Classica, V, p. 45).

S. London, British Museum, add. 12150, saec. v. (411 A.D.); Wright, Catalogue of Syriac Manuscripts in the British Museum, II, pp. 631–633.

V. Mt. Athos, Vatopedi 236. See Note 1, above.

C. Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Codex Coislinianus 276, membr. saec. x; H. Omont, Inventaire sommaire des manuscrits grecs de la Bibliothèque Nationale, III, p. 167.

R. Berlin, Preussische Staatsbibliothek, Codex Phillipps. 46, membr. saec. xii; G. Studemund and L. Cohn, Die Handschriften-Verzeichnisse der königlichen Bibliothek zu Berlin, p. 15. This manuscript is usually known as Codex Rupefucaldinus, from its former owner, Cardinal Rochefoucauld. It came into the possession of the Berlin Library from the private collection of Sir Thomas Phillipps of Cheltenham. See Migne, P. G., XCVI, pp. 441 ff.

8 Migne, P. G., XVIII, 1156, n. 31. The words appear in brackets in Lagarde's edition of H.

9 W. Cureton, The Festal Letters of Athanasius, London, 1848, pp. xvi ff.

10 A. Brinkmann, ‘Die Streitschrift des Serapion von Thmuis gegen die Manichäer,’ Sitzungsberichte, Berlin Academy, 1894, pp. 479 ff. In his edition of Alexander of Lycopolis (Leipzig, 1895), pp. xxx–xxxi, Brinkmann suggests a connection between G and a collection of anti-manichaean writings preserved in a manuscript at Florence (ix–x saec), Bibl. Laur. plut. ix. 23 (Bandini, I, pp. 427 ff.).

11 This statement should perhaps be qualified, as it is possible that H was derived not immediately from G but from a copy of G. H contains not only the text of Serapion and Titus but also a text of Photius taken from a manuscript at the Vatican (Cod. Vat. Gr. 1923, cf. Brinkmann, p. 485, n. 2). It is natural to suppose that the text of Serapion and Titus was also copied from a manuscript at Rome, and such a manuscript exists at the Bibliotheca Angelica, Cod. Lat. 229, C. 2.15 (Pio Franchi de'Cavalieri and Giorgio Muccio, Index codicum graecorum bibliothecae angelicae, Studi Italiani de Filologia Classica, IV, 1896, pp. 170–171). This manuscript is plainly a transcript of G made after the disarrangement of pages of the latter, but the Angelica codex has apparently lost some of its original contents. It is impossible to prove with certainty its relation to H, but καταπεπομἑνος H (Lagarde, p. 75.25) for καταπεπομἑνων VG might easily have arisen from the reading of Angelica καταπεπομενος, and ἀνακόλουθα H (Lagarde 72.29), omitted in VG, appears correctly in the Angelica codex as a marginal note. Further investigation of this manuscript might settle the question of its connection with H, but would hardly add to our knowledge of the text of Titus and Serapion.

12 Neither Brinkmann's edition of Serapion nor one of Titus by Brinkmann and L. Nix, mentioned by Bardenhewer (Geschichte der altkirchlichen Literatur, III, 1912, p. 272) as “schon lange in Vorbereitung,” has appeared.

13 The reading τὴν ἀρχἠν appears to be an error of H.

14 The word άνακόλουϑα is superfluous and is missing in V. It was probably originally a marginal note.

15 V reads μαθημάτων

16 H reads καταπεπομένϲς

17 V adds κατὰ before τῆς πονηρίας

18 Pitra, p. 59, n. 3. Quae varietates sat multae colliguntur, sed non omnes, quia urgebat tempus a codice recedendi, turn maxime quod solus huic operi accingebar, in quo unus hinc inde distractus oculus, interdum coecus est.

19 Pitra omits, by homoeoteleuton, σύνδρομον αὐτῷ τὸ εἶναι, but this is clearly his own mistake. V reads αὐτό for αὐτῶν before πρὸς τὸ εἶναι.

20 A study of these two manuscripts in relation both to the original form of the catena they contain and to the textual value of the patristic quotations they supply, has been made by Holl, Die Sacra Parallela des Johannes Damascenus (Texte und Untersuchungen, N. F. I. 1), Leipzig, 1897.

21 Pitra's figures, “Cod. fol. 214.f. Patrol, col. 1261 A. 1.14.” are wrong.

22 An edition of both texts by Professor F. C. Burkitt and myself will, it is hoped, form a volume of the Harvard Theological Studies.

23 C agrees with G S, but R reads ἀμεταμέλητος, which is evidently a mistake for ἀμετάβλητος, arising from a misreading of μ for β.

24 The first sentence in Titus, book i, is a good example of both styles.

25 Examples of this phenomenon abound. Cf. Lagarde, Greek, p. 56.24 τὰ τεκμήρια (Lagarde, Syriac, p. 70.11); Greek, 56.27 τῶν βουλευμάτων = (Syriac, 70.15); Greek 56.39 ἐκπέσοι = (Syriac, 70.3).