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The Writings of Mārūtā of Maipherqat and the Making of Nicaea in Arabic

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The Writings of Mārūtā of Maipherqat and the Making of Nicaea in Arabic Journal of Eastern Christian Studies 71(1-2), 1-28. doi: 10.2143/JECS.71.1.3285907 © 2019 by Journal of Eastern Christian Studies. All rights reserved. THE WRITINGS OF MĀRŪTĀ OF MAIPHERQAT AND THE MAKING OF NICAEA IN ARABIC JONATHAN STUTZ (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München) The authority which Constantine the Great radiated throughout the Chris- tian world of Late Antiquity is reflected in a wide range of legendary accounts concerning the first Christian emperor. Contrary to what one might expect, given the vast store of secondary literature on Constantine’s hagiographic legacy, there is at least one important account transmitted in Syriac which seems nevertheless to have escaped the attention of all but a few scholars. In the Syriac manuscript tradition, this account has been transmitted together with 73 pseudo-Nicene canons allegedly translated from Greek into Syriac by Mārūtā, bishop of Maipherqat, for the Persian church. The account itself relates Helen’s and Constantine’s origins, the former’s pilgrimage to the Holy Land, and the convening of the Council of Nicaea. It blends motifs both familiar and unfamiliar and at times gives the impression of having been assembled from elements known from other hagiographical narratives, while at the same time presenting other elements about whose origin we can only speculate. The narrative and the related pseudo-Nicene canons were later translated into Arabic and circulated within larger canon collections. These manuscripts were brought to Europe at the time of the Counter-Reformation and trans- lated into Latin and hence became part of the synodical collections of the following centuries.1 In modern scholarship this account has been presented to western readers through the seminal works of Oskar Braun and Arthur Vööbus. 1 The Jesuit F. Torres (1509-84) and the Maronite A. Eccellensis translated several texts related to the council of Nicaea from Arabic canon collections, being reprinted in – among other places – Acta Conciliorum et Epistolae Decretales, ac Constitutiones Summorum Ponti- ficum ab anno 34 ad 1714, vol. I, eds. Hardouin/Labbé (Paris, 1714-15), pp. 335-344, 463-528, and Sacrorum Conciliorum nova et amplissima collectio, vol. II, ed. Mansi (Paris, 1692-1769), pp. 705-720, 947-1064. See also Hubert Kaufhold, ‘Sources of Canon Law in Eastern Churches’, in The History of Byzantine and Eastern Canon Law to 1500, ed. W. ­Hartmann (Washington D.C., 2012), pp. 215-342, on p. 233. 2 JONATHAN STUTZ Most recently, Jan Willem Drijvers offered a further study contributing to the contextualization of this account.2 While Drijvers dealt primarily with the Syriac version, I would like here to shift attention to its reception in Arabic literature. In doing so, I will focus first on how this particular narrative informed future Arabic-language representations of the Council of Nicaea on which the narrative of Mārūtā is centered. Because of the peculiar characteristics of our account, it will be necessary first of all to give a short introduction to its contents and resume some ques- tions about its origin and original context. Since the surviving manuscript tradition has an Eastern Syrian background (testifying to the authority the canons of Mārūtā enjoyed there), we will then procede to the Chronicle of Seert, one of the few historiographical works in Arabic that comes from that tra- dition. The importance of the narrative in that particular geographical region did not escape the attention of Muslim writers either, as the example of ‘Abd al-Ğabbār shows. The account of Mārūtā, however, also became famous among other churches, as shown by the transmission of the chronicle of Eutychius of Alexandria and by Arabic canon collections of the Melkite and Coptic churches, which will be presented in the next section. As some other examples from Muslim historiography will show, this growing interest in the history of the ecumenical councils did not remain unnoticed outside Chris- tian literary production, becoming at times a contested issue. A short consideration of the adopted terminology here may be of help. I am aware of the problems which can be raised by speaking of an ‘account of Mārūtā’. The legendary account of Constantine which we focus on here may not have been penned by this particular author and may have been ascribed to him only at a later stage, because of his authority and name. But the transmission context of our fictional material and the need to distinguish it from other accounts regarding Constantine make it convenient to give it this designation. 2 See Oskar Braun, De sancta Nicaena synodo. Syrische Texte des Maruta von Maipherkat, KSt IV, 3 (Münster, 1898); Arthur Vööbus, The Canons Ascribed to Mārūtā of Maipherqat and Related Sources, 2 vols., CSCO 439/Syr. 191 (text) and CSCO 440/Syr. 192 (transl.) (Leuven, 1982); and J. W. Drijvers, ‘Marutha of Maipherqat on Helena Augusta, Jerusalem and the Council of Nicaea’, Studia Patristica, 34 (2001), pp. 51-64. See also a brief discus- sion of this material in J. Stutz, Constantinus Arabicus. Die Arabische Geschichtsschreibung und das christliche Rom, Islamic History and Thought, 4 (Piscataway, NJ, 2017), pp. 24-28. THE WRITINGs OF Mārūtā OF MAIPHERQAT AND THE MAKING OF NICAEA 3 1. Mārūtā OF MAIPHERQAT AND THE ACCOUNT OF THE COUNCIL OF NICAEA The legendary material on Constantine under consideration was transmitted, as mentioned above, in the context of a collection of texts concerning the Council of Nicaea and ascribed to Mārūtā, bishop of Maipherqat. The latter is known both for his diplomatic missions to the Sasanian court and for his role in the convocation of a synod at Seleucia-Ctesiphon (410) which reorgan- ized the Church in Persia.3 He is also known for his hagiographic contribu- tions, and may be considered the author of the 73 pseudo-Nicene canons, but there is no direct evidence that he also composed a hagiographi­cal account of Helen and Constantine.4 It is a reasonable inference that the authority of Mārūtā was the reason that further texts accrued to a collection or dossier of documents on the first ecumenical council. Since this dossier was transmit- ted as part of much larger canon compilations of later date, many questions remain open, as for example how far we can speak of an autonomous work at all. At the heart of this collection are the 73 pseudo-Nicene canons which were allegedly translated into Syriac by Mārūtā at the request of the Katho- likos Isḥāq. They are of special importance for the church in Persia, as they were composed specifically for the needs of a community living outside the border of the Roman Empire. While the Council of Nicaea put down canons ‘of many and different sorts written by them on many matters,’ not all of them were applicable in the absence of a Christian emperor. ‘In the land of the Persians,’ therefore, ‘not all the canons are necessary because the king and all the ranks which are with him do not adhere to our faith.’5 These canons are accompanied, as mentioned, by several other texts and letters loosely related to the Council of Nicaea. A set of ‘preliminary texts’ contains, among others, letters of Mārūtā to Mār Isḥāq, a list of heresies in the early church, a text on the interpretation of Greek terms, and a presentation of the ranks 3 On this Persian synod see W. Schweigert, ‘Katholikos Isaak (399-410 n. Chr.). Ein Beitrag zur nestorianischen Patriarchengeschichte’, in Syrisches Christentum weltweit. Studien zur syrischen Kirchengeschichte. Festschrift Prof. Hage, eds. M. Tamcke, W. Schweigert, and E. Schlarb, Studien zur Orientalischen Kirchengeschichte, 1 (Münster, 1995), pp. 180-189. 4 Drijvers, ‘Marutha of Maipherqat’ (see n. 2), pp. 54-55. 5 Vööbus, The Canons Ascribed to Mārūtā (see n. 2), p. 32 (text) and p. 28 (transl.). 4 JONATHAN STUTZ and orders of the church. Except for the list of heresies, these texts will not concern us here.6 A set of ‘supplementary texts’ again transmits documents strictly related to the council, such as ‘The Creed of the Synod of Nicaea’ or ‘The Names of the Bishops [Attending the Synod]’. Most important for our purpose, however, are the texts on Helen and Constantine distributed throughout all three parts of this collection. Helen is said to be from Edessa or Kepher Paḥar in Mesopotamia, where she was instructed in the Christian faith by the local bishop, Barsamya. There she was betrothed to Valenṭīanōs bar Qūsṭōs (Valentinian, son of Constantius), who was preparing to engage the Persians in war, and gave birth to Constantine.7 Helen’s part here is not limited to the context of Constantine’s child- hood; she also plays an essential role in initiating the Council of Nicaea. After Constantine (whom Helen did not raise in her faith out of fear for her husband) eventually converted to Christianity, Helen went on pilgrimage to Jerusalem. It was in that city that she learned from the enigmatic bishop Alexander about the Arian heresy and the losses which the church suffered by it. The bishop further censured her for her lavish building program, which would be unjustified in the face of this doctrinal affliction suffered by the church. On Alexander’s suggestions Helen therefore urged Constantine to summon a council. Alexander himself, foreseeing his martyrdom at the hands of the Arians, wrote a creed to be accepted by the council and sent it to Constantine. Several details concerning the council distinguish the Mārūtā narrative from the standards set by Byzantine historiography. Instead of the traditional number of 318 bishops, we find a total of 2,048 bishops participating in the discussions.8 These were divided into different groups, each following the teaching of a certain sect, while only 318 of them accepted the article of faith 6 See Drijvers, ‘Marutha of Maipherqat’ (see n.
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