From Greek into Arabic; Some Notes About Translation and Exegesis in a 13th Cent. Christian-Arabic Work

Document Type : Original Article

Author

Faculty of Humanities, Cordoba University, Cordoba, Spain.

Abstract

Much has been debated, among others by Samir Khalil, concerning the need for cataloging and giving an account for the collection of Christian-Arabic manuscripts in the different Libraries, alongside the urgency in publishing such material.
Added to the scarcity of inventories of this specifically Christian collection (one rare exception, still incomplete, being that of the Monastery of St. Catherine, in Mount Sinai) and the lack of scientific rigor of many of the existing catalogs from the 19th century and even the 20th century, the scornful treatment of Christian works, remarkable cases excepted, is to be emphasized in the two well-known important repertoires.
The only relevant overall work we can consult is the great work by Graf and still, this is being updated under the supervision of Samir Khalil, as there are some lacunae, and lack of information about the manuscripts, the error in the identification, classification, and analysis of many samples, this said with no disregard for the great achievements of the work
It seems obvious that there is still a hard and lengthy work ahead that the materials and places to go into are manifold, and the nature of documents is varied. In addition, the recuperation of the material already edited or presented as the pre-edited state, no matter how valuable it is, must be collected, analyzed, and taken some profit out of it, if the chance is offered.
In this line and according to the above mentioned, we attempt in this paper to announce an important unpublished manuscript: it is the Arabic version of the book of “Book of Psalms” translated from an Antiochean Greek ‘Abd Allāh b. al-Faḍl (11th cent). Such manuscript has special relevance because of the important exegetic material it contains and transmits. This MS, still unpublished, proves outstandingly relevant, especially because we do not have a critical edition of the Book of Psalms. 

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