Presentation & contributors

Heirs of the Apostles offers a panoramic survey of Arabic-speaking Christians—descendants of the Christian communities established in the Middle East by the apostles—and their history, religion, and culture in the early Islamic and medieval periods. The subjects range from Arabic translations of the Bible, to the status of Christians in the Muslim-governed lands, Muslim-Christian polemic, and Christian-Muslim and Christian-Jewish relations. The volume is offered as a Festschrift to Sidney H. Griffith, the doyen of Christian Arabic Studies in North America, on his eightieth birthday.

Contributors

David Bertaina, Elie Dannaoui, Stephen Davis, Nathan P. Gibson, Cornelia Horn, Sandra Toenies Keating, Juan Pedro Monferrer-Sala, Johannes Pahlitzsch, Andrew Platt, Thomas W. Ricks, Barbara Roggema, Harald Suermann, Mark N. Swanson, Shawqi Talia, Jack Tannous, David Thomas, Jennifer Tobkin, Alexander Treiger, Ronny Vollandt, Clare Wilde, and Jason Zaborowski. Show Less

Content

• Preface Abbreviations Notes on Contributors Bibliography of Sidney H. Griffith’s Publications

Part 1 Arabic Language, Bible, and Qurʾān

• An Arabic Christian Perspective on Monotheism in the Qurʾān: Elias of Nisibis’ Kitāb al-Majālis   David Bertaina
• From Multiplicity to Unification of the Arabic Biblical Text: a Reading of the Rūm Orthodox Projects for the Arabization and Printing of the Gospels during the Ottoman Period   Elie Dannaoui
• Early Christian Arabic Translation Strategies (Matthew 11:20–30 in Codex Vat. Ar. 13)   Juan Pedro Monferrer-Sala
• Flawed Biblical Translations into Arabic and How to Correct Them: a Copt and a Jew Study Saadiah’s Tafsīr   Ronny Vollandt
• The Utility of Christian Arabic Texts for Qurʾānic Studies   Clare Wilde

Part 2 Arabic Christian Responses to Islam and Muslim Interpretations of Christianity

• Apocalyptic Ecclesiology in Response to Early Islam   Cornelia B. Horn
• The Rationality of Christian Doctrine: Abū Rāʾiṭa al-Takrītī’s Philosophical Response to Islam   Sandra Toenies Keating
• The Doctrine of the Incarnation in Dialogue with Islam: Four Lines of Argumentation   Thomas W. Ricks
• Muslim Views of the Cross as a Symbol of the Christian Faith   Shawqi Talia
• The Doctrine of the Trinity in Early Islam: Misperceptions and Misrepresentations   David Thomas

Part 3 Arabic Christianity in the Medieval Islamic World

• Byzantine Monasticism and the Holy Land: Palestine in Byzantine Hagiography of the 11th and 12th Centuries   Johannes Pahlitzsch
• Inquiring of “Beelzebub”: Timothy and al-Jāḥiẓ on Christians in the ʿAbbāsid Legal System   Andrew Platt and Nathan P. Gibson
• The Church and the Mosque in Wisdom’s Shade: on the Story of “Alexander and the Hermit Prince”   Mark Swanson
• Revisiting Cheikho’s Assessment of Abū Tammām’s Christian Origins   Jennifer Tobkin
• Paul of Antioch’s Responses to a Muslim Sheikh   Alexander Treiger
• Part 4 Manuscript Discoveries

• Evagrius Ponticus at the Monastery of the Syrians: Newly Documented Evidence for an Arabic Reception History   Stephen J. Davis
• Christian-Muslim-Jewish Relations in Patristic Literature: the Arabic Questions and Answers of Basil and Gregory   Barbara Roggema
• A Fragment of a Christian-Muslim Disputation “in the Style of Abū Rāʾiṭa and ʿĪsā ibn Zurʿa” (Gotha ar. 2882, fols. 16r–24v): a Reassessment   Harald Suermann
• A Greco-Arabic Palimpsest from the Sinai New Finds: Some Preliminary Observations   Jack Tannous
• An Arabic Manuscript of the Visions of Anba Shenouda: Edition and Translation   Jason R. Zaborowski
• Index