Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib and the Arabic Diatessaron

Review of the scholarship on the document and the problem of its translator, and directions for future
research
Nicholas Allan Aubin
RLST 667a: The Arabic Bible in its Historical Context
Professor Stephen Davis
Abstract:

The publication in 1888 of the Arabic translation of Tatian’s (fl. A.D. 150-175) Diatessaron
introduced a period of passionate scholarly inquiry. While specialists in various disciplines, including
early Biblical philology, Diatessaronic studies, early and medieval church history, Syriac theological/
intellectual history, and Christian Arabic studies, have noted the potential this document provides for
profound insight into the gaps and lacunae that remain in their own systems of knowledge, the
question of the identity of the translator has dominated the scholarly discourse on the document. The
attribution of the translation to the Nestorian philosopher, theologian and polymath Abū l-Faraǧ
ʿAbdallāh ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib (d. 1043) has served as a major point of contention between respected scholars
for over a century, and much ink has been spilt attempting to settle the matter one way or the other.
Scholars have taken many approaches to this question and exercised incredibly creativity in the
presentation of their variegated conclusions, but the question remains today essentially as it was in
the middle of the 20th century, in a sort of opaque aporia, shedding just enough light to allow for a
number of pictures to be imagined, but ultimately lacking in any clear, definitive resolution.

This paper will provide an overview of the Arabic Diatessaron—including a detailed

presentation of the manuscript evidence we have for the document—and some background on the
man allegedly behind it. It will also rehearse the major arguments drawn up for and against the
attribution to Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib, but will not set out to add another voice to any side of the the cacophony
of scholarly opinion on the matter. Rather, this paper will content itself with two basic intentions: first,
to highlight the methods and approaches that have been used in ways that are injurious both to the
pursuit of sound resolution to this issue and to the practice of scholarship at large; second, to offer a
prioritized set of research aims beyond the old chestnut of who translated the Diatessaron into Arabic,
probing the many understudied areas connected with the document and its alleged translator into
which verifiable research can more readily be practiced and from which potentially more enlightening
knowledge can be amassed.
 Aubin - 2 -

The Document:

Our knowledge of the Diatessaron is not hardly as complete as one might expect, if it were
anticipated that the sum of our knowledge and insight into the document would be in keeping with
the scale of the attention paid to it by scholars of every stripe since the fourth century A. D. The
Diatessaron as an object of scholarly curiosity has held a captive audience since Eusebius penned his
Historia Ecclesiastica (before ca. 325); his statement about the document, in which he names Tatian as
the man responsible for its composition, and gives to it the name ‘Diatessaron,’ also sheds some light
on his fascination with the method and ingenuity behind its composition:

Ὁ...Τατιανὸς συνἀφειάν τινα καὶ συναγωγὴν οὐκ οἶδ᾽ ὅπως τῶν εὐαγγελίων συνθεὶς,
τὸ διὰ τεσσάρων τοῦτο προσωνόµασεν, ὅ καὶ παρὰ τισιν εἰσέτι νῦν φέρεται.
“Tatian brought together a certain combination and collection—I do not
know how—of the gospels, calling this the ‘Diatessaron’, which is also still now
received by some.”1

The concept of a gospel harmony, that is to say a single, self-contained and complete but non-
repetitive narrative drawn verse by verse from the four versions of the New Testament gospel, may
have seemed a curiosity to a churchman of fourth century Palestine, accustomed, by that point in time
and in that particular area, to respecting the more rigid boundaries between the four canonical gospel
testimonies. But to the Syriac Christian community of the 2nd-4th centuries, such an arrangement of
the gospel was evidently an integral part of their heritage and liturgical practice. Theodoret of
Cyrrhus, bishop of the same small town in Syria from 423 to 457, in part of his Haereticarum fabularum
compendium, describes the find of more than 200 copies of the Diatessaron in the churches that were
within his diocese, which he promptly replaced with copies of the Gospels of the four Evangelists (τὰ
τῶν τεσσάρων εὐαγγελιστῶν ἀντεισήγαγον εὐαγγέλια).2

One would hope to find in the manuscript libraries of the world at least some surviving
manuscripts of the Diatessaron, in either of the two languages (Greek or Syriac3) proposed as the

1. Eusebius of Caesarea, h.e. IV.29.6, cited in Petersen, pp. 35-36.

2. Theodoret, haer. fab. comp. I.20 cf. Petersen, pp. 41-42.
3. There is still considerable debate surrounding the language used by Tatian for the Diatessaron; all of his surviving
works are in Greek, but geographical and literary factors (including the rich Syriac commentary tradition dating back to
the time of Ephrem,) point to a Syriac origin. cf. Petersen, p. 154.
 Aubin - 3 -

language Tatian used in composing the document. The lack of a Syriac manuscript is especially
striking given its evident popularity among the Syriac Christian communities throughout the seven
centuries leading up to its Arabic translation in the 10th-11th century. But for a number of reasons,
including the various material and historical circumstances (especially movements aimed at
suppressing the work, such as that initiated by Theodoret above,4) none of the Syriac manuscripts
have survived, and all we have in the Greek manuscript record are a few lines unearthed at Dura-
Europos which show signs of having been translated from the Syriac.5

Apart from the fragment from Dura-Europos, which, though datable to the early to middle
third century, is less than a single complete folio, our earliest window on to the contents of Tatian’s
Diatessaron is dependent on the Codex Fuldensis, copied in 546 by Victor of Capua, Italy.6 However,
this Latin wording of this gospel harmony, it has been shown, was “purified” in a manner so as to agree
with the Vulgate Latin readings, and is therefore of little value in seeking the text of the original
document.7 The second earliest witness to the Diatessaron is a two column, bilingual document in
Latin and Old High German, copied around 830. While the Latin text is virtually identical with that
found in the Codex Fuldensis, the Old High German exhibits some variants that point to a source
outside of (and prior to?) the Codex Fuldensis.8 In the early 19th century, the Lutheran pastor Johann
Christian Zahn could point to seven more witnesses to the Diatessaron, mostly in Latin and German
dating from the 13th to 14th centuries, and at this point the Arabic translation of the Diatessaron was
introduced into the eyes of Western scholarship for the first time.9 A great deal of excitement
surrounded the discovery of the Arabic Diatessaron, due principally to its presumed linguistic and
chronological proximity to the Syriac original. It was always latently assumed (albeit without solid
philological foundation) that an Eastern witness to the Diatessaron would be the best hope for
recovering the original text of the document.

Various other witnesses to the text of the Diatessaron would be discovered in the intervening

4. In this case the Diatessaron was labeled heretical because of the elimination of the genealogies of Christ found in the
beginning of Matthew and Luke 3:23ff.
5. Kahle, pp. 294-5.
6. Peteresen, pp. 45-48.
7. Petersen, p. 86.
8. Petersen, pp. 87-9.
9. Petersen, pp. 92ff.
 Aubin - 4 -

centuries, however none of them has attracted as much attention or offered scholarship as much as
those named above. Much of the ensuing scholarship on the Diatessaron focused on critical
examination of the systematic relationships between these manuscripts, but for the purposes of this
paper, we will focus on the manuscript tradition of the Arabic Diatessaron, and its treatment at the
hands of the scholars who saw in it the most potential for recovering the original text of Tatian’s
Diatessaron. But first it would serve our purposes to introduce the man supposedly behind the
translation of the Arabic Diatessaron.

Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib:

Unlike our picture of the Diatessaron, our knowledge of Abū l-Faraǧ ʿAbdallāh ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib (d.
1043) is informed by many primary and secondary sources that were written during or not long after
the man’s life. He was a Nestorian Christian with intimate knowledge of Syriac and the Syriac
exegetical tradition, and is reported to have been a priest and administrator in the Church of the
East.10 Ibn Abī Uṣaybiʿah, the famous biographer of the physicians preceding the 13th century, gives us
a colorful report in which Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib is called upon by a couple of Muslim scholars who have
travelled afar to study philosophy and medicine with him. They are amazed to find such a learned
man inside the church, swinging the censers, dressed in wool and wearing the traditional head-piece.11

We can be sure that Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s renown was widespread and that men of all faiths and
schools admired his work. Popular Arabic bibliographies and biographies—meant to serve as
references for practitioners of various disciplines, especially medicine, and for the general udabāʾ—
from the 13th century bestow lavish respect on him and give him such honorific titles as al-fīlasūf al-
imām al-ʿālim.12 They give a detailed account of his occupations and areas of specialty while also
giving us insight into his scholarly output. His talents were many and multifarious; while serving as
the lead physician and healing the sick at the ʿAḍudī hospital in Baġdād, he also commented on the
scientific books of Galen, Hippocrates, and wrote commentaries on many of the works of philosophy
by Aristotle.13 He is mentioned in many works by other leading figures of his day, including Ibn Sīnā,

10. Faultless, “Ibn al-Ṭayyib,” p. 667.

11. Ibn Abī Uṣaybiʿah, ʿUyūn al-anbāʾ fī ṭabaqāt al-aṭibbāʾ. p. 324.
12. Ibn Abī Uṣaybiʿah, ʿUyūn al-anbāʾ fī ṭabaqāt al-aṭibbāʾ. p. 323.
13. Faultless, “Ibn al-Ṭayyib,” p. 668. Cf. also: Ibn Abī Uṣaybiʿah, ʿUyūn al-anbāʾ fī ṭabaqāt al-aṭibbāʾ. p. 323.
 Aubin - 5 -

who relates the hilarious tale of his being tricked into purchasing Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s latest work at an
exorbitant cost.14 Ibn Abī Uṣaybiʿah also includes the following quote from Ibn Sīnā, reviewing a set of
medical works by Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib:15

‫ـ' ـ ــ‬DC‫ـ‬B"‫ و ـ‬،/‫=ـ‬-‫ >ـ? ا ـ‬/‫ــ‬,=-‫ـ< ا ـ‬7‫ـ;ج ا‬9-‫ ا ـ‬8‫ـ‬7ٔ‫ ا‬6‫ــ‬,4-‫ـ' ا ـ‬0123)
G‫ـ‬E,EF ‫ ـ ـ ــ‬/‫ــ‬.% '‫ـــ‬+,-‫ـ'ن ـ)(ـ* ا‬% $‫ا"ـ‬
.'03H ‫;ي‬B) 'H‫'ت و‬,3,K=-‫ وا‬L=+2-‫? >? ا‬.-‫ ا‬$9,"'MN ‫ف‬PQR G,S;H

Ibn Sīnā found in the medical volumes things that were correct (ṣaḥīḥatan) and praiseworthy
(marḍiyatan), compared to his works in logic and and physics and other things, which were allegedly
not worthy of such praise from the šayḫ ar-raʾis. Another compiler of history and biography has a very
boastful Ibn Sīnā asserting that some of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s prose is not eloquent (ġayr faṣīḥ) and even
occasionally faulty (saqīm).16 How reliable we are to consider this report is open to debate, for it must
be born in mind that the quote comes from (at least) a secondary authority, not from Ibn Sīnā himself,
with much room for the insertion of personal bias and exaggeration in between the links in the chain
of transmission. We can say, however, on the basis of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s surviving works, that his Middle-
or Christian-Arabic is in many ways different from the literary language of ‘pure’ Classical Arabic,
which then (as all too often now) was the meter stick by which is measured linguistic capability.

Naturally, the Arabic commentaries (written by and large by Muslims) do not mention the
theological works Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib penned, but our knowledge is born out in other sources, including an
impressive number of surviving manuscripts.17 In addition to a number of works on the Trinity and the
Unity, he wrote a commentary on the entire Bible (the Firdaws an-Naṣrānīyah), one on sections of the
Bible, (for instance, his commentary on the Psalms,) and a commentary on the Gospels. None of these
works has been studied in depth, and only his commentary on Genesis, (part of the Firdaws,) has been
edited.18 It has been observed, however, that his commentary of Genesis, and—one might assume—
his other commentaries, are dependent in large measure on the Syriac tradition of which he was a
part. Much of his work is dedicated to citing the opinions of the Syriac and Greek fathers, and chief

14. Gutas, Avicenna and the Aristotelian Tradition, p. 68.

15. Ibn Abī Uṣaybiʿah, ʿUyūn al-anbāʾ fī ṭabaqāt al-aṭibbāʾ. p. 324.
16. Joosse, “Introduction,” p. 113-114.
17. Faultless, “Ibn al-Ṭayyib,” pp. 674ff. provides an excellent survey of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s theological works and their surviving
manuscripts. Compare to Graf, Geschichte, II, pp. 160ff.
18. Sanders, J.C.J. Ibn aṭ-Ṭaiyib: Commentaire sur la Genèse. In: Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium (=CSCO), Vol.
274. Louvain, 1967.
 Aubin - 6 -

among his sources of influence is the Syrian theologian Ishoʿdad of Merv (fl. c. 850).19

The Manuscripts:

The first manuscript of the Arabic Diatessaron to reach Western readers was brought to Rome
“from the East” by Joseph Simon Assemani in 1719.20 Ms. A, as it has come to be denoted, is to be found
in the Vatican library under the heading Vatican Arabo XIV. Those who have studied the document
first hand have given it an Egyptian provenance (on the basis of certain Coptic letters inscribed in the
margins by the same hand that made the manuscript,) and have dated the document to 12th-14th
century. The incipit and colophon make no mention of to figure responsible for the translation into
Arabic. The document is scarcely vocalised, and uses almost no diacritical markings. This manuscript
includes the genealogies of Christ in the natural place, towards the beginning of the document.

Ms. B,21 dated to the 14th-16th century, and presumably also from Egypt, is bound together with
and preceded by a lengthy introduction to the gospels by an anonymous author. Abū l-Faraǧ ʿAbdallāh
ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib is cited in the incipit and colophon of the Diatessaron portion of the volume. The
colophon mentions the scribe of the Syriac vorlage from which this Arabic translation was allegedly
made, a certain ʿĪsà ibn ʿAlī al-Mutaṭabbib (d. 892), who was a student of Ḥunayn ibn Isḥāq (d. 874).22
Another remarkable feature of the volume is its decorative, claret-colored leather binding and gold
ornamentation, which, according to Kahle resembles contemporary Qurʾānic style, especially in the
layout of the first two surahs.

Ms. E,23 copied in Egypt on 22 May, 1795, features an incipit that is identical to that of Ms. B.,
but lacks the decorative flourishes that characterize Ms. B. In the incipit and colophon, Abū l-Faraǧ
ʿAbdallāh ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib is named as author. This manuscript exhibits a certain carelessness or poor
control of language on account of the scribe, with dozens instances of substandard vocalisation on

19. Faultless, “Ibn al-Ṭayyib,” p. 669.

20. Joosse, “Introduction,” pp. 80-81.
21. Vatican Borgianum Arabo 250, cf. Joosse, pp. 81-82.
22. The text of the Ms. is defective; it literally reads L‫ـ‬E\
‫ـ< ا ـ‬7 <‫ـ‬,+[
‫ ـ ـ‬Z‫ـ‬,21N
‫ ـ ـ ـ‬/‫ـ‬,=2-
‫ـ'ي ا ـ ـ ـ‬Y <‫ـ‬7 X‫ـ‬UKW
‫ ـ ـ‬V‫ـ‬T7‫ ـ‬G‫ـ‬TU"
‫ـ< ـ ـ‬H
<,H‫ ا‬$ّ1-‫' ا‬202[‫ ر‬with obvious orthographical errors. cf. Joosse, “Introduction,” p. 103.
23. Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate Cairo no. 202. cf. Joosse, op. cit, p. 83.
 Aubin - 7 -

each page.

Ms. O24 was, according to its colophon, copied in Egypt in January, 1806 from a much older Ms.
penned in 11 March, 1107 by Ibn al-ʿAssāl, one of ancestors of the three famous brothers (the Aulād al-
ʿAssāl) who flourished in the thirteenth century. The Diatessaron comes third in a bound set of works,
following an anonymous introduction to the gospels and a compendium on the Christian Truth.25 The
series has been understood as a thematically cohesive response to objections against the Trinity and
Christian doctrine raised by none other than al-Ġazālī (d. 1111), selections of whose work form the
matter of a sort of ‘question and answer’ portion at the end of the compendium on the Christian
Truth.26 Abū l-Faraǧ ʿAbdallāh ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib is named as translator in preamble. Ms. O also cites the
author of the Syriac vorlage as ʿĪsà ibn ʿAlī al-Mutaṭabbib. In keeping with the theme of a response to
the Muslim challenge, the entire volume is done up in a decorative style similar to both Ms. B above
and the contemporary Qurʾāns.

Ms. S27 was copied in Cairo in 1797. According to Paul Sbath’s 1934 catalogue, Abū l-Faraǧ ibn
aṭ-Ṭayyib is named as translator in the incipit, which is identical to that found in manuscripts B, E and
O. This version lacks, however, the decorative embellishments found in B and O. The manuscript is
currently unavailable, and we rely on the description given in Paul Sbath’s catalogue (published
1928-34). The colophon is not described in his entry, but we are told that the work was done quite
neatly and in beautiful script.

Ms. T28 is likely a late 18th century copy of Ms. S. The manuscript contains a collection of
prayers after the Diatessaron text.

The loose folia comprising Ms. C29 are known as the “Beirut Fragments”,30 and were penned in
July 1332. The colophon provides us with a transmission history that can be traced through two Coptic

24. Bodelian Library, Oxford, Ms. Arab e 163, cf. Joosse, op. cit., pp. 83-4.
25. tiryāq al-ʿuqūl fī ʿilm al-uṣūl (ad-dīnīya) “Antidote of the minds in the matter of the divine principles.” cf. Kahle, p.
302.
26. Kahle, pp. 301-304.
27. Library Paul Sbath 1020. cf. Joosse, p. 83.
28. Library Paul Sbath 1280. cf. Joosse, p. 83.
29. Jesuit Library, Beirut 429. cf. Joosse, pp. 84-85.
30. The fragments were named as such by Whit Monday because the three loose folia were found “under a pile of rubbish
at the gate of the Maronite monastery of Luaiza, north-east of Beirut,” in 1890. Cf. Joosse, “Introduction,” p. 84, n. 70.
 Aubin - 8 -

priests to a version scribed in the early 13th century at Fūwah, Egypt. A “very old” manuscript copied
in Antioch is said to be the source for this early 13th century copy, implying that there existed a version
that could have been written at least as early as the 12th century, possibly the 11th. Despite the
scrupulous transmission history provided by the three priests, no mention of the original translator is
given in the colophon.31

It is also worth mentioning manuscript Paul Sbath 1029 in the context of the Arabic
Diatessaron and its manuscript history. This is consciously and explicitly not a manuscript of the

Diatessaron, but a different and independent work, created in the 12th century and given the title: _‫ــ‬+‫ــ‬%

‫ـ'ر‬0d‫` ـ‬a‫ـ;)ـ< ا‬4K2-

‫ ا ـ ــ‬G‫ـ‬37‫`ر ـ‬a‫م ا‬PQ‫ـ‬% <‫ـ‬H *‫ـ‬2b
‫ـ' ـ‬2H‫ــ'ر ـ‬,R`a‫ـ;ار ا‬7`a‫“ ا‬Treasure of pious and good [things, consisting]
of that which was collected from the words of the four holy Evangelists.” The author of this new work
does mention the Diatessaron translated by Abū l-Faraǧ ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib, in the hope of providing literary
background and motivation for his own work, stating that many anticipated him in creating a gospel
harmony, among them “the great priest Abū l-Faraǧ ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib the Easterner.”32 This author also
explains the motivation for his own efforts by suggesting that after comparing Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s work to
the verifiedly correct Syriac, Coptic and Greek versions of the gospels, he found Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s work to
be riddled with deletions and unneccessary repetitions: 33

‫ـ;رة‬E2-
‫ ا ـ ـ‬g‫ـ‬,b
‫`"ـ' ـ‬a‫ ا‬X‫ـ‬1Y‫ ـ‬$‫ـ‬7 f‫ـ‬17‫ـ' ـ‬e‫[ و‬/‫ـ‬,=-
‫ـ< ا ـ ـ‬7‫ ]ا‬$‫ـ‬32b
‫ي ـ ـ‬Z‫ـ‬-‫ ا‬g‫ـ‬,B" ‫` ـ ـ‬a‫ ا‬X‫ـ‬1Y‫ ـ‬f‫ـ‬9e‫ـ' و ـ‬21>
‫ــ‬
‫ص‬8‫ـ‬M+- ‫ ا ـ ـ‬i‫ـ‬37‫ ـ‬g‫ـ‬2D‫ أ ـ‬C‫ـ‬e $‫ـ‬NC‫ـ‬b‫ـ? و‬H;‫ـ‬-‫=ـ? وا‬K(-‫ـ' ـ ـ ـ‬D ?‫ـ;)ـ'"ـ‬U-‫ـ< ا ـ‬H '‫ـ‬0.EF
‫ ـ ـ ـ‬X‫ـ‬1Y‫ ـ‬L‫ـ‬9.2-‫اـ ــ‬
...‫;ورة‬S ;,W <H <,,1,B"`a‫م ا‬PQ% i37 ‫;ر‬%‫ و‬G,1k-'7 gF`a‫< ا‬H '0>Z[‫ و‬G,1,B"`a‫ا‬

This manuscript is significant for three reasons: first, it provides a relatively early witness (12th
century) to the existence of an Arabic gospel harmony. Second, it shows that by the 12th century, the
opinion that Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib had a part in an Arabic gospel harmony was current among learned men in
the Coptic community at that time. Third, and perhaps most interesting, it seems to suggest that, at
least in the opinion of the author of this manuscript, Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib did not translate the Syriac
Diatessaron of Tatian in Arabic, but rather, like him, prepared his own collection of the four gospels

31. Kahle, pp. 298-299.

32. Cf. Baarda, “Author,” pp 68ff. and Marmardji, pp. xc-xci.
33. Cf. Baarda, “Author,” p. 69.
 Aubin - 9 -

( ً‫ا‬C‫ ً ا[ ـ‬PQ‫ ـ‬,‫ ـ‬B‫ ـ' ا" ـ‬0‫ ـ‬+‫ ـ‬H fُ ‫ ـ‬3‫ ـ‬2‫ ـ‬b ). What we are to make of his suggestion that Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib collected the
Gospels in a manner that did not square with the Bible texts of the three great Christian language
traditions of the Near East, Syriac, Coptic and Greek, is unfortunately ambiguous. In addition to the
repetition or elision of certain passages, it could refer to the absence or relocation of the genealogies
of Christ. As will be seen below, this document has been the source of great debate in the matter of
Arabic Diatessaron’s translator. It is important to note in any event, that the author of this manuscript
also makes no mention of Tatian by name, only gestures towards a vague group of learned men,
jamāʿtun min al-afāḍil, who had preceded him in the act of collecting one gospel from the four, among
them Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib.

The Recensions:

The manuscripts of the Arabic Diatessaron outlined above have been studied extensively over
the past 100 years, and scholars since 1939, when A. F. L. Beeston’s observations on the document were
printed,34 have recognized that the surviving manuscripts belong to two separate recensions families.
The first, containing manuscripts A and C (the Beirut Fragments) is defined by the lack of any
mention in the colophonof Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib as the translator, the placement of the genealogies of Christ
towards the beginning of the document, within the structure of the narrative, and the use of two

letters to denote the source of the gospel passage, ( 8‫\)ـــــــ‬8‫ـــــــ‬-\;‫ـــــــ‬H\f‫ـــــــ‬H). The second family includes

manuscripts B-E-O-S-T, and is defined by the following specific details; the translator is named as Ibn
aṭ-Ṭayyib, the genealogies are appended at the end of the document, and the citations of the gospel
passages are given with a single letter, (‫) م\ر\ق\خ‬.35

The Editions:

The Arabic Diatessaron has been treated in two separate editions, one of which might be
called critical. In 1888 P. Ciasca presented his Tatiani Evangeliorum Harmoniae Arabice to the Pope, in
a very ornate volume with a Latin translation in the introduction.36 Ciasca utilized the two

34. Beeston, “The Arabic Version of Tatian’s Diatessaron.” In Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland.
October, 1939. pp 608-610.
35. Cf. Petersen, Diatessaron. pp. 136-137.
36. Ciasca, P. A. Tatiani Evangeliorum Harmoniae Arabice: Nunc primum ex duplici codice edidit et translatione latina
donavit. Rome: Typografia Polyglotta, 1888.
 Aubin - 10 -

manuscripts discovered up to that point, manuscripts A and B. While he looks to B for the
identification of the translator (not found in A) and a few lacunae in the text of A where folia have
disappeared, he relies most heavily on manuscript A, favoring the readings of the older manuscript,
but notes the divergences of B as they occur. The problem, however, which Ciasca could not have
anticipated in 1888, was that the two manuscripts come from two different recension traditions, and
his hybridized version essentially produces a text that “never existed” in written form.37 Furthermore,
his Latin translation is guilty of glossing over many of the intrinsic peculiarities of the text in favor of
Vulgatized Latin readings. This is not a problem for those concerned exclusively with the Arabic, but
for those relying on the Latin, or the slew of other translations into English and other European
languages that followed its publication, it would paint the problematic picture that the text of Tatian’s
Diatessaron agrees closely, on semantic and syntactical levels, with modern European translations of
Bible verses, many of which had their roots in the Vulgate.

With the publication of Marmardji’s Diatessaron de Tatien in 1935,38 the academy was
presented with a new edition, one relying on manuscript E, but supplemented by and occasionally
replaced with readings from manuscripts A and B. It has been suggested that the choice to base the
edition on manuscript E was made primarily because Marmardji had a photograph of this manuscript
in the library at the École Biblique in Jerusalem where he worked.39 It is striking that this edition
completely ignores the Beirut Fragments, discovered some 45 years earlier. More problematic than
this oversight, however, is the general attitude taken to the work by Marmardji; instead of presenting
the work as it is found in the three manuscripts he worked with, the editor assumed that the Arabic
would have originally adhered to the rigorous standards of Classical literary Arabic, and took the
pleasure of pointing out (and occasionally correcting!) ‘scribal errors’ he came across in the
manuscripts. A Maronite Christian in Palestine, “Marmardji was a fanatical champion of the form of
his mother tongue which he had learned in school.”40 His pro-active correcting was especially
problematic because his manuscript of choice was not very carefully written, by comparison with

37. Cf. Petersen, Diatessaron. p. 137. and Joosse, “Introduction,” pp 86 ff.

38. Marmardji, A. S., Diatessaron de Tatien: Texte arabe établi, traduit en français, collationné avec les anciennes versions
syriaques, suivi d’un évangéliaire diatessarique syriaque et accompagné de quatre planches hors texte. Beirut: Imprimerie
Catholique, 1935.
39. Kahle, p. 301.
40. Kahle, p. 301.
 Aubin - 11 -

manuscripts A and B, but we must be sceptical of the editor’s claim to have discovered “seventy odd
mistakes in the vocalisation... on every page.”41 Were it not for the gravity of the issues caused by such
academic recklessness and poor editorial technique, we might find humor in the sharp wit of some of
the many scholars who wrote scathing reviews of Marmardji’s edition: Curt Peters called the edition
the height of un-methodology, “den Gipfel von Unmethode.”42 Baumstark quipped that not only was
Marmardji’s text better than that of the Arabic translator, but also more accurate than the Syriac of the
vorlage!43 Jokes aside, the fact remains that Marmardji has left us with an edition that makes it very
difficult to determine “whether the printed text is that of the Ms. or is his idea of what the Ms. ought
to read.”44 While it is our standard edition to date, few could argue against the scholarly refrain that “a
new edition is a desideratum.”45

Scholarship on Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s Role in the Translation

Here it behooves us to rehearse the arguments made by scholars over the last 125 years for and
against the identification of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib with the Arabic translator of the Diatessaron. The goal of
this presentation is not to show the superiority of one conclusion over the other, but to show, in the
most dispassionate and unbiased sense possible, the relative merits of various methods of approach to
the question, by citing techniques and attitudes that have proven to be more of a detriment to this
issue than an aid.

Ciasca, in the introduction to his 1888 edition of the text, provides the first instance of
attribution of the work to Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib. (Ms.B, the second manuscript to cross his desk, mentions Ibn
aṭ-Ṭayyib as the translator in the incipit and colophon, which served as the motivation behind his
identification.) In order for his attribution to gain traction, he was required to explain away the
curious fact that two major contemporaries of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib, Grīgōr bar ʿEbrāyā and Abū l-Barakāt, are
silent on the matter of the Diatessaron in their otherwise rich biblio-biographical accounts of Ibn aṭ-
Ṭayyib’s works. He answered this challenge by noting that these lists are not stipulated by their

41. Kahle, p. 301.

42. Peters, p. 21. cf. Joosse, “Introduction,” p. 88.
43. Joosse, “Introduction,” p. 88.
44. Metzger, Early Versions, p. 15. cf. Joosse, “Introduction,” p. 88.
45. Petersen, 137.
 Aubin - 12 -

authors to be exhaustive, and by pointing to other works known to be by Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib that also did
not make the list.46

Ernst Sellin, in his review of Ciasca’s edition, published 1891,47 attempted to prove that Ibn aṭ-
Ṭayyib was the translator by showing the lexicographic and syntactical correlation of the Arabic
Diatessaron to a Leyden manuscript48 of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s commentary on Matthew. In his terse report,
five specific phrases from Matthew49 are indicated where the text of the Arabic Diatessaron (as found
in manuscripts A and B) agrees with the Leyden manuscript over and against the Pešitta and the
Versio Syriaca Philoxeniana.50 His argument is that since Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s commentary on Matthew uses,
in five places, wording not found in the two major Syriac tettra-evangelia in use in his day, but found
in the Arabic Diatessaron, he must have had intimate knowledge of the latter document, and possible
could have had a role in translating it.

H. W. Hogg, writing in 1895,51 was the first to cast doubt on the attribution to Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib. His
suspicion was based on the quality of the Arabic text and the lack of evidence in the contemporary
bibliographies. As for the text, he cites, among other lines, the following “glaring case” from Matthew
27:54 (ch. LII, v. 11 of the Arabic Diatessaron):

‫ا‬nCb ‫ا‬8>'R ‫ َ;ت‬bَ ?.-‫'ٓء ا‬,rٔ`a‫ وا‬G-_-_-‫' رأوا ا‬2s -‫ع و‬8U) ٕ`a ‫ا‬8"'% ‫ ّ;اس‬E-‫ ا‬$3H ‫ا‬8"'% <)Z-‫ وا‬G-'b;s -‫ ا‬w);Yَ ‫و‬

This passage certainly provides a bit of a puzzle for the Arabist trained on pure Classical
Arabic, particularly the use of the preposition li before Jesus’ name to denote spacial proximity to a

human figure, and the syntax of the phrase ,‫ــ ّ;اس‬E‫ــ‬-‫ ا‬$‫ــ‬3‫ــ‬H ‫ا‬8‫ــ'"ــ‬% but is Hogg justified in claiming that

“this sentence is a good example of word-for-word translation of the Peshitta.”?52 Hogg ultimately

46. Ciasca, p. xii.

47. Sellin, E. “Der Text des von A. Ciasca herausgegebenen arabischen Diatessarons. Forschungen zur Geschichte des
neutestamentlichen Kanons, Band IV, 1891. pp 225-246.
48. Hs. 454. Cat. V. δ. 1., which he names “L” in his work.
49. Matthew 3:4, 4:18, 5:24, 5:46, 8:10.
50. Cf. White, Sacorum Evangeliorum: Versio Syriaca Philoxeniana. Oxford; Clarendon, 1778. This is an edition of the work
commissioned by Philoxenos of Mabbug/Hierapolis (d. 523).
51. H. W. Hogg, The Diatessaron of Tatian, in: A. Menzies, Ante-Nicene Christian Library, Additional Volume, Edinburgh
1897, pp. 35-141. =idem, in: A. Menzies, The Ante-Nicene Fathers X, Grand Rapids, 1969, p. 36, under section 7. Cf. Baarda, p.
64, n. 17.
52. Hogg, o.c., p. 123, n. 3633. The Pešitta text at Matt. 27:54 reads as follows:
 Aubin - 13 -

concedes that the “inferiority of parts of the translation... hardly suffice[s] to refute [the attribution in
the colophon of manuscript B to Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib].”53 Taking a different tack, he also points out that “in
Ibn-at-Tayyib’s own commentary on the gospels,”54 Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib refers to the Diatessaron in a way
“remarkably impersonal for one who had made or was to make a translation of it.”55 He goes on to call
for a critical evaluation of three major literary sources and the connections between them:56

1. “A supposed version of at least Matthew and John made from the Syriac by Ibn-at-Tayyib,
mentioned by Ibn-al-ʿAssal in the Preface to his scholarly recension of the gospels (MS. numbered
Or. 3382 in Brit. Mus., folio 384b) and used by him in determining his text.”

2. “The gospel text interwoven with the commentary of Ibn-at-Tayyib on the gospels,”

3. The Arabic Diatessaron.

If the relation(s) between these three works could be established, he argued, we would be in a much
better position to diagnose the agency of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib in the translation of the Arabic Diatessaron.

L. Cheikho introduced the first direct challenge to the attribution in 1897-1901,57 drawing the
Beirut fragments into the picture for the first time. On the basis of the colophon of the fragments, he
posited a date for the original composition of the “very old manuscript”58 in the 9th or early 10th
century, before Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib could have translated the document. Following the line of reasoning
foreseen by Ciasca, and introduced by Hogg, he finds proof against the attribution in the silence of the
Christian Arabic bibliographical record on any mention of an Arabic Diatessaron by Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib.59

‬ ‫> ‫ܘܐ?ـ‬
‫&ܘ‬ ‬ ‫ ‫=ـ‬4
‬ ‫ـ;ـ‬7‫ܕܗܘܝ ‫ܕ‬
‬ ‫ ‫‬+‬ ‫ـ‬1‫( ‫ܘܐ*ـ;ـ‬
‬ ‫ـ‬-‫ܘ ‫ܙܘ‬8
‬ ‫ـ‬7‫ ‫‬6‬ ‫ـ‬5‫ܥ ‫‬4
‬ ‫ـ‬0‫ـ‬1‫ـ‬2‫‬ ‫ܗܘܘ‬ ‫‬+‫ ‫ܕ'ـ!ـ&*ـ‬.
‬ ‫ـ‬,‫ـ‬-‫‬ ‫ܘܕ‬+‫ـ"ـ!ـ&ܘ'ـ(‬ ‫ܕ*ـ‬#
‬ C.2‫ܕܐ‬ ‫ ‫‬C‫ܗܘ‬
‬ ‫&ܗ ‫‬B
‬ ‫ܗ'( ‫‬
‬ ‫&*&ܐ*@ ‫‬A
‬ ‫‫‬
53. Hogg, o.c., p. 36.
54. It is not sure which commentaries Hogg has in mind, but it seems likely that he is referring to an 11th century
manuscript mentioned by De Slane, (catalogue No. 85.) Cf. Hogg. p. 36, n. 13 and p. 37, n. 1.
55. Hogg, o.c. p. 36, n.13, Cf. Baarda, o.c. 64.
56. Hogg, o.c. p. 37, n. 1.
57. L. Cheikho, “Lettre au sujet de l’auteur de la version arabe du Diatessaron,” in Journal Asiatique, IX, t. ix, (1897), pp.
301-307.
58. ‫ا‬Cb G(,.Y GTU" Cf. Baarda, o.c. p. 65.
59. Baarda, 65-7.
 Aubin - 14 -

In 1912, S. Euringer conducted a “specialized” study60 of the Beirut fragments and refuted the
conclusions drawn by Cheikho a decade earlier. His investigation, praised by A. Baumstark for its
methodological precision,61 effectively allows for the “very old manuscript” to have been written in the
time of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib by showing that first of the other two priests named in the transmission was
active in the 13th century, and in that priest’s eyes, a manuscript from the 10th or 11th century would
certainly seem “very old.”

Paul Sbath, writing in 1928,62 argues for the traditional attribution of the Arabic Diatessaron to
Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib on the basis of the introduction found in manuscript Paul Sbath 1029, which seems to
provide a twelfth-century witness to the fact that Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib was connected in some way to a
document that combined the four gospels into one narrative.

Marmardji dedicated much of his 1935 edition of the text of the Arabic Diatessaron to the
exposition of his argument against its translation by Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib. He takes a decidedly linguistic
approach to the issue, and as has been stated above, he is guilty of correcting the text and supplying
his own readings where he feels the Arabic to be sub-par. Marmardji refused to accept Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib as
the translator of the Arabic Diatessaron, on the basis of the awkward and unrefined Arabic found in
the text. In his introduction he posited that some unknown author, “un ignorant,” attributed the work
to the renown savant to ensure that his own work would be read and respected.63 To the challenge
posed by the potential witness in Ms. Paul Sbath 1029, Marmardji offered an explanation that had Ibn
aṭ-Ṭayyib penning a new, independent collection of Gospel selections, not rendering a translation of
the Syriac vorlage of the Diatessaron.64

Despite his steadfast and resolute dismissal of any possibility that Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib translated the
document into Arabic, he arrives at the following conclusions about the man behind the translation,
again, by employing a purely philological analysis of the text:

60. S. Euringer, Die Überlieferung der Arabischen Übersetzung des Diatessarons, in Biblische Studien (Freiburg)
XVII: 2 (1912).
61. “Seine Arbeit darf als das Muster einer mit besonnener Ruhe und methodischer Sicherheit geführten Untersuchung
bezeichnet werden.” Cf. Baarda, p. 67, n. 31.
62. P. Sbath, Bibliothèque de Manuscrits Paul Sbath, prêtre Syrien d’Alep. Catalogue t. II, Cairo, 1928.
63. Marmardji, lxxxviii.
64. Marmardji, lxxxviii-lxxxix
 Aubin - 15 -

1. In view of the Syriasms present in the text, the translator must have been a Syriac speaker.

2. Citing the orthography of the name of Jesus ( ‫ع‬8‫ـــــــــ‬U‫ ) إ)ـــــــــ‬he argues that the translator was a
Nestorian.

3. Because of the presence of certain words in the text, including G‫ـ‬-_‫ـ‬.32-

‫اـ ـ ـ‬ for “the Pharisees,” the

translator must have been a native of Assyria or Iraq.65

Marmardji’s views were well received by many scholars, with the notable exception of
Baumstark.66 Paul Kahle largely agreed with Marmardji on the linguistic quality of the text being
beneath Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s skill level.67 Beeston and Kahle both went on to argue, from the curious
evidence in the colophon of the Oxford manuscript, that the mention (in 1107) of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib was
nothing more than an attempt by Aulād al-ʿAssāl to garner respect for the document by “passing it off
as the work of a well known savant,”68 and cannot therefore be taken at face value.

A few years later, in 1944, A. J. B. Higgins argued that the Diatessaron was originally translated
from Syriac into Arabic by the same ʿĪsà ibn ʿAlī al-Mutaṭabbib mentioned in colophon of manuscripts
B and O, based on his own (erroneous) reading of an ambiguous statement in the colophon of
manuscript O:

;H‫`وا‬a‫ ا‬x9[ <k- g(+-‫* >? ا‬+MN ;,W <H $,1Y 8D 'H X1Y ‫ا‬ZD /.%

“And this man wrote on the basis of what was before him without any modifi-
cation in the translation but kept the words”69

He posits that “ ‫ا‬Z‫ـــ‬D ” here refers to ʿĪsà ibn ʿAlī, whose translation adhered to the Old Syriac—
which would have more closely resembled the work of Tatian—and that Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib later drafted his

65. Marmardji, p. lxxxv-lxxxvii. Cf. Baarda, 70.

66. For his scathing review of the text and the methods employed by Marmardji in arriving at his conclusions regarding
the attribution, see infra., above, Section on “Editions.”
67. Kahle, o.c. p. 311.
68. Beeston, A. F. L. “The Arabic Version of Tatian’s Diatessaron.” p. 610.
69. Higgins, “The Arabic Version,” p 189. The translation is Higgins’ formulation, not mine.
 Aubin - 16 -

own ‘translation’ —actually more of a revision of the work by ʿĪsà ibn ʿAlī— to bring the Arabic more
in line with the later and more popular Pešitta.70 Somewhere along the way, according to Higgins, the
copyists simplified the translation history and named Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib as the sole translator. Higgins later
retracted his conclusion, after Kahle and Graf71 contributed more acceptable readings of the
ambiguous line.

Methods for further research

The scholarship on the Arabic Diatessaron since the middle of this century has refrained from
making any more hard and fast claims to the attribution of the document. Baarda’s enormously
helpful article “The Author of the Arabic Diatessaron,” presents a thorough history of the problem, but
concludes that “as long as there is no decisive proof to the contrary the name of the translator should
be none other than Abū l-Faraǧ ʿAbdūʾallāh ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib.”72 The only other scholar to take up the
question directly is Peter Joosse, whose recent (1997) PhD dissertation73 focuses on the text of the
Sermon on the Mount in the Arabic Diatessaron, and whose insightful essay “An Introduction to the
Arabic Diatessaron” gives the most detailed and richest account of the problem and the various
attempts at its solution thus far. While Joosse’s close study of the text of the Arabic Diatessaron is
aimed not at establishing proof for or against the traditional attribution, but at establishing the Syriac
text of the Diatessaron, still it breaks new ground towards the question of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s role as
translator by comparing curious features of the Arabic text to one of the only known works of Ibn aṭ-
Ṭayyib to have been published, the Fiqh an-Naṣrānīya.74 Joosse is careful not to take the few isolated
agreements he comes across as proof for Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s agency in the translation. He ultimately states
that his examples “certainly do not deny Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s authorship of the Arabic Diatessaron.
However, neither do they furnish the indelible proof that he was the author of the harmony.”75 On the
basis of these two statements, Sidney Griffith states in his most recent book, The Bible in Arabic, that

70. Higgins, “The Arabic Version,” p 189. Cf. also Baarda, 75.
71. Graf, Geschichte. Vol II. p. 169, n. 2. ff.
72. Baarda, p. 103.
73. Joosse, Nanne P. G. The Sermon on the Mount in the Arabic Diatessaron. Ph.D dissertation, Free University of
Amsterdam, Printed in the Netherlands: Centrale Huisdrukkerij, 1997.
74. Joose, “Introduction,” p. 114.
75. Joosse, “Introduction,” p. 116.
 Aubin - 17 -

“the current scholarly consensus is that the original Arabic translation was done by… Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib.”76

Going forward, scholars possessed of the certain technical skills, languages and academic
interests requisite for serious engagement with the Arabic Diatessaron cannot afford to invest further
efforts into the solving the problem of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s agency in its translation without first
considering two things; First, the various merits and risks of the available methods for approaching
the problem, and second, the actual value to be found in the problem’s potential resolution. For the
sake of the first consideration, we can evaluate the efforts of the scholars past and present in
addressing the issue and arrive at the following conclusions:

Arguments based purely on the “quality” of the Arabic text of the Diatessaron (such as those
made by Marmardji and, to a lesser extent, Kahle,) without an eye to the particular faces of the Arabic
language(s) that made up the medieval Near East, are flawed from the start. To assume that all men of
scholarly repute in Baġdād wrote, at all times, and to all audiences, like native-speaking bards and
philosophers celebrated for their eloquence and lexical profundity, is as naïve as it is damaging to the
pursuit of truth. Allowance must always be made for the varying registers of Arabic that co-existed in
11th-century ʿIrāq, and the various purposes towards which the language could be put: one would not
expect a translation of a Syriac document for a Sryiac-Arabic liturgical environment to reflect the sort
of Arabic prose attainable in a more open-ended, improvisational context. One must also bear in
mind that in a multi-lingual society, a particular figure can grow over the course of his lifetime in
linguistic proficiency, and that two works by the same author could show wildly different styles of
Arabic.

Reliance on the attributions given of the incipit and colophon of a manuscript can be
misleading, especially in cases where a prominent figure is mentioned as the author of a document in
a later manuscript, but no mention of that figure is given in the earlier manuscripts. It is important to
recognize all of the possible motivations for attributing a document to a certain author, and to
consider the likelihood that any of those motivating factors might have been at play in this particular
attribution. To that end, it is incumbent on the scholar of the Arabic Diatessaron to perform a more
holistic investigation into the function and reception of the document over the centuries covered by

76. Griffith, The Bible in Arabic, p. 141.

 Aubin - 18 -

the manuscript record, and most especially, to consider its significance within the inter-faith and
inter-confessional dialogues occurring throughout that interval.77

It is most important to understand the alleged author of a work before assigning the work to
that author. With that in mind, it is lamentable that the vast majority of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib’s corpus remains
buried in manuscripts in libraries and private collections across the world. These works are available
to be studied, but due to the rare combination of interests and talents required to study them
appropriately and with the due diligence they deserve, and the great deal of time and effort needed to
work with them, they have been neglected and passed over. Only by studying the entirety of his work
can we hope to gain an understanding of the motivating factors and ideological principles behind Ibn
aṭ-Ṭayyib’s scholarly output. From these texts we might get a sense of his potential motivations for (or
aversions to) translating the Diatessaron, a crucial component in assessing the likelihood that he
might have had a hand in the operation.78

As per the second question, that is, the actual value of chasing down the elusive evidence to
settle the question of attribution once and for all, we owe it to ourselves to step back from the issue
and consider the wealth of information waiting to be discovered to the peripherals of the target. The
Arabic Diatessaron as a living document, something that was repeatedly offered up by Arabic Christian
communities in many regions and at many times, offers an endless array of information that is
entirely independent of the issue of the identity of the original translator. But before much more is
done with the document, it is imperative that a new critical edition be struck, this one including, at
the very least, manuscripts A, B, O, and the Beirut fragments, and excluding the needless emendations,
obfuscations and corrections that plague our current standard edition. Perhaps the most pressing
desideratum, both for those interested in the attribution of the Arabic Diatessaron to Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib,
and those interested in the broader Eastern Christian tradition, is that the exegetical79 and theological

77. An excellent example of this line of approach is Kahle’s work on the attribution given in the Oxford manuscript, Ms.
O. See above, infra, p. 6.
78. For instance, J. Faultless has noted his general ethic as a preservationist of “the Syriac heritage in Arabic,” though
whether this trend may only apply to exegetical writings of to all of the Syriac heritage remains ambiguous, and in need of
further investigation. Cf. Faultless, “Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib” p. 668-669.
79. The edition of the text of the Commentary on the Gospels prepared by Y. Manqariyus (Cairo, 1908) has been shown
to be grossly unreliable. There is an extensive Mss. tradition surrounding this document, in at least two recensions. Cf.
Faultless, “Ibn al-Ṭayyib,” pp. 676-679.
 Aubin - 19 -

works of Ibn aṭ-Ṭayyib will receive the attention that has, until now,80 been unduly devoted to the
comparatively minor question of who translated the Arabic Diatessaron.

80. With the exception of the call of H. W. Hogg in 1895 to investigate the relationships between the known texts of Ibn al-
Ṭayyib and the Diatessaron.
 Aubin - 20 -

Bibliography

Baarda, T. “The Author of the Arabic Diatessaron.” Miscellanea Neotestamentica, Suppl. to Novum
Testamentum. Vol. 47, 1978. Leiden, Brill. pp. 61-104.
Beeston, A. F. L. “The Arabic Version of Tatian’s Diatessaron.” In Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of
Great Britain and Ireland. October, 1939. pp 608-610.
Cheikho, L. “Lettre au sujet de l’auteur de la version arabe du Diatessaron,” in Journal Asiatique, IX, t.
ix, (1897), pp. 301-307.
Ciasca, P. A. Tatiani Evangeliorum Harmoniae Arabice: Nunc primum ex duplici codice edidit et
translatione latina donavit. Rome: Typografia Polyglotta, 1888.
Euringer, S. Die Überlieferung der Arabischen Übersetzung des Diatessarons, in Biblische Studien
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Faultless, J. “The two recensions of the Prologue to John in Ibn al-Ṭayyib’s Commentary on the Gospels.”
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(1944). pp. 187-199.
Hogg, H. W. The Diatessaron of Tatian, in: A. Menzies, Ante-Nicene Christian Library, Additional
Volume, Edinburgh 1897, pp. 35-141. =idem, in: A. Menzies, The Ante-Nicene Fathers X, Grand
Rapids, 1969, p. 36, under section 7.
Joosse, Nanne P. G. (=Peter below), The Sermon on the Mount in the Arabic Diatessaron. Ph.D
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Joosse, Peter, “An Introduction to the Arabic Diatessaron.” Oriens Christianus. Band 83, 1999. pp. 73ff.
Kashouh, Hikmat, The Arabic Versions of the Gospels: the manuscripts and their families. Boston:
Gruyter, 2012.
Kahle, P. The Cairo Geniza. Oxford, 1959.
 Aubin - 21 -

Manson, T. W., Sadducee and Pharisee: The origin and significance of the names. Manchester, England:
Manchester University Press, 1938.
Marmardji, A. S., Diatessaron de Tatien: Texte arabe établi, traduit en français, collationné avec les
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