Moses bar Kepha or Moses bar Cephas (
Syriac ''Mushe bar Kipho''; born in
Balad in Nineveh, now in
Iraq, about the year 813; died at the age of ninety, in 903) was a writer and one of the most celebrated bishops of the
Syriac Orthodox Church
, native_name_lang = syc
, image = St_George_Syriac_orthodox_church_in_Damascus.jpg
, imagewidth = 250
, alt = Cathedral of Saint George
, caption = Cathedral of Saint George, Damascus ...
of the ninth century.
A biography of him, written by an anonymous
Syriac writer, is preserved in one of the
Vatican manuscripts, extracts from which are given by Asemani in his ''Bibliotheca Orientalis'' (II, 218f.). He was a monk and afterwards became bishop of three cities, Beth-Ramman, Beth-Kionaya and
Mosul on the
Tigris, assuming the name of Severus. For ten years he was the patriarchal ''
periodeutes'', or visitor, of the Diocese of
Tagrit where he acquired a notable reputation and great fame among his fellow Christians. He was buried in the monastery of St. Sergius, situated on the Tigris, near his native city.
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Principal writings
*A Commentary on the Old and New Testaments, often quoted by
Bar Hebraeus, and most of it still extant in manuscript form;
*a treatise on
predestination and
free will, preserved in a manuscript in the
British Museum (Add. 14,731);
*a commentary on
Aristotle's ''Dialectics'', mentioned by Bar Hebraeus;
*a commentary on the
Hexameron
The term Hexameron (Greek: Ἡ Ἑξαήμερος Δημιουργία ''Hē Hexaēmeros Dēmiourgia'') refers either to the genre of theological treatise that describes God's work on the six days of creation or to the six days of creation thems ...
in five books, preserved in the
Bibliothèque Nationale de France
The Bibliothèque nationale de France (, 'National Library of France'; BnF) is the national library of France, located in Paris on two main sites known respectively as ''Richelieu'' and ''François-Mitterrand''. It is the national repository ...
(Syr. 241), a passage of which is translated into French by
François Nau
François Nau (13 May 1864 at Thil – 2 September 1931 at Paris) was a French Catholic priest, mathematician, Syriacist, and specialist in oriental languages. He published a great number of eastern Christian texts and translations for the first ...
in his ''Bardésane l'astrologue'' (Paris, 1899), p. 59;
*a ''Tractatus de Paradiso'', in three parts, dedicated to his friend Ignatius. (The Syriac original of this work was thought lost, but a Latin version of it was published by
Andreas Masius (Antwerp, 1569) under the title ''De Paradiso Commentarius''. However a Syriac manuscript has now been discovered at Yale)
*A treatise on the soul, in forty chapters, with a supplementary essay on the utility of offering prayers and sacrifices for the dead. (This treatise is preserved in the
Vatican Library; a German translation of it is given by O. Braun in his ''Moses Bar-Kepha und sein Buch von der Seele'' (Freiburg, 1891).)
*A ''Tractatus de sectis'', or, ''Liber disputationum adversus haereses'' (see Assemani, B.O. II, 57);
*a treatise on the Sacraments;
*a commentary on the Liturgy;
*an ecclesiastical history.
His other works comprise discourses, homilies, and a commentary on the writings of St
Gregory of Nazianzus.
References
*
Further reading
*James F. Coakley
"Mushe bar Kipho" in ''Gorgias Encyclopedic Dictionary of the Syriac Heritage: Electronic Edition'', edited by Sebastian P. Brock, Aaron M. Butts, George A. Kiraz and Lucas Van Rompay (Gorgias Press, 2011; online ed. Beth Mardutho, 2018).
External links
Peshittain the
Encyclopædia BritannicaClassical Syriac Manuscripts at Yale University: A Checklistin ''HUGOYE: JOURNAL OF SYRIAC STUDIES''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bar-Kepha, Moses
810s births
903 deaths
9th-century Syriac Orthodox Church bishops
Writers of the medieval Islamic world
9th-century writers