I The Sources

Syria: Liturgy of St. James. Syriac Texts 9

The oldest manuscript of the Liturgy of St. James is, however, Vatic. gr. 2282, 9th century, a liturgical roll. Baumstark and Schermann pointed out its significance in Oriens christianus III, pp. 214ff., and its text was edited by Cozza-Luzi in Nova Patrum Biblioteca X, 2, pp. 29–116.1) Cf. also Brightman in the Journal of Theol. Studies 12, 311.

The codices trace back to a textual form that must be dated between 670 and 787: for they mention only the first six ecumenical synods in the intercessory prayer. This is particularly noticeable in Par. 476, where on p. 297, 13, the "six" synods are explicitly mentioned, while later, on p. 297, 20, the Nicene [Council] of 787 is added as the seventh.

The Syriac church created a translation of the Liturgy of St. James into its own language and developed it further according to need: the Anaphora still reveals the underlying Greek text over long stretches. This Syriac form is preserved in numerous manuscripts dating back to the 8th century and can be found in all Syriac missals. A critical edition of the recension attributed to James of Edessa († 708), based on a manuscript of the British Museum belonging to the 10th century, was produced by Adolf Rücker in the Liturgiegeschichtliche Quellen Liturgical-Historical Sources (edited by K. Mohlberg et al.), issue 4 (1923). The critical apparatus provides the variants of the remaining manuscripts, which diverge into an older (N) and a younger (R) class. In the sections running parallel to the Greek text, a reconstruction of the wording available to the Syriac translator is printed alongside. My citations refer to this edition.

In addition to the Liturgy of St. James, the Syrians possess a wealth of other anaphoras attributed to men of the ancient and medieval church. Renaudot, in his Liturgiarum orientalium collectio II, made most of these accessible in Latin translation; about half are also printed in the original language in the Syriac missals. Brightman, pp. lviii ff., provides an overview, to which it must be added that Baumstark has since published No. 44, the Athanasian Liturgy in Syriac and Latin, in Oriens christianus II, 96–129. These forms, which are essentially dependent on the Liturgy of St. James, have no independent source value.1) A precise examination of this question can now be found in Fuchs, Anaphora des Patr. Johannan I (Liturgiegesch. Quellen issue 9), who seeks to separate the wheat from the chaff: his criteria do not always seem convincing to me.