On the mystery of letters

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From the mystery of letters ( Gr. Περὶ τοῦ μυστηρίου τῶν γραμμάτων Peri tou mysteriou ton grammaton ) is an anonymously written Christian work on secret messages in the forms and names of the Greek and Hebrew letters . It probably originated in Palestine in the 6th century .

Tradition situation

In December 2007, three Greek and one Coptic-Arabic manuscripts of the text were known. The manuscripts date from the 14th to 16th centuries.

Origin and dating

The work was originally written in Greek in the Palestine area. Only one of the manuscripts names an author: Saint Sabas of Jerusalem (439–535). However, due to content-related criteria, it can be assumed that it was dated to the middle of the 6th century, so that Sabas is out of the question as an author.

The editor of the Greek text dates the work to the second half of the 6th century. In the text, tendencies hostile to education and philosophy are related to the Origenistic controversy of the 6th century , the main scene of which was Mar Saba , the most important monastery founded by Sabas. Based on these connections and the attribution of the work to Sabas, she hypothesizes that the work was written by a monk - probably a calligrapher - from the Mar Saba monastery.

content

In the introduction, the author explains that while studying the Apocalypse of John he would have become aware of the mystery of the Greek alphabet through the phrase "I am the Alpha and the Omega " repeated three times . Through intense prayer for enlightenment regarding the meaning of this sentence, he was transferred to Sinai , where he received a revelation about the secret messages of the letters, which he now wants to pass on to his readers.

First, he reduced the Greek alphabet to 22 letters, following the example of the Hebrew alphabet . He declares this to be the image of 22 works of creation in the biblical account of creation and, corresponding to these, the image of 22 “works” of Christ, i.e. H. of 22 events in Christian salvation history, from the Annunciation to the Resurrection and the Second Coming .

The correspondence between creation history, Christ's earthly life and the alphabet is further elaborated by the author in the subsequent chapters by interpreting the forms of the Greek letters as a representation of partly the history of creation and partly the Christian history of salvation. For example, he interprets the letter Delta as a picture for heaven and earth, the letter Chi again as a picture for the spread of the four Gospels in the four cardinal directions. Then he recites his version of a story of the alphabet. He interweaves motifs from Greek myth and Hebrew Bible as well as other Jewish and pagan writings. According to his presentation, the Hebrew alphabet was first imparted to Enoch's generation through divine inspiration. However, knowledge of this was lost due to the confusion of languages ​​during the construction of the Tower of Babylon . But the Greek letters of the "finger of God" were now inscribed on a stone tablet. Here the author quotes Ex 31,18  EU , where it is said of the commandment tables of Moses that they were written on by the “finger of God”. This tablet came into the hands of the band around Kadmos after the flood , which led to the fact that the letters were first used in Phenicia and Palestine.

The author assigns the Hebrew letter names to the Greek letter forms, since in his opinion they are the original names. He translates these Hebrew letter names into Greek and interprets them as praise to Jesus Christ. This is followed by a long digression on the Episemon (the Greek numeral for 6) and its counterpart Waw (sixth letter of the Hebrew alphabet and Hebrew numeral for 6). The author also recognizes references to Jesus Christ in these.

The last chapters of the treatise expand on what has already been mentioned and deal with topics of a more general nature. In this way, the author takes a detailed look at the history of mankind, the course of which he finds on the one hand in the sequence of vowels and non-vowels in the Greek alphabet, on the other hand in the structure of the biblical account of creation. He devotes a long chapter to Christology , in particular to the doctrine of two natures, as it was laid down at the Council of Chalcedon as part of the Christian creed. Speculations about the biblical name Adam conclude the work .

Footnotes

  1. ↑ See Bandt, pp. 4–7
  2. ↑ See Bandt, p. 7f.
  3. ↑ Revelation 1,8 LUT ; 21.6 LUT ; 22.13 EU .
  4. ↑ Cf. Genesis 1 LUT / 1 + Mos1 LUT . The division of the biblical account of creation into 22 individual works in analogy to the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet is already carried out in the Jubilee Book (cf. Bandt, pp. 74–76).
  5. ↑ Cf. Genesis 1,1 LUT

literature

  • Cordula Bandt: The treatise “On the Mystery of Letters.” Critical text with introduction, translation and commentary ; Texts and studies on the history of early Christian literature 162; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2007; ISBN 978-3-11-019606-1 ; Extracts
  • Franz Dornseiff : The alphabet in mysticism and magic ; Leipzig: Teubner, 1925 (= Leipzig: Reprint-Verlag, 1994)
  • Adolphe Hebbelynck: Les Mystères des Lettres Grecques. Texts Copte, Traduction, Notes ; in: Le Muséon 19 (1900), pp. 5-36; 105-136; 269-300; 20 (1901), pp. 5-33; 369-414.