Orientalism, Aramaic and Kabbalah in the Catholic Reformation

241 Pages·2007·2.3 MB·English

by  Wilkinson

Orientalism, Aramaic and Kabbalah
in the Catholic Reformation
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Studies in the History of
Christian Traditions
Founded by
Heiko A. Oberman†
Edited by
Robert J. Bast
Knoxville, Tennessee
In cooperation with
Henry Chadwick, Cambridge
Scott H. Hendrix, Princeton, New Jersey
Paul C.H. Lim, Nashville, Tennessee
Eric Saak, Indianapolis, Indiana
Brian Tierney, Ithaca, New York
Arjo Vanderjagt, Groningen
John Van Engen, Notre Dame, Indiana
VOLUME 137
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Orientalism, Aramaic
and Kabbalah in the
Catholic Reformation
The First Printing of the Syriac
New Testament
By
Robert J. Wilkinson
LEIDEN • BOSTON
2007
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On the cover: The Sephirotic plate from John’s Gospel.
Brill has made all reasonable efforts to trace all rights holders to any copyrighted
material used in this work. In cases where these efforts have not been successful
the publisher welcomes communications from copyrights holders, so that the
appropriate acknowledgements can be made in future editions, and to settle other
permission matters.
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
A Cataloging-in-Publication record of this book is available from the Library of
Congress.
ISBN 978 90 04 16250 1
Copyright 2007 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishing,
IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated,
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Fees are subject to change.
printed in the netherlands
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Iris Wilkinson
28. 2. 1925–15. 2. 2006
John Henry Wilkinson
22. 7. 1925–24. 5. 2006
in piam memoriam
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CONTENTS
List of Plates ............................................................................... ix
Introduction ................................................................................ 1
First Beginnings: Teseo Ambrogio and the Maronite
Delegation to the Fifth Lateran Council ............................... 11
First Beginnings: Egidio da Viterbo and the Kabbalistic
Context of Syriac Studies at the Time of the Fifth
Lateran Council ...................................................................... 29
The Scholars of the editio princeps: Moses and Masius .............. 63
The Scholars of the editio princeps: Postel ................................... 95
The Scholars of the editio princeps: Widmanstetter ..................... 137
The editio princeps ......................................................................... 171
Conclusion .................................................................................. 189
Bibliography ................................................................................ 193
Index ........................................................................................... 217
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LIST OF PLATES
Plate One. Title page of Teseo’s Introductio (Padua 1593) proclaiming
the mystical and kabbalistic signi(cid:2) cance of his alphabets.
Plate Two. Specimen page of the Introductio to illustrate the estrangela
type.
Plate Three. Teseo’s plates illustrating the Phagotum.
Plate Four. Title page of Postel’s Linguarum duodecim characteribus to
illustrate the dif(cid:2) culties of printing oriental and particu-
larly ligatured script.
Plate Five. Widmanstetter’s arms, with Syriac text and kabbalistic
word play (explained in the text).
Plate Six. Title page of editio princeps 1555.
Plate Seven. Obtestatio ad lectorem from editio princeps.
Plate Eight. Specimen page from editio princeps (Hebrews 1), illustrat-
ing its similarity to an eastern book.
Plate Nine. Festal list from editio princeps in Syriac and Latin. The
presence of liturgical material in the Syriac New Testa-
ment proved of signi(cid:2) cance for confessional polemics.
Plate Ten. The Sephirotic plate from John’s Gospel discussed
extensively in the text.
Plate Eleven. Title page of Widmanstetter’s Syriacae Linguae . . . Principia
Elementa (Vienna 1556) often bound with the editio
princeps.
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