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Tatian: Perfection According to the Saviour
Tatian Perfection According to the Saviour Author:J. Rendel Harris Tatian was born to pagan parents in Assyria during the first two decades of the second century. Educated as a rhetorician, Tatian was versed in art and science, and he seems to have also received training in philosophy and religion. Prior to his conversion, he traveled widely throughout the Mediterranean; in Rome he became a disciple of Justin M... more »artyr. His "Diatessaron" was the first harmony of the gospels; he may have intended it to be used by his students in the school he founded in Mesopotamia. With this work, he gave Syria a gospel in her own language for the first time. Another work of his has survived entitled, "Oration to the Greeks," a rhetorical apology against the worthlessness of paganism written in Asiatic style. He composed other works as well, including "On Morals" and "On Perfection according to the Savior," which are now lost. Tatian was later considered a heretic, for his theology took a turn toward the Gnostic schools. The date of his death is uncertain, but the year he left Rome was around 172. J. R. Harris was curator of manuscripts in the John Rylands Library when he wrote an essay entitled, "Tatian: Perfection According to the Saviour." In this article he deals with a work that was published in 1836 by the Armenian convent at St. Lazaro containing the writings of Ephraim, the greatest early Syrian scholar. In this collection of documents was a commentary on a harmony of the gospels. After it was translated into Syriac, scholars suspected that it was Ephraim's lost commentary on the Diatessaron. There was an immediate effort to reconstruct Tatian's harmony based on this commentary by Ephriam. Harris entered the pursuit as well and drew from sources not previous discussed. During his research, another work became the focus of his attention-a lost treatise "On Perfection." He found the perfection tract in the Armenian collection, and he attributed it to Tatian. It is an ascetic work matching the later practices of the harmonist. Harris provides a translation of this tract, together with a reflection upon its contents, in this volume.« less