Syriac apocalyptic literature are Christian texts in the apocalyptic genre of Syriac literature concerned with prophesying the end of the world. They were written in the Syriac language, primarily during the 600s and 700s CE, a period when Christians felt they were facing an existential threat due to the rise of Islam and the fall of the Persian empire.[1][2][3]
By far the most famous of these works is the Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius. Written in the 600s, it spread widely, becoming "one of the medieval world's most popular and widely translated texts."[4]
The other Syriac apocalyptic works are the Apocalypse of John the Little (written in the 700s);[2] the Apocalypse of Pseudo-Ezra (700s-1100s);[5] the Syriac Apocalypse of Daniel (600s);[6] and the Syriac Apocalypse of Pseudo-Ephraem (600s).[7][3] Some scholars include the Bahira Legend, a work by a Christian monk in the 1100s or later, and the Poem on Alexander the Great, also called the Alexander Romance.[8][9]
The Apocalypse of Pseudo-Ephraem refers to two pseudo-epigraphical texts, one in Syriac, the other in Latin, attributed to the church father Ephrem the Syrian.
Not all texts called Syriac Apocalypses fall into this category. For instance, 2 Baruch, also known as the Apocalypse of Baruch, is sometimes called the Syriac Apocalypse of Baruch (to distinguish it from 3 Baruch, the Greek Apocalypse of Baruch), but it is a Jewish apocryphal text written before 200 CE, after the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE.
See also
editReferences
edit- ↑ Amirav, Hagit; Grypeou, Emmanouela; Stroumsa, Guy G. (2017). Apocalypticism and Eschatology in Late Antiquity: Encounters in the Abrahamic Religions, 6th-8th Centuries. Peeters. ISBN 978-90-429-3537-2.
- 1 2 Penn, Michael Philip (2015-03-21). When Christians First Met Muslims: A Sourcebook of the Earliest Syriac Writings on Islam. Univ of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-28493-7.
- 1 2 Brock, Sebastian P. (1984). Syriac perspectives on late antiquity. London : Variorum Reprints. ISBN 978-0-86078-147-9.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link) - ↑ Bonura, Christopher J. (2025-11-04). A Prophecy of Empire: The Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius from Late Antique Mesopotamia to the Global Medieval Imagination. Univ of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-41825-7.
- ↑ Estes, Laura Locke (2016). The Apocalypse of Pseudo-Ezra: Syriac Edition, English Translation, and Introduction. (MA thesis). Abilene Christian University.
- ↑ Henze, Matthias (2001-05-28), "The Syriac Apocalypse of Daniel", Introduction, Text, and Commentary, Mohr Siebeck GmbH & Co. KG, pp. 1–157, ISBN 978-3-16-147594-8, retrieved 2026-02-28
- ↑ Shoemaker, Stephen J. (2018-10-02). The Apocalypse of Empire: Imperial Eschatology in Late Antiquity and Early Islam. University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 978-0-8122-9525-2.
- ↑ E. A. Wallis Budge. The History of Alexander the Great, being the Syriac version of the Pseudo-Callisthenes.
- ↑ Sebastian P. Brock. Syriac Sources for Seventh-Century History. p. 36.