Barhadbeshabba, ›The Cause of the Foundation of Schools‹

The Cause of the foundation of schools, which has been written around 600 by the East Syriac author Barhadbeshabba, is practically unique in intellectual history by explaining the anthropological phenomenon of schools. The author, who was himself a teacher at the famous School of Nisibis in Upper Mesopotamia, describes the history of divine and human schools until his own lifetime by renarrating important parts of biblical history as forms of teachings, paying attention to the Greek philosophical tradition and the teachings of Persian Zoroastrianism. He introduces his work by a sketch of his own philosophical convictions regarding our knowledge of God, the necessity of logic and the status of our soul. Due to its diverse contents, the work finds since a long time the interest not only of specalists of Eastern Christianity, but also of ancient historians, of historians of philosophy and of researchers in the field of religion, esp. Coranic and Zorostrian Studies. A new critical edition of this important text is been for a long time a desideratum, because the first editor Addai Scher could not use all extant manuscripts. For this reason, the text is re-edited here with introduction, translation and notes, using four extant manuscripts as well as the documentation of three, last one’s given by Addai Scher in its 1907 edition. The introduction describes the manuscripts and their relationship as well as the circumstances of the text’s composition. Thus, this new edition will be an indispensable tool for anybody working in the field of intellectual history of the Near East immediately before the rise of Islam.