Missionary Stories and the Formation of the Syriac Churches by Jeanne-Nicole Mellon Saint-Laurent (review)

This book is a revision of Saint-Laurent’s dissertation. She analyzes the stories of six Syriac figures: “the Acts of Thomas, the Teaching of Addai, the Acts of Mari, the Life of Simeon of Beth Arsham, the Life of Jacob Baradaeus (two versions), and the Life of Aḥdemmeh” (1). She also devotes a chapter to John of Ephesus, the writer of two of the hagiographies. Throughout her book she labels the texts of Acts and Lives as “missionary stories” and “myths.” She sets the following criteria and boundaries for her chosen texts: they are written in Syriac between 300 and 800 c.e., the narratives are set within the Eastern Roman and Sassanian empires, they depict an idealized portrait of the figure under discussion, and the texts come from within the non-Chalcedonian and East Syriac church traditions (1). She focuses on sets of questions under two main themes: literary and historical (4). Her method of approaching these hagiographical texts is to interpret them as “sacred paintings and objects” (2). She argues that these hagiographies mark the gradual, rather than abrupt, division of the Chalcedonian and non-Chalcedonian churches (12), that they reflect aspects of mission, and that they had a role in “the creation of religious memory” (13).

Each chapter is devoted to one of the seven above-mentioned hagiographical texts. The first three chapters discuss “three texts of the apostolic Acts genre,” that is the Acts of Thomas, the Teaching of Addai, and the Acts of Mari (14). The following three chapters examine “three hagiographies of historic personage: Simeon of Beth Arsham, Jacob Baradaeus, and Aḥdemmeh” (15). The last three texts portray clerics of the non-Chalcedonian Syriac church whose work and preaching defined the communities they led. In each chapter Saint-Laurent follows a specific pattern. She begins with the scholarship relevant to each text, primary sources, textual editions, translations, and major academic studies, followed by a précis of the text under discussion. She provides the reader with a historical and geographical orientation helped by the map at the beginning of the book. At the beginning of each chapter she introduces the reader to some aspects of Syriac literature or the Syriac churches relevant to the text. This introduction sets the stage for Saint-Laurent to examine the literary and historical questions relevant to the text. Her analysis of the “Acts genre” brings attention to biblical comparisons that relate the journeys and acts of Christ to those of the itinerant apostles. She is also interested in the role of the ruling figure, king or prince, who provides authority to the community that follows the itinerant apostle or other historic figures. Throughout the book she regards the ecclesiastical figures as missionaries, because they preached the gospel throughout their journeys. Each chapter of the book concludes with a summary.

Saint-Laurent’s study is a contribution to the introduction of notable Syriac figures to the non-specialized in Syriac studies. She is an organized writer; she provides a clear outline, thesis, methodology, and boundaries at the outset of her book. This commendable approach, however, also raises questions regarding the study’s boundaries, the terms she uses to express her ideas, and the images she gives of the churches under discussion. Limiting the discussion to non-Chalcedonian Syriac churches creates the impression that the Chalcedonian churches did not undergo a similar redefinition of identity and restructuring of church boundaries. She speaks, for example, of “the restructuring of a separate hierarchy” (74) or “the emergent Miahpysite church” (91), while in the same paragraph she refers to Volker Menze’s work, which concluded that the laity “could not distinguish between the Chalcedonian and the Miaphysite liturgies.” Using terms such as “separate” and “emergent” conditions the reader to consider the Chalcedonian churches as orthodox, stable, and non-changing in contrast to the non-Chalcedonian churches emerging as new entities with new...