On Metropolitan Epistle 26

The best part of epistle 26, to the Catholicos Marammeh, is that it panicked the metropolitan of Adiabene so much he postmarked the Papal letters which had earlier come to Arbela. 1 Shebat on the fourth day means Wednesday 1 February.

The source planting Maremmeh's papacy earliest is Elias of Nisibin who would start his Februaries in AH 24 so AD 645 / AG 956. The next year is when 1 February falls on a Wednesday. This pope has one more February in him, two at most; so the next candidate for #26, AD 652, is ruled out.

LENT 3/12: I forgot last night that Lent's beginning was not a Wednesday in the Church as of the middle seventh century. I don't want to dive into the Cadbury rabbithole (yet) of Julian-calendar Easter but, in case some Syrian does cough up an Easter reference with the day of the month in it: here. For AD 646: 9 April, so Lent started Sunday 26 February.

In our year, which is AG 957, the great headache for the Eastern Church is Sahdona. Ishoʿyahb referred to him as Bar-Sahde earlier, and EW Budge translated a massive letter about him. More letters are forthcoming, for instance #30 to Beth-Garmay: Behold, now great Rome, and its ally Ravenna, and all Italy, and the whole kingdom of the Lombards, and the whole kingdom of the Franks, and all Africa, and all Sicily, all Thrace, and all Crete, and Rhodes, and Chios, and all the whole islands, and Constantinople and its jurisdiction, and Asia and Bithynia, and Lycaonia and Pamphylia, and Galatia and Isauria, and all Greece, and Jerusalem and Cyprus, and many Palaestinians and Phoenicians profess with unanimous consent the two hypostases and two operations and properties of Christ. This overstates the case for Constantinopolitan patriarch Paul II; but it certainly applies to Theodore bishop of Rome - and wait 'til you see what Martin is cooking up.

I do not know what to make of the Papal failure in the West to which #26 alludes. For an earlier generation I'd immediately think Nisibin. But although Guidi's Khuzestan got Maremmeh's starting year wrong, I do trust him inasmuch as Maremmeh (at last) had cajoled Nisibin's Christians - who had stayed in Orthodoxy - into accepting a metro'. This setback instead may entail a failure across the border, into gathering West-Syria into Orthodoxy. With Mar John and Mar Maruta still active, er... yeah, good luck with that.

FIEY 4/17/23: M. XXVI discussed chapter V p. 15-16 especially on the dates.