Bar Sira

As we're talking 'Abdisho', one commentary stands out: Abraham of Bet-Rabban, AG 9th century = AD 6th. On the son of Sira, "Ecclesiasticus".

We now have this in Greek. Ben Sira was done in Hebrew originally: some Dead Sea Scrolls, bare references in Talmud, and the Cairo Genizah. But the Jews went through their backlog, after which Ben Sira went the way of Tobit. I think even Jerome was stuck with the Greek.

Out East I'd thought that translation from Greek was done to Syriac later and by Paul of Tella the heretic. (The Melkites were doing their own thing into their own Aramaic.)

Of interest here, supposedly (Stadel credits Si'rt) Mar Aba the Great had beat Paul to the punch. But some of Aba's words on Genesis survive and nobody accuses him of taking from the Septuagint, like Ephrem was using Diatesseron. Might Bar Sira be taken from the Greek though?

Gorgias are promising a Bar Sira from the "Peshitta" or, at $90, perhaps "threatening" is the word.

BACKDATE 12/31