A History Seen from a Literary Work, and Vice Versa

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  • 『エジプト人マカリオス伝』をめぐる諸考察
  • エジプトジン マカリオスデン オ メグル ショ コウサツ レキシ ト ブンガク デンショウ ノ カンケイ
  • Some Reflections on the <i>Life of Saint Macarius the Egyptian</i>
  • 歴史と文学伝承の関係

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One of the most prominent monks of the fourth century, Macarius the Egyptian has been treated in various ways by the literary tradition of the Christian Orient. Homilies attributed to him, although they have been proved to be unauthentic, are among the most read of spiritual texts; apophthegmata related to him are well known; and all these works have been transmitted in several languages of the region, as is also the case with his Life, the subject of my doctoral dissertation. One might expect that we know much about this famous figure.<br>However, it is far from certain that various anecdotes, such as those included in the Life, show us the historical figure of Macarius. What do we know about the real Macarius? The first half of the article discusses this problem, and it appears that the historical figure of Macarius is shrouded in legends. As for the Life, since it stands at the end of the tradition concerning Macarius, though it seems out of the question that it has value as a source for the historical Macarius, it is better to consider the Life as a source for the image people of later generations had about Macarius, and of course this in itself is not without interest.<br>A different approach is adopted in the second half of the article, in which history is seen from the transmission of the Life. It is shown that in the process of transmission, the Life touched various interesting literary movements, such as a large-scale translation project into Bohairic from either Greek or Sahidic, hitherto almost unknown activity involving translation from Bohairic into Syriac, the probable encounter of Arabic text (s) with the Byzantine literary movement of metaphrasis, etc.<br>It is the author's conviction that these two approaches are complementary and necessary when one deals with problems related to early monasticism in Egypt.

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