Archäologie eines Textes: Die Menander-Sentenzen in syrischen Spruchsammlungen

Abstract

AbstractThe preserved palimpsests give evidence for the presence of the texts of Menander in the Syriac school tradition in Late Antiquity. Two Syriac gnomologies under the name of Menander develop the Hellenistic tradition of combining Greek moral philosophy with Jewish wisdom literature. Thus they reflect the process of the Jewish and Christian reception of the Late Antique παιδεία, where the texts of Menander were used for educational purposes. The Syriac collections, like ancient hills in archeology, preserve several cultural strata that come to light through source analysis and could be traced back to the Greek moral philosophy, Jewish wisdom literature, and Christian ascetic writings preserved or written in Syriac