Thesis (Ph.D.)--Duquesne University, 2009. / Title from document title page. Abstract included in electronic submission form. Includes bibliographical references (p. 203-245) and index.

Thesis (M.M.) Florida State University, 2007. / Advisor: Benjamin D. Koen, Florida State University, College of Music. Title and description from dissertation home page (viewed 8-29-2007). Document formatted into pages; contains 95 pages. Includes biographical sketch. Includes bibliographical references.

This thesis analyzes the narratological structure of the Life of Aaron, a hagiographical text from Late Antique Egypt. Such an analysis has not yet been performed on this text, and the method is still rarely applied to hagiographical literature. In the short term, I intend for this thesis to expose the complex yet consistent structure of this fascinating text. In the long term, I see this thesis as part of a broader movement to incorporate Coptology into the mainstream study of Late Antique literature. My general introduction discusses the Life of Aaron, its manuscript and archaeological evidence, and the state of scholarship on it. Following this, my first chapter compares the text to five significant Late Antique hagiographical works from Egypt: the Life of Antony, the Life of Pachomius, the Historia Monachorum in Aegypto, the Life of Onnophrius, and the Life of Shenoute. My second chapter surveys the ancient (Aristotelian) and modern (structuralist) narratological methods employed in this thesis. Finally, my third chapter contrasts the Life of Aaron’s literal structure with its underlying chronology - what narratologists call the fabula - and exposes the story’s narrator hierarchy. An epilogue then proposes avenues for future research, and the thesis closes with two short appendix graphs which summarize my analysis.

Coptic is the latest stage of the indigenous Egyptian language written in the Greek alphabet with some additional characters taken from the Demotic script. Due to climatic conditions many manuscripts have survived from Egypt. The bulk of Coptic manuscripts of the 1st millenium A. D. is preserved in fragmentary condition and the remains are scattered – often as single leaves or small groups of leaves – over collections on three continents. So a major aim of scholarly work is the virtual reconstruction of codices. Assigning a fragment to a specific manuscript is often not easy. It’s not only necessary to compare the script for similarities but also to take into account the contents in order to identify the manuscript of origin and the position of the leave therein. In the case of known texts which have been recorded in a manuscript as full texts a mathematical approach can be used to estimate the position of a fragment. Special problems arise with manuscripts of uncertain arrangement, e.g. liturgical codices that do not have one continuous text. They combine texts from the scriptures, hymns, prayers, or lifes of saints. In these cases reliable estimates can only be given by comparing the identified text / texts on a single leave with a representative amount of data: this means collecting and indexing as much known material as possible and arranging it according to liturgical usage. The lecture presents ways of assigning fragments by use of palaeography to known codices. An important tool is the “palaeography data base” developed in the Institut für Neutestamentliche Textforschung at Münster (INTF) as a base instrument for virtual reconstructions in the Virtual Manuscript Room (VMR) of the INTF. Furthermore, electronic tools will be shown that are a by-product of the lecturer’s PhD for identifying texts, the order of manuscripts as well as for further research.

No description available.

Tesi--Milan. / Bibliography: p. [103]-108.

La thèse présente l’édition, la traduction et le commentaire de quatre testaments écrits sur papyrus, datés du VIIe siècle ap. J.-C., et émanant des supérieurs d’un monastère de Haute-Égypte, le monastère de Saint-Phoibammôn, situé sur la rive gauche de Thèbes. Utilisant la forme du testament de droit privé, les supérieurs lèguent à leur successeur la direction spirituelle du monastère en même temps que la propriété de ses biens et son administration. Les implications de ce dossier sont à la fois juridiques – dans quelle mesure ces documents sont-ils conformes au modèle offert par le droit byzantin ? –, historiques – les testaments apportent des éclairages nouveaux sur l’histoire du monastère de Saint-Phoibammôn, qui fut un important centre de vie ascétique au VIIe siècle et la résidence de l’évêque Abraham d’Hermonthis, son fondateur –, et linguistiques – il s’agit d’un dossier bilingue, le premier testament étant en grec et les trois suivants en copte, ce qui permet d’étudier les processus de traduction d’une langue à l’autre, et de s’interroger sur le statut du copte comme langue juridique. Cet ensemble est unique car il offre la possibilité d’étudier le même type de documents, provenant du même endroit, rédigés dans deux langues différentes, et condensés sur une période chronologique relativement courte (moins d’un siècle). / The dissertation contains the edition, traduction and commentary of four wills written on papyrus, dated from the 7th century CE, and drawn up by the superiors of a monastery in Upper Egypt, the monastery of Saint Phoibammon, located on the left bank in Thebes. Through the form of a private will, the superiors bequeath to their successor the spiritual direction of the monastery as well as the property of its goods and its administration. This dossier has implications of various sorts: legal – to what extent are these documents in accordance with the model of Byzantine law? –, historical – the wills bring new elements on the story of the Saint Phoibammon monastery which was an important centre of ascetic life in the 7th century and where lived bishop Abraham of Hermonthis, its founder –, linguistic – it is a bilingual dossier, as the first will is written in Greek, the three following in Coptic, allowing to study the translation process and to ponder about the legal status of the Coptic language. This group of documents is unique because it allows to study the same kind of document, coming from the same place, written in two different languages, and dating from a relatively short period of time (less than a century).

This dissertation focuses on the ecclesiastical formation of the Anti-Chalcedonian Alexandrian See and its following, primarily during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. For hundreds of years, this Christian Orthodox communion had a distinctive "geography" which, in a sense, has been "carved up" in the modern period. Today, its territories are incorporated within the boundaries of a number of national states, while the sweeping abstraction of "world regions" has bisected the territorial reaches of communion, assigning one parcel to the "Middle East" and the other to "Africa." This fragmentation is reflected in the scholarship, where the "parts" of this geography have been scattered across multiple, and sometimes mutually isolated fields of inquiry. In the coming chapters, we set out in search of an Alexandrian Orthodox Oecumeme which modern discourses, constructs and analytical frames have concealed. We will shed light on various dimensions of a formation which was constituted by myriad relationships and characterized by nebulous frontiers. We will contemplate an arrangement in which "Egyptian" Copts, "Ethiopian" Orthodox and others were linked in shared communion, while situating this within the wider context of an ancien regime order. We will also explore the metaphorical hinterlands of communion, where manifold relationships existed linking Christians and Muslims, monks and bedouin and others, sometimes in most intimate ways. Over the course of these chapters, we will follow processes, discourses and conceptual changes of the nineteenth century that invaded the "hinterlands," severing and reordering relationships while gradually erecting an edifice of boundaried constructs (territorial, institutional, communal.) The exploration of these novelties, together with a host of starkly drawn binaries (among them "religious"/"secular" and "spiritual"/"temporal") will provide insights into the emergence of modern nation-states, national minorities and national churches. But the apparition of these restricting and fragmenting objects coincided with an apparently paradoxical development; the so-called "globalization" of the patriarchal see of Alexandria. This set of circumstances is inexplicable without a rigorous inquiry into the profound transformations that have characterized the modern period. The coming chapters constitute, collectively, a building block to this larger purpose.

Thesis (Th. M.)--Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, 1995. / Map not included on fiche. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 108-109). "The books and booklets issued by Father Matta el-Meskeen": leaves 102-107.

<p> This thesis is an initial attempt to shed light on mutual interaction between Coptic and Jewish traditions by demonstrating a Jewish impact on the early stage of the Alexandrian Church as seen in the Coptic Morning Service. It explores the possible influence of the Jewish liturgies and prayers including the writings of the late Second Temple era (200 BCE - 70 CE) on some of the origins of fundamental Coptic rituals. The Coptic Morning Service holds almost identical texts, order of prayers, and, many major Jewish thematic interrelations.</p> <p> This study argues for an important lacuna in the spirituality of the contemporary Coptic worshiper. The mystifications that surround many Coptic liturgical components prevent parishioners from praying with understanding (1 Cor. 14:15). The twenty-first century Copt needs a sort of "Halakah" guidance towards their worshipping practices.</p> <p> This thesis hopes to offer a potential reconstruction of the early history of the Alexandrian Church through liturgy that could open a new scholarly field of Judeo-Coptic studies.</p> / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA)