Customer Reviews

Holy Women of the Syrian Orient (Transformation of the Classical Heritage)

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Brock and Harvey provide an English translation of fifteen texts recording the lives of ancient Syrian Christian women, along with notes and an introduction. These saints' lives date from the fourth to seventh centuries C.E. The authors include a helpful introduction commenting on the Syrian Orient, the nature of hagiography, and the problem of literature about women.

I found the translations smooth, engaging, and enjoyable, with neither archaic language nor informal breeziness. Despite many recent monastic translations, few are devoted to women. Only two of these lives have previously been translated into English. Brock and Harvey have produced an unusual and needed volume.

The fifteen texts are divided into nine chapters. The first is an extract from the "Life of Abraham" concerning that saint's niece, Mary. A model ascetic, after being viciously raped by a monk Mary turns to a life of prostitution. Her uncle dons the disguise of a soldier to enter her brothel and rescue her. She repents and is saved. Similar themes of sexual sin and repentance sound in the second chapter, the "Life of Pelagia," a renowned prostitute who repents and finds a new life--not only in chastity, but as a transvestite. Disguised as a man, she journeys to Jerusalem to live out her days as the male recluse "Pelagios."

The following chapters are of a different character. Chapter three contains six extracts from different sources concerning female martyrs in Persia; chapter four relates several accounts of female martyrs in Najran, a town in southern Arabia. The fifth chapter contains two selections from John of Ephesus' Lives of the Eastern Saints. Chapter six, within a narrative concerning Abba Daniel of Sketis, tells of the transvestite Anastasia as well as an abbess and a mad nun. Chapter seven, told from the perspective of a woman narrator, relates the trials of a convent undergoing the Diocletian persecution and the martyrdom of the virtuous Febronia. The final eighth chapter is a lavish tribute from the seventh-century writer Martyrios to a spiritual mentor, the elderly Shirin.

This book helpfully provides access to a world few could otherwise explore. Highly recommended.