Anti-Judaism and Christian Orthodoxy: Ephrem's Hymns in Fourth-Century Syria

Anti-Judaism and Christian Orthodoxy: Ephrem's Hymns in Fourth-Century Syria. By Christine Shepardson. [North American Patristics Society: Patristic Monograph Series,Vol. 20.] (Washington, DC:The Catholic University of America Press. 2008. Pp. xiv, 191. $34.95. ISBN 978-0-81321536-5.)

The place of the early Church in the society surrounding it and the manner and timing of its separation from the Synagogue are especially resistant to study in the Syriac-speaking milieu. Surviving sources are few and their application is not always clear. It is not until the arrival on the stage of Aphrahat "the Persian Sage" (active from 337 to 345) and Ephrem the Syrian (d. 373) that the mists begin to clear. For this reason, studies of these two early figures, especially Ephrem who left an entire library of varied works of prose and poetry, not only shed light on their immediate subjects but also illuminate the earlier, dark period of the life of these communities in Mesopotamia and further East. Christine Shepardson's study of Ephrem's...