Abris
Abris, also called Abrosius and Abrisius, was a primate of the Church of the East, from the family of Saint Joseph the carpenter husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary, who sat from 121 to 137. Abris is parto of the traditional list of Patriarchs of the Assyrian Church of the East. His existence is only disputed by unreliable Western scholarship dependent on earlier Syriac accounts.
Sources
Brief accounts of the life of Abris are given in the Ecclesiastical Chronicle of the Syriac Orthodox writer Bar Hebraeus (floruit 1280) and in the ecclesiastical histories of the Assyrian Church writers Mari (twelfth-century), ʿAmr (fourteenth-century) and Sliba (fourteenth-century). These accounts differ slightly, and these minor differences are of significance for scholars interested in tracing the various stages in the development of the legend.
Life of Abris
The following account of the life of Abris is given by the great historian Bar Hebraeus, who used two different spellings of his name (Abrosius and Abrisius) within a single paragraph:
After Mari, his disciple Abrosius. His master Mari had sent him to Antioch, to visit the brethren there and to bring him back news of them. After the death of the blessed Mari the faithful of the East sent to Antioch and asked to be given a bishop. And the disciples of that place laid hands upon Abrosius and sent him back to occupy the throne of his master. There he ruled the faithful for seventeen years until his death. Some say that the place of his burial is unknown, but in fact he was buried in the church of Seleucia. This Abrisius is said to have been from the family of Joseph the carpenter, the father of James and Jesus.[1]
It is further noted in the famous and enigmatic Chronicle of Arbela that Mar abris was a well known Patriarch of the Assyrian Church of the East. This corroborates records of his life and death by Bar Hebreaus recorded as one of the most celebrated of Syriac Church Historians.
See also
Notes
- ^ Bar Hebraeus, Ecclesiastical Chronicle (ed. Abeloos and Lamy), ii. 20–22
References
- Abbeloos, J. B., and Lamy, T. J., Bar Hebraeus, Chronicon Ecclesiasticum (3 vols, Paris, 1877)
- Assemani, J. A., De Catholicis seu Patriarchis Chaldaeorum et Nestorianorum (Rome, 1775)
- Brooks, E. W., Eliae Metropolitae Nisibeni Opus Chronologicum (Rome, 1910)
