Ephrem the Syrian

Ephrem the Syrian, also called Ephraim of Nisibis or Ephraem Syrus, was a fourth-century Syriac Christian deacon, theologian, and hymnographer, and is generally regarded as the foremost of the Syriac Church Fathers. He was born about 306 in Nisibis, a major fortress city on the Roman–Persian frontier in northern Mesopotamia (modern Nusaybin in southeastern Turkey). Later hagiography claimed that his father was a pagan priest who drove him from home after his conversion, but there is no contemporary confirmation of that story. What is reasonably secure is that Ephrem was baptized as a young man and was formed by Jacob, the first historically attested bishop of Nisibis, who took part in the Council of Nicaea in 325. Under Jacob and his successors Ephrem taught in the Christian school of Nisibis and was ordained deacon. He remained a deacon for the rest of his life and never accepted the priesthood or the episcopate. He belonged to the Syriac institute of the covenant (qyāmā), a consecrated celibate way of life that preceded later organized monasticism.

During Ephrem’s years in Nisibis the city endured three sieges by the Sasanian king Shapur II, events he later commemorated in the Hymns on Nisibis (Carmina Nisibena). After the emperor Julian died on campaign in 363, Jovian ceded Nisibis to Persia and the Christian population was obliged to leave. Ephrem went with the exiles and settled in Edessa (Syriac Urhay; modern Şanlıurfa, Turkey), capital of Osroene and a principal centre of Syriac-speaking Christianity. There he continued to teach, to write hymns and commentaries, and to oppose doctrines he regarded as heretical, including those associated with Bardaisan, Marcion, Mani, and Arian or Arianizing groups. He is often connected with the School of Edessa, though the exact character of that link is debated. In 372–373 a severe famine struck Edessa; according to a near-contemporary report, Ephrem organized the distribution of food and care for the sick. He died in Edessa in June 373, traditionally on the ninth of the month, and was buried there, according to tradition among the poor or in the cemetery of the foreigners.

Ephrem wrote almost entirely in classical Syriac and is the outstanding poet of that language. His surviving corpus includes cycles of teaching hymns (madrashe) meant to be sung by choirs, especially of women; verse homilies (memre); and prose commentaries, notably on Genesis, Exodus, and the Diatessaron. Major hymn cycles include the Hymns on Faith, Hymns on Paradise, Hymns against Heresies, Hymns on the Nativity, Hymns on Unleavened Bread, Hymns on the Church, and Hymns on Virginity. His method is symbolic and typological rather than speculative in the Greek philosophical manner. He insists on the hiddenness of God, treats Scripture and the natural world as two witnesses to divine reality, gives a prominent place to Mary, and affirms the reality of the sacraments. Later Syriac tradition called him the Harp of the Holy Spirit and the Sun of the Syrians. Greek, Armenian, Georgian, Latin, Slavonic, Coptic, and Arabic versions and adaptations carried his name far beyond the Syriac churches, although many works circulating under his name in Greek are not authentic.

Veneration of Ephrem began soon after his death in both Eastern and Western Christianity. The Roman Catholic Church keeps his feast on 9 June; the Eastern Orthodox Church and several Eastern Catholic churches keep it on 28 January; other dates appear in the Syriac Orthodox, Maronite, Coptic, and related calendars. In 1920 Pope Benedict XV declared him a Doctor of the Church, sometimes styled Doctor of the Syrians. He is invoked as a patron of spiritual directors and spiritual leaders. Because he died well before the Christological divisions of the fifth century, he is claimed as a father by the Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Church of the East traditions alike.