The purpose of the present paper is to revisit the interface between biblical studies, receptionexegesis, and reception theory. In the first part of the paper, we discuss what we believeto be the most important lessons learned from recent scholarship on the relationshipbetween these fields and highlight what we think is still an underestimated conclusion:if we assume that “meaning” is contextual rather than essential, the full(er) capacity of abiblical text is not discoverable until we have examined how it has appeared in various contexts.Related to this is the question of why and how texts survive and even thrive in newcontexts and in what way later authors utilize the “capacity” of the biblical texts, becauseeven if “meaning” is ultimately brought to texts by their readers, texts are in some sensesagents as well. To exemplify these discussions and the connection between reception exegesisand biblical criticism, two short examples from the reception of Psalms 110 and 137in medieval Christian Arabic and Judeo‑Arabic sources are presented. In the first example,we recapitulate findings on how inner‑biblical reception generates a complex web ofpotential interpretations but also how the ambivalence created in the process may be thegreatest asset of that text. It is also an example of where interpretation may teach us aboutthe life and thought of ancient and medieval communities and how they interacted withone another over the meaning of the biblical text. In contrast, the second example is morecentered on the “capacity” of the text and in what sense communities exploit that potentialfor their larger purposes.

The Life of Theodore of Edessa was most likely composed in Greek in the eleventh-century and soon after translated to Arabic. It includes three major rewritings of biblical characters who are re-located in a ninth-century storyworld under Muslim dominion: Joseph and Potiphar's wife (cf Griffith 1994), Job and his wife, and what appears to be Elymas, the Jewish sorcerer in Acts 13. The first and the last rewritings incorporate inter-religious debates. I will suggest that the method used by the hagiographer may best be described as flannelgraphic: biblical characters are moved around on various geographical scens, where unexpected meetings and twists in the story take place and where biblical and contemporary themes and issues come into contact.

Among the rich manuscript treasures kept at the British Library, we find more than one hundred Christian Arabic Bible translations and Bible commentaries. So far, information about them has been dispersed in a dozen manuscript catalogues. This dispersion of information has made it rather difficult—even for experts in the field—to navigate through the corpus and locate relevant material. As a means to increase accessibility to these valuable objects, I have for several years had the pleasure to re-examine these manuscripts, select some for digitization, write a few blogs on them (here and here), and finally gather all the data into a new catalogue. This blog post is about that process.

The present article discusses the Muslim legal scholar and theologian `Al & amacr;' alDin al-B & amacr;ji (631-714/1233-1314) and his polemic against the Pentateuch, which he read in at least two Christian Arabic translations that were in use among R & umacr;m Orthodox Christians (Melkites). It aims to identify the recensions of the Pentateuch that al-B & amacr;ji had access to, and to understand how the differences between these recensions contributed to his view that the shared Jewish and Christian scripture had undergone changes. The article suggests that alB & aacute;ji used a combination of arguments to undermine especially the Christian reception of divine revelation, pointing out apparent inconsistencies and illogicalities in the biblical stories themselves as well as text -critical cruxes caused by discrepancies between different versions that circulated side by side within the Eastern Christian communities. Finally, some of the "irrationalities" he describes seem to be particular of the copies of the texts he had in front of him.

The present study offers a comparative analysis of colophons written in Arabic by Christian scribes at the monasteries of Saint Chariton, Saint Sabas, and Saint Catherine in the ninth and tenth centuries CE. These monasteries have played a crucial role in the formation of the early Christian Arabic manuscript tradition. The colophons of these manu-scripts provide the most immediate access to the socio-cultural milieu of their producers. The present study is based on a selection of 20 colo-phons, which are explicitly connected to one of the three monasteries. Our main aim is to draft a typology of early Christian Arabic colophons as a means to investigate the various issues surrounding emergent Chris-tian Arabic scribality. Additionally, we will discuss paleographical fea-tures of the handwriting of the scribes who authored the colophons dis-cussed here. As we will show, these can be used to connect anonymous colophons and manuscripts without colophons, at least with some prob-ability, to the workshops of these monasteries. Overall, our aim is to highlight the microhistorical significance of early Christian Arabic colo-phons, which not only offer spatio-temporal, prosopographical, social, intellectual, and, to some extent, economic coordinates for the contex-tualisation of early Christian Arabic manuscript production, but also al-low us to catch a glimpse of early Christian Arabic scribal self-perception. 

The present study offers a comparative analysis of colophons written in Arabic by Christian scribes at the monasteries of Saint Chariton, Saint Sabas, and Saint Catherine in the ninth and tenth centuries CE. These monasteries have played a crucial role in the formation of the early Christian Arabic manuscript tradition. The colophons of these manu- scripts provide the most immediate access to the socio-cultural milieu of their producers. The present study is based on a selection of 20 colo- phons, which are explicitly connected to one of the three monasteries. Our main aim is to draft a typology of early Christian Arabic colophons as a means to investigate the various issues surrounding emergent Chris- tian Arabic scribality. Additionally, we will discuss paleographical fea- tures of the handwriting of the scribes who authored the colophons dis- cussed here. As we will show, these can be used to connect anonymous colophons and manuscripts without colophons, at least with some prob- ability, to the workshops of these monasteries. Overall, our aim is to highlight the microhistorical significance of early Christian Arabic colo- phons, which not only offer spatio-temporal, prosopographical, social, intellectual, and, to some extent, economic coordinates for the contex- tualisation of early Christian Arabic manuscript production, but also al- low us to catch a glimpse of early Christian Arabic scribal self- perception.

This paper provides a number of cases where early Christian Arabic Bible translators resorted to qur’ānic-sounding language and (later) also a qur’ānic aesthetic in their production of biblical codices. The main purpose of the paper is to discuss various reasons as to why they went so far into the “realm of the other” when producing these translations. The answer to that question is most likely connected to the little-known function of these Bible translations, a topic also addressed in the paper. The adoption of qur’ānic language results in a comparatively high level of intertextuality and the use of codicological features associated with Mamluk Qur’āns also tend to blur religious borders. Thus, the paper also explores the possibility to view a portion of the Christian Arabic Bible endeavour as part of the broader process of “religious co-production.”