TeTra | Philip Forness ""The Ecclesiastical History of Pseudo-Zachariah (fl. c. 568/569)"

TeTra Research Seminar | October 5th
Philip Forness (KU Leuven)
"The Role of the Bible in Shaping Historiographical Imagination: The Ecclesiastical History of Pseudo-Zachariah (fl. c. 568/569)"
The Ecclesiastical History (or Chronicle) of Pseudo-Zachariah forms one of the principal examples of the historiographical tradition of the emerging Syriac Orthodox Church in the sixth century. It comprises a compilation of diverse texts with three main divisions that together form a narrative stretching from creation to 568/569. The various sources used by the compiler offer different snapshots of the intersection of the Bible and the practice of history writing. Here diverse passages are summoned to evaluate the actions and character of ecclesiastical leaders, historical events are interpreted as the fulfillment of Biblical prophecies, and the Bible is cited to provide historical and geographical information. Perhaps most distinctively, the compiler uses Biblical wisdom literature to conceptualize the task of history writing itself. As a whole, Pseudo-Zachariah’s work sheds light on how the Bible shaped the imagination of ecclesiastical historians in the sixth century.
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