Page:Commentaries of Ishodad of Merv, volume 1.djvu/26

xviii the use of the Commentary on the Diatessaron, quotations from which we are able to identify, by means of Mösinger's edition of the Armenian translation, in many places where no acknowledgement of the source is made; and this renders it reasonably certain that there is much more borrowed from Theodore also than is actually confessed. The Nestorian commentaries naturally rely upon their great exegete, either thinly disguising his name or omitting it altogether.

The mention of Nestorian commentaries suggests to me that this is the proper place to refer to the Gannat Busamé (or Garden of Delights), an enormous commentary upon the Lectionary as read in Nestorian Churches throughout the year, of which I am happy in possessing a copy. Here, too, there is a constant reference to the Interpreter, and there are also many passages which coincide with the comments of Ishoʿdad ; as in a number of these the reference to Ishoʿdad is directly made, we are sure that Ishoʿdad is one of the principal sources of the Gannat Busamé, and I have indicated the fact on the earlier pages of Mrs Gibson's text, either by the full reference, or by the letters G.B. The question will arise whether Gannat Busamé quotes Theodore, for instance, elsewhere than from the pages of Ishoʿdad; this is certainly the case even in passages which coincide with Ishoʿdad. The Gannat is a mine for recovering Theodore. Indeed one of the richest Theodorian nuggets which I have found was the passage referring Acts xvii. 28 to Epimenides, which I took from the pages of the Gannat Busamé. So I have no doubt that Theodore is everywhere in both commentaries, if we had only a secure means of identification. The difficulty will arise in cases where our author has used Theodore freely; in that case his reference to him may sometimes be more misleading than his silence. This case will occur in the commentary on John, where we have the text of Theodore preserved in a Syriac translation (ed. by Chabot); a comparison with Ishoʿdad will show constant contact with Theodore, but also an occasional difficulty in reasoning from the later writer to the earlier.

As an illustration of the way in which the hand of Theodore may be recognised, we may refer to the long discourse on our Lord's prayer from the Cross on pp. 202—204, in the course of which the writer affirms that 'David says, my prayer shall be about the calamity of the Babylonians.' The reference is to Psalm cxli. 5, and it is clear that the writer has identified this Psalm as being a Psalm of the captivity and spoken prophetically by the mouth of David. It is natural to conclude that this