Copyright ©2011 by Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute
Distributed under an Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) License.
Proposed dates range from mid-4th memre) preceded by an introductory
essay (mamllā) on the spiritual life and the pursuit
of perfection. The anonymous author gives very few historical or
geographical details in the memre, but one reference
points to a location of the author and his spiritual community in northeast
Iraq near the Lesser Zab River.
The collection does not have a Syriac title. Its Latin title (Liber Graduum) was given by Michael Kmosko in his
1926 critical edition of the Syriac text (with Latin translation), referring
to the ascetical steps (massqātā) one must climb
along the steep road to the heavenly city of Christ. This term is mentioned
only in two memre, numbers 19 and 20. Kmosko utilized
fifteen mss., only three containing more than five memre.
Kmosko theorized that the the book was a primary text of the Messalian movement in the mid-to-late-4th cent. This view was accepted by I. Hausherr and dominated scholarship for the next thirty years. In the 1950’s A. Vööbus challenged the Messalian characterization of the book and directed scholars towards its witness to early Syriac asceticism and spirituality. Others focused on the pneumatology (A. Guillaumont), ecclesiology (R. Murray), anthropology and prayer (A. Kowalski), structure (L. Wickham), and christology and asceticism (D. Juhl).
The thirty memre are of uneven length and utilize a
variety of genres: extended biblical exegeses, sermons, discourses on
ascetical method. The dominant theme threading throughout the collection is
the description of the two statuses of Christian life: uprightness (kenutā) and perfection or maturity (gmirutā) and those individuals who attempt to embody these ways of
life — the Upright (kene) and the Perfect (gmire).
Writing in the midst of a pre-monastic religious community, the author of the
‘Book of Steps’ attempted to counter a decline in the standards and fervor
among the Perfect. The first half of the collection presents a rule for both
levels as the ideal to which they aspire. The second half contains a variety
of materials, with the last six memre advocating the
legitimacy of the Upright.
The titles of the memre are: Preface by the editor of
the collection; 1. Author’s introduction; 2. About those who want to become
Perfect; 3. The physical and spiritual ministry; 4. On the vegetables for
the sick; 5. On the milk of the children; 6. On those who are made Perfect
and continue to grow; 7. On the commandments of the Upright; 8. On one who
gives all he has to feed the poor; 9. On Uprightness and the love of the
Upright and the prophets; 10. On fasting and the humility of body and soul;
11. On the hearing of Scripture when the Law is read before us; 12. On the
hidden and public ministry of the church; 13. By the same author on the ways
of the Upright; 14. On the Upright and the Perfect; 15. On Adam’s marital
desire; 16. On how a person may surpass the major commandments; 17. On the
sufferings of our Lord who became through them an example for us all; 18. On
the tears of prayer; 19. On the discernment of the way of Perfection; 20. On
the difficult steps which are on the road of the City of our Lord; 21. On
the tree of Adam; 22. On the judgments which do not save those who observe
them; 23. On Satan and Pharaoh and the Israelites; 24. On repentance; 25. On
the voice of God and of Satan; 26. On the second law which the Lord
established for Adam; 27. About the history of the thief who is saved; 28.
On the fact that the human soul is not identical with the blood; 29. On the
discipline of the body; 30. On the commandments of faith and the love of the
solitaries.