SEPTEMBER 2020 COMMONWEAL: Member Comments
SEPTEMBER 2020 COMMONWEAL
FROM THE EDITORS
Voting as an act of faith
COMMENT
HEROES & cheapskates (Regina Munch)
Beirut’s agony (Griffin Oleynick)
Mosque or museum? (George E. Demacopoulos)
COLUMN
John Paul II on social sin(Rita Ferrone)
SHORT TAKES
The “canceling” of Flannery O’Connor? (Angela Alaimo O’Donnell, Cathleen Kaveny)
Federal immigration officers in Portland (Paul Moses)
Poland’s complacent majority (Piotr H. Kosick)i
The unrevised Ephrem (Joseph Amar)
ARTICLES
Religion in American politics (Kenneth L. Woodward)
Why the Left must work with liberals (James T. Kloppenberg)
INTERVIEW
SCREEN
BOOKS
American Prophets by Jack Jenkins (Reviewed by Kaya Oakes)
Catholic Social Teaching edited by Gerard V. Bradley and E. Christian Brugger
(Reviewed by Bernard G. Prusak)
One Mighty and Irresistible Tide by Jia Lynn Yang (Reviewed by Melody S. Gee)
The Dalai Lama by Alexander Norman (Reviewed by Thomas Albert Howard)
ARTS
David Jones’s ‘Nativity’ (E. R. Powell)
POETRY
“Incarnation” (Sr. Lou Ella Hickman)
LAST WORD
Jazz vespers (David Gibson)
The unrevised Ephrem (Joseph Amar)
ReplyDeleteJOSEPH AMAR is professor emeritus of Syriac, Arabic, and Early Christianity at the University of Notre Dame. He is writing a cultural and intellectual biography of Ephrem the Syrian.
This “preview” of his biography of Ephrem places it high on my list of must reads. I hope it is published soon.
Ephrem was made a Doctor of the Church in 1920 before critical editions of his extensive work appeared. There are many works attributed to Ephrem in Greek that are not his. It appears Amar is about to argue that Ephrem’s very original thought has been obscured by people who tried to make him support a very different monastic agenda. While Ephrem was a part of the sons and daughters of the Covenant that observed celibacy, they were urban Christian who lived lives of service to others. Monasticism developed later in other places.
Ephrem is famous for his poetry which was chanted by groups of consecrated women. Amar argues that a protégé writing shortly after Ephrem's death revealed that having poetry chanted by women was innovative, contrasting with what was going on before, and afterwards in regard to women’s roles.
The protégé writes “ Look! An entirely new sight—women are proclaiming the word. What is more, they are called teachers in our gatherings. [Ephrem’s] teaching is the mark of an entirely new age; For in the kingdom, men and women are equal. “ If Ephrem were only a pious saint this might be dismissed as interesting but eccentric However Ephrem is a Doctor of the Church, whose original thinking has to be taken seriously.
Ephrem justified the role of women in the church in the following words. “ Like your brothers, you were clothed in glory from the midst of the waters... With your brothers you have shared a single forgiving Body. And from a single cup of new Life you have been refreshed. A single salvation is yours and theirs alike.” Ephrem was speaking of teaching/proclaiming roles more widespread and profound than those of ordination. While Ephrem has been credited as being a deacon, this might also be respective much like being called a monk. Amar says Ephrem's teaching might provide Pope Francis with a rationale for affirming greater teaching and proclaiming roles for women in the Church.