Eusebus Pamphilia Parts 1,2 and 3

BOOK I CHAPTER XIII Narrative concerning the Prince of the Edessenes.

97 since in addition to these, there were many others who were called apostles, in imitation of the Twelve, as was Paul himself, he adds: “Afterward he appeared to all the apostles.”206 So much in regard to these persons. But the story concerning Thaddeus is as follows.

CHAPTER XIII. Narrative concerning the Prince of the Edessenes.

1. The divinity of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ being noised abroad among all men on account of his wonder-working power, he attracted countless numbers from foreign countries lying far away from Judea, who had the hope of being cured of their diseases and of all kinds of sufferings.

2. For instance the King Abgarus,207 who ruled with great glory the nations beyond the Euphrates, being afflicted with a terrible disease which it was beyond the power of human skill to cure, when he heard of the name of Jesus, and of his miracles, which were attested by all with one accord sent a message to him by a courier and begged him to heal his disease.

3. But he did not at that time comply with his request; yet he deemed him worthy of a personal letter in which he said that he would send one of his disciples to cure his disease, and at the same time promised salvation to himself and all his house.

4. Not long afterward his promise was fulfilled. For after his resurrection from the dead and his ascent into heaven, Thomas,208 one of the twelve apostles, under divine impulse sent Thaddeus, who was also numbered among the seventy disciples of Christ,209 to Edessa,210 as a preacher and evangelist of the teaching of Christ.

5. And all that our Saviour had promised received through him its fulfillment. You have written evidence of these things taken from the archives of Edessa,211 which was at that time a royal city. For in the public registers For a fuller discussion of this whole subject, see Andrews (Life of our Lord, pp. 104–116), Schaff (Church Hist. I. 272–275), and Weiss (Einleitung in das N. T. p. 388 sqq.), all of whom defend the natural brother hypothesis; Lightfoot (Excursus upon “The Brethren of the Lord” in his Commentary on Galatians, 2d ed. p. 247–282), who is the strongest advocate of the half-brother theory; Mill (The Accounts of our Lord’s Brethren in the N. T. vindicated, Cambridge, 1843), who maintains the maternal cousin theory; and Lange (in Herzog), who presents the paternal cousin hypothesis. Compare finally Holtzmann’s article in the Zeitschrift für Wiss. Theologie, 1880, p. 198 sqq.

206 1 Cor. xv. 7.

207 Abgarus was the name of several kings of Edessa, who reigned at various periods from b.c. 99 to a.d. 217. The Abgar contemporary with Christ was called Abgar Ucomo, or “the Black.” He was the fifteenth king, and reigned, according to Gutschmid, from a.d.

13 to a.d. 50. A great many ecclesiastical fictions have grown up around his name, the story, contained in its simplest form in the present chapter, being embellished with many marvelous additions. A starting-point for this tradition of the correspondence with Christ,—from which in turn grew all the later legends,—may be found in the fact that in the latter part of the second century there was a Christian Abgar, King of Edessa, at whose court Bardesanes, the Syrian Gnostic, enjoyed high favor, and it is certain that Christianity had found a foothold in this region at a much earlier period. Soon after the time of this Abgar the pretended correspondence was very likely forged, and foisted back upon the Abgar who was contemporary with Christ. Compare Cureton’s Anc. Syriac Documents relative go the Earliest Establishment of Christianity in Edessa, London, 1864.

208 On the traditions in regard to Thomas, see Bk. III. chap 1.

209 See chap. 12, note 11.

210 Edessa, the capital of Abgar’s dominions, was a city of Northern Mesopotamia, near the river Euphrates. History knows nothing of the city before the time of the Seleucidæ, though tradition puts its origin back into distant antiquity, and some even identify it with Abraham’s original home, Ur of the Chaldees. In the history of the Christian Church it played an important part as a centre of Syrian learning. Ephraem, the Syrian, founded a seminary there in the fourth century, which after his death fell into the hands of the Arians.

211 We have no reason to doubt that Eusebius, who is the first to mention these apocryphal epistles, really found them in the public archives at Edessa. Moses Chorenensis, the celebrated Armenian historian of the fifth century, who studied a long time in Edessa, is an independent witness to their existence in the Edessene archives. Eusebius has been accused of forging this correspondence himself; but this unworthy suspicion has been refuted by the discovery and publication of the original Syriac (The Doct. of Addai the Apostle, with an English Translation and Notes, by G. Phillips, London, 1876; compare also Contemp. Rev., May, 1877, p. 1137). The epistles were forged probably long before his day, and were supposed by him to be genuine. His critical insight, but not his honesty, was at fault. The apocry-