East Syrian Rite - Manuscripts and Editions

Manuscripts and Editions

Few of the manuscripts, except some lectionaries in the British Museum, were written before the 15th century, and most, whether Chaldean or Nestorian, are of the 17th and 18th. The books in use are:

• Takhsa, a priest's book, containing the Eucharistic service (Qurbana or Qudasha) in its three forms, with the administration of other sacraments, and various occasional prayers and blessings. It is nearly the Euchologion of the Greeks (see Rite of Constantinople).
• Kthawa dhaqdham wadhwathar or Qdhamuwathar, "Before and After", contains the Ordinary of the Divine Office except the Psalter, arranged for two weeks.
• Dawidha (David), the Psalter, divided into hulali, which answer more or less to the kathismata of the Greeks. It includes the collects of the hulali.
• Qiryana, Shlika w'Iwangaliyuna, lections, epistles, and gospels, sometimes together, sometimes in separate books.
• Turgama, explanatory hymns sung before the Epistle and Gospel.
• Khudra, containing the variables for Sundays, Lent and the Fast of the Ninevites, and other holy days.
• Kashkul, a selection from the Khudra for weekdays.
• Geza, containing variables for festivals except Sundays.
• Abukhalima, a collectary, so called from its compiler, Elias III, Abu Khalim ibn alKhaditha, Metropolitan of Nisibis, and patriarch (1175–99).
• Ba'utha d'Ninwayi, rhythmical prayers attributed to Saint Ephraem, used during the Fast of the Ninevites.
• Takhsa d'amadha, the office baptism.
• Burakha, the marriage service.
• Kathnita, the burial service for priests.
• Anidha, the burial service for lay people.
• Takhsa d'siamidha, the ordination services.
• Takhsa d'khusaya, the "Office of Pardon", or reconciliation of penitents.

These last six are excerpts from the Takhsa. Of the above the following have been printed in Syriac:

For the Nestorians:

• The Takhsa, in two parts, by Archbishop of Canterbury's Assyrian Mission (Urmi, 1890–92) The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge has published an English translation of the first part of the Takhsa, both parts "unmodified except by the omission of the heretical names" (Brightman);
• Dhaqdham wadhwathar, by the same (Urmi, 1894); Dawidha, by the same (Urmi, 1891).
• Khudra, in three volumes, by Mar Narsai Press (Trichur, 1960; reprint 1993).

For the Chaldean Catholics:

• Missale Chaldaicum, containing the Liturgy of the Apostles in Syriac and Epistles and Gospels in Syriac with an Arabic translation, in Garshuni (Propaganda Press fol., Rome, 1767). A new and revised edition, containing the three liturgies and the lections, epistles, and gospels was published by the Dominicans at Mosul in 1901. The Order of the Church Services of Common Days, etc., from Kthawa dhaqdham wadhwathar (octavo, Mosul, 1866). *"Breviarium Chaldaicum in usum Nationis Chaldaicae a Josepho Guriel secundo editum" (16mo, Propaganda Press, Rome, 1865).
• "Breviarium Chaldaicum", etc., .

For the Malabar Catholics:

• "Ordo Chaldaicus Missae Beatorum Apostolorum, juxta ritum Ecclesiae Malabaricae" (fol., Propaganda Press, Rome, 1774).
• "Ordo Chaldaicus Rituum et Lectionum", etc., (fol., Rome, 1775).
• "Ordo Chaldaicus ministerii Sacramentorum Sanctorum", etc., (fol., Rome, 1775).

These three, which together form a Takhsa and Lectionary, are commonly found bound together. The Propaganda reprinted the third part in 1845.

• "Ordo Baptismi adultorum juxta ritum Ecclesiae Malabaricae Chaldaeorum" (octavo, Propaganda Press, Rome, 1859), a Syriac translation of the Roman Order.

The Malabar Rite was revised in a Roman direction by Aleixo de Menezes, Archbishop of Goa, and the revision was authorized by the controversial Synod of Diamper in 1599. So effectively was the original Malabar Rite abolished by the Synod in favour of this revision, and by the schismatics (when in 1649, being cut off from their own patriarch by the Spaniards and Portuguese, they put themselves under the Jacobite patriarch) in favour of the West Syrian Liturgy, that no copy is known to exist, but it is evident from the revised form that it could not have differed materially from the existing Nestorian Rite.