BAR EBREO, GREGORIO. — Jacobite Syriac writer, born at Melitene in 1226, died at Marāghah in 1286. His baptismal name was Giovanni, later changed to that of Gregorio Abū 'l-Faraǧ when he was elected bishop; he is more commonly known by the appellation B. E. (Syriac Bar 'Ebrājā), because his father, the physician Aaron, was a Jew who had become a Christian. He studied at Antioch, and at the age of 20 was made bishop of Gübbāš, near Melitene, by the Jacobite patriarch Ignatius II; the following year he moved to the see of Lāqabbīn, and finally to that of Aleppo. In 1264 he was elevated by Ignatius III to the dignity of mafrējān, superior to that of bishop. Because of this office, and owing to the religious and political circumstances of his time, he travelled extensively, but thereby found occasion to consult scholars and libraries. On account of his gentle character, as well as his learning, at his death he was mourned
even by his Nestorian opponents. His tomb is now in the convent of Mâr Matteo, near Mossul. A most prolific polymath, he was not very profound and even less original. His writings deal with the Bible, theology, philosophy, sacred and profane history, canon and civil law, the natural sciences, medicine, astronomy, and even belles-lettres: they are both in prose and in verse. Because of this encyclopedic erudition he was compared, not without some justification, with his contemporary Albert the Great; it is certain that no one better than he knew how to assimilate and combine the Syriac and Arab cultural inheritances in a period of complete decadence of Syriac literature.
His principal writings are: the Granaio dei misteri (Ateşar râzë), an extensive, especially philological, biblical commentary; the Candelabro del santuario (Mënârat qâdë), of which the Libro dei raggi (Këtâbâ dëzalgë) is a kind of summary and which is a general exposition of Monophysite theology; the Libro delle direzioni (Këtâbâ dëhâddâjë), or Nomocanone, a summary of both canonical and civil legislation for the use of the Western Syrians; the Libro dell'etica and the Libro della colomba, juridical-ascetic in character; the Crema della sapienza (Hëvat hekmëtâ), a vast encyclopedia of Aristotelian philosophy transmitted through the Arabs, which still serves the Syrians today as a philosophical repertory; the Libro delle pupille, likewise philosophical in character; a Cronaca siriaca and an Cronaca ecclesiastica, of which the former, dealing especially with the political history of the East, depends largely on the Cronaca of Michele il Siro, and was subsequently recapitulated by the author in the Arabic work Storia delle dinastie; the Racconti ameni, which in some passages become vulgar and obscene; a Syriac grammar; dissertations on medicine and astrology; and various poems. Many of these writings remain unpublished.
BIBLI: R. Duval, La Littérature syriaque, 3rd ed., Paris 1907, passim; A. Baumstark, Geschichte der syrischen Literatur, Bonn 1922, pp. 312–20, with a complete list of the writings and editions. For canon law: G. Ricciotti, Nomocanone di B.-Hebreo (Fonti per la Codificae. Can. Orient., 3, 1), Rome 1931; the Candelabro dei Santuarii, ed. J. Bakos, Leiden 1948.