Friday, December 31, 2021

John the Baptist being the Greatest "among those born of women" in Ephrem's Commentary on Tatian's Diatessaron

  

There is none [greater] among those born of women. With regard to the prophets, he was more eminent than they, although born of a woman. He is less than those born of the Spirit, concerning whom the evangelist has said, To those who received him he gave them the power to become sons of God. For John [preached] a baptism of repentance, but these a baptism for the remission of sins. (Saint Ephrem's Commentary on Tatian's Diatessaron: An English Translation of Chester Beatty Syriac MS 709 with Introduction and Notes IX §14a [trans. Carmel McCarthy; Journal of Semitic Studies Supplement 2; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993, 2000], 161)