The name of Tatian is not mentioned as the
author of the "Harmony," and the question is open as to whether the
authorship of the commentary is rightly ascribed to Ephraem Syrus. In
any case there can be no doubt that the Armenian work is a translation.
The Arabic work published by Ciasca, and supposed to be a version of
Tatian's _Diatessaron_ itself, is derived from two manuscripts, one
belonging to the Vatican Library and the other forwarded to Rome from
Egypt by the Vicar Apostolic of the Catholic Copts. The latter MS.
states, in notes at the beginning and end, that it is an Arabic
translation of the _Diatessaron_ of Tatian, made from the Syriac by the
presbyter Abu-l-Pharag Abdullah Ben-at-Tib, who is believed to have
flourished in the first half of the eleventh century, and in one of
these notes the name of the scribe who wrote the Syriac copy is given,
which leads to the conjecture that it may have been dated about the end
of the ninth century. A note in the Vatican MS. also ascribes the
original work to Tatian. These notes constitute the principal or only
ground for connecting Tatian's name with the "Harmony."
So little is known regarding the _Diatessaron_ of Tatian that even the
language in which it was written is matter of vehement debate. The name
would, of course, lead to the conclusion that it was a Greek
composition, and many other circumstances support this, but the mere
fact that it does not seem to have been known to Greek Fathers, and
that it is very doubtful whether any of them, with the exception of
Theodoret, had ever seen it, has led many critics to maintain that it
was written in Syriac.
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