Kitab Khabar al-Shaikh Balaram wa Ibn al-Malik Yuwasif

Christian retelling of Indian fables

This story is a Christianised adaptation of the life of the Buddha, who appears as 'Joseph' (or Josephat, a name ultimately derived from the term Boddhisatva) with his teacher 'Balaraam' appearing as a character derrived from the ascetic who inspired the Buddha's turn to spiritual pursuits. The literary genre of providing moral instruction through fables was already a widespread literary tradition in the Arab world, particularly with tales such as Khalila and Dimna (rooted in the Indian Panchatantra, which was translated into Arabic in the 8th century) in wide circulation. Contextually, this retelling of Indian fables was a tool by which Christian missionaries were adapting their liturgical traditions for new audiences in the Middle East; providing moral fables in Arabic to spread the Christian faith.

Dr Christopher Wright provides a detailed explanation of the historical attribution of this text to John of Damascus in his description of Life of Barlaam and Joasaph (Cambridge, University Library, MS Add. 4491): 'The story of the Buddha had been adopted into the Manichaean tradition, capitalising on the themes of renunciation of the world and the flesh common to Buddhism and Manichaeism, and passed thence through Persian and Arabic versions to spread the Christian faith in the East. From there it was translated into Greek, with some alterations, in the late 10th or early 11th century by Euthymios Hagioreites, a Georgian monk who spent much of his life in Constantinople and in the monasteries of the Byzantine holy mountains of Olympos and Athos, eventually becoming abbot of the Georgian Monastery of Iviron on Mount Athos. The title commonly transmitted with the work credited a monk named John with bringing the story from India, and this led to a traditional attribution of the text to the Church Father John of Damascus'.

The many variations of the transliterated title into English make the exercise of finding other examples of this text in Arabic challenging: no comparable manuscripts have been located (the aforementioned manuscript at Cambridge University Library is a fragmentary example of the text from the 12th century, in Greek).

Single volume, decorated manuscript on ruled paper with triple-crescent moon watermark, in Arabic, 179 leaves, complete, 285 x 192 mm; single column, 17 lines black naskh copied in a regular hand, headings and section markers in red, catch-words, some occasional finger-soiling or browning to outer margins, light damp-staining to upper edges, early ink ownership inscriptions to first and final leaf, offsetting to first and final leaves causing discolouration; contemporary tan morocco over pasteboards, ruled and tooled in blind to covers, spine stamped in blind within raised bands, some faint water-staining to lower board, text-block slightly cocked, edges speckled in red, a very handsome and attractive volume.