Aphrahat

Aphrahat (c. 280–c. 345), called the Persian Sage (Sapiens Persa), was a fourth-century Syriac Christian writer who lived under the Sasanian Empire, almost certainly as a celibate ascetic and possibly as a bishop or head of the monastery of Mar Mattai near Mosul. He is the earliest substantial witness to Syriac Christian thought, writing entirely outside the Greco-Roman world and apparently in no significant contact with the Greek theological tradition. Between 337 and 345 he composed twenty-three Demonstrations (tahwyātā), the first twenty-two arranged as an alphabetical acrostic on the Syriac alphabet and treating the Christian life — faith, love, fasting, prayer, war, monasticism, penitents, the resurrection, humility, pastors, the dispute with the Jews, the messiah, the foods, virginity, almsgiving, persecution, and death — and the twenty-third, on the grape (De Acino), serving as a recapitulation of salvation history. His expositions are notable for their extensive scriptural argumentation, their preservation of pre-Nicene exegesis, and their detailed engagement with Jewish interlocutors during the persecution of Shapur II.