Coptica 15, 2016

84 Mark N. Swanson The Copto-Arabic sermon follows this outline quite closely, but with elaborations. 14 When Alexander heard of the hermit prince’s great quest, he was, we read, “exceedingly amazed, and said: “O man, you have asked the impossible, what cannot be!” Alexander explains this impossibility, frequently quoting or alluding to Scripture. Thus, the word in the Psalms [34:19], “Many are the sorrows of the righteous;” the sufferings of “our saintly fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob;” and the story of Job; all show that sorrow and illness are inevitable. As for death, Alexander says: And as for your saying, ‘life without death,’ death is inevitable for every creature, because God ( subḥānahu wa-taʿālā ) said to our father Adam, after he had transgressed by eating of the tree… : ‘You shall eat your morsel [of bread] by the sweat of your brow until you return to the earth from which you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.’ … 15 The Coptic preacher here gives us a Christianized, Scripture-quoting Alexander who is a witness to ascetic practice which stands in sharp contrast to his own deep involvement in worldly affairs—which he comes to regret. 2. Alexander’s tutor Aristotle sends him a book My second example comes from a theological encyclopedia composed at the end of the 14 th century by al-Makīn Jirjis ibn al-ʿAmīd, usually called “the younger” in order to distinguish him from his 13 th -century relative, the historian of the same name. 16 Jirjis had had a career as a financial administrator for the Mamlūks before he retired to become a monk and hermit—and to write a huge theological work usually called al-Ḥāwī ,” or The Compiler . 17 One chapter in the collection is a treatise on al-qaḍāʾ wa- l-qadar or divine predetermination and human freedom, and in it we find a mention of Alexander the Great. 18 Jirjis tells us that Alexander had sent messengers to his tutor Aristotle in order to summon him and escort him to his side; Aristotle excused himself claiming weakness, but sent a book in 14 MS Paris, BnF ar. 4761, ff. 31b-35b; Ghica, “Sermon arabe,” 153-57 (nos 35-99). 15 MS Paris, BnF ar. 4761, f. 34a-b; Ghica, “Sermon arabe,” 155-56 (nos 75-78). 16 On Jirjis, see Adel Sidarus and Mark N. Swanson, “Al-Makīn Jirjis ibn al-Amīd,” in Christian-Muslim Relations: A Bibliographical History , Vol. 5 (1350-1500) , ed. David Thomas et al. (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2013), 254-61. 17 In full, the work is called Mukhtaṣar al-bayān fī taḥqīq al-īmān (“The brief exposition in faith’s verification”), or al-Ḥāwī al-mustafād min badīhat al-ijtihād (“The profitable compilation, from the faculty of ratiocination”). See the recent edition of the work: al- Mawsūʿah al-lāhūtiyyah al-shahīrah bi- l-Ḥāwī l-Ibn al-Makīn , 4 vols., ed. by a monk of Dayr al-Muḥarraq (Cairo: Dār Nūbār li-l-Ṭibāʿah, 1999-2001). 18 Book I, Chapter 1, Part 3 (on al-qaḍāʾ wa-l-qadar ); al-Mawsūʿah al-lāhūtiyyah , I: 168- 85, in particular pp. 176-80.