Healing Difficult Childbirth in Syriac Charms: Alexey Lyavdansky
We are pleased to announce a new mini-series of eLectures within the framework of the seminar “Traditions of Magic in the Near East and Caucasus”, hosted by the Institute for Oriental and Classical Studies (Higher School of Economics, Moscow). The lectures take place each Wednesday from 1 December until 22 December 2021 starting at 4:30 pm (GMT) / 19:30 (Moscow) via Zoom.
Lecture 1
01.12.2021, Wednesday
19:30 Moscow
16:30 / 4:30 pm London
12:30 pm New York
Alexey Lyavdansky (HSE University, Moscow)
Healing Difficult Childbirth in Syriac Charms
How is healing of difficult childbirth achieved in the Syriac tradition of protective charms? The analysis of the available textual evidence shows that the charms for this purpose are found in 18 mss out of the corpus of 50 mss.
There are two types of healing charms for difficult childbirth. The most popular is the text which includes a recipe with the well-known formula “Lazarus, come out! Christ is calling you” (15 mss). It is usually accompanied by another recipe / formula. Only two mss add the third recipe.
Much less known is the type which includes historiola with the following plot:
The anonymous narrator hears the voice of a woman in labor, turning with a prayer for healing to the Lord. The Lord orders the angel Gabriel to go to heaven and bring three branches from there: one from the tree of life, the second from the tree of the Lord's cross, and the third from the tree of Moses' staff. Each of the branches has its own purpose. In particular, the third branch helps to expel Satan from the body of a woman in labor and free her from birth pangs.
The paper examines the most significant parallels to the motives of this story, found in Syriac, Jewish, Arabic and Slavonic sources.
Please register for the lectures following this link.
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