What happened to the Forum?

[Luc Lefebvre]

There is hardly any activity on this forum. Was this only a trend and now things have changed?

Has Paul moved onto other pursuits?

So uh... the short answer is just that these days most people use any other social media platform besides old forums. Facebook is probably the most popular. There is a Peshitta.org studies group there, and it was mildly active, but Shamasha deleted his Facebook account several months ago now, so the group has more or less died out there as well. I'm not sure what he's up to. The other reason seems to be that the Hebrew Roots obsession with it has died down (and the movement itself seems to have stagnated online I think).

Now, as I think Charles was alluding to above, there is still a tremendous amount of research and work that can be put into Assyrian Aramaic studies, and the New Testament of the Peshitta. With the recent consecration of His Holiness, Mar Awa III Royel, to the supreme rank of Catholicos-Patriarch in the Assyrian Church of the East, I'm encouraged that there may be a renewed interest in Assyrian Aramaic studies and the Peshitta. H+H Mar Awa III has done a great job in the past with education (a lot in English, like his book on the Sacraments), and if I'm not mistaken, when Shamsha Paul was meeting to discuss the possibility of producing a Peshitta Bible in English comparable to the Orthodox Study Bible of the Greek churches, I think it was H+H Mar Awa III. Of course, that project never came to fruition. But I was still very excited when I saw that he was elected as the new Catholicos-Patriarch, and look forward to what developments may come about for the Assyrian Church of the East under his leadership.

And I mention that because the Eastern Peshitta which many of us have come to love and cherish is the text belonging to the branches of the Church of the East (Assyrian, Ancient, and Chaldean). I know people like Roth and Gorovenko tried to claim it for the modern day Netzarim sect with their extensive commentary and pseudo-Nestorianism (actually, it's probably true Nestorianism, but I say pseudo because it's not what Nestorius believed, nor the Church of the East); but it belongs to those ancient, apostolic churches, and ultimately I think the research depends on them as well. I know Shamsha Paul kept the two relatively separate, but I'm not sure if that was the best choice since it attracted way too many Sacred Namers and Hebrew Roots folks who didn't speak the language and were just trying to "Semitic cosplay". So that kind of pseudo-scholarship I think also killed the work being done around here.

Anyway, just my rant and ramblings. I probably broke several group rules being blunt about a few points... but, with the lack of activity I'm thinking it'll be okay.