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Mar Narsai was
born in the Parsian Empire at ‘Ain Dulbe in Ma’alta, he was orphaned at an
early age and was brought up by an uncle who was superior of the monastery of
Kfar Mari, near Beth Zabdai; he also spent 10 years as a student at the Persoian
School in Edessa, to which he subsequently returned as a teacher, eventually (
at an unknown date) becoming its Head. Owing to the conflect with the bishop
Cyrus, Narsai left Edessa (perhaps c. 471) for Nisibis, where, with the help of
its bishop Barsauma he reestablished the School (which no doubt took in the
staff and students of the Persian School of Edessa when that was closed in 489
by order of emperor Zeno); he was still alive in 496, the date of the first
Statutes of the School of Nisibis. The date of his death, certaily at a great
age, is not known.
His surviving
works are all in verse, being memre using both 7:7 and 12:12 metres. Some 80
memre or verse homilies, are preserved, the majority dealing with biblical
topics ( both Old and New Testaments); there are also an important group which
constitute verse commentaries on the baptismal and eucharistic rites. Although
Narsai is probably the most important poet of the Ancient Church of the East,
only a small number of his homolies are so far in modern translations.
In the course of
the first of his verse homilies ( memre) Narsai recounts the ordeal of Abraham
when God bade him offer of his son Isaac as a sacrifice ( Gen:22). After
stressing the mangnitude of Abraham’s agony on receiving this command, Narsai
continues:-
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