#12──致謝／附錄──ACKNOWLEDGMENTS／APPENDIX

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Many people have helped me to bring the Revelation of the Magi to a wider audience. My work on this text started during my doctoral program at Harvard Divinity School. I am grateful to my thesis adviser, Professor Francois Bovon, for his careful shepherding of this project from its inception, and his kindness in introducing me to the scholarly community in Europe that is devoted to the study of early Christian apocryphal literature. Professor J. F. Coakley, now of the University of Cambridge, spent countless hours supervising my translation of the Revelation of the Magi from the Syriac. His very patient editing of my work has saved me from embarrassment time and again, and any error remaining in the translation are entirely my own. Professor Karen King consistently pushed me toward further analytical rigor during the dissertation-writing process. Other colleagues from Harvard who have provided helpful advice on innumerable occasions include Ellen Aitken, Carly Daniel-Hughes, Ben Dunning, Ken Fisher, Anne-Marie Luijendijk, and Laura Nasrallah, as well as innumerable other faculty members and graduate students who offered constructive feedback during seminars and workshops. I am very grateful to the following faculty members for being extremely supportive of my professional development: Susan Abraham, Nicolla Denzey, Eldon Epp, Helmut Koester, Anne Monius, and Stephanie Paulsell. I would also like to single out for special thanks Margaret Studier, managing editor of Harvard Theological Review, who urged me to submit my dissertation to Harper
collins to be considered for the Huston Smith Prize.

My new colleagues at the University of Oklahoma have also provided invaluable support, particularly as I worked toward adapting the work of my dissertation for a more general audience. I am especially grateful to Erik Braun, Rangar Cline, Marie Dallam, Kyle Harper, Rachel Knudsen, Rienk Vermij, David Vishanoff, and Jane Wickersham for their feedback. I am especially grateful to my program director, Dr. Charles Kimball, for his strong support of this project in my first year of teaching. I am indebted to the senior members of the Religious Studies Program, Tom and Barbara Boyd, for their kind encouragement and support of me as a new-comer to Oklahoma.

I am exceedingly grateful to Eric Brandt at Harper collins for his resolute support of my work. His enthusiasm for the Revelation of the Magi has buoyed the project through the planning and editing stages. Thanks to him, the final form of this book is bar better than I could have ever imagined. I am very thankful to his assistant, Kathryn Renz, for her kindness and accessibility in explaining various aspects of the publishing process to me, as a first-time author. I am also indebted to the careful editing of Carolyn Holland and Carl Walesa, and to the design talents of Janet Evans.

My family has been my deepest source of inspiration and support. My father, Greg; my mother, Debby; my sister, Elizabeth; and my brother, Brian, and his wife, Leslie, have all encouraged me with their enthusiasm for this project, as have my father-in-law, Bill Bangs, and brother-in-law, Jonathan Bangs. I would especially like to thank my mother-in-law, Margie Bangs, who constituted a crucial focus group of one for my translation and introduction. My grandmother, Helen Mason, and my uncle, H. D. Mitchell, were both eager to read whatever I sent them and put their theological training to good use. Finally, my deepest love, admiration, and gratitude are for my wife, Elizabeth, who is both
my toughest critic and biggest fan.

APPENDIX

THE MAGI LEGEND
FROM THE
“OPUS IMPERFECTUM
IN MATTHAEUM”

[The Latin text of the Opus Imperfectum in Matthaeum is taken from Migne’s Patrologia Graeca, volume 56, columns 637-638. It can also be found, with translation and commentary, in chapter 2 of my dissertation, available online at https://ou.academia.edu/BrentLandau/Papers.]

Apocryphal Book Under the Name of Seth. Victorious Mountain. – I have heard some referring to such a writing, even if it is not beyond dispute, nevertheless not ruining the faith, but charming (it), seeing that there was a certain race situated at the very beginning of the East near the Ocean, who had possession of a certain writing having been inscribed with the name of Seth, concerning this star which was going to appear, and (concerning) what sort of gifts to offer it, which was carried out through generations of studious people, with the fathers handing down to their sons. And so they selected from themselves twelve more learned ones and lovers of the celestial mysteries, and they set before them the expectation of that star. And if someone from them died, his son or one of his relatives who was found of the same inclination was set up in place of the dead one. And they were called Magi in their language, because in silence and with a silence voice they glorified God. Therefore, during every year, after the threshing harvest, they went up a certain mountain placed there, which was called in their language the Victorious Mountain, having in it a certain cave in the rock, most pleasant, with fountains and choice trees, going up into which, and washing themselves, they were praying and glorifying God in silence for three days. And they did thus for each generation, always waiting, that by chance in their generation that star of blessing might appear, until it appeared to them coming down above that Victorious Mountain, having in itself a form like a little boy and above it (or him?) the likeness of a cross. And it was speaking to them, and it taught them and instructed them to set out for Judaea. And while they journeyed for two years, the star went ahead, and neither food nor drink ran out from their pouches. And otherwise the deeds that were rendered by them were expressed in the compendious Gospel. However, when they had returned, they continued worshiping and glorifying God even more attentively than before, and they preached to all in their race, and they instructed many. Finally, after the Resurrection of the Lord, when the Apostle Thomas went into that province, they joined him, and having been baptized by him, they were made assistants of his preaching.

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