GREGORY THE ILLUMINATOR.

Yachakhapatum: The Homilies of St. Gregory the Illuminator. [Collection of Sermons].

Constantinople: 1824.

$4,800.00

In Stock Item Number: RRB-153104

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The Yachakhapatum, the Homilies of St. Gregory the Illuminator

Rare nineteenth-century Armenian edition of the Yachakhapatum, the celebrated collection of homilies traditionally ascribed to St. Gregory the Illuminator, the apostle and first Catholicos of the Armenian Church. Octavo, printed in Classical Armenian, bound in full contemporary tree calf with gilt titles and tooling to the spine in six compartments with floral ornament and a lettered leather label. With a full-page engraved frontispiece portrait of St. Gregory the Illuminator in his vestments and decorative engraved head-pieces and borders. In very good condition with rubbing, losses to the spine, and light toning.

The Yachakhapatum is a collection of twenty-three homilies that stands among the oldest monuments of Armenian Christian literature. Within the Armenian tradition the discourses are ascribed to St. Gregory the Illuminator (c. 257-c. 331), the apostle of Armenia who converted King Trdat and established Christianity as the state religion in the early fourth century, making Armenia the first nation to adopt the faith, although modern scholars date the texts themselves no earlier than the fifth century. First printed at Constantinople in 1737, the homilies were long revered as a foundational work of Armenian devotional and doctrinal writing.