Ephrem the Syrian's Hymns on the Unleavened Bread

"The fourth-century Syriac author Ephrem the Syrian left behind a large corpus of "hymns" on various topics that provide key insights into a unique Syriac expression of Christianity along the volatile border of the Roman and Persian Empires. The set of hymns presented here provides a fascinating study of Syriac Christianity because Ephrem invites the reader into a world of symbolic interpretation filled with imagination brimming beneath the surface of word-plays, alliteration, and typological comparisons. These hymns also thrust the reader into the middle of a fourth-century context in which Christians and Jews maintain competing practices of a Passover service to the extent that Ephrem feels the need to distinguish between the symbol and the reality"--P. [4] of cover.