Pope Francis was able to appreciate in the Vatican a holy book written in Aramaic, saved from the Islamic State invasion of the city of Qaraqosh in Iraq, and recently restored in Italy.
This is the holy book “Sidra”, written in Aramaic around the 14th or 15th century, which contains liturgical prayers for the feast of Easter and the Holy Cross.
The holy book belongs to the Syro-Christian Church of the city Qaraqosh, on the Nineveh Plain, which the Pope will visit in March.
The meeting with a small group of restaurateurs from the Federation of Christian Organizations of International Voluntary Service (FOCSIV) was held on Wednesday, February 10, after the general audience.
The manuscript was saved thanks to “the cunning of some of the priests of that city” in the face of the “iconoclastic and anti-Christian wrath” of the Islamic State that invaded that country from 2014 to October 2016.
In January 2017, journalists Laura Aprati and Marco Bova found the Holy Book located in Erbil, after which it was handed over to the Archbishop of Mosul, Mgr Yohanna Butros Mouché, in the hands of LA FOCSIV volunteers
Later, the book was transferred to Italy for its restoration which took about 10 months as it was in a very critical state of conservation requiring preliminary examination and linguistic comparison with some parts from the same period kept in the library . .
In the near future, the holy book will be returned to the Syro-Christian church in Qaraqosh.
The President of the FOCSIV, Ivana Borsotto emphasized that “the restoration of the holy book of Qaraqosh is part of the commitment that the Federation has committed to rebuilding the social fabric of an area like Kurdistan. Iraqis and Iraqis “, adding that the possibility that people in the Nineveh plain will be able to continue to sing in Aramaic with this book will remind everyone” that a different future is still possible. “
Translated and adapted by Mercedes De La Torre. Originally posted on ACI print