Ephrem the Syrian

c. 306–373 · Syriac Church (Nisibis; Edessa) · Nisibis; Edessa

Ephrem (c. 306–373), deacon of Nisibis and after 363 of Edessa, is the greatest poet of the Syriac Church and the only Syriac writer numbered among the Doctors of the Church. Alongside his hymns he composed prose and metrical homilies; the three translated in the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, on our Lord, on repentance and on the sinful woman of Luke 7, show his exegesis in sermon form.