St. Paul of Edessa (d. 619)

An established scholar, distinguished translator and a man who acquired knowledge of the literatures (Greek and Syriac), Paul II was ordained metropolitan of Edessa around 594 or 595 as a successor ofSergius.502 He was given the title "The Translator of Books" because dur­ing the Persian expedition against the Jazira and Syria, he took refuge on the island of Cyprus in 609, where in 619, he made a fairly free translation of hymns com­posed by Severus of Antioch and others. This transla­tion was later revised by Jacob of Edessa in 675. He also translated the Gloria in Exclesis Deo according to the traditions of Qinnesrin. In 616, he was among the bishops who accompanied Athanasius I to Egypt. His commemoration day is fixed on the twenty-third of August. (History of Syriac Literature and Sciences, Patriarch Ignatius Ephrem I Barsoum, Presseggiata Press, p 105)