
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich HegelLectures On The History Of Philosophy
"Moses Maimonides, a learned Jew, gives further historical particulars in his Doctor Perplexorum of this transition of Philosophy to the Arabians. He says: “All that the Ishmaelites have written of the unity of God and other philosophic dogmas”—especially the sect of the Muatzali (מעתוזלה, i.e. the Separated), who were the first to take an interest in the abstract intellectual knowledge of such subjects, while the sect Assaria (האשערייה) arose later—“is based upon arguments and propositions which have been taken from the books of the Greeks and Aramaeans” (Syrians), “who strove to refute and deny the teachings of the philosophers.”" "The Christian Greeks and learned Aramaeans, therefore, when they perceived that their doctrines were so clearly and plainly refuted by the philosophers, thought out a wisdom of their own, the “Wisdom of the Words” (Devarim), and they themselves received on that account the name of the Speakers (Medabberim, מִדַבְרִים)." "When the Ishmaelites followed and attained supremacy, and the books of the philosophers themselves fell into their hands, and along with them the answers which “Christian Greeks and Aramaeans had written against the philosophic books, as for instance the writings of Johannes Grammaticus, Aben Adi, and others, they eagerly laid hold of these and adopted them bodily.” Christians and Ishmaelites felt the same need of philosophy; the Ishmaelites, moreover, strove all the more eagerly after knowledge of this kind, because their first desire was to defend Mohammedanism against Christianity, which was the religion of a large proportion of the nations they had conquered." In reference to the source he drew from, Hegel equates the terms "Syrians" and "Arameans" while talking about philosophy that had been transmitted from Arameans and Greeks to the Arabs.

Moses MaimonidesThe Guide of the Perplexed
Moses' original quote: "Know also that all the statements that the men of Islam – both the Muʿtazila and the Ashʿariyya – have made concerning these notions are all of them opinions founded upon premises that are taken over from the books of the Greeks and the Syrians who wished to disagree with the opinions of the philosophers and to reject their statements." 1204 Samuel ibn Tibbon translation: "Those who first initiated this line of inquiry were the Mutazilites, and later on, the Asharites branched out from them. All of these doctrines are built upon premises and propositions taken directly from the books of the Greeks and the Arameans, who exerted themselves to argue against and dispute the opinions of the philosophers, and to tear down their arguments." Moses Maimonides composed The Guide for the Perplexed around 1190 in Judeo-Arabic, where he used the word al-Suryāniyyīn to mean "the Syrians." He was historically describing the Christian scholars of the Levant who translated classical Greek philosophy into Arabic. In 1204, Samuel ibn Tibbon translated the work into medieval Hebrew, choosing to replace "Syrians" with the term Aramim ("the Arameans").

Matathia KarakashianArameans Also Called Syrians
"The city of Amid and Edessa were in Armenian Mesopotamia, (they were) some of the descendants of Aram, in the cities of the two Syrians (perhaps the reading is uncertain — ‘two…’). For the Arameans are also called Syrians after the name of Aram, who was the ancestor of the Syrians .”

Leopold ZunzLiterature of the Jews
"The first embrace the northern countries, Cimmerians, Ripaeans, Armenians, Scythes, Medes, Ionians, Hellenists, Tartessians, Cyprians, Rhodians, Tibareneans, Mossians and Tyrrhenians. Hamites are the nations of the south, the inhabitants of Ethiopia and Meroë, the eastern Africans, the western Arabians, the people of Saba, Dedan, Babylonia, Egypt, Lybia, Thebais, Colchis, the Philistines, Cretes, Canaanites or Phoenicians. Besides the Hebrews, the following are considered to be Semites, viz. the Elymaeans, Assyrians, Lydians, Aramaeans (Syrians), the people of the countries which reach to the confines of the Arian's (Arrapachitis) and finally, those of south and southeastern Arabia (Hadramaut, Sanaa, Ofir, Mesene, Nedsjd)."

Al-MasudiTur Abdin Remnant Of Arameans
"And the Suqān, whose source is from the district of al-ʿUmr and the hill of the mountain known as Baʿlam al-Shayṭān, which is adjacent to the mountain of Ṭūr ʿAbdīn. This is a mountain in which there are the remnants of the Arameans among the Syriacs (baqāyā al-Aramān min al-Suryāniyyīn)."

Isidore of SevilleAram from whom the Syrians come
"The sons of Shem, five in number, each individually begot single nations. Of whom the first was Elam, from whom the Elamites, princes of Persia: the second Assur, from whom the empire of the Assyrians burgeoned: the third Arphaxad, from whom the race of the Chaldaeans arose: the fourth Lud, from whom the Lydians: the fifth Aram, from whom the Syrians, whose metropolis was Damascus."

Jerome of StridonRezin king of Aram, that is, the Syrians
"What seems to me to be explained in this way: we read in Isaiah that Rezin king of Aram, that is, the Syrians, who reigned in Damascus, and Pekah son of Remaliah king of Israel, with the intention of fighting against Judah, came (Isa.VII): concerning whom the Lord directs Achaz king of Judah and Jerusalem not to be afraid of the two half-burnt torches: because as a sign of complete liberation, the Virgin's conception and childbirth are shown to him."

Jerome of StridonAram That is Syria
"Give understanding, that Azael, when Ozia and Jeroboam reigned, was already dead in Syria, and his son Benadad succeeded him in the kingdom, from whom all the later kings of Aram, that is, Syria and Damascus, took the name Benadad." "For we read that Theglathphalasar, king of Assyria, after killing King Rezin of Damascus, of whom Isaiah speaks, transferred all the people of Syria, who were called Aram, to Cyrene, and for this reason it is said now (2 Kings 16)." "...shall I not (Alternate: shall I not indeed) reject him, that is, the people of Damascus, or Aram, that is, Syria, can have this meaning according to the history: If they had persecuted my people once, or even twice, I would have forgiven them."

Cornelius a LapideFrom Aram Come The Arameans That Is Syrians
"ARAM. — From him came the Arameans, that is, the Syrians. Note that in Scripture ‘Syria’ has a broad extent, and includes Armenia, and even Mesopotamia, which is called Aram-Naharaim, that is, the Syria of the two rivers, because it lies between the Tigris and the Euphrates, as I shall discuss more extensively in chapter 25, verse 20."

Pavlos KarolidisPre-Islamic Arameans
"But in Mesopotamia the Greek and Greek speaking population lived primarily in the cities, almost all which were built by the Greeks. On the contrary, the people in the countryside of this far-flung land were definitely a compact Aramaean population. This explains the fact that in Mesopotamia, through Christianity, we see Aramaic literature which in turn quickly produced a culture for the Aramaean element, that in the end prevailed in the whole country. In this also contributed as we saw earlier, that by the end of the 4th century began in the eastern and southern parts of the country a political change. And it was in the interest of the Persians to support the Aramaean element against the Greek in their perpetual dispute over Mesopotamia with the Greco-Romans. The ecclesiastical unity of the Christians in Mesopotamia and in Persia who were primarily Aramaeans and Nestorians also played a strong role in the evolution of things. After Seleucia, the great city of southeast Mesopotamia or Babylonia and Ctesiphon became permanently part of the Persian state and Ctesiphon became its capital, Seleucia, a city even bigger than Antioch, the creation of Seleucus and great center of Greek civilization, became instead an Aramaean Nestorian religious and educational center under the auspices of the Persian authorities. Same was the fate of the important city of Nisibis in northeast Mesopotamia. The Aramaean heretical element came to dominate in all of Mesopotamia while the Greek element that represented Orthodoxy became a minority."

John Murray FirmAramean Denominations of Mesopotamia
"Syrians. — The Syrian (Aramaean) Christians are divided into Nestorians, Chaldaeans, New Chaldaeans, Jacobites, and Protestants. They are descendants of the old Aramaean population of Mesopotamia driven from its ancient home by the encroachments of the nomads and the butcheries, of Timur."

John Murray FirmNestorians Represent Arameans
"For many centuries the rich plains of Mesopotamia, and the fertile valleys of Armenia, were overrun by nomads — Arabs, Turks, Mongols, and Tatars— whose one thought seems to have bora to depopulate the districts they traversed, and convert them into pasture-grounds. The Arameans who escaped from the Mesopotamian lowlands are represented by the Nestorians of today."

James Frederic McCurdyNestorians Of Aramean Descent
"The persistence of the type may be best illustrated by the existence of the title malik among the Nestorians of Aramean descent in their settlements in Kurdistan, where the head of each “city” (m’dinta) is called by that name, being chosen to that honour by the citizens upon the death of his predecessor, usually but not necessarily from the same family."

Mark SykesNestorian and Jacobite Arameans
"The foreign or at least non-Kurdish stocks may briefly be enumerated as the Arabo-Aramean population of Mossul, the pure Arameans as typified in the Nestorian and Jacobite Christians of Ain Kawa, Akra, and Keni Sanjak, the Turkish peoples of Altyn Kiopru, Kerkuk and Erbil, and the Bedawin and Felahin Arabs on the banks of the Tigris and the plains eastward of Mossul." "The presence of the latter are denoted by a black. The question as to whether these Nestorian Christians of Hakkiari, who have a tribal organisation, are indigenous Kurds or fugitive Christians of Aramean stock, is I think still open; several learned Kurdish notables are of opinion that the Nestorians of Hakkiari are Kurds who were converted to Christianity before the advent of Al Islam; on the other hand the Christian clergy are firmly convinced that this is not the ease." Mark Sykes explicitly classifies the Nestorian and Jacobite Christians of Ain Kawa, Akra, and Keni Sanjak as "pure Arameans", viewing them as a distinct, non-Kurdish population.














