- 08
- Mar
- 2025
The Beit Gazo is a collection of Syriac hymns dating back to the 4th century, beginning with Saint Ephrem and Saint Jacob of Serugh. Expanded over more than a millennium, it was compiled by Maronite Patriarch Estephanos Douaihy in the 17th century. Long preserved solely through oral tradition, it was not until 1899 that Benedictine monk Dom Jean Parisot introduced its first musical notations.
How much do we know today about the musical heritage that emerged from the Levant and our mountains, enriching the West with its melodies and poetic depth? These hymns, which still echo beneath the vaulted ceilings of humble rural churches and in certain urban neighborhoods or suburbs, trace an unbroken lineage back to the 4th and 5th centuries. Saint Ephrem and Saint Jacob of Serugh laid the foundations of a tradition that transcended their Eastern world, leaving a lasting imprint on Christianity as a whole.
As André Malraux once said, “the early Middle Ages is hardly the West; it is the forest of an East that knew Syriac chants before receiving the Byzantine cloaks.”
The Beit Gazo
This heritage has continuously evolved, giving rise to a melodic universe and an invaluable treasure. This is reflected in the name of its repertoire, Beit Gazo, meaning "the treasure." For more than a millennium, it has been passed down exclusively through oral tradition.
As with other cultural domains, it was once again Patriarch Estephanos Douaihy, in the 17th century, who compiled the first written collection of Maronite chant lyrics. However, it was not until the late 19th century that the music was notated by the French Benedictine monk Dom Jean Parisot. The extensive work of both the patriarch and the Benedictine monk was later expanded upon by Father Louis Hage at the Saint-Esprit University of Kaslik in the 1980s.
Many of the texts in this collection date back to the 4th and 5th centuries and are masterpieces of Syriac antiquity. They offer insight into the culture and deep character of these societies. For Dom Jean Parisot, “these compositions were worthy of preservation as expressions of Eastern genius and manifestations of popular art, deeply connected to the life of the people and faithfully reflecting their essence.”
Music, poetry, and art are expressions of identity. They express the imagination and the inexpressible while also enabling their transmission across generations. As André Malraux once said, “in the presence of poetry, how could we not acknowledge that the forms of a civilization, its style, are the embodiment of its imagination?”
Dom Jean Parisot
In 1899, Dom Jean Parisot made the first notations of Syriac chant in Lebanon, aiming, as he stated, to prevent the distortions of traditional chants. Until then, several Syriac manuscripts still used musical symbols that, as Father Louis Hage put it, constituted a system of grammatico-musical marks. Others, mostly dating from the late Middle Ages, he further noted, “were marked with symbols similar to those of Old Byzantine notation.”
This grammatico-musical system is known as the Karkaphian Massorah. Some trace its origins to the city of Karkaph in Mesopotamia, and the Maronite scholar Assemani cites it as specific to the populations of the mountains of Phoenicia and Mesopotamia. Its use in Mount Lebanon is documented in several manuscripts, which reveal the richness and complexity of this notation system, where, as Paulin Martin noted, “every detail—position, number, color, and even the size of the marks—is regulated, prescribed, and defined.”
Dom Jean Parisot was tasked with collecting and notating, as he himself stated, Maronite, Syriac, and Chaldean melodies. In other words, he focused on the Syriac hymns of Lebanon, Christian Syria (between Edessa and Tur Abdin in present-day Turkey), and Mesopotamia (between Nineveh and Diyarbakir in present-day Turkey).
He carried out this compilation with the support of Archbishop Debs of Beirut, Archbishop Boustani of Sidon, and the collaboration of solo singers from Beirut and Sidon, who were part of the Ain-Warqa seminary. From the beginning, he noted that he was presented with “a significant number of melodies,” none of which had been notated, “as the books only contained the text.”
Virtuosity
Syriac chant, in general, shies away from displays of virtuosity. This aversion to ornamentation is even more pronounced among the Maronites, whose mountain heritage heightens their sensitivity to structure and the force of rhythm. This rhythm echoes both the labor of terraced farming and stone carving, as well as the upward climb in the mountains and the rhythm of the heartbeat.
“Their religious origins and the rugged nature around them have left a deep imprint—both mystical and austere,” wrote Ambassador René Ristelhueber about the Maronites. Their chant embodies this duality, blending austerity with humility. As Dom Jean Parisot observed, “Eastern chant excels at conveying tenderness, supplication, and restraint.” "It knows how to bow in humility,” he added.
However, this austerity is above all spiritual. It reflects the fundamental principle of Syriac art, which rejects ornamentation. Its chant—like its writing and painting—is always connected to the Melto (the Word), giving it a soteriological dimension. In its purity, this chant embodies the Incarnate Word of the Savior.
Austerity
“From a melodic perspective, Syriac chants, less impassioned in expression than the secular songs of the Arabs, have a calm character,” as noted by Dom Jean Parisot. Musical or vocal virtuosity is seen as an obstacle to the encounter with the Absolute, which can only be truth in its purest form.
From the Maronites’ Mount Lebanon to the Chaldeans’ Upper Mesopotamia, the observation remains the same. Dom Jean notes that, “in general, Chaldean melodies, free from the influence of Arab music, are based on simpler, distinctly diatonic modes while also possessing a beautifully melodic character.”
The embellishments found in contemporary Maronite Syriac chant are often a result of Arab music's influence, which contrasts with the principle of austerity, restraint, and even abstinence. Sobriety is linked to simplicity, and by extension, to Truth, leading to the encounter with the Absolute. The vision is eschatological, and the process remains soteriological across its various artistic forms, including music, painting, and architecture.
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