Syriac language

Villagers in Syria still speak the same language as Jesus Christ

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• published: 21 Jul 2015
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SHOTLIST : Maaloula, Syria - November 2007 1. Wide shot Maaloula sign 2. Houses 3. Graveyard with houses in background 4. Apartment blocks seen through olive trees 5. Zoom on Virgin Mary at top of hill 6. Mosque 7. Muslim women walking down road 8. Pan olive trees to men sitting drinking coffee by roadside 9. SOUNDBITE (English) Hussain Mohamed, village elder: "All together, not 'this is Muslim, this is Christian', no. Everybody in this village� like my brother. Muslim or Christian. No difference, here, in this village." 10. Pan coffee pot to man speaking (Arabic) 11. Men and young boy speaking together in Aramaic 12. Old man 13. Pan young man to older man 14. SOUNDBITE (English) Mohammed Hussain, 70, village elder, talking about a teenage boy sitting with him: "From when he was born, his mother talked to him in Syrianic Aramaic, and he knew what she said to him. All his life, (he has) talked Aramaic." 15. Wide shot houses and churches 16. Girls laughing in street 17. Little boys walking up steps 18. Little boys reciting poem in Aramaic 19. Wide shot mountains with caves 20. Close-up caves 21. Father Toufic on balcony of monastery overlooking village 22. Inside chapel through hole in wall 23. Pan altar to window 24. SOUNDBITE (French) Father Toufic, Saint Sergius chapel: "In 325 A.D., at the First Council of Nicaea - the first ecumenical council - in order to differentiate themselves from the pagans, Christians decided that altars would be flat, not shaped like this (curved). And that is why we know this shape probably goes back to that time of transition in Christian architecture, and we can date this altar back to that time." 25. Father Toufic 26. Woman praying in front of icon 27. UPSOUND: (Aramaic)Father Toufic saying the Lord's Prayer 28. Pan ceiling to altar 29. SOUNDBITE (French) Father Toufic, "You can say it is pre-Christian, because the other types of Aramaic that exit today are what you call Christian Aramaic - be it Syriac, Chaldean or Assyrian - those are Aramaic dialects too, but they date back to Christian times, the Christians brought the language with them." QUESTION: "So that Aramaic (the dialect spoken in Maaloula) is�?" TOUFIC: "Pre-Christian." QUESTION: "So when would it date back to?" TOUFIC: "The 9th or 8th century B.C., if it truly is the Aramaic spoken by Jesus Christ." 30. Mosque at night 31. Saint Tekla convent 32. Close-up Saint Tekla convent 33. Pan chapel dome to window into chapel 34. Mass in Aramaic inside St Tekla chapel 35. Pan ceiling to altar inside St Tekla chapel 36. Young girl 37. Priest with incense 38. Pan to bread 39. Candles LEAD IN : There are very few places left in the world where Aramaic, the language of Jesus Christ, is still spoken. The people of the village of Maaloula in northern Syria speak the ancient language in everyday life. STORYLINE: It feels like history has stopped in the small Syrian village of Maaloula, some 50 kilometres (31 miles) north of the capital Damascus. Along with the neighbouring villages of Jabadin and Bakha, it is one of the last places in the world where Aramaic, the language of Jesus Christ, is still spoken. Maaloula means "the entrance" in Aramaic, referring to its dramatic location at the entrance to a rocky gorge. Perched on the slopes of the Qalamoun Mountains at an altitude of 1,500 meters, Maaloula overlooks a vast green carpet of fig trees, grapevines and poplar trees. With its blue-roofed houses nestled into the rock, Maaloula a picturesque village, is one of Christianity's oldest sites. It's believed some of the caves were used by prehistoric men. Others were excavated by the Greeks and the Romans, and later used as shelter by the first Christians fleeing persecution. You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/12066b9247b324b647fa8a43b5008d7f Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork