Abgar

Abgar is the name or title of twenty-eight princes of Edessa (q.v.) in Mesopotamia. The most notable of these princes is the fourteenth of the name, a contemporary of Jesus, and was said to have written a letter to Jesus, and to have received an answer from him. These letters, translated into Greek from the Syriac by Eusebius of Cæsarea, were denounced as spurious by Pope Gelasius in 494, and soon lost all credit. The letter from Abgar contains a request that Jesus should visit him, and heal him of a certain disease. In the reply, Jesus is represented as promising to send a disciple to heal him after his ascension. For other fables in this connection, see Lipsius, Die Edessanische Abgarsage (1880).