Paul the Persian
Paul the Persian or Paulus Persa was a 6th-century East Syriac theologian and philosopher who worked at the court of the Sassanid king Khosrau I. He wrote several treatises and commentaries on Aristotle, which had some influence on medieval Islamic philosophy. He is identified by some scholars with Paulus of Nisibis (d. 571 AD) and with Paul of Basra. According to Jackson, he was "a Christian who may have studied Greek philosophy in the schools of Nisibis and Gundeshapur". He is remembered for his writings in Syriac for his royal patron. These include his notes in  Syriac on Aristotle's "Logic", in which he declares the superiority of science over faith. Life. Paul the Persian is known from the 9th-century "The Chronicle of Seert" and from the "Chronicon Ecclesiasticum" of the 13th-century Jacobite historian Bar-Hebraeus. These sources indicate that he was born in Dershahr in Persia. Bar-Hebraeus mentions that he lived during the time of the Nestorian patriarch Ezekiel (567-580). According to Bar-Hebraeus, Paul was a cleric in the Church of the East and well versed in ecclesiastical and philosophical matters. Paul wrote two known works. He produced an introduction  to the philosophy of Aristotle, which was delivered before the Persian King Chosroes I, and later translated into Syriac by Severus Sebokht. The same work was also translated into Arabic at a later date. The other work extant is "On Interpretation", which has never been published. Both the "Chronicle of Seert" and Bar-Hebraeus record that he aspired to become metropolitan of Fars, and, failing to be elected, converted to Zoroastrianism. However this is not otherwise documented and may merely be the product of the rivalry between the Jacobite Syriac Orthodox Church and the Nestorian Church of the East. The  entry in the "Chronicle of Seert" reads: