A Nestorian physician, famed for his work in ophthalmology, bar Ali (f 1001) composed a Syriac/Arabic lexicon in the late ninth century. It survives in numerous manuscripts, and at the entry for "Diatessaron" reads as follows:
[Syriac] Diastarson [sic], [other] manuscripts: Diaqutron:hH the gospel which is the Diatessaron, which Tatian made, the "Mixed" [Mehalleta = sing.]. [This Syriac entry is followed by the Arabic entry, which reads as follows:] Mixed. A Gospel made meaning by meaning [or: expression by expression; or, perhaps: word for word], collected, to the meaning [or: expression] of the words of collected, to the meaning [or: expression] of the words of the four Gospels of the Apostles — Peace of God upon them. And in it are not mentioned the physical genealogy, nor the exalted one, of our Lord Christ, and he who composed it is cursed for this reason.[JR Harris, The Diatessaron of Tatian (Cambridge 1890) 13 - 14]
Bar Ali calls the Diatessaron a "gospel"; the entry equates it with "(the) Mixed." The Arabic entry repeats Theodoret's information that it excised the genealogies. The final clause, concerning Tatian's anathematization ("and he who composed it. . ."), is found in only one manuscript (Oxford: Bodleian Library, MS 182 [Huntingdon 25]; dated 1529/30); it is presumed 'a later copyist's addition.
