| Saint Isidore of Seville |
Isidore, depicted by Murillo |
| Born |
~560, Cartagena, Spain |
| Died |
April 4, 636, Seville,
Spain |
| Venerated in |
Roman Catholic Church |
| Feast |
April 4 |
| Attributes |
bees; bishop holding a pen while surrounded by a swarm of bees; bishop standing near a beehive; old bishop with a prince at his feet; pen; priest or bishop with pen and book; with Saint Leander, Saint Fulgentius, and Saint Florentina; with his Etymologia |
| Patronage |
(only proposed, but quite well embraced) computers, the
internet; students |
 Saints Portal |
Saint Isidore of Seville (Spanish: San Isidro
or San Isidoro de Sevilla), Latin: Isidorus Hispalensis (c.
560 – April 4, 636) was
Archbishop of Seville for more than three decades and has
the reputation of being one of the great scholars of the early Middle Ages. All the later
medieval history-writing of Hispania (the Iberian
Peninsula, comprising modern Spain and Portugal) were
based on his histories.
At a time of disintegration of classical culture, and aristocratic violence and illiteracy, he was involved in the conversion
of the royal Visigothic Arians to Catholicism, both
assisting his brother Leander and continuing after his brother's death. Like Leander, he took a most prominent part in the
Councils of Toledo and Seville. In all justice, it may be said that it was due to the
enlightened statecraft of these two illustrious brothers, that the Visigothic legislation which emanated from these councils, is
regarded by modern historians as exercising an important influence on the beginnings of representative government.
Life
Childhood and education
Isidore was born in Cartagena, Spain, to Severianus and Theodora, part of an
influential family who were instrumental in the political-religious manoeuvring that converted the Visigothic kings from
Arianism to Catholicism, and were all awarded sainthoods:
- His elder brother Leander was his immediate predecessor in the Catholic
Metropolitan See of Seville, and while in office opposed king Liuvigild
- A younger brother, St. Fulgentius, was awarded the Bishopric of Astigi at the start of the new reign of Catholic Reccared.
- His sister Florentina was a nun, and is said to have ruled over forty convents and
one thousand religious.
Isidore received his elementary education in the Cathedral school of Seville. In this institution, which was the first of its
kind in Hispania, the trivium and quadrivium
were taught by a body of learned men, among whom was the archbishop, Leander. With such diligence did he apply himself to study that in a remarkably short time mastered
Latin, Greek, and Hebrew.
Whether Isidore ever embraced monastic life or not is still an open question, but though he himself may never have been
affiliated with any of the religious orders, he esteemed them highly — on his elevation to the episcopate he immediately constituted himself protector of the monks and in 619 he pronounced anathema against any ecclesiastic who should in any way molest the monasteries.
Bishop of Seville
On the death of Leander, Isidore succeeded to the See of Seville.
His long incumbency in this office was spent in a period of disintegration and transition. The ancient institutions and
classic learning of the Roman Empire were fast disappearing. For almost two centuries the
Goths had been in full control of Hispania, and their barbarous manners and contempt of learning
threatened greatly to put back her progress in civilization.
Realizing that the spiritual as well as the material well-being of the nation depended on the full assimilation of the foreign
elements, St. Isidore set himself to the task of welding into a homogeneous nation the various peoples who made up the Gothic
kingdom. To this end he availed himself of all the resources of religion and education. His efforts were attended with complete
success. Arianism, which had taken deep root among the Visigoths, was eradicated, and the new heresy of Acephales was completely
stifled at the very outset; religious discipline was everywhere strengthened.
Second Synod of Seville (November 618 or 619)
Isidore presided over the Second Council of Seville, begun 13 November, 619, in the reign of Sisebur. The bishops of Gaul and Narbonne attended, as well as
the Hispanic prelates. In the Council's Acts the nature of Christ is fully set forth, countering Arian conceptions.
Fourth National Council of Toledo
At this council, begun 5 December, 633, all the bishops of
Hispania were in attendance. St. Isidore, though far advanced in years, presided over its deliberations, and was the originator
of most of its enactments.
The council probably expressed with tolerable accuracy the mind and influence of Isidore. The position and deference granted
to the king is remarkable. The church is free and independent, yet bound in solemn allegiance to the acknowledged king: nothing
is said of allegiance to the bishop of Rome.
It was at the Fourth National Council of Toledo and through his influence that a decree was promulgated commanding and
requiring all bishops to establish seminaries in their Cathedral Cities, along the lines of the school associated with Isidore
already existing at Seville. Within his own jurisdiction he had availed himself of the resources of education to counteract the
growing influence of Gothic barbarism. His was the quickening spirit that animated the educational movement of which Seville was
the centre. The study of Greek and Hebrew, as well as the liberal arts, was prescribed. Interest in law and medicine was also encouraged. Through the authority of the fourth council
this policy of education was made obligatory upon all the bishops of the kingdom.
Works
Isidore's Latin style in the ‘’Etymologiae‘’ and elsewhere, though simple and lucid, cannot be said to be classical, affected
as it was by local Visigothic traditions. It discloses most of the imperfections peculiar to all ages of transition and
particularly reveals a growing Visigothic influence. Isidore can possibly be characterized as the world's last native speaker of
Latin.
Etymologiae
Long before the Arabs had awakened to an appreciation of Greek Philosophy, he had introduced
Aristotle to his countrymen. He was the first Christian writer to essay the task of compiling
for his co-religionists a summa of universal knowledge, in the form of his most important work, the Etymologiae (taking its title from the method he used in the transcription of his era's knowledge). It
is also known by classicists as the Origines (the standard abbreviation being Orig.). This encyclopedia — the first known to be compiled in medieval civilization — epitomized all learning, ancient as well as modern, forming a huge compilation of 448 chapters in 20 volumes. In
it many fragments of classical learning are preserved which otherwise would have been hopelessly lost but, on the other hand,
some of these fragments were lost in the first place because Isidore’s work was so highly regarded that it superseded the use of
many individual works of the classics themselves, which were not recopied and have therefore been lost.
The fame of this work imparted a new impetus to encyclopedic writing, which bore abundant fruit in the subsequent centuries of
the Middle Ages. It was the most popular compendium in medieval libraries. It was printed in at least 10 editions between 1470 and
1530, showing Isidore's continued popularity in the Renaissance. Until the twelfth century brought translations from Arabic sources, Isidore transmitted what
western Europeans remembered of the works of Aristotle and other Greeks, although he
understood only a limited amount of Greek. The Etymologiae was much copied, particularly into medieval bestiaries.
The shape of the Earth
The medieval
T-O map represents the inhabitated world as described by Isidore in his
Etymologiae.
Isidore taught in the Etymologiae that the Earth was round. His meaning was ambiguous and some writers think he
referred to a disc-shaped Earth; his other writings make it clear, however, that he considered the Earth to be globular.[1] He also admitted the possibility of people dwelling at the
antipodes, considering them as legendary[2] and noting that there was no evidence for their existence.[3] Isidore's disc-shaped analogy continued to be used through the Middle Ages by
authors clearly favouring a spherical Earth, e.g. the 9th century bishop Rabanus Maurus
who compared the habitable part of the northern hemisphere (Aristotle's northern temperate
clime) with a wheel, imagined as a slice of the whole sphere. See also: Flat Earth.
Other works
His other works include
- Historia de regibus Gothorum, Vandalorum et Suevorum (a history of the Goths, Vandals and Suebi) [4]
- his Chronica Majora (a universal history)
- De differentiis verborum, which amounts to brief theological treatise on the doctrine of the Trinity, the nature of
Christ, of Paradise, angels, and men.
- On the Nature of Things (not the poem of Lucretius, but the book of astronomy and
natural history dedicated to the Visigothic king Sisebut)
- Questions on the Old Testament.
- a mystical treatise on the allegorical meanings of numbers
- a number of brief letters.
- Sententiae libri tres (Codex Sang. 228, 9th century)
Afterlife
Isidore was the last of the ancient Christian philosophers, as he was the last of the great Latin Church Fathers. He was undoubtedly the most learned man of his age and exercised a far-reaching and
immeasurable influence on the educational life of the Middle Ages. His contemporary and friend, Braulio, Bishop of Saragossa, regarded him as a man
raised up by God to save the Iberian peoples from the tidal wave of barbarism that threatened to inundate the ancient
civilization of Hispania, The Eighth Council of Toledo (653) recorded its admiration of his
character in these glowing terms: "The extraordinary doctor, the latest ornament of the Catholic Church, the most learned man of
the latter ages, always to be named with reverence, Isidore". This tribute was endorsed by the Fifteenth Council of Toledo, held
in 688.
See also
Wikimedia Commons has media related to:
References
- ^ Isidore, Etymologiae, XIV.ii.1[1]; Wesley M. Stevens, "The
Figure of the Earth in Isidore's De natura rerum", Isis, 71(1980): 268-277.
- ^ Isidore, Etymologiae, XIV.v.17[2].
- ^ Isidore, Etymologiae, IX.ii.133[3].
External links
Primary sources
Secondary sources
Other material
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