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St. Jerome

 
Who2 Biography: St. Jerome, Saint / Writer
 
St. Jerome
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  • Born: 347
  • Birthplace: Pannonia (now Slovenia)
  • Died: 420
  • Best Known As: The medieval scholar behind the Latin translation of the Bible

Name at birth: Eusebius Hieronymous

Also known as Sophronius, Jerome was a medieval church scholar, first a hermit and then a secretary to Pope Damasus in the 380s. From there he went to Palestine and devoted himself to study and writing. He wrote ecclesiastical histories, exegeses and translations, and is credited with shaping the Latin version of the Bible (called the Vulgate) from Hebrew and Greek texts.

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Saints: Jerome
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Jerome (Hieronymus) (c.341–420), monk and Doctor of the Church. Born at Strido, near Aquileia, in Dalmatia, Jerome was well educated, first by his father, then by the grammarian Donatus at Rome. After this he studied rhetoric with such success that it is evident in all his writings. Meanwhile he used to visit the churches and especially the catacombs of Rome and was baptized some time before 366. He travelled in Gaul, Dalmatia, and Italy. While at Trier he decided to become a monk; this he did with like-minded friends in Aquileia until, after a quarrel caused by some real or supposed scandal, Jerome left for Palestine. He reached Antioch in 374: two of his companions died, Jerome too was seriously ill. In this state he dreamt that he appeared before God's judgement-seat and was condemned for being a Ciceronian rather than a Christian. For several years he took this experience very seriously. He became a hermit in the desert of Chalcis in Syria for five years, gave up the classics he knew and loved so well, and learnt Hebrew instead to study Scripture in its original language. Already he had learnt Greek, so that, with his mastery of style and rhetoric, he was equipped for his future achievements as writer and translator. Unfortunately Jerome also had a difficult, cantankerous temperament and a sarcastic wit which made him enemies.

After being ordained priest in Antioch, although he had no wish for orders and in fact never said Mass, he studied in Constantinople under Gregory of Nazianzus; no doubt Jerome found himself more at home in the sophisticated capital than among the rustic Syrian monks. There he translated Eusebius' Chronicle from Greek into Latin, and a number of Origen's homilies; to these he added his first original Scriptural work on the Vision of Isaiah, addressed in its later form to Damasus. He returned to Rome to act as interpreter to Paulinus, one of the claimants to the See of Antioch.

Once there, he was retained as his ‘secretary’ by Damasus, then a very old man; he produced other scriptural opuscula, mainly translations. He then embarked on the enormous task of producing a standard Latin text of the Bible, revised according to the meaning of the original texts, but not, apparently, an entirely new translation. He began on the Gospels and the Psalter; eventually he produced all, or nearly all, the Bible in what was later called the Vulgate version. He also wrote a number of influential commentaries on particular books such as the Prophets and the Epistles; that on Matthew's Gospel became a standard work.

His stay in Rome lasted only three years, but during it he became the guide of a group of dedicated Christian ladies, Paula, Marcella, Eustochium, and others, most of whom had been living a semi-monastic life in their widowhood. He gave them much help in their study of Scripture and in their pursuit of a more perfect Christian life apart from the worldly conditions of Rome. His relationship with them gave rise to scandalous gossip, largely unjust. But Jerome made enemies wherever he went: his aggressive sarcasm and readiness to equate himself with authentic tradition were often counter-productive. He paid the price for being a brilliant controversialist for good causes by arousing jealousy and animosity. He left Rome in 385, as he had left Syria and Constantinople before, under something of a cloud; he resolved to start again, this time at Bethlehem, where Paula established a convent of nuns and Jerome one of monks. There he spent the rest of his life, teaching, writing, and studying.

The causes for which he fought were three: the provision of as accurate a text as possible of the Bible through recourse to the original languages and previous translations. The biblical text should be illuminated by sound exegesis. Monastic life should be based on a systematic lectio divina, a prayerful but serious study of Scripture and the Fathers. This life is derived from the Counsels of the Gospel and Paul; it finds its best exemplar in the life of the Virgin Mary, especially in her perpetual virginity. In the welter of conflicting theological opinions of his time he believed the See of Rome was the surest guide. His achievement as scholar and controversialist was somewhat marred by his quarrel with his old friend Rufinus. But his immense learning was unmatched by other Christian writers except Augustine, while his passionate devotion and the asceticism which he believed necessary in the following of Christ are manifest. His works in favour of Christian monasticism such as the Lives of Paul of Thebes, Hilarion, and Malchus, and the works against Jovinian were especially influential. His Letters, for both style and content, are reckoned to be the finest of Christian antiquity.

Jerome died at Bethlehem and was buried under the church of the Nativity there, close to the graves of Paula and Eustochium, close also to the traditional site of the birth of Christ. Later his body was translated to the basilica of St. Mary Major, Rome. In art Jerome is often represented (anachronistically) as a cardinal, sometimes in his monastic cave with a lion at his feet. One Renaissance pope, looking at his portrait, said it was well for him that he held his stone, which was a sign of his voluntary penance, for without this he could scarcely be considered a saint. Such paintings were common from the 15th to the 17th centuries, but the earliest representation of him seems to be one in the 9th-century Bible of Charles the Bald, where he sets out for the Holy Land and expounds the Scriptures to Paula and Eustochium. As one of the four Latin Doctors he is depicted on East Anglian screens and elsewhere. Feast: 30 September.

Bibliography
Click here for a list of abbreviations used in this bibliography.

  • Works in P.L., xxii–xxx and C.S.E.L., liv–lvi, lix; Corpus Christianorum, lxxii and lxxviii; tr. in S.C. and Ancient Christian Writers. Letters tr. by F. A. Wright (1933) and C. C. Mierow (1963); Studies by F. Cavallera, Saint Jerome (2 vols., 1922); I. d'Ivray, Saint Jérôme et les dames de l'Aventin (1938); D. Gorce, Saint Jérôme et la Lectio Divina (1952); A. Penna, S. Gerolamo (1949); id., Principi e carattere dell'exegesi di S. Gerolamo (1950); F. X. Murphy (ed.), A Monument to St. Jerome (1952); H. F. D. Sparks, ‘Jerome as Biblical Scholar’, in The Cambridge History of the Bible, i (1970), 510–41; J.N.D. Kelly, Jerome (1975); E. D. Hunt, Holy Land Pilgrimage in the later Roman Empire (1982) H.S.S.C., iii. 200–8
 
Biography: St. Jerome
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St. Jerome (ca. 345-420) was an early Christian biblical scholar. The official Latin Bible of the Roman Catholic Church, the Vulgate, is largely the product of his labors of translation and revision.

Born in territory now in northwest Yugoslavia, Jerome studied rhetoric as a youth at Rome in preparation for a career in law, which he did not pursue. The 2 decades from his early 20s were a period of much travel and temporary settlement. After a journey to the German city of Trier, he stopped for a time at Aquileia, in Italy, and there became a member of circle of young Christian intellectuals sharing a common commitment to the ascetic life. He had already formed his two consuming interests: scriptural studies and the pursuit of Christian asceticism. In Syria from about 374, for 4 or 5 years he lived as a recluse in the desert, beginning there his study of Hebrew. Finding that life not entirely compatible, he journeyed in 379 to Constantinople, where he was a student of Gregory of Nazianzus; and there also he undertook the translation from Greek into Latin of homilies by Origen, that eminent biblical scholar much admired by Jerome.

For 3 years from 382 Jerome was at Rome, serving as secretary to Pope Damasus. At the Pope's suggestion, he undertook a complete revision of the Latin Gospels of the New Testament, the aim of which was to replace older, varying, and inaccurate versions with a uniform one based on the best available Greek manuscripts. At Rome also he took every opportunity to commend the life of ascetic renunciation, particularly among wealthy and aristocratic ladies, among whom he had a notable following. The death of Damasus in 384 led to Jerome's departure from Rome, and in the company of a group of ascetic enthusiasts he made a pilgrimage to the monastic centers of Palestine and Egypt.

From 386 to the end of his life Jerome was settled in Bethlehem. There he presided over a monastery endowed by the wealthy Paula, who herself presided nearby over a sister foundation for women. Jerome's most significant accomplishment in his 34 years at Bethlehem was his translation of the Old Testament from the original Hebrew into Latin. It was an act of scholarly courage, arousing in his lifetime the criticism of many (including Augustine) who were wedded to the traditional Greek Old Testament as the basis for Latin translations. Of much less credit to Jerome in these years was his role in a number of vitriolic controversies; in the most unfortunate of these he aligned himself with implacable foes of that teacher, then dead a century and a half, from whom Jerome had learned so much - Origen.

Further Reading

A variety of opinions on Jerome are in F. X. Murphy, ed., A Monument to Saint Jerome (1952), a symposium of essays by a number of scholars on various aspects of Jerome's life and significance. David S. Wiesen, St. Jerome as a Satirist: A Study in Christian Latin Thought and Letters (1949), deals with Jerome's writings. See also Jean Steinmann, Saint Jerome and His Times (1959).

Additional Sources

Kelly, J. N. D. (John Norman Davidson), Jerome: his life, writings, and controversies, New York: Harper & Row, 1975.

Warmington, William, A moderate defence of the oath of allegiance, 1612, Ilkley etc.: Scolar Press, 1975.

 
Columbia Encyclopedia: Saint Jerome
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Jerome, Saint (jərōm', jĕr'əm) , c.347–420?, Christian scholar, Father of the Church, Doctor of the Church. He was born in Stridon on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia of Christian parents (although he was not baptized until 366); his Roman name was Sophronius Eusebius Hieronymus. He studied in Rome (c.359–363) under Aelius Donatus. After further study at Trier and Aquileia, he journeyed to the East. At Antioch, in 375, he experienced a vision in which Christ reproved him for his pagan studies. Renouncing his classical scholarship, he fled to the desert to live as an ascetic and to devote himself to scriptural studies, for which he learned Hebrew. In 378 he returned to Antioch, was ordained there the following year, and then went to Constantinople to study under St. Gregory Nazianzen. In 382, Jerome returned to Rome with Gregory, when Pope Damasus I asked them to help settle some Eastern problems; Jerome remained as papal secretary. He was acclaimed for his exposition of Scripture, and Damasus requested him to begin on a new version of the Bible. Jerome was spiritual adviser to a number of noble ladies leading conventual lives, among whom the most eminent was St. Paula. Jerome's outspoken criticism of the secular clergy, however, caused antagonism, and when Damasus died he returned East. From 386 to his death, Jerome worked in the monastery that Paula established for him in Bethlehem. There he did the bulk of revision of his Latin translations of the Bible. He also wrote commentaries on Ecclesiastes and the epistles of St. Paul, translated Origen's homilies, revised part of the Latin version of the Septuagint, and translated from the Hebrew Isaiah and other prophets, Psalms, Kings, and Job. Jerome's texts were the basis of the Vulgate. In 393 he wrote De viris illustribus [concerning illustrious men], biographies of 130 Christian writers. Other works include Adversus Jovinianum [against Jovinian], which praises virginity; a dialogue against the Pelagians; panegyrics on deceased friends (e.g., St. Paula); and brilliantly written letters, of which over 100 remain, which furnish a rare account of his time. His correspondence with St. Augustine, with whom he sometimes quarreled, is of particular interest. St. Jerome was involved in many theological and scholarly controversies, even with a long-established friend such as Rufinus. Collections of patristic literature have translations of many of his works. St. Jerome is buried in the Church of St. Mary Major in Rome. Feast: Sept. 30.

Bibliography

See his letters (ed. by J. Duff, 1942); P. Monceaux, St. Jerome: the Early Years (tr. 1933); D. S. Wiesen, St. Jerome as a Satirist (1964); J. N. D. Kelly (1973); E. F. Rice, Jr., St. Jerome in the Renaissance (1988).

 
Quotes By: St. Jerome
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Quotes:

"A fat stomach never breeds fine thoughts."

"When the stomach is full, it is easy to talk of fasting."

"A friend is long sought, hardly found, and with difficulty kept."

"True friendship ought never to conceal what it thinks."

"The friendship that can cease has never been real."

"Love is not to be purchased, and affection has no price."

See more famous quotes by St. Jerome

 
The Dream Encyclopedia: Saint Jerome
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Jerome was a fourth-century Christian best known for his translation of the Bible into Latin. His translation, known later as the Vulgate, was the authoritative Catholic version of the Bible for the next 1,500 years. Owing to mistranslations of certain key biblical passage, Jerome helped to propagate a negative attitude toward dreams throughout western Christendom.

As a young man, Jerome had collected an extensive personal library of pagan literary works, which he believed conflicted with his Christian faith. This conflict surfaced in a dream in which, brought before the Throne of Judgment, he was told that he was a follower of Cicero rather than Christ. After being subjected to innumerable lashes, Jerome swore that he would never read such worldly books again. It is said that when he awakened his back bore the marks of the lash. Later Jerome dreamed about his own death, as well as about having the supernatural power to fly (a common dream theme, though Jerome might not have been aware of just how common it was).

It was perhaps these dream experiences that led Saint Jerome to mistranslate the Hebrew word for witchcraft, anan, as "observing dreams" (in Latin, observo somnia) when commissioned to translate the Bible by Pope Damasus L Anan appears ten times in the Hebrew Scriptures (the Old Testament), but Jerome translates it as "observing dreams" only three times, in such statements as, "you shall not practice augury nor observe dreams," which more accurately reads, "you shall not practice augury or witchcraft." These simple changes, which made the Bible appear to discourage attending to one's dreams, significantly altered the course of how dreams were viewed for centuries.


 
Wikipedia: Jerome
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Saint Jerome

Saint Jerome by Lucas van Leyden
Priest, Confessor, and Doctor of the Church
Born c. 340-347, Stridon, on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia
Died 420, Bethlehem, Judea
Venerated in Roman Catholic Church
Eastern Orthodoxy
Anglican Communion
Lutheranism
Oriental Orthodoxy
Major shrine Basilica of Saint Mary Major, Rome, Italy
Feast September 30 (Western Christianity)
June 15 (Eastern Christianity)
Attributes lion, cardinal attire, cross, skull, trumpet, owl, books and writing material
Patronage archeologists; archivists; Bible scholars; librarians; libraries; schoolchildren; students; translators

Saint Jerome (c. 347 – September 30, 420) (Formerly Saint Heirom) (Latin: Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus; Greek: Εὐσέβιος Σωφρόνιος Ἱερώνυμος) was a Christian priest [1] and apologist best known for translating the Vulgate. He is recognized by the Catholic Church as a canonized saint and Doctor of the Church, and his version of the Bible is still an important text in Catholicism. He is also recognized as a saint by the Eastern Orthodox Church, where he is known as St Jerome of Stridonium or Blessed Jerome.[2] He is presumed by some to have been an Illyrian.

In art, he is often represented as one of the four Latin doctors of the Church along with Augustine of Hippo, Ambrose, and Pope Gregory I. As a prominent member of the Roman clergy, he has often been portrayed anachronistically[3] in the garb of a cardinal. Even when he is depicted as a half-clad anchorite, with cross, skull and Bible for the only furniture of his cell, the red hat or some other indication of his rank as cardinal is as a rule introduced somewhere in the picture. He is also often depicted with a lion, due to a medieval story in which he removed a thorn from a lion's paw,[4] and less often with an owl, the symbol of wisdom and scholarship.[5] Writing materials and the trumpet of final judgment are also part of his iconography.[5] He is commemorated on 30 September with a memorial.

Contents

Life

Saint Jerome in his Study, by Domenico Ghirlandaio

Jerome was born at Stridon, on the border between Pannonia, Dalmatia, and Italy,[6] close to Aquileia.

Jerome was possibly an Illyrian, born to Roman Catholic parents, but was not baptized until about 360 or 366, when he had gone to Rome with his friend Bonosus (who may or may not have been the same Bonosus whom Jerome identifies as his friend who went to live as a hermit on an island in the Adriatic) to pursue rhetorical and philosophical studies. He studied under the grammarian Aelius Donatus. There Jerome learned the Greek and Latin languages.[7]

As a student in Rome, he sinned casually and afterwards suffered bouts of repentance. To appease his conscience, he would visit on Sundays the sepulchres of the martyrs and the apostles in the catacombs.[8]

After several years in Rome, he travelled with Bonosus to Gaul and settled in Trier where he seems to have first taken up theological studies, and where he copied, for his friend Tyrannius Rufinus, Hilary of Poitiers' commentary on the Psalms and the treatise De synodis. Next came a stay of at least several months, or possibly years, with Rufinus at Aquileia where he made many Christian friends.

Some of these accompanied him when he set out about 373 on a journey through Thrace and Asia Minor into northern Syria. At Antioch, where he stayed the longest, two of his companions died and he himself was seriously ill more than once. During one of these illnesses (about the winter of 373-374), he had a vision that led him to lay aside his secular studies and devote himself to the things of God. He seems to have abstained for a considerable time from the study of the classics and to have plunged deeply into that of the Bible, under the impulse of Apollinaris of Laodicea, then teaching in Antioch and not yet suspected of heresy.

St. Jerome reading in the countryside, by Giovanni Bellini

Seized with a desire for a life of ascetic penance, he went for a time to the desert of Chalcis, to the southwest of Antioch, known as the Syrian Thebaid, from the number of hermits inhabiting it. During this period, he seems to have found time for study and writing. He made his first attempt to learn Hebrew under the guidance of a converted Jew; and he seems to have been in correspondence with Jewish Christians in Antioch.Possibly during this time he became interested in the Gospel according to the Hebrews, which he would later write was the true Gospel of Matthew.

Returning to Antioch in 378 or 379, he was ordained by Bishop Paulinus, apparently unwillingly and on condition that he continue his ascetic life. Soon afterward, he went to Constantinople to pursue a study of Scripture under Gregory Nazianzen. He seems to have spent two years there; the next three (382-385) he was in Rome again, attached to Pope Damasus I and the leading Roman Christians. Invited originally for the synod of 382, held to end the schism of Antioch, he made himself indispensable to the pope, and took a prominent place in his councils.

St. Jerome, by Peter Paul Rubens, 1625–1630

Among his other duties, he undertook a revision of the Latin Bible, to be based on the Greek New Testament. He also updated the Psalter then at use in Rome based on the Septuagint. Though he did not realize it yet at this point, translating much of what became the Latin Vulgate Bible would take many years, and be his most important achievement (see Writings- Translations section below).

In Rome he was surrounded by a circle of well-born and well-educated women, including some from the noblest patrician families, such as the widows Marcella and Paula, with their daughters Blaesilla and Eustochium. The resulting inclination of these women to the monastic life, and his unsparing criticism of the secular clergy, brought a growing hostility against him amongst the clergy and their supporters. Soon after the death of his patron Damasus (December 10, 384), Jerome was forced to leave his position at Rome after an inquiry by the Roman clergy into allegations that he had improper relations with the widow Paula.

Additionally, his condemnation of Blaesilla's zest for life had lead Blaesilla to adopt aescetic practices, but exacerbated her physical weakness to the point that she died just four months after starting to follow his instructions; much of the Roman populace were outraged at Jerome for causing the premature death of such a lively young woman, and his insistence to Paula that Blaesilla should not be mourned, and complaints that her grief was excessive, were seen as heartless, polarising Roman opinion against him.[9]

In August 385, he returned to Antioch, accompanied by his brother Paulinianus and several friends, and followed a little later by Paula and Eustochium, who had resolved to end their days in the Holy Land. In the winter of 385, Jerome acted as their spiritual adviser. The pilgrims, joined by Bishop Paulinus of Antioch, visited Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and the holy places of Galilee, and then went to Egypt, the home of the great heroes of the ascetic life.

At the Catechetical School of Alexandria, Jerome listened to the blind catechist Didymus the Blind expounding the prophet Hosea and telling his reminiscences of Anthony the Great, who had died thirty years before; he spent some time in Nitria, admiring the disciplined community life of the numerous inhabitants of that "city of the Lord", but detecting even there "concealed serpents", i.e., the influence of Origen of Alexandria. Late in the summer of 388 he was back in Palestine, and spent the remainder of his life in a hermit's cell near Bethlehem, surrounded by a few friends, both men and women (including Paula and Eustochium), to whom he acted as priestly guide and teacher.

Painting by Niccolò Antonio Colantonio, showing St. Jerome's removal of a thorn from a lion's paw.

Amply provided by Paula with the means of livelihood and of increasing his collection of books, he led a life of incessant activity in literary production. To these last thirty-four years of his career belong the most important of his works—his version of the Old Testament from the original Hebrew text, the best of his scriptural commentaries, his catalogue of Christian authors, and the dialogue against the Pelagians, the literary perfection of which even an opponent recognized. To this period also belong most of his polemics, which distinguished him among the orthodox Fathers, including the treatises against the Origenism of Bishop John II of Jerusalem and his early friend Rufinus. As a result of his writings against Pelagianism, a body of excited partisans broke into the monastic buildings, set them on fire, attacked the inmates and killed a deacon, forcing Jerome to seek safety in a neighboring fortress (416).

Jerome died near Bethlehem on September 30, 420. The date of his death is given by the Chronicon of Prosper of Aquitaine. His remains, originally buried at Bethlehem, are said to have been later transferred to the basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, though other places in the West claim some relics—the cathedral at Nepi boasting possession of his head, which, according to another tradition, is in the Escorial.

Translations and commentaries

St Jerome, by Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, 1607, at St John's Co-Cathedral, Valletta, Malta

Jerome was a scholar at a time when that statement implied a fluency in Greek. He knew some Hebrew when he started his translation project, but moved to Jerusalem to strengthen his grip on Jewish scripture commentary. A wealthy Roman aristocrat, Paula, funded his stay in a monastery in Bethlehem and he completed his translation there. He began in 382 by correcting the existing Latin language version of the New Testament, commonly referred to as the Vetus Latina. By 390 he turned to the Hebrew Bible, having previously translated portions from the Septuagint. He completed this work by 405. Prior to Jerome's Vulgate, all Latin translations of the Old Testament were based on the Septuagint. Jerome's decision to use a Hebrew text instead of the Septuagint went against the advice of most other Christians, including Augustine, who considered the Septuagint inspired. Modern scholarship, however, has cast doubts on the actual quality of Jerome's Hebrew knowledge; the Greek Hexapla is now considered as still the main source also for Jerome's "iuxta Hebraeos" translation of the Old Testament.[10]

For the next fifteen years, until he died, Jerome produced a number of commentaries on Scripture, often explaining his translation choices. His patristic commentaries align closely with Jewish tradition, and he indulges in allegorical and mystical subtleties after the manner of Philo and the Alexandrian school. Unlike his contemporaries, he emphasizes the difference between the Hebrew Bible "apocrypha" and the Hebraica veritas of the protocanonical books. Evidence of this can be found in his introductions to the Solomonic writings, the Book of Tobit, and the Book of Judith. Most notable, however, is the statement from his introduction to the Books of Samuel:

This preface to the Scriptures may serve as a helmeted [i.e. defensive] introduction to all the books which we turn from Hebrew into Latin, so that we may be assured that what is outside of them must be placed aside among the Apocryphal writings.[11]

Jerome's commentaries fall into three groups:

  • His translations or recastings of Greek predecessors, including fourteen homilies on the Book of Jeremiah and the same number on the Book of Ezekiel by Origen (translated ca. 380 in Constantinople); two homilies of Origen of Alexandria on the Song of Solomon (in Rome, ca. 383); and thirty-nine on the Gospel of Luke (ca. 389, in Bethlehem). The nine homilies of Origen on the Book of Isaiah included among his works were not done by him. Here should be mentioned, as an important contribution to the topography of Palestine, his book De situ et nominibus locorum Hebraeorum, a translation with additions and some regrettable omissions of the Onomasticon of Eusebius. To the same period (ca. 390) belongs the Liber interpretationis nominum Hebraicorum, based on a work supposed to go back to Philo and expanded by Origen.
  • Original commentaries on the Old Testament. To the period before his settlement at Bethlehem and the following five years belong a series of short Old Testament studies: De seraphim, De voce Osanna, De tribus quaestionibus veteris legis (usually included among the letters as 18, 20, and 36); Quaestiones hebraicae in Genesim; Commentarius in Ecclesiasten; Tractatus septem in Psalmos 10-16 (lost); Explanationes in Michaeam, Sophoniam, Nahum, Habacuc, Aggaeum. About 395 he composed a series of longer commentaries, though in rather a desultory fashion: first on the remaining seven minor prophets, then on Isaiah (ca. 395-ca. 400), on the Book of Daniel (ca. 407), on Ezekiel (between 410 and 415), and on Jeremiah (after 415, left unfinished).
  • New Testament commentaries. These include only Philemon, Galatians, Ephesians, and Titus (hastily composed 387-388); Matthew (dictated in a fortnight, 398); Mark, selected passages in Luke, Revelation, and the prologue to the Gospel of John. Treating Revelation in his cursory fashion, he made use of an excerpt from the commentary of the North African Tichonius, which is preserved as a sort of argument at the beginning of the more extended work of the Spanish presbyter Beatus of Liébana. But before this he had already devoted to the Revelation another treatment, a rather arbitrary recasting of the commentary of Saint Victorinus, with whose chiliastic views he was not in accord, substituting for the chiliastic conclusion a spiritualizing exposition of his own, supplying an introduction, and making certain changes in the text.

The works of Hippolytus of Rome and Irenaeus greatly influenced Jerome's interpretation of prophecy.[12] He noted the distinction between the original Septuagint and Theodotion's later substitution.[13]

Jerome warned that those substituting false interpretations for the actual meaning of Scripture belonged to the “synagogue of the Antichrist”.[14] “He that is not of Christ is of Antichrist,” he wrote to Pope Damasus I.[15] He believed that “the mystery of iniquity” written about by Paul in 2 Thessalonians 2:7 was already in action when “every one chatters about his views.”[16] To Jerome, the power restraining this mystery of iniquity was the Roman Empire, but as it fell this restraining force was removed. He warned a noble woman of Gaul:

“He that letteth is taken out of the way, and yet we do not realize that Antichrist is near. Yes, Antichrist is near whom the Lord Jesus Christ “shall consume with the spirit of his mouth.” “Woe unto them,” he cries, “that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days.”... Savage tribes in countless numbers have overrun run all parts of Gaul. The whole country between the Alps and the Pyrenees, between the Rhine and the Ocean, has been laid waste by hordes of Quadi, Vandals, Sarmatians, Alans, Gepids, Herules, Saxons, Burgundians, Allemanni, and—alas! for the commonweal!-- even Pannonians. [17]

His Commentary on Daniel was expressly written to offset the criticisms of Porphyry,[18] who taught that Daniel related entirely to the time of Antiochus IV Epiphanes and was written by an unknown individual living in the second century BC. Against Porphyry, Jerome identified Rome as the fourth kingdom of chapters two and seven, but his view of chapters eight and 11 was more complex. Jerome held that chapter eight describes the activity of Antiochus Epiphanes, who is understood as a "type" of a future antichrist; 11:24 onwards applies primarily to a future antichrist but was partially fulfilled by Antiochus. Instead, he advocated that the “little horn” was the Antichrist:

We should therefore concur with the traditional interpretation of all the commentators of the Christian Church, that at the end of the world, when the Roman Empire is to be destroyed, there shall be ten kings who will partition the Roman world amongst themselves. Then an insignificant eleventh king will arise, who will overcome three of the ten kings... after they have been slain, the seven other kings also will bow their necks to the victor.[19]

In his Commentary on Daniel, he noted, “Let us not follow the opinion of some commentators and suppose him to be either the Devil or some demon, but rather, one of the human race, in whom Satan will wholly take up his residence in bodily form.” [20] Instead of rebuilding the Jewish Temple to reign from, Jerome thought the Antichrist sat in God’s Temple inasmuch as he made “himself out to be like God.” [21]

Jerome identified the four prophetic kingdoms symbolized in Daniel 2 as the Neo-Babylonian Empire, the Medes and Persians, Macedon, and Rome.[22] Jerome identified the stone cut out without hands as "namely, the Lord and Savior".[23]

Jerome refuted Porphyry's application of the little horn of chapter seven to Antiochus. He expected that at the end of the world, Rome would be destroyed, and partitioned among ten kingdoms before the little horn appeared.[24]

Jerome believed that Cyrus of Persia is the higher of the two horns of the Medo-Persian ram of Daniel 8:3.[25] The he-goat is Greece smiting Persia.[26] Alexander is the great horn, which is then succeeded by Alexander's half brother Philip and three of his generals.

Historical writings

  • One of Jerome's earliest attempts in the department of history was his Chronicle (or Chronicon or Temporum liber), composed ca. 380 in Constantinople; this is a translation into Latin of the chronological tables which compose the second part of the Chronicon of Eusebius, with a supplement covering the period from 325 to 379. Despite numerous errors taken over from Eusebius, and some of his own, Jerome produced a valuable work, if only for the impulse which it gave to such later chroniclers as Prosper, Cassiodorus, and Victor of Tunnuna to continue his annals.
  • Three other works of a hagiological nature are:
    • the Vita Pauli monachi, written during his first sojourn at Antioch (ca. 376), the legendary material of which is derived from Egyptian monastic tradition;
    • the Vitae Patrum (Vita Pauli primi eremitae), a biography of Saint Paul of Thebes;
    • the Vita Malchi monachi captivi (ca. 391), probably based on an earlier work, although it purports to be derived from the oral communications of the aged ascetic Malchus originally made to him in the desert of Chalcis;
    • the Vita Hilarionis, of the same date, containing more trustworthy historical matter than the other two, and based partly on the biography of Epiphanius and partly on oral tradition.
  • The so-called Martyrologium Hieronymianum is spurious; it was apparently composed by a western monk toward the end of the sixth or beginning of the seventh century, with reference to an expression of Jerome's in the opening chapter of the Vita Malchi, where he speaks of intending to write a history of the saints and martyrs from the apostolic times.
  • But the most important of Jerome's historical works is the book De viris illustribus, written at Bethlehem in 392, the title and arrangement of which are borrowed from Suetonius. It contains short biographical and literary notes on 135 Christian authors, from Saint Peter down to Jerome himself. For the first seventy-eight authors Eusebius (Historia ecclesiastica) is the main source; in the second section, beginning with Arnobius and Lactantius, he includes a good deal of independent information, especially as to western writers.

Letters

Jerome's letters or epistles, both by the great variety of their subjects and by their qualities of style, form the most interesting portion of his literary remains. Whether he is discussing problems of scholarship, or reasoning on cases of conscience, comforting the afflicted, or saying pleasant things to his friends, scourging the vices and corruptions of the time, exhorting to the ascetic life and renunciation of the world, or breaking a lance with his theological opponents, he gives a vivid picture not only of his own mind, but of the age and its peculiar characteristics.

The letters most frequently reprinted or referred to are of a hortatory nature, such as Ep. 14, Ad Heliodorum de laude vitae solitariae; Ep. 22, Ad Eustochium de custodia virginitatis; Ep. 52, Ad Nepotianum de vita clericorum et monachorum, a sort of epitome of pastoral theology from the ascetic standpoint; Ep. 53, Ad Paulinum de studio scripturarum; Ep. 57, to the same, De institutione monachi; Ep. 70, Ad Magnum de scriptoribus ecclesiasticis; and Ep. 107, Ad Laetam de institutione filiae.

Theological writings

Practically all of Jerome's productions in the field of dogma have a more or less vehemently polemical character, and are directed against assailants of the orthodox doctrines. Even the translation of the treatise of Didymus the Blind on the Holy Spirit into Latin (begun in Rome 384, completed at Bethlehem) shows an apologetic tendency against the Arians and Pneumatomachoi. The same is true of his version of Origen's De principiis (ca. 399), intended to supersede the inaccurate translation by Rufinus. The more strictly polemical writings cover every period of his life. During the sojourns at Antioch and Constantinople he was mainly occupied with the Arian controversy, and especially with the schisms centering around Meletius of Antioch and Lucifer Calaritanus. Two letters to Pope Damasus (15 and 16) complain of the conduct of both parties at Antioch, the Meletians and Paulinians, who had tried to draw him into their controversy over the application of the terms ousia and hypostasis to the Trinity. At the same time or a little later (379) he composed his Liber Contra Luciferianos, in which he cleverly uses the dialogue form to combat the tenets of that faction, particularly their rejection of baptism by heretics.

In Rome (ca. 383) he wrote a passionate counterblast against the teaching of Helvidius, in defense of the doctrine of The perpetual virginity of Mary and of the superiority of the single over the married state. An opponent of a somewhat similar nature was Jovinianus, with whom he came into conflict in 392 (Adversus Jovinianum, Against Jovinianus) and the defense of this work addressed to his friend Pammachius, numbered 48 in the letters). Once more he defended the ordinary Catholic practices of piety and his own ascetic ethics in 406 against the Spanish presbyter Vigilantius, who opposed the cultus of martyrs and relics, the vow of poverty, and clerical celibacy. Meanwhile the controversy with John II of Jerusalem and Rufinus concerning the orthodoxy of Origen occurred. To this period belong some of his most passionate and most comprehensive polemical works: the Contra Joannem Hierosolymitanum (398 or 399); the two closely-connected Apologiae contra Rufinum (402); and the "last word" written a few months later, the Liber tertius seu ultima responsio adversus scripta Rufini. The last of his polemical works is the skilfully-composed Dialogus contra Pelagianos (415).

Jerome's reception by later Christianity

Jerome is the second most voluminous writer (after St. Augustine) in ancient Latin Christianity. In the Roman Catholic Church, he is recognized as the patron saint of translators, librarians and encyclopedists.

He acquired a knowledge of Hebrew by studying with a Jew who converted to Christianity, and took the unusual position (for that time) that the Hebrew, and not the Septuagint, was the inspired text of the Old Testament. The traditional view is that he used this knowledge to translate what became known as the Vulgate, and his translation was slowly but eventually accepted in the Catholic Church.[27] The later resurgence of Hebrew studies within Christianity owes much to him. On the other hand, recent scholarship argues that Jerome knew barely a word of Hebrew, and that his "translation" was in fact based on the Greek of Origen's Hexapla.[28]

Jerome sometimes seemed arrogant, and occasionally despised or belittled his literary rivals, especially Ambrose. But Jerome himself came under attack, especially from Rufinus, for falsely claiming to have read many authors whose works he had in fact never laid eyes upon. One notorious example[28] was when he claimed to have read the works of Pythagoras. When Rufinus pointed out that Pythagoras had not in fact written anything, Jerome replied that he was speaking "de dogmatibus eorum, non de libris , quae potui in Bruto discere" ("not about his books, but his teachings, which I learnt about in [the philosopher] Brutus"). The writings of Brutus, however, had been lost for centuries.

He showed more zeal and interest in the ascetic ideal than in abstract speculation. It was this strict asceticism that made Martin Luther judge him so severely. In fact, Protestant readers are not generally inclined to accept his writings as authoritative. The tendency to recognize a superior comes out in his correspondence with Augustine (cf. Jerome's letters numbered 56, 67, 102-105, 110-112, 115-116; and 28, 39, 40, 67-68, 71-75, 81-82 in Augustine's).

Despite the criticisms already mentioned, Jerome has retained a rank among the western Fathers. This would be his due, if for nothing else, on account of the great influence exercised by his Latin version of the Bible upon the subsequent ecclesiastical and theological development.

Quotes

I praise wedlock, I praise marriage, but it is because they give me virgins. [...] to command virginity would have been to abrogate wedlock. It would have been a hard enactment to compel opposition to nature and to extort from men the angelic life; and not only so, it would have been to condemn what is a divine ordinance. (Jerome's Letter 22, to Eustochium, section 20 on-line)
Be ever engaged, so that whenever the devil calls he may find you occupied. (Letter 125, to the priest Innocent)
Ignorance of the Scriptures is ignorance of Christ. (Jerome's Prologue to the “Commentary on Isaiah”: PL 24,17)

See also

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Notes

  1. ^ Saint Jerome, Catholic Encyclopedia
  2. ^ Though "Blessed" in this context does not have the sense of being less than a saint, as in the West.
  3. ^ Saint Jerome and some library lions
  4. ^ The lion episode, in Vita Divi Hieronymi (Migne Pat. Lat. XXII, c. 209ff.) was translated by Helen Waddell Beasts and Saints (NY: Henry Holt) 1934) (on-line retelling).
  5. ^ a b The Collection: St. Jerome, gallery of the religious art collection of New Mexico State University, with explanations. Accessed August 10, 2007.
  6. ^ Michael Walsh, ed. Butler's Lives of the Saints. (HarperCollins Publishers: New York, 1991) pp 307.
  7. ^ Michael Walsh, ed. Butler's Lives of the Saints. (HarperCollins Publishers: New York, 1991) pp 307.
  8. ^ Robert Payne, The Fathers of the Western Church, (New York: Viking Press, 1951) pp 91.
  9. ^ Joyce Salisbury, Encyclopedia of women in the ancient world, Blaesilla
  10. ^ Pierre Nautin, article Hieronymus, in: Theologische Realenzyklopädie, Vol. 15, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin - New York 1986, p. 304-315, here p. 309-310.
  11. ^ http://www.bible-researcher.com/jerome.html
  12. ^ Farrar, Lives, vol. 2, p. 229.
  13. ^ Jerome, Preface to Daniel, in APNF, 2d series, vol. 6, p. 492.
  14. ^ See Jerome’s The Dialogue against the Luciferians, p.334 in A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church : St. Jerome: Letters and select works, 1893. Second Series By Philip Schaff, Henry Wace.
  15. ^ See Jerome’s Letter to Pope Damasus, p.19 in A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church : St. Jerome: Letters and select works, 1893. Second Series By Philip Schaff, Henry Wace.
  16. ^ See Jerome’s Against the Pelagians, Book I, p.449 in A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church : St. Jerome: Letters and select works, 1893. Second Series By Philip Schaff, Henry Wace.
  17. ^ See Jerome’s Letter to Ageruchia, p.236-7 in A Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church : St. Jerome: Letters and select works, 1893. Second Series By Philip Schaff, Henry Wace.
  18. ^ Eremantle, note on Jerome's commentary on Daniel, in NPAF, 2d series, Vol. 6, p. 500.
  19. ^ See Jerome’s Commentary on Daniel
  20. ^ See Jerome’s Commentary on Daniel
  21. ^ See Jerome’s Commentary on Daniel
  22. ^ Jerome, Commentaria in Danelem, chap. 2, verses 31-40
  23. ^ Jerome, Commentaria in Danieluem, chap. 2, verse 40
  24. ^ Jerome, Commentario in Danielem, chap. 7, verse 8
  25. ^ Jerome, Commentario in Danielem
  26. ^ Jerome, Commentaria in Danielem, chap. 8, verse 5
  27. ^ Stefan Rebenich, Jerome (New York: Routlage, 2002), pp. 52-59
  28. ^ a b "Jerome: The "Vir Trilinguis" and the "Hebraica Veritas"". http://www.jstor.org/stable/1584340?seq=1&Search=yes&term=Seneca&term=Pythagoras&term=Jerome&term=ac&list=hide&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3DJerome%2BPythagoras%2Bac%2BSeneca%26x%3D0%26y%3D0%26wc%3Don&item=3&ttl=107&returnArticleService=showArticle&resultsServiceName=doBasicResultsFromArticle. Retrieved on 2008-12-17. 

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Bibliography

  • J.N.D. Kelly, "Jerome: His Life, Writings, and Controversies" (Peabody, MA 1998)
  • S. Rebenich, "Jerome" (London and New York, 2002)

References

  • "Biblia Sacra Vulgata," Stuttgart, 1994. ISBN 3-438-05303-9
  • This article uses material from Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religion.
  • birth/death dates from Cameron, A (1993). The Later Roman Empire. London: Fontana Press. pp. 203. ISBN 0-00-686172-5. 

 
 

 

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