On the Ancient Synagogue

** 3

DEDICATION.

...-g The previous page ended with "omittin-" [those things], both insofar as I thought it was in the interest of the Church original: "Ecclesiæ interesse" that I keep my reputation as unsullied as possible; and then especially, insofar as this truth, when correctly and solidly demonstrated, commends itself to the excellent uses listed in the Work itself; besides the remarkable light which Scripture receives from it. For indeed, lest I should seem to have set aside the Divine Letters meaning the Holy Scriptures while I was discussing the opinions and statutes of the Masters likely referring to the Jewish Rabbinic authorities whose works he is analyzing, I applied myself especially diligently to this: that upon every given opportunity I might shed light on many passages of Holy Scripture whose meanings lay hidden in obscurity. In this whole Disputation Disputation: A formal academic argument or treatise, usually involving the examination of different viewpoints, however, I have conducted myself with as much modesty as I have with trepidation; having provoked or offended no Learned Man with my words, as far as I know. For I certainly know that I am dealing here with a Work full of dangerous risk original: "periculosæ... plenum Opus aleæ"; an allusion to the Roman poet Horace, referring to the "dangerous game of chance" involved in handling controversial or historical topics, as the saying goes; and in weaving this Work together, I had even greater reason to set before myself that which Jerome said when he was about to write the Funeral Oration for Nepotian: Small minds cannot sustain great subjects original: "Grandes materias ingenia parva non sustinent"; Saint Jerome, Letter 60. There are many things here that are doubtful and obscure, for which a great skill in matters, clarity of judgment, and the tools of vast and solid erudition are required to successfully unearth them from Antiquity and reconcile them. These qualities I know, first of all, to be very modest and small in myself; furthermore, time did not permit [more], nor, even if it had permitted it most greatly, [would I have obtained] from my mind...