Corpus of Latin Ecclesiastical Writers, Vol. LXV: Hilary's Treatise on the Mysteries, Fragments, and Hymns

Jerome, therefore, seems to have had before his eyes a copy that contained both the book of mysteries and the book of hymns, just as Codex A does. However, since he often does not indicate the titles of the works he enumerates with sufficient care, the true and plain title cannot be certainly elicited from his words. We have already said above that the inscription of the work perished along with the first folio in Codex A. However, the subscription gives us an opportunity to define the title more accurately. For it reads thus: finit tractatus mysteriorum S. Hilarii episcopi etc. Here ends the treatise on mysteries of Saint Hilary, bishop, etc. We shall soon see that the scribe wrote finit ends (singular) by mistake for finiunt end (plural). The term tractatus treatise, moreover, was a very common term in the 4th century for designating commentaries or homilies interpreting the Holy Scriptures. Other examples are our Hilary's Tractatus super psalmos Treatise on the Psalms, Tractatus in Iob Treatise on Job (Jerome, de viris inl. 100), and the Tractatus of Gregory of Elvira, which are commonly attributed to Origen. Other reasons can also be offered to persuade one that the inscription of the work was Tractatus mysteriorum. The work is divided into two books; after the treatise on Moses is completed, one reads in Codex A: explicit liber primus. incipit secundus The first book ends. The second begins (p. 30, note 4). It is very unlikely that the author himself called his work, which he divided into two books, the Liber mysteriorum Book of Mysteries. Furthermore, Hilary himself uses the term tractare to treat three times to indicate the nature of the work's subject matter: "but in their own times I will treat all things from Adam" (4, 4), and "although it was useful to know the significance of the spiritual acts to have treated [this]" (32, 26 sq.; cf. 13, 18). Finally, the subject of the work clearly agrees with the notion we attach to the term tractatus. Regarding the meaning of the word mysteriorum of mysteries, learned men had various theories before the text of the Tractatus itself was found. Most thought the Tractatus was a liturgical work intended for the use of the Gallican churches. From the work itself, however, it is clear that the word mysterium has the sense of 'type', 'example', or 'image', a sense frequently found among ecclesiastical writers (cf. Studien III 38).

Regarding the titles that we have placed at the beginning of each interpretation of the patriarchs and prophets in the text, some were written in the margin of Codex A in red ink, such as 4, 8 de adam on Adam, 7, 24 de cain et abel on Cain and Abel, 10, 20 de lamech on Lamech, 32, 25 de hiesu naue on Joshua; others were written in the same color within the text itself, such as 12, 14 de noe on Noah, 22, 12 de moyse on Moses, 30, 5 de osee on Hosea; finally, others, which perished in the codex itself along with the leaves, but which can be restored from the context of the preserved fragments and the subscription of Codex A, we have substituted, enclosing them in brackets, such as 15, 23 de abraham on Abraham, 17, 10 de ysahac on Isaac. We have placed all titles in the text itself, however, because one may conclude from the titles written within the text of Codex A that all the titles originate not from some scribe, but from the author of the Tractatus himself. The eleventh chapter of the first book, where Hilary continues to speak of the patriarch Seth after explaining the deeds of Lamech, is not inscribed with any title, perhaps because this interpretation is very brief and in Genesis the narrative about Seth immediately follows the narrative about Lamech in the same chapter.