Complete Works of Saint Jerome, Vol. IX

A proved the Hebrew volumes described by him, or compared with Greek interpreters, as well as the province of Palestine, which he traversed and traveled for the sake of a fuller understanding of Hebrew names, having also taken the most learned masters of the Jews as his companions. Let us follow each in its own order. He excuses himself to St. Damasus for his slowness in Epistle 125, because he did not write back immediately to his questions, being detained by another work. What such a work is, however, he declared in these words at the beginning of the same epistle: In the meantime, however, I was moving the tongue, and he was moving the articulation, when suddenly a Hebrew intervened, bringing not a few B volumes, which he had received from the Synagogue as if to read. And immediately: You have, he said, what you had asked for: and he frightened me, being doubtful and not knowing what to do, with such haste that, leaving all else behind, I flew to transcribing: which indeed I do to this present day. Detained similarly by Hebrew letters, and the constant contention of books, he gave a shorter Epistle 74 to Marcella: That I wrote so small C an epistle, he says, was for a double cause, because the courier was hastening, and I, detained by another work, was occupying myself with this as a sort of parergon secondary task. You ask what that is, so great, so necessary, by which the duty of epistolary conversation was excluded. Long since, I have been comparing the edition of Aquila with the volumes of the Hebrews; lest by chance, because of hatred for Christ, the Synagogue may have changed anything: and to confess to a friendly mind, concerning what pertains to the strengthening of our faith, I find many things. Now, with the prophets, Solomon, the Psalter, and the books of Kings having been examined exactly, I hold Exodus, which they call ELLESMOTH, about to pass to Leviticus: you see, therefore, that no duty is to be placed before this work. Occupied with these studies in Rome, the holy man desired, moreover, to contemplate Judea with his eyes: for just as they understand the histories of the Greeks better who have seen Athens; so he will view the holy Scripture more clearly, who has contemplated Judea with his own eyes, or has recognized the memories of ancient cities, and places, and the same names, or those that have been changed. Hence, it was also a care for Jerome to undertake this labor with the most learned of the Hebrews, so that they might travel around the province that all the Churches of Christ sound forth. Thus, he himself, in conceived words to Domnio and Rogatianus in the preface to the book of Chronicles, with which he also confessed that he never trusted himself in divine volumes by his own*

powers, nor had his own opinion as a master, but was accustomed to ask even about those things he thought he knew; how much more in those about which he was uncertain? He confirms this, indeed, with the following argument: Finally, he says, when you recently demanded by letter that I translate Chronicles into the Latin language for you; I took a certain doctor of the law from Tiberias, who was held in admiration among the Hebrews, and I conferred with him from the crown, as they say, to the tip of the toe: and thus confirmed, I dared to do what you were ordering. What more could be desired in a studious man, I certainly do not see. He exhausts all his labor in Hebrew matters, does not spare his expense, undergoes laborious pilgrimages, constantly confers with the most learned of the Jews; he describes books with his own hand; he contends with the Greeks by means of the Hebrews. Finally, what did he not do to attain understanding of the holy language? Rightly, therefore, he said above: And I give thanks to the Lord, because from the bitter seed of letters I harvest sweet fruits; that is, the knowledge of the divine Scriptures, and the skill of the Hebrew speech.

IV. Jerome, therefore, distinguished by the knowledge of many languages, and celebrated by all for his learning, began to be requested by many to translate the sacred books from the Hebrew sources into the Latin language. All the prefaces to the Old Testament, of which we will submit examples in part, are witnesses to this matter. And it is superfluous that what is found said in them is written otherwise than it is said there. Let us begin, therefore, with Genesis, the prologue of which is as follows: I have received the letters of my desired one, who by a certain presage of future things shared a name with Daniel (Dan. x, 11, 19), beseeching that I hand over to the ears of our people the Pentateuch, translated into the Latin language from the Hebrew speech. Perhaps this Desiderius was that holy presbyter in Gascony, who with Riparius was the author of the brilliant work by Jerome for the holy relics of the martyrs against Vigilantius. The authors of these little dictations of mine, says Jerome, are the holy presbyters Riparius and Desiderius, who write that their parishes are stained by the vicinity of that man, and they sent the books through brother Sisinnius, etc. Unless we believe it was another Desiderius, an honest and eloquent man, to whom the Holy Doctor was writing Epistle 154, in which it also appears that the short works of Jerome were vehemently requested by him, who with Daniel...