Saint Jerome

[Michael_J_Lord]

Is it true that Saint Jerome did not believe that the Deuterocanonical books were inspired at first and then afterwords changed his mind?

 

[jcrichton]

Is it true that Saint Jerome did not believe that the Deuterocanonical books were inspired at first and then afterwords changed his mind?

I have heard this before… I think that, just as with Scriptures, many Catholics and non-Catholics chose to do selective reading and adopt those writings and authors that support their arguments (which usually contradict the Church); here’s a take on St. Jerome:

newadvent.org/cathen/03267a.htm

The influence of Origen’s and Athanasius’s restricted canon naturally spread to the West. St. Hilary of Poitiers and Rufinus followed their footsteps, excluding the deuteros from canonical rank in theory, but admitting them in practice. The latter styles them “ecclesiastical” books, but in authority unequal to the other Scriptures. St. Jerome cast his weighty suffrage on the side unfavourable to the disputed books. In appreciating his attitude we must remember that Jerome lived long in Palestine, in an environment where everything outside the Jewish Canon was suspect, and that, moreover, he had an excessive veneration for the Hebrew text, the Hebraica veritas as he called it. In his famous “Prologus Galeatus”, or Preface to his translation of Samuel and Kings, he declares that everything not Hebrew should be classed with the apocrypha, and explicitly says that Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Tobias, and Judith are not on the Canon. These books, he adds, are read in the churches for the edification of the people, and not for the confirmation of revealed doctrine. An analysis of Jerome’s expressions on the deuterocanonicals, in various letters and prefaces, yields the following results: first, he strongly doubted their inspiration; secondly, the fact that he occasionally quotes them, and translated some of them as a concession to ecclesiastical tradition, is an involuntary testimony on his part to the high standing these writings enjoyed in the Church at large, and to the strength of the practical tradition which prescribed their readings in public worship. Obviously, the inferior rank to which the deuteros were relegated by authorities like Origen, Athanasius, and Jerome, was due to too rigid a conception of canonicity, one demanding that a book, to be entitled to this supreme dignity, must be received by all, must have the sanction of Jewish antiquity, and must moreover be adapted not only to edification, but also to the “confirmation of the doctrine of the Church”, to borrow Jerome’s phrase.

But while eminent scholars and theorists were thus depreciating the additional writings, the official attitude of the Latin Church, always favourable to them, kept the majestic tenor of its way. Two documents of capital importance in the history of the canon constitute the first formal utterance of papal authority on the subject. The first is the so-called “Decretal of Gelasius”, de recipiendis et non recipiendis libris, the essential part of which is now generally attributed to a synod convoked by Pope Damasus in the year 382. The other is the Canon of Innocent I, sent in 405 to a Gallican bishop in answer to an inquiry. Both contain all the deuterocanonicals, without any distinction, and are identical with the catalogue of Trent. The African Church, always a staunch supporter of the contested books, found itself in entire accord with Rome on this question. Its ancient version, the Vetus Latina (less correctly the Itala), had admitted all the Old Testament Scriptures. St. Augustine seems to theoretically recognize degrees of inspiration; in practice he employs protos and deuteros without any discrimination whatsoever. Moreover in his “De Doctrinâ Christianâ” he enumerates the components of the complete Old Testament. The Synod of Hippo (393) and the three of Carthage (393, 397, and 419), in which, doubtless, Augustine was the leading spirit, found it necessary to deal explicitly with the question of the Canon, and drew up identical lists from which no sacred books are excluded. These councils base their canon on tradition and liturgical usage. For the Spanish Church valuable testimony is found in the work of the heretic Priscillian, “Liber de Fide et Apocryphis”; it supposes a sharp line existing between canonical and uncanonical works, and that the Canon takes in all the deuteros.

…so while a Catholic may have an opinion that differes from the Church’s Doctrine, the Church, not the individual, is the actual authority since she is Guided by the Holy Spirit.

Maran atha!

Angel

 

[thistle]

Is it true that Saint Jerome did not believe that the Deuterocanonical books were inspired at first and then afterwords changed his mind?

It is the Church who has authority and not individuals so if an individual has an opinion which differs from Church teaching then the individual is wrong. It may also be that an individual has an opinion on something which the Church had not defined as dogma/doctrine at that time and in cases like that individuals were free to have opinions.

For example, St Thomas Aquinas did not believe in the Immaculate Conception but he was free to hold that opinion because in his time it was not a dogma.

 

[panevino]

Is it true that Saint Jerome did not believe that the Deuterocanonical books were inspired at first and then afterwords changed his mind?

ewtn.com/library/answers/deuteros.htm

“…What sin have I committed if I followed the judgment of the churches? But he who brings charges against me for relating the objections that the Hebrews are wont to raise against the story of Susanna, the Son of the Three Children, and the story of Bel and the Dragon, which are not found in the Hebrew volume, proves that he is just a foolish sycophant. For I was not relating my own personal views, but rather the remarks that they [the Jews] are wont to make against us” (Against Rufinus 11:33 [A.D. 402])

 

[inkaneer]

One must remember that Jerome’s primary teachers were Jewish rabbi’s. He was therefore raised in the Jewish hebrew scriptures which during his time did mot contain the deuteros. He and Augustine debated these and Jerome did translate them. His comment about these in his work *Against Rufinus *11:33 shows he did not impose his own views but merely quoted the objections to these works that Jews would make. Jerome, himself, was fully obedient to the church.