Görge K. Hasselhoff - 'Revising the Vulgate' - Jerome and His Jewish Interlocutors

8/12/2019 Grge K. Hasselhoff - 'Revising the Vulgate' - Jerome and His Jewish Interlocutors

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209Revising the Vulgate: Jerome and his Jewish Interlocutors

Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden ZRGG 64, 3 (2012)Also available online - www.brill.nl

GRGE K. HASSELHOFFRevising the Vulgate:

Jerome and his Jewish Interlocutors1

Sophronius Eusebius Hieronymus was born at Stridon around 347.2As a teen-ager he went to Rome to pursue rhetorical, philological, and philosophicalstudies. He studied under the grammarian Aelius Donatus, and learned at leastthe Greek and Latin languages. In Rome he became baptised in about 360 or366. That means he already was strongly influenced by the paganRomanculture before he became a Christian. In other words, Jeromes Christianitybears markers of Roman rhetoric et alia. Much later in life this is expressed byJerome himself when he referred to a voice in a dream which said to him:

Ciceronianus es, non Christianus. (You are a Ciceronian. You are not a Christ-ian.)3

After the years in Rome he travelled to Gaul until he reached Trier where hesettled for a while and where he met Rufinus. With Rufinus he moved to Aquileia.In about 373 he travelled through Thrace (Trakia) and Asia Minor to northernSyria. After a serious illness at Antioch he devoted himself to God. One of histeachers at that time was Apollinaris of Laodicea who later in life was called aheretic.

From Antioch Jerome went for a time to the desert of Chalcis (southwest ofAntioch, known as the Syrian Thebaid) to join a number of hermits. Here he

seems to have found time for study and writing, and, important for our general

The Church Father Jerome is well-known for his translation (or revision) of theLatin Bible which later was named Vulgate. He did not translate from the Greekas was the case with the so-called Vetus Latina but he sought the Hebrew truth(hebraica veritas). However, this raises the question as to how good hisunderstanding of the Hebrew language actually was. Therefore it is asked where

Jerome might have learned Hebrew and who his Jewish interlocutors might have been.

1An earlier draft of this paper was presented at the International Symposium Trading Reli-gion, Bochum, 25-27 January, 2010. I thank Peter Wick (Bochum), Loren T. Stuckenbruck(Princeton, NJ), and two unnamed referees for helpful remarks, and Ann Giletti (Rome) for editingand useful suggestions.

2For Jeromes biography cf. Georg Grtzmacher.Hieronymus: Eine biographische Studie zuralten Kirchengeschichte. 3 vols. in 1 (Aalen: Scientia Verlag, 1986 = Leipzig / Berlin 1901-1908);Ferdinand Cavallera. Saint Jrme: Sa vie et son uvre, 2 vols. (Louvain: Spicilegium SacrumLovaniense Bureaux/Paris: Champion, 1922); J. N. D. Kelly.Jerome: His Life, Writings, and Con-troversies (London: Duckworth, 1975); Stefan Rebenich.Jerome(London/New York: Routledge,2002); Alfons Frst.Hieronymus: Askese und Wissenschaft in der Sptantike (Freiburg et al.: Herder,2003); for his early lifetime see also Alan D. Booth The Date of Jeromes Birth.Phoenix: The

Journal of the Classical Association of Canada 33 (1979): 346-353; id. The Chronology ofJeromes Early Years.Ibid. 35 (1981): 237-259; for a survey of most of the contemporaries withwhom Jerome had contact see Stefan Rebenich.Hieronymus und sein Kreis: Prosopographischeund sozialgeschichtliche Untersuchungen (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 1992).

3Hieronymus, Ep. 22, 30 (CSEL 54, ed. Hilberg, p. 190).

Some Remarks on Jeromes Biography


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210 GRGEK. HASSELHOFF

subject, he made his first attempt to learn Hebrew under the guidance of aconverted Jew.4Whether he also learned Aramaic is uncertain.5

In 378 or 379, Jerome returned to Antioch where he was ordained a priest byBishop Paulinus. Soon after, he moved to Constantinople to study with Gregoryof Nazianz, one of the so-called Cappadocian Fathers. After about two years in382, Jerome returned to Rome, where he became the secretary of PopeDamasus I. He stayed in Rome for about three years. These years were impor-tant for several reasons. One of them was that Damasus asked Jerome torevise the Latin Bible. During the years in Rome, Jerome was in close contactwith a number of well-born and well-educated women, including some fromthe noblest patrician families, such as the widows Lea, Marcella and Paula,

with their daughters Blaesilla and Eustochium. The close contact with thesewomen seems to be the reason why Jerome, after the popes death, was forcedto leave Rome.6

In August 385, Jerome returned to Antioch. He was accompanied by agroup of young men, among them his brother Paulinianus. A little later, hisfemale patron Paula and her daughter Eustochium also joined him. The twowomen had decided to end their days in the Holy Land. In the winter of 385,Jerome and the women started a pilgrimage to the Holy Land where theyvisited Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and the holy places of Galilee, and then went toEgypt.7(Egypt at that time was the home of a number of great ascetics.)

At the Catechetical School of Alexandria, Jerome became a student ofDidymus the Blind who later, like Apollinaris, was called an Origenist heretic.Didymus at that time expounded on the Book of Hosea. Later in life, Jerometranslated and used it among other great parts from Didymus commentary onZachariah.8In Egypt, Jerome spent some time in Nitria, a centre for ascetics inthe desert.

In the late summer or early autumn of 388, Jerome moved to the village ofBethlehem where he spent the rest of his life as a hermit. He had a mensmonastery and a womens convent built in which, among others, Paula andEustochium lived. It is not certain which languages he employed in every-day

communication. Within the monasteries the language may have been Latin, asmost of the inhabitants came from Rome. Later, also Greek-speaking monksbecame members of the monastery. On the streets of Bethlehem the language

4See Hieronymus (Jerome), Ep. 18A, 10 (CSEL 54, ed. Hilberg, p. 86); Ep. 125, 12 (CSEL 56/1, ed. Hilberg, p. 131).

5See Michael Graves.Jeromes Hebrew Philology: A Study Based on his Commentary onJeremiah (Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2007), 85-86.

6See, e.g., Yves-Marie Duval. Sur Trois Lettres Mconnues de Jrme Concernant Son Sjour Rome (382-385).InJerome of Stridon: His Life, Writings and Legacy, edited by Andrew Cainand Josef Lssl, pp. 29-40 (Farnham/Burlington, VT: Ashgate 2009).

7Cf. Hieronymus, Ep. 108 (CSEL 55, ed. Hilberg, p. 306-51); Brouria Bitton-Ashkelony.En-

countering the Sacred: The Debate on Christian Pilgrimage in Late Antiquity (Berkeley/LosAngeles/London: University of California Press, 2005), 65-105.

8See Aline Canellis. LIn Zachariam de Jrme et la Tradition Alexandrine.InJerome ofStridon: His Life, Writings and Legacy, edited by Andrew Cain and Josef Lssl, pp. 153-162(Farnham/Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2009).


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used seems to have been Koine (Greek), which Jerome had mastered. Whetherpeople also spoke Aramaic remains uncertain.

Before Jerome died, near Bethlehem on 30 September 419 or 420, he had avery fruitful and active time in Bethlehem. He translated the Hebrew Bible intoLatin;9he commented on several Old as well as New Testament books; and hetranslated a number of Greek writings into Latin. He also fought a number ofbattles against other theologians, among them his former friend Rufinus.

This brief outline should be sufficient to show Jerome as a scholar, who inthe first part of his life travelled a great deal and used his encounters with otherscholars to receive a broad basis of knowledge. As Adam Kamesar, MichaelGraves and others have convincingly shown, that oeuvre bears strong marks of

the philological ideal represented by his teacher Donatus.10In the second partof his life, Jerome lived as a hermit and created his magnificent work which,next to Augustines, is the largest of any Latin Father of antiquity.

The Bible in its Various Languages: The Jewish-Christian Bible

Even today there is no commonly accepted and fixed canon of the ChristianBible. Nonetheless, already in antiquity the shape of the Biblical canon wasroughly visible. The Christian Bible falls into two parts, namely the Old and theNew Testament. This structure had taken place after long debates until at leastthe fourth century CE, perhaps even later.11The OldTestament is sharedbetween Jews and Christians, although there are some differences in the re-spective receptions. The Old Testament was originally written in Hebrew (andin parts in Aramaic) and falls into three parts. The first part consists of the fiveBooks of Moses. This part is undisputed between Christians and Jews; only theSamaritans have a slightly different version of these books.12In the HebrewBible follow the books of the Prophets, which consist of some of the historicalbooks, the twelve Minor Prophets and the three Major Prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah

9For the date of the several translations see the survey by Christoph Markschies.Hieronymusund die Hebraica Veritatis: Ein Beitrag zur Archologie des protestantischen Schriftverstndnis-

ses?InDie Septuaginta zwischen Judentum und Christentum, edited by Martin Hengel and AnnaMaria Schwemer, pp. 131-181 (Tbingen: Mohr, 1994), 150 and note 117.10See Adam Kamesar.Jerome, Greek Scholarship, and the Hebrew Bible: A Study of theQuaes-

tiones Hebraicae in Genesim (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993); Markschies, Hieronymus und dieHebraica Veritatis,133-7; Graves,Jeromes Hebrew Philology, 13-75.

11See, e.g., Jack N. Lightstone. The Rabbis Bible: The Canon of the Hebrew Bible and theEarly Rabbinic Guild.In The Canon Debate, edited by Lee Martin McDonald and James A. Sand-ers, pp. 163-184 (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson Publ., 2002) (2ndprinting 2004); David Stern. OnCanonization in Rabbinic Judaism.InHomer, the Bible, and Beyond: Literary and ReligiousCanons in the Ancient World, edited by Margalit Finkelberg and Guy G. Stroumsa, pp. 227-252(Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2003); Gnter Stemberger.La formation et la conception du canon dans lapense rabbinique.InRecueils normatifs et canons dans lAntiquit: Perspectives nouvelles surla formation des canons juif et chrtien dans leur contexte culturel, edited by Enrico Norelli, pp.

113-131 (Lausanne: d. du Zbre, 2004); Philip S. Alexander. The Formation of the BiblicalCanon in Rabbinic Judaism.In The Canon of Scripture in Jewish and Christian Tradition, editedby Philip S. Alexander and Jean-Daniel Kaestli, pp. 57-80 (Lausanne: d. du Zbre, 2007).

12This was already mentioned by Jerome, see Hieronymus,Prologus in libro regum (Galeatus)(Vulgata ed. Weber, 364).


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and Ezekiel. The third part consists of the restincluding the Psalms and theBook of Daniel. Its content was never really fixed, and theoretically the num-ber of books could be larger than those printed in every common HebrewBible.13

This, then, is the Hebrew Bible. There is also a Jewish Greek translationfrom antiquity, the Septuagint. There is much on-going scholarly debate aboutthe age and versions of the Septuagint,14but one thing is certain: at least the fiveBooks of Moses were already translated in the third century BCE. The books ofthe Prophets, the historical writings, and at least parts of the other books fol-lowed soon thereafter. These parts differ from the Hebrew version in severalrespects, such as the order of books and their length, including different chap-

ters. We can, however, state that in the first century CE there was a JewishGreek Bible which was used by Jews, e.g., Philo of Alexandria, and by Chris-tians. That Greek Bible quickly became the Christian Bible, whereas after alonger process the Jewish communities had retained the Hebrew version astheir Bible. Nonetheless there were also further Greek translations within Juda-ism, e.g., those of Theodotion and Aquila. The text of the Hebrew Bible wastransmitted with the Hebrew letters written only as consonants, i.e. as a text inwhich the vowels were missing. To comprehend its meaning required morethan the ability to read. It required knowledge of how to find the right under-standing of the Hebrew words and of the complete text.

Within the developing Christian community already in the first century, akind of Midrash was created that combined the exegesis of the Bible (the OldTestament) and the Jesus narrative, namely the NewTestament. The Christ-ian process of forming one Bible including the Old and New Testaments wasforced by various occurrences.15I only mention here the challenge of Markionand his reducedBible.16But and this must be emphasised until the end ofthe fourth century it was still disputed as to which books should be included inthe Greek Christian Bible. Within the canon of the New Testament the inclu-sion of several of the letters (or Epistles), further books of acts and apocalypseswere disputed.17The canon of the Old Testament was disputed too, as can be

seen from the different lists attributed, for example, to Meliton of Sardis (2nd

century CE) and to Origen (3rdcentury CE).18What must be emphasised here isthat the Septuagint comprises more books then the Hebrew Bible, and, in addi-

13See Lightstone, The Rabbis Bible, 170-84.14See, e.g., Martin Karrer, Wolfgang Kraus, and Martin Meiser, eds.Die Septuaginta: Texte,

Theologien und Einflsse(Tbingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2010); Martin Karrer/Siegfried Kreuzer/Marcus Sigismund, eds. Von der Septuaginta zum Neuen Testament: TextgeschichtlicheErrterungen (Berlin/New York: De Gruyter, 2010); Siegfried Kreuzer/Martin Meiser/MarcusSigismund, eds.Die Septuaginta Entstehung, Sprache, Geschichte (Tbingen: Mohr-Siebeck,2012).

15See, e.g., Lee Martin McDonald. The Biblical Canon: Its Origin, Transmission, and Author-

ity (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson Publ., 2007, updated and revised 3rded.).16See recently Sebastian Moll. The Arch-Heretic Marcion (Tbingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2010).17See, e.g., Hermann von Lips.Der neutestamentliche Kanon: Seine Geschichte und Bedeutung

(Zrich: Theologischer Verlag, 2004), 13-116.18Eusebius Caesarensis, h. e., IV, 26, 14 (for Melito); VI, 25, 2 (for Origen).


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tion, within some books it has different texts, e.g., in the Book of Daniel and inthe Book of Jeremiah.

Before proceeding to the content of the Bible versions, we should pause toconsider a question which, in my opinion, is important for the understanding ofearly Christian history, namely: what did Judaism mean at that time?

Judaism and Christianity: A Parting of the Ways?

A common Jewish and Christian tradition is that with Paul and his mission tothe gentiles the separation of Jews and Christians came to be.19In fact, theseparation of Church and Synagogue was not concluded that early. There is

much evidence that the separation was completed only by imperial force in thefourth century, although the separation processes had, of course, already begunin the first century.20Regarding the Christian side of the story, it will suffice togive two examples. First, the reports on the Council of Nicaea (325 CE) statethat the Christian calendar had to be separated from the Jewish calendar withregard to the date of Easter.21Why would this command be necessary if thereligious groups had been separated centuries before? Second, why did Chris-tian theologians such as Melito and Origen have, as mentioned above, a differ-ent, but growing, canon of the Old Testament which, at least with respect to theBook of Esther, was similar to the growing Jewish canon? (Melito leaves it out;it seems to have been inserted in the 3rdcentury). In addition, we must remem-ber that the Christians were by far not a homogeneous group. One of the manybranches of the early Christianity was the group that by some modern mission-aries to Jews are called the Jewish believers in Jesus.22I prefer the moreneutral term Jewish-Christians. That group, which was of some importancefor Jerome, kept the Jewish rites but believed in Jesus as their messiah.

Concerning the Jewish side of the parting process, I highlight two currentscholarly debates. First, although Peter Schfer in his bookJesus in the Talmudseems to exaggerate in stating that the Talmud is an answer to the Christiancommunity23there is certainly an interesting point in his argument. Although

19

See, e.g., Giorgio Jossa.Jews or Christians? The Followers of Jesus in Search of their ownIdentity. Translated by Molly Rogers (Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006. English Translation of Giudeio cristiani? I seguaci di Gsu in cerca di una propria identit, Brescia: Paideia Editrice, 2004),who argues that the split took place already in the first century.

20James D. G. Dunn, ed.Jews and Christians: The Parting of the Ways A.D. 70 to 135(Tbingen:Mohr, 1992); Adam H. Becker/Annette Yoshiko Reed, eds. The Ways that Never Parted: Jews andChristians in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (Tbingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2003).

21Sacha Stern. Calendar and Community: A History of the Jewish Calendar, 2ndCentury BCE 10thCentury CE (Oxford et al.: Oxford University Press, 2001), 80-84; Roger T. Beckwith. Cal-endar and Chronology, Jewish and Christian: Biblical, Intertestamental and Patristic Studies(Leiden/New York/Kln: Brill, 1996), 51-70.

22Cf. Oskar Skarsaune/Reidar Hvalik, eds.Jewish Believers in Jesus (Peabody, Mass.: HendricksonPubl., 2007); see also Ray A. Pritz.Nazarene Jewish Christianity: From the End of the New Testament

Period until Its Disappearance in the Fourth Century (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 2010 [= 1988]); JamesCarleton Paget.Jews, Christians and Jewish Christians in Antiquity (Tbingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2010).

23Cf. Peter Schfer.Jesus in the Talmud(Princeton, NJ/Woodstock, Oxfordshire: PrincetonUniversity Press, 2007); id.Die Geburt des Judentums aus dem Geist des Christentums: FnfVorlesungen zur Entstehung des rabbinischen Judentums(Tbingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2010).


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the year 200 is always given as the date of the completion of theMishnahandthe middle of the 5thcentury as the date of the completion of the Gemarrahthere is evidence that both corpora were not written down before the end of thefifth or the sixth century (or even later).24The codification may have been ananswer to non-Jewish movements, among them certainly the established Churchwhich may already have left some traces. Second, there is an on-going debate,which was initiated within the Wissenschaft des Judentums, as to whether Christ-ian writings of the Early Church could serve as sources for understanding of thedevelopment of theHaggadah.25But why would Christian writers transmit Jew-ishknowledge if there were no close connections and contact between thereligious groups?

In my opinion the relation between Christians and Jews in the first centuriesseems to have been closer than normally assumed. The encounters related toeveryday life, to cultic practices and to the scriptural basis. This latter aspectwe have to keep in mind with regard to Jerome.

Inner-Christian Transformations of the Bible

As explained above, the Christian Bible was the Septuagint for the Old Testa-ment and the Greek New Testament. As a collection it comprised more booksthan the Hebrew Bible, although it seems that the contents of the canon werenot as clearly established as is generally thought which can be seen in thechoices of Melito and Origen.

A further problem arises with regard to the language. Until the end of thesecond century Christianity was mainly an Aramaic and Greek phenomenon.The Aramaic-speaking people in the Syrian area were a tradition on its ownthat needs no treatment with regard to our discussion. The Greek-speakingChristians seem to have been spread all over the Roman Empire. It soon at-tracted not only the Greeks but also the Latin-speaking people. For liturgicalpractice, but also for mere interest, large parts of the Greek Bible seem to havebeen translated into Latin. This translation, known as the Vetus Latina, is forthe most part preserved or can be reconstructed. Most parts of that version of

the Bible are edited today.26Even the Christians in the East were not happy with the translation of the

Septuagint. Already Origen, the most important Greek-speaking father of thethird century, collected several Greek translations together with the Hebrewtext and a transcription of the Hebrew in Greek letters, presenting these mul-tiple versions in parallel text in the so-called Hexapla. Today the Hexapla is

24Hillel I. Newman. Louis Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews, and the Church Fathers.InGrge K. Hasselhoff, ed.Die Entdeckung des Christentums in der Wissenschaft des Judentums, pp.183-194 (Berlin/New York: De Gruyter, 2010), 189 and note 22; but see the critical evaluation ofan oral redaction of theMishnaby Gnter Stemberger. Mndliche Tora in schriftlicher Form: ZurRedaktion und Weitergabe frher rabbinischer Texte.InDie Textualisierung der Religion, edited

by Joachim Schaper, pp. 222-237 (Tbingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009), 227-228.25Cf. Newman, Louis Ginzberg; G. K. Hasselhoff. Sapientes docent traditiones: Der

Rabbiner Moritz Rahmer und der Kirchenvater Hieronymus.InIbid., pp. 137-163.26See the online-surveys at http://www.vetuslatina.org and http://www.vetus-latina.de (accessed

September, 8th, 2011).


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lost, and only parts of it can be reconstructed, but in Jeromes day it could stillbe used.27And Jerome did so.28

During his time in Rome, Jerome was asked by Pope Damasus I to revisethat Latin Bible according to the Greek tradition in order to have a more preciseand reliable Bible text.29Between 382 and 384, Jerome revised the translationsof the New Testament as well as the translations of several Old Testamentbooks, including the Psalms. The translation of the Old Testament material,which is part of the Vulgate, is called iuxta septuagintam(according to theSeptuagint). The revision of the rest of the Old Latin Translation was done inBethlehem, and then not always according to the Greek tradition but some-times according to the Hebrew tradition, because Jerome expected the Hebrew

to be superior to the Greek since it was the first language of the Bible. He calledit Hebraica veritas.30To translate directly from the Hebrew required a cer-tain knowledge of the Hebrew language. Jerome acquired that knowledge fromsome of his Jewish and Jewish-Christian interlocutors.

Jeromes Jewish and Jewish-Christian Interlocutors

How good Jeromes actual ability to speak Hebrew was is still heavily dis-puted. Some scholars judge him from todays Gesenius grammar knowledge,and say that he was unable to speak and read Hebrew, and that all his transla-tions were made according to OrigensHexapla.31This seams to be as unfairand inaccurate as the opposite opinion claiming his overwhelming knowledgeof the Hebrew language. Adam Kamesar, Stefan Rebenich, Michael Graves,and Hillel Newman, among others, have recently demonstrated that Jeromesskill in reading Hebrew was fairly good.32His speaking ability cannot be judged

27For an edition of the remnants of theHexaplasee Origenis Hexaplorum quae supersunt siveveterum interpretum graecorum in totum vetus testamentum fragmenta, edited by Fredericus Field,2 vols. (Hildesheim: Olms, 1964 [= Oxford, 1875]); Giovanni Mercati. Osservazioni a proemi delSalterio di Origene, Ippolito, Eusebio, Cirillo Alessandrino e altri con frammenti inediti (Vatican-City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1948); Alison Salvesen, ed. Origens Hexapla and Frag-ments (Tbingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1998).

28

See, e.g., the references in the Vulgate prologues to Joshua (Vulgata ed. Weber, 285) and Job(Vulgata, ed. Weber, 732).29Hieronymus, Prologus in evangelio(Vulgata ed. Weber, 1515-1516).30Christoph Markschies (Hieronymus und die Hebraica Veritatis,175-176) has shown that

Jerome after his quarrels with Augustine and Rufinus more or less seems to have abandoned thatparticular term.

31See, e.g., Pierre Nautin. Hieronymus.Theologische Realenzyklopdie, edited by GerhardMller, vol. 15, pp. 304-315 (Berlin/New York: De Gruyter, 1986), 309-310. The earlier debate isdocumented by Stefan Rebenich. Jerome: The Vir Trilinguis and the Hebraica Veritas.VigiliaeChristianae 47 (1993): 50-77, at 56-57 and 72 notes 61-65; Josef Lssl. Hieronymus undEpiphanius von Salamis ber das Judentum ihrer Zeit.Journal for the Study of Judaism33 (2002):411-436, at 413 f.

32See, e.g., Eitan Burstein. La comptence de Jrme en hbreu.Revue des tudes

Augustiniennes 21 (1975): 3-12; Stefan Rebenich, Jerome: The Vir Trilinguis and the HebraicaVeritas,57-65; Graves, Jeromes Hebrew Philology, 84-98; 117-127; Hillel I. Newman. HowShould We Measure Jeromes Hebrew Competence?InJerome of Stridon: His Life, Writings andLegacy, edited by Andrew Cain and Josef Lssl, pp. 31-140 (Farnham/Burlington, VT: Ashgate,2009).


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in every detail, but we do have some information. Jerome not only demon-strates that he had some competence in Hebrew grammatical and lexical ques-tions (which might be explained differently as well), but also presents a largenumber of what were at that time non-written Hebrew exegetical traditions.Thus he seems to have had either good speaking ability or good teachers toexplain to him in another language. With Hillel Newman we have to state:The precise extent of Jeromes command of Biblical Hebrew is ultimatelyunknowable.33

Jerome himself claims to have good expertise of Hebrew, whereas he sayshe was unable to read Aramaic. In the preface to the Vulgate Book of Tobit,which is not part of the Hebrew Bible, but of the Septuagint Jerome makes an

interesting remark. He claims to have had an Aramaic Vorlageand writes:I do not cease to wonder at the constancy of your [i.e. Cromatius andHeliodors] demanding. For you demand that I bring a book written inChaldean words into Latin writing, indeed the Book of Tobias, which theHebrews exclude from the catalogue of Divine Scriptures, being mindfulof those things which they have titled Hagiographa. I have done enoughfor your desire, yet not by my study. For the studies of the Hebrews rebukeus and find fault with us, to translate this for the ears of Latins contrary totheir canon. But it is better to be judging the opinion of the Pharisees todisplease and to be subject to the commands of bishops. I have persisted

as I have been able, and because the language of the Chaldeans is close toHebrew speech, finding a speaker very skilled in both languages, I took tothe work of one day, and whatever he expressed to me in Hebrew words,this, with a summoned scribe, I have set forth in Latin words. I will be paidthe price of this work by your prayers, when, by your grace, I will havelearned what you request to have been completed by me was worthy.34

Several scholars have claimed that what Jerome says could not be true be-cause his Latin translation was a revision of the Septuagint text; but JosephFitzmyer, in his extensive commentary on Tobit, gives evidence that things arenot that simple. He writes:

The relation of the V[ul]g[ate] to the short Greek recension is problemati-cal, because, on the one hand, Jerome often retained words and phrases

33Newman, How Should We,140.34Hieronymus, Prologus in Tobiae(Vulgata ed. Weber, 676): Mirari non desino exactionis

vestrae instantiam. Exigitis enim, ut librum chaldeo sermone conscriptum ad latinum stilumtraham, librum utique Tobiae, quem Hebraei de catalogo divinarum Scripturarum secantes, hisquae Agiografa memorant manciparunt. Feci satis desiderio vestro, non tamen meo studio. Arguuntenim nos Hebraeorum studia et inputant nobis, contra suum canonem latinis auribus ista transferre.Sed melius esse iudicans Pharisaeorum displicere iudicio et episcoporum iussionibus deservire,institi ut potui, et quia vicina est Chaldeorum lingua serrnoni hebraico, utriusque linguaeperitissimum loquacem repperiens, unius diei laborem arripui et quicquid ille mihi hebraicis

verbis expressit, haec ego accito notario, sermonibus latinis exposui. Orationibus vestrismercedem huius operis conpensabo, cum gratum vobis didicero me quod iubere estis dignaticonplesse. Translation by Kevin P. Edgecomb (http://www.bombaxo.com/prologues.html;accessed January 24th, 2010).

35Joseph A. Fitzmyer. Tobit(Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2003), 6.


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from the Vetus Latina (VL), but on the other, he often paraphrased sen-tences and clauses, and apparently exercised great freedom in addingdetails to the text, which are not found in any other ancient version.35

Since the Aramaic version Jerome claims to have used is lost we cannot saywhether his claim is true. As other ancient translations were made from theGreek, it is possible that the Aramaic version was a translation from the Greekas well.36The method Jerome claims to have used, having someone translatefrom the Aramaic into Hebrew, from which Jerome dictated a Latin transla-tion, might be an explanation for both the alleged nearness to the Greek and thedistance from it, because of two intermediate languages between the originaland the Latin translation.

Apart from that Jerome gives further information which is useful for ourenquiry. He says he employed at least two persons. One of them was able tospeak Hebrew and Aramaic, and the second one was a scribe able to writeLatin. I will leave aside the scribe and concentrate on the translator from theAramaic. If Jeromes words are true and he made his translation from theHebrew, then he must have had quite a good understanding of that language. Ifnot, we have to ask in what language he talked to his translator. Was he able tospeak Greek? Did the translator translate into Latin? In any case Jerome wouldhave had to silence the scribe. Although Jerome quarrelled with quite a numberof people, there are, as far as I know, no reports from a scribe claiming that it

was not Jerome but someone else who did the dictating. We have to leave thatquestion open, but must keep in mind that it may be true that Jerome was ableto understand some Hebrew.

During the following years, Jerome seems to have learned enough Aramaicto be able to translate Daniel and the apocryphal Book of Judith. In the prefaceto his translation of the Book of Daniel he writes:

Indeed, a Hebrew was encouraging me, and he was often repeating to meby his language Persistent work conquers all, as in me I saw an amateuramong them, I began again to be a student of Chaldean. And so I mightconfess the truth, to the present day I am better able to read and under-

stand than to pronounce the Chaldean language.37

And in the preface to Judith he writes:

Among the Hebrews the Book of Judith is found among the Hagiographa,the authority of which toward confirming those which have come intocontention is judged less appropriate. Yet having been written in Chaldean

36See Fitzmyer, Tobit, 3; Stuart Weeks/Simon J. Gathercole/Loren Stuckenbruck, eds. TheBook of Tobit: Texts from the Principal Ancient and Medieval Traditions, with Synopsis, Concor-dances, and Annotated Texts in Aramaic, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and Syriac (Berlin/New York: DeGruyter, 2004).

37Hieronymus, Prologus in Danihele propheta(Vulgata ed. Weber, 1341): Verum, adhortante

me Hebraeo et illud mihi sua lingua crebrius ingerente: labor omnia vicit inprobus, qui mihividebar sciolus inter eos, coepi rursum discipulus esse chaldaicus. Et ut vere fatear, usque adpraesentem diem magis possum sermonem chaldeum legere et intellegere quam sonare.. Trans-lation by Kevin P. Edgecomb (http://www.bombaxo.com/prologues.html; accessed January 24th,2010).


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words, it is counted among the histories. But because this book is found bythe Nicene Council to have been counted among the number of the SacredScriptures, I have acquiesced to your request, indeed a demand, and workshaving been set aside from which I was forcibly curtailed, I have given tothis (book) one short nights work translating more sense from sense thanword from word. I have removed the extremely faulty variety of the manybooks; only those which I was able to find in the Chaldean words withunderstanding intact did I express in Latin ones.38

This indicates that Jerome, even at a later time, employed teachers.In other instances we are informed that (and how) Jerome learned Hebrew.

Jerome mentions five persons from whom he learned Hebrew.39Already in the

desert of Chalcis he sought contact with a Jewish-Christian who taught himsome Hebrew. Much later in life he says: I set myself to learn an alphabet andstrove to pronounce hissing, breathtaking words.40In the same passage hewrites that everything connected with learning Hebrew, i.e., speaking, writing,and reading, was difficult for him as a Latin-speaking man.

Later in life, before he started to translate the Book of Chronicles he re-ceived help from an unnamed person from Tiberias:

In order to translate the Book of the Paralipomenon [i.e. the Chronicles]into Latin, I took someone from Tiberias, a certain teacher of the Law,who is admired by the Hebrews.41

A similar case is reported by Jerome for the Book of Job, for which he had thehelp from someone from Lydda:

I remember I paid not a little money toward understanding of this scroll,for an instructor from Lydda who among the Hebrews was thought to havefirst rank, with whose teaching I know not whether I accomplished any-thing; this one thing I know: for me not to have been able to translateanything that I did not understand before.42

38Hieronymus, Prologus in Iudith(Vulgata ed. Weber, 691): Apud Hebraeos liber Iudith interAgiografa legitur; cuius auctoritas ad roboranda illa quae in contentione veniunt, minus idonea

iudicatur. Chaldeo tamen sermone conscriptus inter historias conputatur. Sed quia hunc librumsinodus nicena in numero Sanctarum Scripturarum legitur conputasse, adquievi postulationi vestrae,immo exactioni, et sepositis occupationibus quibus vehementer artabar, huic unam lucubratiunculamdedi, magis sensum e sensu quam ex verbo verbum transferens. Multorum codicum varietatemvitiosissiraam amputavi; sola ea quae intellegentia integra in verbis chaldeis invenire potui, latinisexpressi. Translation by Kevin P. Edgecomb (http://www.bombaxo.com/prologues.html; ac-cessed January 24th, 2010).

39See Ilona Opelt. San Girolamo e i suoi maestri ebrei.Augustinianum 28 (1988): 327-338;Sandro Leanza. Gerolamo e la tradizione ebraica.InMotivi letterari ed esegetici in Gerolamo,edited by Claudio Moreschini and Giovanni Menestrina, pp. 17-38 (Brescia: Morcelliana, 1997).

40Hieronymus, Ep. 125, 12 (CSEL 56/1, ed. Hilberg, p. 131), translation: Dennis Brown. VirTrilinguis: A Study in the Biblical Exegesis of Saint Jerome (Kampen: Kok Pharos, 1992), 72.

41Hieronymus, Praefatio in librum paralipomenoniuxta LXX interpretes (PL 29, 423B): ut

vobis librum Paralipomenon Latino sermone transferrem, de Tiberiade legis quondam doctorem,qui apud Hebros admirationi habebatur, assumpsi [...](my own translation).

42Hieronymus, Prologus in libro Iob(Vulgata ed. Weber, 731): Memini me ob intellegentiamhuius voluminis lyddeum quemdam praeceptorem qui apud Hebraeos primas habere putabatur, nonparvis redemisse nummis, cuius doctrina an aliquid profecerim nescio, hoc unum scio non potuisse


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Only in one instance we do have the name of the person who helped Jeromewith a translation. In a letter to Pammachius and Oceanus from 400/1 (Ep. 84,3) he mentions a certain Baranina whom he persuaded to help him. That Baraninaonly came at night to teach him because he was afraid of his fellow Jews; forthat reason Jerome calls him a second Nicodemus:43

[...] rursum Hierosolymae et Bethleem quo labore, quo pretio Baraninam nocturnumhabui praeceptorem [sic!] timebat enim Iudaeos et mihi alterum exhibebatNicodemum. horum omnium frequenter in opusculis meis facio mentionem.44

It is not unlikely that Baraninastood forBar Chanina, a name quite common inthose days. Already Moritz Rahmer gave reference toseveral(einige) Jews of

that name in Jeromes day.45Although it is not clear whether one of them lived inJerusalem or Bethlehem it is possible that Jerome met one of them.We can sum up as follows. It is quite likely that Jerome had Jewish teach-

ers. It seems that in some areas it was not problematic for Jews to teach aChristian priest, whereas in other areas it might have been. Regardless ofwhether there was a problem, at least four well-educated Jewish scholars spentsome time teaching Jerome at least some aspects of the Hebrew language, andhelped him to translate parts of the Hebrew Bible. Although only one of them ismentioned by name, two of the other teachers were located in centres ofHalakhic studies, namely Tiberias and Lydda. The teacher of Lydda is even

called a sapiens and deutertes, i.e., a teacher of theMishnah. Whether andhow much Jerome paid to his teachers is not transmitted.

The Vulgate and the Commentaries

By 405 Jerome had finished his enterprise of translating the Bible into Latin (orto revise the older Latin version, the Vetus Latina).46His prior aim, to translateaccording to the Hebrew tradition instead of according to the Greek tradition,lead to some quarrels with his contemporaries. Augustine sharply criticisedJerome for his use of the principle of aHebraica veritas.47Although today it is

me interpretari nisi quod ante intellexeram. Translation by Kevin P. Edgecomb (http://www.bombaxo.com/prologues.html; accessed January 24th, 2010). Possibly the same person is re-ferred to in Hieronymus, Commentarius in Abacuc 2, 15-17 (CC.SL 76A, ed. Adriaen, p. 610).

43We should recall that Jews were still permitted to inhabit Jerusalem and its surroundings, sothat it may be true that Baraninaactually came at night not because of his fellow Jews butbecause of the Roman law. On that legal aspect (without that consequence) see Gnter Stemberger.Hieronymus und die Juden seiner Zeit.InBegegnungen zwischen Christentum und Judentum inAntike und Mittelalter: FS Heinz Schreckenberg, edited by Dietrich-Alex Koch and HermannLichtenberger, pp. 347-364 (Gttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1993), 355 and note 32.

44Hieronymus, Ep. 84, 3 (CSEL 55, ed. Hilberg, p. 123), Ep. 84, 3; Rufinus, indulging in polem-ics against Jerome, confirms the existence of that teacher: he transmogrifies the name to Barrabas(see Rufinus,Apologia Contra Hieronymum II, 15, CC.SL 20, ed. Simonetti, p. 95).

45Cf. Moritz Rahmer.Die hebrischen Traditionen in den Werken des Hieronymus: Durch eine

Vergleichung mit den jdischen Quellen kritisch beleuchtet (Breslau: Schlettersche Buchhandlung,1861), 8. On that passage see also Grge K. Hasselhoff, Sapientes docent traditiones, 157-158.

46See, e.g., Brown, Vir Trilinguis, 102.47Cf. Ralph Hennings.Der Briefwechsel zwischen Augustinus und Hieronymus und ihr Streit

um den Kanon des Alten Testaments und die Auslegung von Gal. 2, 11-14 (Leiden/New York/Kln:


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disputed as to whether Jerome solely relied on the Hebrew traditions or madeextensive use of the Hexapla his main principle had a Wirkungsgeschichteofits own. We can say that the results of the Christian-Jewish encounter inBethlehem at the turn of the fifth century resulted in a Bible translation thatafter a while became the Latin standard version for the Western Church. In thesixteenth century at the Council of Trent (Sessio IV, 8 April 1546) the RomanCatholic Church finally declared it was the official version.

But Jeromes work with his contemporary Jews did not only result in thatparticular Bible translation. Jerome also commented on a number of Biblicalbooks. In those commentaries, he every now and then introduces explanationsthat he received from his Jewish interlocutors.48For example, in his commen-

taries on the Minor Prophets, he translates one or more verses according to theHebrew text. He then gives a translation of the Greek version if it differs fromthe Hebrew version. He then goes on to explain the deviations of the Greekversion, sometimes with an introduction such as: The Hebrew, who taught methe Scripture, told me ...(Hebraeus qui me in scriptures instituit ...).49

The commentaries have been transmitted and were used by other commen-tators in their explanations of Biblical texts. Here, too, we can note a certainWirkungsgeschichte which Benjamin Kedar-Kopfstein appropriatelycharacterised: [T]his man built the most important bridge between the classicJewish culture and Western Europe.Nolens volens he did it; but then, history is

full of such ironic twists.50Another field in which Jerome shared his acquired Hebrew knowledge arethe letters in which he occasionally provides transcriptions of Hebrew words.Here further research is needed to determine whether Jerome relied solely onOrigensHexapla or made use of explanations of his teachers.51

Finally I would like to raise another question: what does that exchange ofreligious knowledge mean for (Jeromes) Christianity? We may say thatJeromes study of the Hebrew language was apart from a philological desire

Brill, 1994); Markschies, Hieronymus und die Hebraica Veritatis,163-169; Alfons Frst.Augustins Briefwechsel mit Hieronymus (Mnster: Aschendorff, 1999); Id. Hieronymus und

Augustinus.In Id. Von Origenes und Hieronymus zu Augustinus: Studien zur antikenTheologiegeschichte, pp. 337-358 (Berlin/New York: De Gruyter, 2011); Id. Veritas Latina:Augustins Haltung gegenber Hieronymus Bibelbersetzungen.In Ibid., pp. 359-383.

48For Jeromes commentary on Isaiah see Pierre Jay.Lexgse de saint Jrme daprs sonCommentaire sur Isae (Paris: tudes Augustiniennes, 1985), especially 127-379; for the com-mentary on Jeremiah see Graves,Jeromes Hebrew Philology, 128-192; for Daniel see Jay Braverman.Jeromes Commentary On Daniel: A Study of Comparative Jewish and Christian Interpretationsof the Hebrew Bible(Washington, DC: The Catholic Biblical Association of America, 1978), 53-136; on one passage of the commentary on Qohelet, see Matthew Kraus, Christian, Jews, andPagans in Dialogue: Jerome on Ecclesiastes 12:1-7.Hebrew Union College Annual 70-1 (1999-2000): 183-231.

49Hieronymus, Commentarius in Sophoniam3, 9 (CC.SL 76A, ed. Adriaen, p. 702). There arenumerous quotations and references introduced alike. For analyses compare, e.g., the literature

mentioned in the note [48] above.50Benjamin Kedar-Kopfstein. Jewish Traditions in the Writings of Jerome.In The Aramaic

Bible: Targums in their Historical Context, edited by D. R. G. Beattie and M. J. McNamara, pp. 420-30 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1994), 430.

51A study on these transcriptions by this author is in preparation.


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intended to reveal the deeper truth of Christianity. Since the basic scripture,the Old Testament, was originally written in Hebrew, the quest for the real truthmeant to study the Hebrew Scriptures themselves. That study was not a staticprocess but followed the famous dictum: dies diem docet. With regard to Jeromethat means he did not rest with the achievement of his Bible translation. Whenwriting his commentaries he supplied a translation that in parts was revised,and in parts was newly translated.

A second meaning related toHebraica veritas was the questioning of thecanon of the Septuagint because it differed from the Hebrew versions. Jeromesresponse to that challenge was bipartite. On the one hand, he searched forSemitic versions of only Greek-transmitted writings, as I demonstrated with the

translation of the Book of Tobit. But, on the other hand, we must make note ofJeromes cowardice in not following through on the consequences of his in-sight, for example, by not excluding the so-called apocrypha, i.e., the additionsto the Septuagint. They remained a part of Jeromes Bible translation.

Görge K. Hasselhoff - 'Revising the Vulgate' - Jerome and His Jewish Interlocutors

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