Voices and influences
Jerome
The scholar who went to the Hebrew itself and gave the West a Bible it read for a thousand years.
Summary
This site quotes Jerome 2,794 times across 57 books, and lists 0 works.
- Lived died 420.
- Quoted here most in Matthew: 558 of 2,794.
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Jerome
- Lived
- died 420
- Tradition
- Patristic
5 of 2,794 quotations
Own words
Quoted in full, because Jerome died in 420 and these works are out of copyright. Each citation below names its edition and its year. A citation naming a modernised text means that edition makes its own editorial changes, and that edition's terms are not in this site's record.
(Chapter 49, verse 3) Reuben, my firstborn, you are my strength and the first of my sons, tough in bearing and tough in insolence and injury, like water that does not boil.
The rest of the quotation
You went up on your father's bed, then you defiled it when you went up. In Hebrew it is written: Reuben, my firstborn, you are my strength, and the first in power among my sons. Greater in carrying, and greater in strength. You are poured out like water, do not exceed. For you have ascended the bed of your father and defiled the couch in his ascent.
Genesis 49:3 Reuben, you are my firstborn, my might, and the beginning of my strength, excelling in honor, excelling in power. BSB
But we your people and the sheep of your pasture. When he says "sheep," he signifies innocence. Sheep have nothing but a shepherd. We will give you thanks forever. We will confess: either we do penance, or, what is better, we glorify.
The rest of the quotation
From generation to generation; among the first people, and among the second people. Although according to the historical sense it is said otherwise in Ezekiel, nevertheless according to the spiritual understanding we say this, since these two peoples — that is, the two rods — are joined together in Ezekiel, and become one kingdom.
Psalms 79:13 Then we Your people, the sheep of Your pasture, will thank You forever; from generation to generation we will declare Your praise. BSB
I have become like the pelican of the wilderness. There are said to be two kinds of these birds.
The rest of the quotation
One lives in the waters, and its food is fish; and one lives in the wilderness, and its food is venomous creatures, that is, serpents and crocodiles and lizards. Now these birds are called in Latin 'onocrotali.' To that one therefore have I become like, which lives in the wilderness, which eats venomous creatures: that is, my food was to me as it were poison. I have become like the night-raven in its dwelling-place.
Psalms 102:6 I am like a desert owl, like an owl among the ruins. BSB
"Be exalted above the heavens, O God." God is not exalted except above the heavens, he is not exalted above the earth. When we are earthly, we do not exalt God; but if from earthly we have been made heavenly, then we exalt God.
The rest of the quotation
And our Lord, when he was on earth, did not exalt us. Someone may say: You speak rashly, since he himself says in the Gospel: "When I have been lifted up, I will draw all things to myself."
Psalms 108:5–6 Be exalted, O God, above the heavens; may Your glory cover all the earth. Respond and save us with Your right hand, that Your beloved may be delivered. BSB
Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem; praise your God, O Zion. Just now we heard the holy presbyter preaching that, because of its transgression of the law, the Jewish people has been forsaken; and how is it that now it is said, Praise the Lord, O…
The rest of the quotation
Jerusalem; praise your God, O Zion? Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem. Jerusalem, "vision of peace." Praise your God, O Zion. Zion is interpreted "watchtower." You see, then, what he says: Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem. Wherever there is a vision of peace, wherever there is contemplation of God, there let there be praise of God.
Psalms 147:12 Exalt the LORD, O Jerusalem; praise your God, O Zion! BSB
Influence, on the record
This site quotes Jerome 2,794 times across 57 books.
This site’s own count of what it does with the voice
The life, in order
The life told as one accountfrom this site's record
Eusebius Hieronymus was born about 347 at Stridon, a town on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia that no longer exists. His parents were Christians with money. They sent him to Rome, where he studied grammar and rhetoric under the great teacher Donatus, collected pagan authors, and was baptized in his late teens. He traveled east, and about 375 went into the desert of Chalcis, southeast of Antioch, to live as a hermit. He lasted a few years. He hated the heat, quarreled with the monks over the Trinity, and — by his own account — hired a converted Jew to teach him Hebrew, largely to keep his mind off Rome. That decision changed the history of the Bible in the West. Ordained at Antioch, he went on to Constantinople, where he heard Gregory of Nazianzus, and then in 382 to Rome, where Pope Damasus made him a secretary and set him to revising the Latin Gospels against the Greek. In Rome he also became teacher to a circle of wealthy Christian women — Marcella, Paula, and Paula's daughter Eustochium — who studied Scripture and Hebrew with him. His scorn for the worldly Roman clergy was returned with interest, and after Damasus died in 384 he left the city for good. In 386 he settled at Bethlehem, where Paula founded monasteries for men and women and paid for his books. He stayed thirty-four years, working in a cave beside the traditional site of the Nativity. There he did the thing he is known for. Instead of correcting the old Latin against the Greek Septuagint, he translated the Old Testament out of the Hebrew — going to Jewish teachers for help, arguing that the Hebraica veritas, the Hebrew truth, was the standard. Augustine wrote to warn him that congregations would riot over changed familiar words, and in North Africa one did. Jerome kept going. He also wrote commentaries on most of the prophets, on Matthew and several letters of Paul, a catalogue of Christian writers, letters that were copied and read as literature, and translations of Origen and Eusebius. He was a savage controversialist. He broke publicly with his oldest friend Rufinus over Origen, attacked Jovinian, Vigilantius, and Pelagius in print, and lost few opportunities to wound. In 410 refugees from the sack of Rome arrived at his door and he wrote that the light of the world had gone out. Paula died in 404, Eustochium in 419. Jerome died at Bethlehem in 420. His translation, gathered later with other Latin books into what came to be called the Vulgate, was the Bible of Western Europe until the Reformation and remained the Roman Catholic standard far beyond it. Sources: Jerome, Letters and De viris illustribus; Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church; the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers series, second series volume 6; the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia.
2,794 quotations across 57 books
Where this voice is quoted
My tent is destroyed, and all its ropes are snapped. My sons have departed from me and are no more.
“(Verse 20.) My tent has been devastated, all my ropes have been torn (or all my skins have been ripped), my sons have left me (or my sheep), and there is no one left ((Alternatively: remaining)): there is no one to extend my tent any…”
Listen! The sound of a report is coming— a great commotion from the land to the north. The cities of Judah will be made a desolation, a haunt for jackals.
“(Verse 22) A voice of the cry, behold it comes, and a great commotion from the land of the North: to make the cities of Judah desolate, a habitation of dragons (or a den of ostriches).”
I know, O LORD, that a man’s way is not his own; no one who walks directs his own steps.
“(Verse 23) I know, Lord, that it is not in man to direct his own steps: nor is it in man, to walk and guide his own footsteps.”
Correct me, O LORD, but only with justice—not in Your anger, or You will bring me to nothing.
“(Verse 24, 25.) Rebuke me, O Lord, but with justice, not in your anger, lest you reduce me to nothing.”
“Listen to the words of this covenant and tell them to the men of Judah and the residents of Jerusalem.
“(Verse 2) Hear the words of this covenant (or testament), and speak to the men of Judah, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.”
which I commanded your forefathers when I brought them out of the land of Egypt, out of the iron furnace, saying, ‘Obey Me, and do everything I command you, and…
“(Ver. 4.) Cursed is the man who does not listen to the words of this covenant that I commanded your fathers on the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, out of the iron furnace, saying: Listen to my voice, and…”
And the LORD told me, “There is a conspiracy among the men of Judah and the residents of Jerusalem.
“(Vers. 9, 10) And the Lord said to me: A conspiracy has been found among the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem have turned back to the iniquities of their former fathers, who refused to listen to my words.”
Therefore this is what the LORD says: ‘I am about to bring upon them a disaster that they cannot escape.
“(Verse 11, 12.) Therefore, thus says the Lord: Behold, I am bringing upon them evil from which they cannot escape. They will cry out to me, but I will not listen to them.”
Your gods are indeed as numerous as your cities, O Judah; the altars of shame you have set up—the altars to burn incense to Baal—are as many as the streets…
“(Verse 13) For according to the number of your cities were your gods, O Judah, and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem you have set up altars of confusion to burn incense to Baal.”
As for you, do not pray for these people. Do not raise up a cry or a prayer on their behalf, for I will not be listening when they call…
“(Verse 14.) So you, do not pray for this people, and do not take on praise and prayer for them: for I will not listen to their cry to me, in the time of their affliction.”
And the LORD informed me, so I knew. Then You showed me their deeds.
“(Verse 18) But you, Lord, have shown me and I have known: you have revealed to me their desires.”
O LORD of Hosts, who judges righteously, who examines the heart and mind, let me see Your vengeance upon them, for to You I have committed my cause.
“(Verse 20) But you, Lord of hosts, who judge justly and test the heart and the mind, let me see your vengeance upon them, for I have revealed my cause to you.”
“If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses?
“(Verse 5) If you have struggled running with foot soldiers, how will you be able to compete with horses? If you have relied on the land of peace, what will you do in the pride or tumult of the Jordan?”
I have forsaken My house; I have abandoned My inheritance. I have given the love of My life into the hands of her enemies.
“(Vers. 7, 8.) I left my house, I abandoned my inheritance: I gave my beloved soul into the hands of its enemies. My inheritance became like a lion in the forest: it roared against me, therefore I hated it.”
Is not My inheritance to Me like a speckled bird of prey with other birds of prey circling against her?
“(Ver. 9.) Is my inheritance like a colorful bird to me? Is it like a bird dyed all over? Come, gather all the beasts of the earth; hurry to devour. LXX: Is the den of the hyena my inheritance?”
Many shepherds have destroyed My vineyard; they have trampled My plot of ground. They have turned My pleasant field into a desolate wasteland.
“(Verse 10) Many shepherds have destroyed (or disrupted) my vineyard, they have trampled (or polluted) my portion: they have given my desirable portion into a desert wasteland (or uninhabited). They have made (or it has been made) it into a desolation.”
They have made it a desolation; desolate before Me, it mourns. All the land is laid waste, but no man takes it to heart.
“(Vers. 11, 12.) And the earth mourned, desolate it is, because there is no one who thinks in their heart.”
They have sown wheat but harvested thorns. They have exhausted themselves to no avail. Bear the shame of your harvest because of the fierce anger of the LORD.”
“(Verse 13) They sowed wheat and harvested thorns: they received an inheritance, but it will not benefit them. LXX: You have sown wheat and harvested thorns: their clergy will not benefit them.”
This is what the LORD said to me: “Go and buy yourself a linen loincloth and put it around your waist, but do not let it touch water.”
“We are the robe of Christ. When we have clothed him with our confession of faith, we, in turn, have put on Christ. It is the apostle who says that Christ is our robe, for when we are baptized, we put on Christ.”
For just as a loincloth clings to a man’s waist, so I have made the whole house of Israel and the whole house of Judah cling to Me, declares the…
“The reversed order, however, furnishes a clue for our exegesis. "The Lord is king, in splendor robed." The Lord is king, and he is robed in the splendor of patriarchs and prophets and a people that believes. He is robed in splendor.”
Give glory to the LORD your God before He brings darkness, before your feet stumble on the dusky mountains.
“(Verse 16, 17.) Give glory to the Lord your God ((or our)) before it grows dark, and before your feet stumble upon dark (or gloomy) mountains.”
This is the word of the LORD that came to Jeremiah concerning the drought:
“(Chapter XIV—Verse 1) The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah concerning the words of drought. The anger of God is evident in everything.”
Why are You like a man taken by surprise, like a warrior powerless to save? Yet You are among us, O LORD, and we are called by Your name.
“(Verse 9) Why are you going to be like a tenant on the land, and like a traveler turning to stay? Why are you going to be like a wanderer, or like a strong man who cannot save?”
Then the LORD said to me, “Do not pray for the well-being of this people.
“(Verse 11, 12.) And the Lord said to me: Do not pray for this people for their good. When they fast, I will not listen to their prayers, and if they offer burnt offerings and sacrifices, I will not accept them; for I will consume…”
We acknowledge our wickedness, O LORD, the guilt of our fathers; indeed, we have sinned against You.
“(Verse 20.) We have known, Lord, our impieties and the iniquity of our fathers, for we have sinned against you.”