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
Asa was the father of Jehoshaphat, Jehoshaphat the father of Joram, and Joram the father of Uzziah.
“In the fourth book of Kings we read, that Ochozias was the son of Joram. On his death, Josabeth, sister of Ochozias and daughter of Joram, took Joash, her brother's son, and preserved him from the slaughter of the royal seed by Athalias.”
and Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ.
“(Ver. 16) But Jacob begot Joseph. Here Julianus Augustus has presented to us the disagreement of the Evangelists, why the evangelist Matthew called Joseph the son of Jacob, and Luke called him the son of Heli; not understanding the custom of the Scriptures, that one…”
Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and was unwilling to disgrace her publicly, he resolved to divorce her quietly.
“But how is Joseph thus called just, when he is ready to hide his wife's sin? For the Law enacts, that not only the doers of evil, but they who are privy to any evil done, shall be held to be guilty.”
She will give birth to a Son, and you are to give Him the name Jesus, because He will save His people from their sins.”
“Jesus is a Hebrew word, meaning Saviour. He points to the etymology of the name, saying, For He shall save His people from their sins.”
But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a Son. And he gave Him the name Jesus.
“(Cont. Helvid. c. 5.) Helvidius is at much superfluous trouble to make this word know refer to carnal knowledge rather than to acquaintance, as though any had ever denied that; or as if the follies to which he replies had ever occurred to any person…”
But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a Son. And he gave Him the name Jesus.
“(Verse 25.) And he took his wife, and did not know her until she had brought forth her firstborn son: and he called his name Jesus.”
After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, asking, “Where is the One who has been born…
“We think the Evangelist first wrote, as we read in the Hebrew, 'Judah,' not 'Judæa.' For in what other country is there a Bethlehem, that this needs to be distinguished as in 'Judæa?' But 'Judah' is written, because there is another Bethlehem in Galilee.”
asking, “Where is the One who has been born King of the Jews? We saw His star in the east and have come to worship Him.”
“(Chapter 2, Verses 2 and following) For we have seen his star in the East, and have come to worship him. When King Herod heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.”
‘But you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah, for out of you will come a ruler who will be the…
“(in Mich. v. 2.) The following is the sense of the prophecy. Thou, Bethlehem, of the land of Judah, or Ephrata, (which is added to distinguish it from another Bethlehem in Galilee,) though thou art a small village among the thousand cities of Judah, yet…”
On coming to the house, they saw the Child with His mother Mary, and they fell down and worshiped Him.
“(Verse 11.) And opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold, frankincense, and myrrh. The presbyter Juvencus beautifully captures the significance of the gifts in one verse. Thus, they bring gifts of gold, myrrh, and incense to the king, the people, and the God.”
where he stayed until the death of Herod. This fulfilled what the Lord had spoken through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called My Son.”
“(Epist. 57.7.) This is not in the LXX; but in Osee according to the genuine Hebrew text we read; Israel is my child, and I have loved him, and, from Egypt have I called my Son; where the LXX render, Israel is my child, and…”
Then what was spoken through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled: “A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and refusing to be comforted…
“(In Hierem. 31:15.) This passage of Jeremiah has been quoted by Matthew neither according to the Hebrew nor the LXX version.”
After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt. “Get up!” he said.
“Many here err from ignorance of history, supposing the Herod who mocked our Lord on the day of His passion, and the Herod whose death is here related, were the same.”
and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophets: “He will be called a Nazarene.”
“Had he meant to quote a particular text, he would not have written 'Prophets,' but 'the Prophet.' By thus using the plural he evidently does not take the words of any one passage in Scripture, but the sense of the whole.”
and saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near.”
“John Baptist is the first to preach the Kingdom of Heaven, that the forerunner of the Lord may have this honourable privilege.”
This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah: “A voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for Him.’”
“(Verse 3.) For this is he who is spoken of by the prophet Isaiah, saying: 'The voice of one crying out in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths.'”
John wore a garment of camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey.
“(Verse 4.) Now John himself had a garment made of camel's hair and a leather belt around his waist. He said, 'It is made of hair, not wool.' The type of clothing indicates austerity, not luxury.”
And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham.
“He intimates God's great power, who, as he made all things out of nothing, can make men out of the hardest stone. These stones signify the Gentiles because of their hardness of heart.”
I baptize you with water for repentance, but after me will come One more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry.
“In the other Gospels it is, whose shoe latchet I am not worthy to loose. Here his humility, there his ministry is intended; Christ is the Bridegroom, and John is not worthy to loose the Bridegroom's shoe, that his house be not called according to…”
At that time Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to be baptized by John.
“(Verse 13, 14.) Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John to be baptized by him. But John tried to prevent him, saying: I need to be baptized by you, and you come to me?”
“Let it be so now,” Jesus replied. “It is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness in this way.” Then John permitted Him.
“(Verse 15.) Without measure. He spoke beautifully, without measure, to show Christ in water, John to be baptized by Christ in spirit. Or differently, without measure: so that I, who assumed the form of a servant, may fulfill his humility.”
As soon as Jesus was baptized, He went up out of the water. Suddenly the heavens were opened, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and…
“Not by an actual cleaving of the visible element, but to the spiritual eye, as Ezekiel also in the beginning of his book relates that he saw them.”
Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
“(Chapter 4 - Verse 1) Then Jesus was led into the desert by the spirit. There is no doubt that it was the Holy Spirit. It follows: In order to be tempted by the devil.”
But Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”
“(Verse 4.) He answered and said: It is written: Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God. The testimony is taken from Deuteronomy (Deut. VIII, 3).”
Then the devil took Him to the holy city and set Him on the pinnacle of the temple.
“(Verse 5.) Then the devil took him to the holy city. This assumption, which is called, does not come from the weakness of the Lord, but from the pride of the enemy, who thinks that the will of the Savior is a necessity.”