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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.
Jerome. Painted by Caravaggio. The file is marked public domain. This site's record does not give the artist's death year, which is what settles the painting's own rights. The file record

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.

Hebrew Questions on Genesis, 420

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.

Homily 12, on Psalm 78, 420

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.

Homily 28, on Psalm 101, 420

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.

Homily 34, on Psalm 107, 420

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…

Homily 57, on Psalm 147, 420

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

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

Psalms 78:8Homily 11, on Psalm 77 (420)

Then they will not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, whose heart was not loyal, whose spirit was not faithful to God.

"That they might not become like their fathers." That they might not murmur, as certain ones murmured in the desert and perished; that they might not murmur thus like the Jews, and perish in the desert. "A generation crooked and provoking."

Psalms 78:13Homily 11, on Psalm 77 (420)

He split the sea and brought them through; He set the waters upright like a wall.

"He split the sea and led them through." The Lord walked upon the sea, and calmed the waves of the sea, and led us through. "He split the sea and led them through."

Psalms 78:65St. Jerome, Commentary on Daniel, CHAPTER NINE (420)

Then the Lord awoke as from sleep, like a mighty warrior overcome by wine.

[Daniel 9:14] "'And the Lord hath kept watch over the evil and hath brought it upon us...'" Whenever we are rebuked because of our sins, God is keeping watch over us and visiting us with chastenment.

Psalms 79:8Homily 12, on Psalm 78 (420)

Do not hold past sins against us; let Your compassion come quickly, for we are brought low.

Since we have become poor. Since you became poor for our sake, therefore we too have become poor. "The prayer of the poor man, when he is in anguish, and pours out his prayer before the Lord."

Psalms 79:9Homily 12, on Psalm 78 (420)

Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of Your name; deliver us and atone for our sins, for the sake of Your name.

Help us, O God our Savior. In the Hebrew it has "Help us, O God our Jesus." For wherever there is "Savior," there the Hebrew has "Jesus."

Psalms 79:12Homily 12, on Psalm 78 (420)

Pay back into the laps of our neighbors sevenfold the reproach they hurled at You, O Lord.

Render to our neighbors sevenfold into their bosom. It seems to me that he does not ask against them, but for them: that is, give them your sabbath. Now "sabbath" is interpreted as rest. What he says is this: make them rest in their wickedness.

Psalms 79:13Homily 12, on Psalm 78 (420)

Then we Your people, the sheep of Your pasture, will thank You forever; from generation to generation we will declare Your praise.

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.

Psalms 81:1Homily 13, on Psalm 80 (420)

Sing for joy to God our strength; make a joyful noise to the God of Jacob.

To the end, for the winepresses, of Asaph. In the Law it is written that there are three solemn feasts: Passover, Pentecost, and the Feast of Tabernacles. Before the Feast of Tabernacles, ten days before, there was a fast, and the fast lasted until evening.

Psalms 81:4Homily 13, on Psalm 80 (420)

For this is a statute for Israel, an ordinance of the God of Jacob.

For it is a commandment for Israel, and a judgment of the God of Jacob. What is the commandment of God? To sing to God in victory: not to think it one's own, but the Lord's.

Psalms 81:5Homily 13, on Psalm 80 (420)

He ordained it as a testimony for Joseph when he went out over the land of Egypt, where I heard an unfamiliar language:

When he came out of the land of Egypt, he heard a tongue which he did not know. We too, when we came out of Egypt, heard a tongue which we did not know. Which of us knew the Gospel? which the Apostle?

Psalms 81:7Homily 13, on Psalm 80 (420)

You called out in distress, and I rescued you; I answered you from the cloud of thunder; I tested you at the waters of Meribah. Selah

In tribulation you called upon me, and I delivered you. The prophets and the psalms are for this reason obscure, because suddenly, when you are not expecting it, the speaker is changed.

Psalms 81:8Homily 13, on Psalm 80 (420)

Hear, O My people, and I will warn you: O Israel, if only you would listen to Me!

Hear, my people, and I will testify to you. God is speaking to us. Whatever he said to the people, he speaks also to us. Israel, if you will hear me. Why do you ask that I hear you? Let us see what he commands.

Psalms 81:9Homily 13, on Psalm 80 (420)

There must be no strange god among you, nor shall you bow to a foreign god.

There shall be no new god in you. He whose god is his belly, a new god is his. As many vices as we have, as many sins, so many new gods do we have. I have been angered: anger is a god to me.

Psalms 81:12Homily 13, on Psalm 80 (420)

So I gave them up to their stubborn hearts to follow their own devices.

And I let them go according to the desires of their heart: they shall go on in their own devices. Unhappy is he who is not corrected by God. If anyone sinning is not struck, he is wretched.

Psalms 81:16Homily 13, on Psalm 80 (420)

But I would feed you the finest wheat; with honey from the rock I would satisfy you.”

And he fed them from the fat of the wheat. He led them into the land of promise: he fed them not with manna, as in the desert, but with the wheat that fell, that rose again.

Psalms 82:6Homily 14, on Psalm 81 (420)

I have said, ‘You are gods; you are all sons of the Most High.’

I said: you are gods, and all of you sons of the Most High. Let Eunomius hear, let Arius hear, who say that the Son of God is a son in the same way as we are.

Psalms 82:7Homily 14, on Psalm 81 (420)

But like mortals you will die, and like rulers you will fall.”

But you shall die like men. You see, then, that he who is a man dies. For God does not die. And Adam, as long as he kept the commandment and was a god, did not die.

Psalms 82:8Homily 14, on Psalm 81 (420)

Arise, O God, judge the earth, for all the nations are Your inheritance.

Up to this point God has spoken to men, and again the prophet speaks. Arise, O God, judge the earth. Arise, because our boat is battered by the waves.

Psalms 83:2Homily 62, on Psalm 82 (Alternate Series) (420)

See how Your enemies rage, how Your foes have reared their heads.

For behold, your enemies have made a din. The heretics speak out, and the men of the Church keep silent; they make a noise, and we are quiet; they blaspheme, and we do not bark back. For behold, your enemies have made a din.

Psalms 83:4Homily 62, on Psalm 82 (Alternate Series) (420)

saying, “Come, let us erase them as a nation; may the name of Israel be remembered no more.”

They have said, Come, let us destroy them out of the nation. I see a strange thing. So great is the multitude of the heretics, and such the diversity of their teachings, that their opinions differ among themselves, and yet they agree in this alone…

Psalms 83:6Homily 62, on Psalm 82 (Alternate Series) (420)

the tents of Edom and the Ishmaelites, of Moab and the Hagrites,

The tents of the Edomites and the Ishmaelites. Since once we have begun, leaving behind the lowliness of the literal history, to raise our understanding to a higher manner of the spiritual meaning's exposition...

Psalms 83:7Homily 62, on Psalm 82 (Alternate Series) (420)

of Gebal, Ammon, and Amalek, of Philistia with the people of Tyre.

Gebal, which is interpreted "empty valley." They are not of the mountains, but of the valley: for they have no taste for the things above, but for the things below; they are not of heaven, but wholly of the earth.

Psalms 83:8Homily 62, on Psalm 82 (Alternate Series) (420)

Even Assyria has joined them, lending strength to the sons of Lot. Selah

For Assur also came with them. They went before, and he follows. Let us see who this is that follows.

Psalms 83:9–10Homily 15, on Psalm 82 (420)

Do to them as You did to Midian, as to Sisera and Jabin at the River Kishon, who perished at Endor and became like dung on the ground.

Since, therefore, they came against your people, let us see what the psalmist imprecates upon them. Do to them as to Midian and Sisera. You have read the book of Judges: this is that Midian whom Gideon assailed. And Sisera, and Jabin.

Psalms 83:12Homily 15, on Psalm 82 (420)

who said, “Let us possess for ourselves the pastures of God.”

Who said: Let us possess the sanctuary of God by inheritance. They said it, but they did not accomplish it: for the Lord was fighting for his people.