St. Jerome: Commentary on Ecclesiastes
Overview
This first English translation of St. Jerome’s Commentary on Ecclesiastes includes a discussion by the translators that elucidates the difficulties of Jerome’s text, but also presents an original view of Jerome’s hermeneutical approach to the theological issues raised by this challenging book of the Bible.
Top Highlights
“As long as we are in this present world it is a time for war;* once we leave the world, the time of peace will come,” (Page 59)
“The sense, then, is: I have given my heart to this, too, and I wanted to know whom God loved and whom he hated. What I found was that, though the works of the just are in God’s hands, they nevertheless cannot yet know whether or not they are loved by God; they waver in uncertainty as to whether it is for testing that they undergo what they undergo, or for punishment. Their knowledge, then, will be in the future, and everything is ‘in the face of them’;* that is, knowledge about this is ahead of them, after they leave this life. Then is the judgment; now, it is the struggle. For the present it is an unsettled question whether anyone undergoing adversity is doing so through God’s love, like Job, or through his hate, like so many sinners.” (Page 100)
“For if one falls, Christ will lift27 his partner. But woe indeed to him who, when he falls,28 does not have Christ in himself lifting him up. Also, if one man falls asleep, that is, if he is broken up in death, and he has Christ with him, he will soon be restored to life, warmed and living. And if the devil, stronger in overcoming resistance, stands against a man, the man will stand and Christ too will stand up for his man, for his companion; not because the power of Christ alone is weak against the devil, but because man’s will is left free,* and when we add our own efforts to his, Christ’s war is waged with greater strength.” (Page 69)
“Whenever you see anyone loud-mouthed in the church, stirring applause, raising a laugh, and working his hearers up into a happy mood by means of a kind of meretricious charm of language, take it that that is a sign of senselessness on the speaker’s part, as well as on that of the audience.* The words of the wise, that is, are heard in quietness, in a restrained silence. A senseless person, however influential, with an uproar about him (whether that of his own voice, or from the acclaim of the public), is talking among the senseless.” (Page 109)
- Title: St. Jerome: Commentary on Ecclesiastes
- Authors: Jerome, Richard J. Goodrich, David J. D. Miller
- Series: Ancient Christian Writers
- Volume: 66
- Publisher: Newman Press
- Print Publication Date: 2012
- Logos Release Date: 2015
- Era: era:nicene
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
- Subjects: Bible. O.T. Ecclesiastes › Commentaries--Early works to 1800; Jerome, Saint, d. 419 or 20. Commentarius in Ecclesiasten
- ISBNs: 9780809106011, 9781616430900, 0809106019, 1616430907
- Resource ID: LLS:STJRMCMMCCLSSTS
- Resource Type: Bible Commentary
- Metadata Last Updated: 2024-03-25T20:57:54Z