Commentary Series
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Commentary Series
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About the Commentary Series . . . . |
The Commentary Series is designed for classroom use. Its goal is to make available to teachers and students useful examples of the vast tradition of medieval commentary on sacred scripture. The series includes English translations of works written in a number of medieval languages and from various centuries and religious traditions. The series focuses on treatises which have relevance to many fields of Medieval Studies, including theories of allegory and literature, history of art, music and spirituality, and political thought. The translations strive for clear, straightforward English prose style. Notes are meant to provide sources and to gloss difficult passages rather than to give exhaustive scholarly commentary on the treatise. The editions include short introductions which set the context and suggest the importance of each work.
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THE GLOSSA ORDINARIA ON THE SONG OF SONGS |
In this translation of glosses on the Song of Songs, Mary Dove offers a readily accessible and inexpensive resource for students and scholars. Anselm of Laon, possibly assisted by his brother Ralph, is credited with compiling the Glossa Ordinaria on the Song of Songs, drawing from earlier commentaries by Origen, Gregory the Great, Bede, Alcuin, Hrabanus Maurus, Haimo of Auxerre, and Robert of Tombelaine as well as contributing his own readings of the text. As Dove notes in her introduction, the text is quite complicated, with each manuscript page divided into three columns—the biblical text in large letters in the center column, with space left for interlinear glosses, and glosses in smaller letters in both the right– and left–hand columns. (This format is not reproduced in this translation.) The number of surviving manuscripts (over seventy) shows that plenty of readers enjoyed the challenges the text offered, and for modern readers, the Glossa Ordinaria is the first place to go to find medieval interpretation of biblical texts.
Copyright 2004, pp. xxxii + 186
ISBN 1-58044-084-3 (paperbound only) $13.00
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ON THE TRUTH OF HOLY SCRIPTURE
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"Wyclif sought the restoration of an idealized past even if that meant taking revolutionary steps in the present to recover what had been lost. His 1377-78 On the Truth of Holy Scripture represents such an effort in reform: the recognition of the inherent perfection and veracity of the Sacred Page which serves as the model for daily conduct, discourse, and worship, thereby forming the foundation upon which Christendom itself is to be ordered."—from the Introduction
Copyright 2001, pp. x + 368
ISBN 1-58044-031-2 (paperbound only) $13.00
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SECOND THESSALONIANS:
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"Second Thessalonians has held the attention of the Christian Church and biblical scholars for almost two thousand years. It has been of interest almost exclusively because of its enigmatic description of the signs indicating that the end of the world is at hand. . . Apocalyptic speculation, in one form or another, is as persistent at the turn of this millenium as it was at the last. The commentaries of Haimo of Auxerre and Thietland of Einsiedeln offer glimpses of two links in [the] unbroken chain of the apocalyptic tradition."—from the Introduction
Copyright 2001, pp. vi + 86
ISBN 1-58044-018-5 (paperbound only) $8.00
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COMMENTARY ON THE SONG OF SONGS AND
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"The traditions of mystical theosophy elucidated and taught by Jews in Provence, Catalonia, and Castile in the twelfth-thirteenth centuries have come to be identified as the intellectual Kabbalah. The present volume contains one of the most important and earliest texts composed in this tradition, along with two briefer late thirteenth-century examples of its use" (p. 1). "The commentary of Rabbi Ezra ben Solomon of Gerona (d. ca. 1245) on the Song of Songs is one of the most important texts of the first clearly identified circle of Kabbalists, those operating in the Catalonian town of Gerona at the middle of the thirteenth century."—from the Editor's Note
Copyright 1999, pp. x + 233
ISBN 1-58044-000-2 (paperbound only) $10.00
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NICHOLAS OF LYRA'S APOCALYPSE COMMENTARY
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"Surveys of the history of biblical exegesis and, in particular, the history of Apocalypse commentaries rarely fail to allude to Nicholas of Lyra O.F.M. (1270-1349) as the greatest biblical exegete of the fourteenth century. Late medieval and Reformation verses were written about him. Nicholas was born in the town of Lyre, near Évreux in Normandy. Since Évreux was a center of Jewish studies, he was able to cultivate his interest in Hebrew and to become thoroughly acquainted with the Talmud, Midrash, and the works of Rashi (Solomon ben Isaac, 1045-1105). Lyra's attraction to Rashi's literal method would have a profound influence on his exegetical style."—from the Introduction
Copyright 1997, pp. xii + 238
ISBN 1-879288-78-8 (paperbound only) $10.00
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MEDIEVAL EXEGESIS IN TRANSLATION:
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"This book brings together and translates from the medieval Latin a series of commentaries on the biblical book of Ruth, with the intention of introducing readers to medieval exegesis or biblical interpretation. . . .
"Ruth is the shortest book of the Old Testament, being only four chapters long. It is partly for this reason that it lends itself so well to a short book introducing medieval exegesis; but it is also of interest in itself. Ruth poses a number of exegetical problems, including the basic one of why such an odd book, in which God never appears as an actor, and with a central character who was not an Israelite but a Moabite outsider, and a woman at that, should find a place in the canon of Scripture."—from the Introduction
Commentaries by Jerome, Isidore of Seville, Peter Comestor, Hugh of St. Cher, and Nicholas of Lyra, with The Ordinary Gloss and Additions to The Ordinary Gloss.
Copyright 1996, pp. xxii + 67
ISBN 1-879288-68-0 (paperbound only) $8.00
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COMMENTARY ON THE BOOK OF JONAH
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Haimo of Auxerre's Commentary on the Book of Jonah was probably written as a study text for scholars in the monastery. His basic method is to present a verse from the Book of Jonah, then offer condensed versions of the diverse and occasionally contradictory interpretations of that verse that were available to him. For example, he displays familiarity with the commentaries written earlier by Jerome and Origen. He provides allegorical, literal, moral, and ecclesiastical interpretations. He moves freely between the language of his commentary and the language of the Bible, and he demonstrates the interrelatedness of his own text and biblical teachings. Sometimes he recalls interpretations from earlier in his own commentary. This rich interrelatedness makes Haimo's commentary both challenging and satisfying. In his work we can see the medieval mind at work, trying to interpret not only the biblical text but also his own world.
Copyright 1993, pp. vi + 45
ISBN 1-879288-36-2 (paperbound only) $6.00
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Space provided by Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI. |
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